by Hattie Hunt
“Look, Emma. I can’t begin to understand everything that is going on here. Hell, maybe I don’t want to understand. But—” he reached forward and pulled the flowers away from her. “I do want to understand you. And you can’t greet me like you did out there and then tell me that nothing is wrong. I am not a complete idiot.”
Emma looked up at him with those intense, infinite brown eyes, and a smile played at her lips. “Fine. Quill boy.”
Mason straightened and positioned the jar back in the center of the counter. Emma didn’t pull it back towards her. “Okay. Now that we have that taken care of, is there a barbeque out here? I brought stuff to make dinner.”
Emma chuckled and played with the end of her pony tail, watching as Mason started opening cabinets. “Where on earth did you come from, Mason Covey?”
“Foggy Bottom.”
Emma snorted and slapped her hands on the counter. “What?”
“Foggy Bottom.”
“That is not a real place.”
“Google it.”
She eyed him sideways. “Foggy. Bottom.”
“I didn’t name the place. Pan for boiling water?”
“Two cabinets to your left. There is… one.”
“Perfect. And what did you say about the barbeque?”
“I didn’t. But we don’t have one.”
“Shit.” Mason found the pan he was looking for and plopped it on the stove, which had to be a hundred years old. Or, probably from the sixties, which was about the same thing in appliance years. “I should have called. I thought about it, but I wanted to surprise you. I was going to make burgers.”
Emma shrugged. “We have never needed one out here before. If anything, we light a campfire. But, no one has ever lived out here before either.”
Mason looked up. “But you live out here.”
Emma looked down at an invisible watch on her wrist. “For about… four days. Give or take.”
Four days? There really was a lot Mason didn’t know. Emma didn’t elaborate, and Mason decided he wasn’t going to pry. So, he started digging through the cabinet where he had found the pot. He really hadn’t been paying attention as he dug through the cabinets before. But now, he realized that they were particularly sparse. Everything was a mishmash, old, dented and generally looking like things that had been discarded somewhere and compiled to make the place a little bit livable. If he looked around the room, the observation remained accurate.
Mason found a frying pan that had a flat edge where it had been dropped. He pulled it out and set it on the other side of the stove.
“So, what are you going to make, master chef?”
“Glorified Hamburger Helper.” He started digging through the grocery bags. “With veggie sandwiches, if we want. Lettuce, tomato, onion and pickles on a hamburger bun.” He pulled a box of macaroni out. “Or, we could pile the macaroni and hamburger on the bun. It would be a little like a sloppy joe… but not.”
“How about not.” Emma laughed and started pulling the vegetables out of the bag. “I’ll turn this stuff into a salad. How’s that? I think there is some ranch in the fridge.”
Mason nodded. “Sounds perfect.”
They moved easily around the kitchen together, not really avoiding conversation, but not talking freely. Mason felt like there was a pocket of tension floating above them with whatever was going unsaid. Not something between them, like times before, but around Emma. He could tell she was trying to maintain a façade of peace and calm, but she was only half successful. Mason wanted to ask her about it, but he wasn’t sure where to start, and he wasn’t sure she was ready. And the times he had pried before hadn’t been particularly successful. Maybe, if he waited long enough, she would just start talking.
Still, the mystery of this cabin where she had lived for less than a week had him curious. “So, what is this place, exactly?” He studied the small shelf of spices, trying to decide what to put on the hamburger.
“My brothers and I fixed it up years ago. We used to come here to get away and pretend we were adventurers on a great mission or something. We found it one summer when we were running the woods as our bears. Once we started… adulting, we stopped coming.” Emma shrugged and started chopping lettuce.
“What was it like, growing up with brothers?”
Emma snorted. “A pain in the butt. They are twins, so there was a lot of that twin juju going on and they would prank me and pick on me and gang up on me. I blame them for my fireball tendencies. They made me strong, though. I had to be, to put up with their shit.” She dumped the lettuce into a bowl. “But, they also protected me. Because I am their baby sister.”
“I always wished I had a sibling or two. Until I met a friend who had a sister and a brother who he fought with all the time. I am pretty sure they hated each other. I decided I like being an only child.”
“So, you and your parents really didn’t associate with any other shifters in DC, huh?”
“Nope.”
“That is so crazy. But I guess I grew up here, surrounded by them. Sure, Brett and Joe are my brothers, but in a way, so is Jordan. And all the other bears in the clan. We are a family, if a somewhat dysfunctional one.”
“I am going to pretend you didn’t just call Jordan a brother, because that is…creepy.”
Emma threw an onion skin at Mason. “I am not going to even try to explain it.”
“I appreciate that.”
Emma frowned. “Mason, I really do need you to understand about Jordan. If you and I are going to be a… thing.”
A thing. Mason turned around to stir the hamburger and dump the macaroni into the boiling water. “I understand.”
“You don’t.”
“You grew up together, dated, pretended to date, and were supposed to be married. What else is there?”
“The fact that he is my best friend. And the fact that until a week ago, no one around here had a clue that me and him weren’t together.” She sighed, dumping the onion into the bowl on top of the lettuce. “Things are complicated at best, and people are probably going to talk, if we start going out in public together.”
Mason wasn’t sure he wanted to be having this conversation. They really were doing things backwards. “I don’t care what people say, Emma. One of the benefits of growing up a picked-on loner.”
“I am only saying that things might get difficult. I just—” Emma set the knife down and looked up at Mason. “I just want you to know what you are getting into.”
“I feel like this is third or fourth date material.”
“I think we skipped over a few dates and dove right into complicated.”
“It doesn’t have to be.”
Emma shot up an eyebrow. “Mason, do you realize who you are talking to?”
“I am talking to a strong, beautiful, empowered woman.”
She shook her head, but didn’t say anything. So, Mason stepped around the counter and sidled up beside her. She pointedly focused her attention on the tomato she had been slicing. Mason slid an arm around her waist, letting his fingers lift the edge of her shirt.
“Strong.” He pressed a kiss into her neck and his hand slid around the bare skin of her stomach. He lifted his free hand to her chin and turned it to him.
“And beautiful.” Then he kissed her, his hand pulling her face into his, their lips colliding in earnest. For a moment, he though she was going to resist, then she melted into him, her body turning to his, the tomato forgotten. Then her arms were around his neck, fingers running through is hair and holding his mouth to hers.
He had only meant to kiss her. Now, he spun her around so she was between him and the counter and lifted her up. She wrapped her legs around him, holding him captive as his hands pushed her shirt up until her breasts were uncovered. He could see her nipples pressing against the thin fabric of her neutral bra. She might as well not have been wearing one. He didn’t bother unfastening it from the back. He pulled down the fabric until one of her breasts was out in the open.
Teasing the free nipple with his tongue, he cupped her other breast in his hand, squeezing and kneading in rhythm to her rushed breathing.
Her hands brushed against his stomach, and a shudder of pleasure rippled through him. Then her fingers were working the button on his pants.
Water hissed from the stove, and a roll of burning steam filled the kitchen as the pot of pasta boiled over. He had half a mind to let it burn, but she pulled back, nuzzling her face into his neck as she erupted in laughter, wrapping her arms back around him. He wasn’t ready to give up. Her laughter only turned him on further, and the need in his groin had swollen to levels not worth turning back.
With her face buried against him, he couldn’t reach her breasts any more with his mouth, so he let both hands claim them, finding her ear with his teeth. Her laughter turned to a pleasured squeak.
“Mason,” she giggled, her fingers clenching into his shirt. The room smelled like smoke and burning pasta. “Mason, shouldn’t you get that?”
“It’s already ruined,” he murmured through nips at her ear.
“Mason, I’m hungry.” She tried to push him back, but he held her tighter.
“So am I.”
“You know what I mean.”
“You taste just fine.”
She arched her back, and he could tell she was close to giving in, even though her entire body still trembled with laughter. She pushed back against him once more, laying all the way back on the counter, her mouth, ears, breasts all out of reach. She was wearing pants, a thin barrier to the only part of her body he could still reach.
He leaned over her, tracing his tongue down her stomach until his chin hit the edge of her jeans. Then he gripped the fabric above the button in his teeth and pulled. It came undone in a breath, and he felt her body relax.
Her laughter gave way to a low moan as he pulled her pants down over her hips. “I swear if you burn my house do—"
He pressed his thumb against her underwear, teasing her sweet spot through the lace. Her hips bucked towards him, reacting to the pressure in the way only a woman could. He looped his finger through the inside of her panties and pulled them to the side. Lowering his face to her, he let his breath roll across her moist flesh. He knew he had won as her body curved up to meet him.
And then she growled. A low, dangerous sound that brought Bones out from the back of his cognition. Emma flattened out on the counter, craning her neck back towards the stove. “Shit, Mason. Dinner is on fire!”
Mason stumbled back as Emma jumped off the counter, half tripping towards the stove as she pulled up her pants. He moved easily past her, picking up the pan of hamburger which had erupted in a small ball of fire. The flames licked against his knuckles as he pushed through the kitchen to the door. He didn’t know what to do with the thing other than get the pan out of the house before he did catch it on fire.
“Grab the pasta.”
But Emma had already picked up the pan and was right behind him, black smoke curling up into her face.
“Where is the fire pit?”
“To the right.”
Mason turned and immediately found it. He dumped the burning burger into the dead coals, and flakes of ash puffed into the air like snow. Emma set the pan of pasta on one of the rocks. It hadn’t caught on fire, but the water had burned out and it was smoking. It wouldn’t have taken much longer.
Crossing her arms over her bare chest, Emma set a glare on Mason. “I told you not to catch the house on fire.”
“I didn’t catch the house on fire. It was only dinner.” He could still see Mal in her eyes, and he tried an innocent smile, stepping up to her. “I think it was worth it.”
Emma planted a hand square in the center of Mason’s chest. “I wouldn’t try it.”
Or, don’t piss off the bear.
Mason readjusted himself with a sigh as they watched the fire burn off the grease in the pan. “So, um. Dinner?”
Emma raised an eyebrow at him. “I guess we will go hunting.”
“Go what?”
“You know, when a bear is hungry, and they track down a deer or a squirrel and eat it. Hunting.”
“As your bear.”
“Yes, Mason.”
He crinkled up his nose, trying to think of what Bones ate when they went out. Dirt. Roots. Rocks. Also known as whatever ended up in his mouth while he was digging up bones for his collection.
Maybe he shouldn’t have let dinner burn.
24
Emma and Mason sat on the couch in the cabin. When they had returned from the hunt, Mason doused half of the bowl of lettuce and onion—the tomatoes hadn’t made it—in ranch, trying to get the bitter taste of leaves and dirt out of his mouth. Not only had it tasted disgusting, he hadn’t found a porcupine’s diet particularly filling. Especially while Emma and Mal chewed on a fish they caught in the river.
She didn’t even smell like fish. Or bear. And Mason was pretty sure he smelled like a damned pile of dirt. Still, she had snuggled into him, her loose hair falling over one shoulder in an intoxicating wave of lavender and sugar.
“What are you thinking?”
Mason looked down at her, laying a kiss in her hair. “About how awful dirt tastes.”
Emma chuckled, snuggling tighter against him. “Not what I was expecting, but I’ll take it.”
“What about you?”
“Fish.”
“Ha. Ha.” Mason poked her in the side and she squealed, launching herself to the other end of the couch. It was his turn to laugh for real. “Somebody is ticklish. I’ll have to remember that.”
“You really don’t.” Emma eyed him sideways and then inched back towards him. When Mason reached towards her foot with his hand, she jerked back again. “Fine.”
Emma pulled her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms around them. She rested her chin on her knees and leveled a serious gaze on him. “Did you always want to be a teacher?”
Mason creased his eyebrows. He hadn’t expected that question. “I think so.”
“You think so.”
“Well, I didn’t change my mind after I started college.”
She frowned. “And looking back now, do you wish you would have done something different?”
He had never really thought about it. He had never really thought he had the option. “Not really. I was lucky to get a college education, so I accepted my path and ran down it at full speed.”
“Interesting.”
“Why?”
“If you could do it all again, would you do things differently?”
“That is the same question as the last.” Mason scooted towards Emma and faced her, legs crossed. He reached out with one hand, tracing a line along her calf absently.
“It’s different. Do you wish you had done it differently or would you try a different path if given the opportunity?”
“That is very… deep.”
She slapped his hand playfully away from her leg. “Just answer the question Mason.”
He laughed. “Fine. I probably wouldn’t do anything differently, unless the Smithsonian would have hired me before I started school. But in the end, I think I would have regretted not going to school. I might not work at the Smithsonian now, but I can still go there and look at the exhibits with a critical eye and the experience of teaching and an education and appreciate it for what it is. Had I gone straight there, I would probably have ended up a security guard or a receptionist and I never would have been able to learn in the way I have.” Mason started tracing a finger along her leg again. “If you get what I mean.”
“I do.” She sighed, blowing out the air so her lips sputtered.
“Why do you ask?”
Her infinite brown eyes shot up to his, and Mason’s stomach lurched as if gravity had fallen out beneath him. “Because I can’t decide if I’ve made the right decision about my life.”
Well, what was he supposed to say to that?
Emma watched the expressions flicker across Mason’s face as he proce
ssed what she had said. She had never let herself think the words, but after Jordan had shown up at the bakery, it was all she could do not to think them. However, she hadn’t thought she would ever speak them out loud. And now, here she was.
Mason’s mouth puckered, then frowned. His eyebrows creased. He blinked. Lips parted on the edge of a word, and then snapped shut again. She wondered which part of it was tripping him up. Did he take her life to mean everything she had done until this point? Or, maybe, had he jumped to what the two of them had been doing together. Weirdly enough, since the afternoon in the woods, she didn’t see that as a concern at all.
Emma kept her eyes on him, keeping them open longer between each blink as she focused on not running away from impulses that had started stirring in her mind.
Finally, his expression stabilized, settling on concern. “Why would you say that?”
She closed her eyes. “Just everything that has happened. Now that I’m here, I’m—” Tossing her head back, she looked up at the ceiling. “I’m not sure it is what I want.”
Emma grimaced and made herself unfold her legs so her feet were in Mason’s lap. He immediately started massaging them, which wasn’t at all what she was going for, but had her melting in a heartbeat.
“Which part?”
Emma wasn’t sure. Alpha? Clan life? Jordan—not Jordan in the way they weren’t together, but in the way they weren’t the same.
“Is it too easy to say all of it?”
“Yes. Hold on, let me put on my teacher face.” Mason leaned back on the couch and started digging around in his pocket. He pulled out a pen and snapped it onto the wire of his glasses, which he pushed up on his nose as far as they would go.
Emma rolled her eyes. “I thought for sure Mal had left your pen in the woods,” she chuckled.
“He did. I made a new one.” He gestured dismissively with one hand. “Okay. So, when a person has a problem, to make it easier to manage it has to be broken down into smaller pieces.”
“Good luck with that.”
