Page 151 of Scent to the Feral Cowboys
“Your family was okay with you starving yourself?” This from Cooper. He was standing closer now, the whisk in his hand dripping something red onto the floor.
“I wasn’t starving myself,” she disagreed, shaking her head. “But… I do think the whole eating thing was the one part of ballet that bothered my grandparents. The thinner I got in California, the more they tried to feed me when I visited home. There was this one time our entire dining table was covered in food. Everything I loved as a kid. They didn’t miss anything, not even the silly sunflower butter sandwiches cut into hearts.”
Nelly’s Omega scent fanned out into the room, shifting into a pleasant garden in full bloom. She felt safe. Happy. Thinking about her grandparents was the opposite of thinking about ballet.
I realized as she began roaming away from the fence, heading towards the greenhouses, that I wanted to make her life happy. I wanted to cut sunflower butter sandwiches into hearts and make her Omega scent smell like a million gardenia blossoms.
She disappeared out of view, and I pushed away from the building immediately, not hesitating for a second. Not being able to see her made me anxious. My inner Alpha urged me forward, legs pumping.
My body moved faster, until I was practically running towards the hothouses. It felt like Nelly was vanishing, igniting something primal inside me. Even with my pack brothers now, even with Wade when we were kids, I’d never felt such an unstoppable urge to protect someone.
I darted between the buildings made of pale green glass, eyes scanning the area ahead. My heart beat slowed fractionally when I saw her ahead, a hundred yards or so away.
She was heading toward the old homestead. Most of it had been reclaimed by the land, leaving just an old barn that we kept standing more out of respect than necessity. It wasn’t dangerous, we stored antiquated farm equipment inside, but I still didn’t like the idea of her going there on her own.
I slowed my pace, not wanting to invade her solitude. I knew how I felt on my early mornings in the stables, just me and the horses and my own fucked-up thoughts.
Nelly moved with purpose, my boots and socks carrying her over the uneven ground. Even dressed in the borrowed shit from an attic box, she moved with dancer’s grace. My breath caught as she paused, tilting her face toward the morning sun, letting it bathe her freckled skin in golden light. Her hair captured the rays, blinking with twenty-four karat gold.
I stood still now, hoping she wouldn’t sense me behind her. Was I far enough away? I was standing downwind, and a gust brought her to me. She was a floral aphrodisiac that filled my lungs and made my chest expand. It bordered on physical agony. Funny how the flower notes had shifted. No longer so cultured, no longer a dozen thornless roses perfectly prepped in a vase. Her glands released a wildness now, Bee Balm and Bergamot. And, beneath that, was Sagebrush, like the very land was claiming her so she’d have to stay.
She was moving again.
Mounting a small hill and then traveling down the other side. I started walking, cresting the rise in mere seconds, and finding her standing at the edge of the old stone foundation. The small two room cabin predated even Gramps and Gran. This land had been in the Nelson family for more than a hundred years.
Nelly put her hands on her hips, head slowly rotating, looking for something more interesting than the bones of a home that died long ago. Her gaze landed on the only other thing of interest—the barn. She started towards it, and I hung back now, watching her figure cut through the overgrown grass.
She approached the building with cautious curiosity, running her hand along the weathered wood as she moved nearer to the entrance. The windows were half broken, the outer walls riddled with holes. It was an eyesore, but one we refused to tear down until we had to. This barn was our history. The double doors each hung from bent, rusted hinges. Nelly gripped the patinaed handles and pulled outward. A groan of protest rocketed through the air, making her pause. She looked up the length of the barn, maybe wondering if the whole damn thing was going to crash down any second. But then she finished opening the doors, letting them fall against the outer walls with a thud. She hesitated on the threshold, peering into the dimness beyond. Then, with a determined set to her shoulders, she stepped inside.
My heart kicked against my ribs, Alpha instincts once again reacting as I lost sight of her.
It was irrational. There was nothing that would hurt her in the barn, just Grandpa's rusted-out tractor that hadn't run in thirty years. The old Dodge power wagon he'd refused to sell even when it no longer started. Broken hay balers, harrow discs with teeth sharp enough to puncture skin, tools scattered where they'd been dropped decades ago. As the list grew, so did my worry. Shit, I’d never really thought about how dangerous the barn truly was for someone who wasn’t used to ranch life. The place was a tetanus shot waiting to happen.
I crossed the distance to the barn in quick strides, slowing before I reached the open doors. Though I was anxious, I still didn’t want to ruin Nelly’s privacy. And I loved how she wasexploring Sagebrush on her own. Targeting a gap in the actual wall where a piece of wood had busted inward, I watched Nelly moving through the cluttered space. Her footsteps, though slow and careful, stirred up so much dust that she had to cover her mouth, though she coughed regardless.
She checked out the Dodge parked on bum tires near the far wall, opening the driver’s side door and patting the seat, which sent a fresh cloud of dust into the air, making her sneeze loudly. I almost shouted, ‘bless you!’ but I stopped myself in time. She left the truck’s door open and moved to the once green, now brown tractor. Its engine was a lost cause, but Gramps had taken me and Wade on it so many times as kids. We’d sit in front of him on the seat, cutting back the grass all over the ranch. I smiled as Nelly hopped up onto the split leather cushion, turning the tractor’s spoked steering wheel and leaning over to see how the tires shifted to and for.
She moved deeper into the barn, and I lost sight of her behind the tractor. I stepped closer to the door, alarm prickling along my spine. The floor on that side was uneven, with boards that had rotted through in places. It was solid ground under the wood though, and she wasn’t some helpless damsel. I clenched my jaw, forcing myself to stay put.
This woman had survived whatever Eros had done to her. Survived a brush with a mountain lion. Survived the loss of her career and the life she'd built afterwards. She was surviving even us. She could handle an old barn.
Still, my fingers itched to reach for her, to guide her away from potential dangers, to keep her safe within the circle of my arms. The Alpha in me growled at being restrained, at being forced to watch rather than act. But the man in me, who'd seen the fury laced with fear in her eyes when she’d first arrived and watched her walls slowly begin to lower these past days, knewbetter than to intervene. For wild creatures, independence was as essential as oxygen. And my Omega was as wild as the wind.
So, I stood in the shadow of the doorway, my heart in my throat, as Nelly Shaw made the old barn her own. I tried to move around on the outside, searching for wounds in the wall I could see her through, but I only managed brief glimpses.
For an eternity, I endured barely seeing her.
Finally, when I was close to breaking, she put me out of my misery.
Nelly stepped into the center of the barn where sunlight streamed through roof damage. Dust motes swirled around her as she raised her arms, forming a perfect circle above her head. The movement was so deliberate, so precise, so fucking mesmerizing. She arched her back, one arm extended behind her, then she straightened again, recreating the circle above her head. Nelly dropped her arms. She frowned downward, then began testing the floor with quick, firm pushes of her booted feet. After a few moments, seemingly satisfied, she stepped out of the boots. She rose on tiptoes, arms lifting in an angelic beat of wings. She extended her right leg forward, knee slightly bent outward, foot turned so sharply I couldn’t believe it was humanly possible. Her other leg moved back, mirroring the right.
I blinked, and she was turning, executing a controlled spin that transformed the barn. It was still dilapidated, a structure past its heyday, but now its decaying nature held sad beauty.
My throat went dry as I watched her. Her eyes were half-closed, her face serene in a way I'd never seen it before. For that brief moment, she wasn't the wary, defensive woman who'd been thrust into our lives against her will. This was Nelly Shaw, the principal ballerina. This was the woman she lost.
Her body stilled, her chest rising and falling with steady breaths. Then she placed her hands on her hips—the very sameway she’d stood at the ancient foundation—and began surveying the cluttered space with a critical eye. The corner of her mouth lifted in a half-smile that sent an unexpected jolt through my chest. She nodded once, decisively, as if confirming something to herself.
What happened next left me slack-jawed with astonishment. Nelly, five foot nothing and barely a buck twenty, shoved back into her boots and began clearing the center of the barn. She started with smaller items, old feed buckets and broken tools, carrying them to the perimeter of the space. But then she moved to heavier objects. A rusted plow disc, fragments of old stall dividers, even a small anvil that had to weigh at least forty pounds. She didn't try to lift what was clearly too heavy. Instead, she'd crouch down, get leverage with her legs, and push or drag the larger items. She worked with the focused determination of someone who knew exactly what they wanted and how to get it. Every now and then, she checked on her progress. She extended her leg behind her or performed a shallow leap across the clearing she’d made.
