AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I know. Neither can I,” River said, a quiet reverence in his voice I only ever heard when he talked about Ava.
“So I’ll fix this, starting now,” I said, borrowing some of my twin’s determination. I wasn’t entirely sure how to do that, though. River reached across and messed up my hair.
“No. We’ll fix this, Ry,” he said. He paused for a minute before he glanced over at the other blanket. “Any advice, Nick? I get the impression you have a lot of brothers and sisters.”
I smirked. I’d sensed Nick waking up a few minutes ago. He was playing possum, trying not to intrude on our conversation. But if we were going to be a pack, we couldn’t hide things from each other.
He gently slipped out from under the shared blankets the others were still sleeping under, then grabbed another one to wrap around him as he came to sit next to us. I noticed he checked it gingerly first to make sure no critters had snuck in to keep warm. Proving he’d done this before, too. We really should camp out with sleeping bags rather than blankets and comforters. I should have grabbed the ones in our go-bags for Ava.
“Sorry,” he said, keeping his voice low. “I got used to being an early riser living on the farm.”
“Don’t apologize,” River said to him. “We have to figure out how being in a pack actually works. But I don’t think having a lot of boundaries is part of it.”
“Yeah,” Nick agreed with a grin. “I get that from watching Maia and Lexie’s packs come together. Those guys are all up in each other’s business.”
“So, advice?” I asked him, really needing it. I’d never had to work at a relationship, or fix one I’d broken, before now.
Nick looked flustered. His gaze darted between Ava and us. “Are you asking for advice about brothers, or about Ava?”
“Both. I’ll take whatever you’ve got.”
He shifted the blanket tighter around him to ward off the morning chill. “Sibling shit is hard. I have a big family that I always felt lost in. I love them, but it always seemed as if my pieces didn’t fit theirs. It’s weird, but this pack feels simpler for me. It’s a no-brainer. Nobody has ever needed me for anything before. Or chosen me. I know it’s not going to be easy, but I just get the feeling our pieces all fit. Does that make sense?”
“Yeah, it does,” River said quietly. I agreed with a slow nod as I pulled one arm out of my blankets to rest under my head. These people should have felt like strangers, but they didn’t. They felt like home. Almost as if we’d already lived another life together, at some other point in time.
“And for Ava?” I asked. I couldn’t help but notice he’d dodged that question.
He blushed, which was adorable. “I don’t know a lot about women, but Ava seems to be the simplest part. Not that she’s simple, I just mean, she’s not a choice. For me, anyway. She’s it, the one. Any part of herself she shares with me I’m going to hold on to and cherish. The how we can work out, and I don’t really care about the why.”
“So you block the rest out, and that’s it?” I asked. Surely it couldn’t be that easy.
“Not block it out. It just doesn’t matter. Everything else is noise. Hold on to Ava, keep her at the heart of everything you both do, and I think you’ll be okay. She loves you both, has her whole life, as far as I can see. That’s all I’ve got for you.”
“Huh,” I said. It seemed our little tech geek was also a Zen master. He had more in common with Wolf’s view of the world than I would have thought.Was I overcomplicating everything? Was he right? Did it even matter why she left, if she was here now and I had the chance to make her mine?
“Look,” Nick blurted with a frown, before I could add anything more. “I know we agreed to be part of this pack last night, and I meant every word I said. I’m all in. But Ava didn’t get a vote. She may not feel the same way about me. If she chooses someone else as her beta, it will slay me, but I’ll honor it.”
“I don’t think you have anything to worry about, kid,” River said with a small smile at Nick’s earnestness. He seemed to have a genuine affection for Nick already, which surprised me. River didn’t connect with people easily.
A faint vibrating sound had us both narrowing our eyes as Nick pulled Ava’s phone out of his hoodie pocket. “Oh shit, that’s Lexie and Maia. They’re calling early. That’s not a good sign. I better take it.”
He jumped up and took off into the forest, so as not to wake the others up. It was impossible to talk quietly on a phone.
“Are we good?” River asked me when Nick was gone. I wanted to banish his hesitation in asking that question, but it was going to take time. As much as what Nick had suggested made sense, one conversation wouldn’t fix a decade’s neglect of our relationship. Especially with everything changing so rapidly. It was a start, though. Neither of us were going anywhere without the other.
“Yeah, Riv. We’re good.” I sat up and gave him a hug that had been a long time coming. He squeezed me tight in return and I felt like I could breathe for the first time in years.
“I’ll put some more wood on the fire for when the others wake up,” he said as he pulled back. He shifted to get up, but we both froze as a low moan filled the clearing. It was coming from Ava.
River sprang into a crouch, but didn’t move any closer. Another low moan followed the first one, and her hips shifted restlessly under the blankets. Her hand moved down onto Wolf’s stomach and pulled the blankets back with it, before moving back up to his chest under his shirt. Her eyes were still closed, but her breathing had picked up rapidly.
“Holy shit, is she dreaming?” I whispered to River, as her hips shifted again in a rolling motion.
“Yeah,” he said, his voice coming out rough, “and it looks like one hell of a dream.”
fifteen
Adelicious,tinglyheatspread through me as a slow burning pleasure built in a spiral within my core. I heard a moan that seemed to vibrate through my chest.Was that me?
