Page 156 of Scent to the Feral Cowboys
NELLY
Five days later…
No response from Eros.
The stew was settling in my belly, making me feel all warm and cozy. I crossed and then immediately uncrossed my legs, trying to get comfortable in the wooden dining chair. My body hurt like hell, but it was a good kind of hurt.
Before heading to the barn after breakfast, I’d checked on Dolly with Wade and then carefully groomed Ghost. Once again, Boone had done his best to coax me into the saddle, but I’d refused. I was totally content feeding her apples and brushing her. Honestly, I wasn’t sure I’d ever ride her. If I thought hard enough, I could still feel the ache in my ass from those past attempts horse riding. Me and Ghost could just be Sagebrush besties, my feet firmly on the ground.
Then, I’d spent hours and hours and hours dancing. I’d moved my body until I had to drop on the still-dusty old barn floor and focus on breathing.
But it wasn’t just my physical body in pain; my heart was suffering too. Right after finishing one of Cooper’s glorious gooseberries scones this morning, Levi had handed me a cell phone.
“We thought you might want to call your grandmother,” he said slowly, his hand still outstretched, fingers still half-curled as if around the phone. “I’m sorry we didn’t offer sooner. We should have, as soon as we knew about her.”
“Call my grandmother?” I’d asked, stupidly.
Yes, she’d crossed my mind a hundred times since touching down in Wyoming, but I’d never asked to contact Serenity House. Grandpa was gone. And I didn’t know if, when I called, I’d get ‘my’ Grandmother, or the Grandmother who didn’t recognize me anymore. I hadn’t even meant to mention her to the men. It had slipped out against my will when I’d asked Cooper if I could wash the quilt in his room.
“I mean,” Levi paused, lifting the hand that once held the cell up to the back of his neck and rubbing, “you don’t have to of course, but we just wanted to make sure you had the option.”
“Right…” My voice trailed off, fading into nothing. In my head, I added, ‘the option’.
Would it help to call, or just remind me more keenly that I had no one left in the world to come to my rescue?
In the end, I’d decided to keep the cell phone like a security blanket. I’d use it when the monsters in the dark got too loud, too close, too great and terrible. Maybe the phone was why I’d danced so much, and so intensely. Maybe I’d been trying to shake off the feelings.
“Want anything else, Nell?” Cooper brought over a basket of buttermilk biscuits. “I’ve still got some pie from lunch too.”
I shook my head. “Thanks, but this is plenty.”
I’d missed actual lunch time, too busy dancing to be bothered with food, so I was eating warmed leftovers now. It was exactlythe wrong time of day to devour so much—three o’clock, only a couple hours before dinner time—but I was voraciously hungry. It was just me, Cooper, and Levi in the kitchen, along with the two ranch dogs. Cooper kept fussing at them, telling them they were laying down on the job, but Tripp and Tracker paid him zero attention. They stayed curled in the corner, happily snoozing. I wasn’t sure where the twins and Boone were. Not inside the house though.
Levi sat across from me, not eating, just keeping me company. His head was down as he slowly flipped pages in a book. He was an avid reader, something I’d discovered last night when perusing the living room bookcases.
“Do you read much?” He’d asked, finding me reading the back cover of a mystery.
“When I can. I always kept a book at work for my breaks.” I closed the thick hardback and slid it back onto its shelf between a fantasy and a book on livestock.
“What do you like?” Levi moved closer to me, lifting one hand to trail across spines.
With him so close, my inner Omega woke up. I subconsciously tilted my body, bringing me a fraction closer to him. Today, he smelled more of paper and ink. Hints of coffee laced those notes, and further beneath was a base of fresh turned soil. In response, my perfume shifted and honed, melding and complimenting his, but never losing itself completely to his stronger Alpha chemistry.
“Nelly?” He said my name as a question, and I realized I’d never answered him.
He just smelled so amazing.
I just wanted to touch him.
“Everything,” I breathed out. “I like everything.”
I didn’t say, ‘I like to read’. I just said, ‘everything’. And that’s because what I truly meant was that I liked everything about Levi.
We reached for the same book at the same time, fingers grazing. Heat pulsed between us. Blush crept into my cheeks. Levi’s lavender eyes darkened. I had to walk away quickly to keep from pressing my body against his, mixing our scents irreversibly, and starting something that I shouldn’t.
About ten minutes later, I was scraping the last bits of stew from my bowl, deciding if I wanted to go back to the barn or maybe take a hot bath. Before I could decide, the back door flew open, banging against the wall with enough force to rattle the windows. Wade stood in the doorway, his tall frame blocking the bright, golden afternoon light. Sweat glistened on his forehead, and his chest heaved from exertion. My gaze widened at his manic energy; it was so unlike the calm, nurturing Alpha I’d seen these past five days.
"It's Dolly," he said, voice breathless as he stepped into the kitchen. "She's in labor, but there's a problem."
