“Shit.” Erin stepped back from the peephole and wrung her hands.
“Honey, let me in. I can tell you’re right there.”
“What do you want, Will?”
“You’re hurting, and that hurts me. Will you let me in so I can help?”
“How did you find me?”
“Tess and Nadia helped.”
“They did? Why would they do that?”
“Because in spite of where you were born, the people in the executive mansion consider you to be an Afótama clansperson.”
In spite of.
He knows.
But of course he knew. She couldn’t keep such a thing a secret, even if she hadn’t said anything—not with her head being as loud as it was. And Will was a bulldog of a researcher. He could find out things about her she hadn’t even thought to ask.
“Erin, please let me in.”
“I don’t know what you think you can do.”
“I’m not trying to do any particular thing. You’re my lady, and I really need to touch you right now. Please.”
Touch. The word snapped tingles down her spine and over her skin. She squeezed her hands into tight fists and let the pain of her nails digging into the flesh of her palms clear her concentration. She wanted to touch him, too, and be touched by him. But she’d left Norseton so she could sort things out without interference. He would get in the way of that.
“I’m not going to get in your way, Erin.”
“Will—”
“Don’t tell me to get out of your head,” she said with an unexpected snarl. His temperament had always been so even. “I’m trying to help. I’ll do everything I can to help you feel better, but you have to let me. Do you trust me?”
She wanted to. She wanted nothing more than to collapse and let him fix things, but she was tired of being dependent on other people. For once, she wanted to try to fix things on her own. “Yes, I trust you. I just want to do this by myself.”
“Why? Why this one thing, especially when it concerns me?”
“It doesn’t concern you. This is my mess, my problem.”
“The way I see it, your parents made the mess and now you’re trying to pull yourself together. Listen. I have knowledge that could help you. Don’t struggle with this when I can give you what you need. Let me. That’s my job.”
“I don’t want to be anyone’s job.”
She thunked her palm against her forehead and groaned at herself. She was being contrary for no good reason, and she knew it.
“Okay. You win.” She unlatched the door and walked away before he could open it.
By the time it creaked inward, she’d climbed onto the bed in the corner and laced her fingers atop her lap.
He nudged his glasses up and shut the door. “I bet I could have convinced you to open the door faster if I’d brought the croissants.”
She smiled, in spite of herself. “A candy bar would have worked in a pinch.”
“All I brought was whatever I had in my pockets. My phone and my wallet. That’s it.” He joined her on the bed and immediately slipped a hand under her shirt and around to her belly. On a sigh, he said, “Sorry,” and closed his eyes. “I haven’t had my fill of you. Nowhere near it.”
“Really?”
“Why does that surprise you so much? Tell me what I can do to make you believe it.”
“I don’t know. This is new for me.”
“I should hope so.” He took her hands in his and kissed the backs of them.
Closing her eyes, she forced some air through her parted lips and let his warmth seep into her. It lapped against her edges and burnished all her rough spots. It sought entry into her, as if by penetrating her skin, it’d fix her heart—repair her past.
“Tell me why you’re here,” he whispered.
“I would have thought that was obvious. I ran because…I was ashamed.”
“Ashamed of what?”
“Of being ignorant. And of feeling like an outsider, I guess.”
“That’s understandable, but let’s talk through it anyway, huh? Will you humor the researcher and talk to him?”
She chuckled and opened her eyes. She met his soft gaze and let him pull her onto his lap, her front to his.
He planted his palms against the skin of her back and smoothed upward, hooking his chin over her shoulder. “Whose cabin is this?”
“Believe it or not, it belongs to Lora.”
“Lora?”
She nodded against his neck and let out a breath. “Jody spotted me on the way out, and I guess he told Lora. Lora left a message on my phone saying if I needed someplace to go…”
“You know, she would have eventually told Tess.”
“Only if Tess realized I was missing.”
“I think she would have worked it out sooner than you think. How’d you get here?”
“Hitchhiking.”
“Erin…”
“I won’t do it again. Next time, I’ll have my own car.”
“The next time you leave, I’d better be right beside you.”
“That’s assuming I go back.”
“Of course you’ll go back.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“Because I’m there.”
“You belong there. Even you felt compelled to go home—to your people.”
“And you belong with me. Do you feel like that’s arguable?”
She fondled the back of his hair and chewed on his question for a few seconds. He’d said it with such certainty in his voice, so decisiveness, and she envied him for that.
“What I feel isn’t something that requires thought,” he said.
“Get out of my head,” she whispered. She might as well give up on saying it. He probably never would, and she would miss his casual interjections if he stopped. Him cutting her off at the pass made some things easier. He could steer the conversation, and all she had to do was follow along.
“Most Fallonites seem to have evolved away from recognizing their fated partners, if they have them. According to Ollie, most don’t anymore. He believes the gods have turned their backs on them.”
“For what they did to Ótama?”
“No, they had some grace after that. It was a series of choices, I suppose. A lot of things that transpired over time that made the gods withdraw their favor.”
“You think I have some?”
“That’s up to you to decide. I can tell you, though, that Ollie thinks he had some. He knew Tess was his, as surely as I know you are mine. You think you can shake a claim for me out of your muddle of thoughts?”
“I don’t have the right to claim anyone.” Especially not Will. If there were an Afótama hierarchy, he’d be somewhere near the top, whereas she was clinging to the bottom and hoping not to fall off the platform.
“I’m pulling you back into the fold.” He gripped the bottom of her shirt and eased it up to mid-back, at which point she needed to lean back for him. She caught his serious gaze just before he pulled the shirt over her head. “It’s like Tess said. One Fallonite at a time.”
“But then there’s the issue of me not even knowing that’s what I was.”
“I get it.” He scooped her up by the bottom and laid her on her back. “But let’s separate out all the issues and work through them one by one.”
He loosened her shoelaces next, peeled her socks off her, and reached for the button of her jeans next.
She put her hand over his to stop him. “You can’t distract me with sex.”
“Because it’s wrong or because you don’t want to?”
Of course she wanted to, but she felt she shouldn’t have. Besides, she didn’t think it would work, anyway, and she craved distraction—anything to get her mind off what a mess her life was at the moment. Finally, she said, “Because it’s not going to help.”
“Do you trust me?”
“Of course I do.”
“Then believe me when I say it’ll help. Touching me will help me help you.”
“Just touch?”
“Yes. That’s all.”
She lifted her hand and let him slowly, reverently work her pants down. The cabin was drafty, and the small heater’s warmth didn’t quite reach her corner. She sat up and reached for the blanket top, but Will grabbed her wrists. “Wait.”
“I’m cold.”
“You don’t think I’ll warm you up?”
“I didn’t know that was your plan. I’d like for you to try.”
He kissed the ticklish undersides of her wrists. Her giggles helped relax the residual tension in her body as he laid her arms down at her sides. “Just stay perfectly still and watch me.”
She pressed her lips tightly together and fixed her gaze on his hands which crushed the hem of his T-shirt. He yanked it off in one quick tug and tossed it onto the rug. His shoes and pants came next, and left in only his boxer briefs, he crooked his thumbs into his waistband. “I can control my urges, but it’s up to you. Off or on?”
Off. She loved looking at him in the nude. His long, lean muscles and wide-stanced, masculine bearing was so incredibly sexy. She wanted to look at him—to stare at him until she’d had her fill or until she’d memorized every inch of his body…because he was hers, supposedly. She couldn’t wrap her mind around it. A man like him certainly couldn’t belong to anyone, much less an outsider like her.
“Off…” He wriggled the waistband down a bit. “Or on?”
She swallowed and forced her gaze up to his face. “Um. On.”
She may not have known much about her past, but she knew enough about to future to discern that if he were naked, and she were anything close to naked, she’d want to make love. Maybe she wasn’t Afótama, but she wanted to be touched, and with Will, what would almost certainly lead to other things.
“All right, then.” He climbed onto the bed and settled behind her, pulling her back against his front.
Her plaintive whimper rattled her lungs before she could even think to tamp in down. His full appendage against her ass and his hot breath against her hair, inciting goosebumps, had her core tightening, and body wound up tight.
And then the warmth like earlier returned, suffusing her back, up her neck to her face, and down her spine to her legs. Sighing, she curled her toes and let each muscle relax.
He glided his thumb along her cheek and stroked down her throat. “How do you feel?”
She closed her eyes and tried to ignore the torrent of self-doubt that was already there, the shame of being less than, and the shyness she always felt when Will was near. She shoved it all back, and considered only his comforting touch, the softness of the mattress beneath them, the scent of the burning wood and Will’s pungent soap. When she could quiet her mind like that and focus only on what was present, she felt safe.
Protected.
“Calm,” she said. “Safe.”
“Warm?” He chuckled.
“Getting there. Cuddle me a little more.”
He draped a leg over hers and wrapped his arm around her waist. “Better?”
“Mm-hmm. You feel perfect.”
“Why do you sound so wistful?”
“It’s not always going to be like this.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m going to go back to Norseton and will have to confront my parents again. I’ll have to stand in front of Lora, and thank her for her kindness and yet be ashamed of having to ask for it. I’ll have to endure those pitying looks from Tess, and—”
“And I’ll be with you.”
“You can’t be with me all the time.”
“No, but I can be with you when it matters. You do need to hash shit out with your parents.”
“Cut them loose, I mean.”
“That’s up to you. I can’t tell you how to digest what they did or even make sense of why they did it.”
She tried to push up onto her elbow, but Will nudged her back down. “What do you know that I don’t?”
“I don’t know. Let’s compare notes. What did they tell you?”
“They said a Fallonite couple begged them to take me and made them swear not to tell anyone because they didn’t want anyone to think they were dealing in the trade of children. Especially not after all those Afótama children were kidnapped.”
“That’s not quite what I found out. Ollie made some additional inquiries for me.”
“Oh, gods.” So, her chieftain knew her business—knew she didn’t belong there.
“Don’t worry about it. I think you’d be surprised to know how unflappable Ollie is.”
“What did he learn?”
“That your parents were a couple of teenagers who had no resources, and that the Petersens were the ones to approach them, not the other way around.”
This time when she tried to sit up, Will didn’t stop her. “But, why?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. We could dig deeper and speculate, but you have to be prepared to be fed answers you may not necessarily want to hear.”
“I want to know.”
He chuckled and nudged her hair back from her eyes. “I figured you would. It wouldn’t hurt to start with your birth parents and see what they have to say.”
“Would they talk to me?”
“I don’t know, but do you remember what I said a couple of days ago? Sometimes, you don’t need to get your answers straight from the source.”
“You can ask the people around them.”
“Right. I don’t think it’ll come to that, though. In my opinion, if they were talked into giving you up in the first place, it follows that they may not be so hesitant to reconnect.”
“And tell me the real story.”
“Mm-hmm.” He stroked down her arm and entwined his fingers with hers.
“So the questions remains…do I really want to know it?”
“Only you can answer that.”