“Because you said it yourself, Jack!” Hawk shifted onto his knees, his voice openly pleading. “You said, ‘if you’re attracted to someone and you care about them, what’s the problem?’ So, like?—”
“Halt.” I managed to bark. “Halt this now.”
The edge of Hawk’s mouth turned up. “Halt? What are you, a castle guard now?”
My head spun, and as it often did, my gaze focused on the little hoop nose piercing Hawk had gotten a couple of months before. It was oddly delicate, like Hawk himself.
“I mean, please stop doing that mile-a-minute talking thing you do when you’re nervous. I just need to think—er, torecover. From the fall. And the pinecones. And the… Pilkners. And… Wait. Are you okay? No, you’re clearly not okay. Here, take my hand.”
I yanked him up so quickly he nearly tumbled into me and sent us sprawling again. Thankfully, he wasn’t heavy enough to knock me over the way I’d done to him a few minutes earlier.
“Now who’s nervous babbling?” Hawk muttered under his breath. “Yeesh, I asked a simple question…”
Simple?Was he high?
“I’m not taking your vir—er… having…” I swallowed thickly around an obstacle in my throat. “With you… the sex,” I hissed.
“Jack,” Hawk said, soft and rebuking. “You make it sound dirty. I know for a fact that you sleep with people all the time. It’s not like I’m asking you to do anything illicit?—”
“Sleeping with my best friend’s baby brother is plenty illicit!” I sputtered, stomping several feet back down the path before turning to stomp in the other direction. “Not to mention dangerous.”
“Dangerous? Sex with me?” Hawk’s nostrils flared as he tried to hide a smile, but I knew his expressions too well to doubt what he was feeling.Amusement, damn him. “I know I’m a lotyounger than you, Jack, but I think you have the stamina to keep up, at least if Peter is to be believed?—”
“Not dangerous like that! Jesus. And stop mentioning Peter. Also, my stamina is not an issue, thank you very much,” I couldn’t help but add before remembering that my sexual stamina was not a thing I should be discussing with Hawkever. I spun around again. “But youarea lot younger than me. And Webb might be my best friend, but he’d still murder me and bury me in a shallow grave if I laid a hand on you. Hell, I’d be lucky to die a quick death. More likely, he’d get your brothers to help, like some kind of… fraternal vengeance posse. Webb, Knox, Porter. God, even Reed would make a trip north, and he probably has CIA torture training or some shit.”
“Reed’s a consultant. No one actually believes he’s a spy,” Hawk scoffed. He stood with his arms folded over his chest, watching me pace back and forth. “That’s just something Porter jokes about. And since when do you care what people think?”
“Since I’m busy contemplating how your family will come for me in the dead of night and do things to me all because of yoursimpleproposition that I tread on sacred ground!” I yelled, gesturing wildly at him. I huffed out a breath and added quietly, “And don’t tell me I’m being dramatic because we both know better. When Webb tried to set me up with Knox, he all but invited himself along on the date to play chaperone, and Knox is older than Webb! With you…”
I didn’t finish my sentence because I didn’t have to. We both knew Webb was protective of his family by nature but could be stiflingly overprotective where Hawk was concerned. If he believed Hawk was in danger, he’d raze entire cities to the ground. It wouldn’t matter that Hawk had consented to the danger. It wouldn’t even matter that he had gone out in the damn woods andpropositionedthe danger.
“Well. Yes.” Hawk sighed and deflated a little. “That is a consideration. I’d sort of hoped that you’d want this with me more than you’d care about that stuff,” he said quietly.
Ugh. I ran a frustrated hand through my sweaty hair. I hated when he got quiet. Quiet meant sad and hurt when I’d rather die than hurt him.
“Hawk.Bird. I do care about you?—”
“And it’s kinda funny when you think about it,” Hawk went on with a little shrug. “If Webb and the others really want me to be safe, they should be proud of me for choosing someone trustworthy to have sex with. I could just find some rando on a hookup app, I guess, but?—”
My brain exploded into a heap of toxic sludge until I was afraid I was about to have a medical event.
“You will not lose your virginity to a random stranger from an app,” I informed him. There was something dark and rough in my voice I’d never heard before. My heart continued to thunder in my neck, and I was lightheaded at the thought of this man—my precious Hawk—in the clutches of an unknown player. “Promise me, Bird. Promise me you will not do something as stupid as?—”
Hawk threw up his hands in an uncharacteristic display of temper. “Whoaaa. Hold on, buddy. Did you or did you not meet Smug Peter on Hinge?”
I opened my mouth and shut it again. “Not the point.”
“And everyone knows Knox and Gage werebothon Grindr before they got their shit together and admitted they were in love. And Porter has GROWLr installed on his phone because he’s got a thing for bears?—”
“No.” I shook my head. “Too much information.Waytoo much information?—”
“So why is it okay for everyone else to have sex with strangers but not me?”
Because you are special. You are precious. You aremine…
That last one brought me up short.
Mineto protectwas what I meant, obviously. Mine to care for until a person came along who deserved him.
