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I shrug. “I don’t know why, but when I was six or seven, I was terrified of the red-and-black nutcracker in our living room.” I picture the hideous jaw in my mind. “Liam bought it at some school flea market. Jay disassembled it one afternoon when we were alone; arms, legs, upper and lower jaw, and all the mechanical stuff too. Afterwards, I put it back together and understood how it worked.” I smile at Bren. “Okay, technically it didn’t work quite as well afterward…you almost had to dislocate its arm and Liam threw a slight tantrum, but… I was no longer scared of it.”
“You’re comparing my behavior to a nutcracker,” Bren says, so genuinely amazed that I can’t help but love him even more.
“No.” The fear drains from me the more we talk. “It was simply a memory.”
“Maybe I keep saying it because I’m so scared.” Bren walks toward me and I don’t have time to think about anything anymore.
He kisses me tenderly but longingly, and a hot-cold shiver runs through my body. I feel his warm tongue deep in my mouth, and when he kisses me this way, there is no room in me for questions, no room for anything but him. In those moments, I know we belong together and that nothing else matters even if we don’t know what’s going to happen next. He loves me more than his life and I love him more than my life. Nothing else matters.
I wrap my arms around his neck, feeling the bond between us billow, enveloping us like a silk parachute.
“I would never leave you, Bren,” I whisper as our lips part again and look deep into his eyes. “Never. Not for Amarok, not for anyone.”
Bren picks me up like he hasn’t been hurt and carries me to the back of the tent. He sits with me on his lap. A sweet, almost painful tugging sensation runs through my abdomen.
“I know. When I think straight, I know, Lou.”
“Best to forget all this,” I whisper, pressing my lips against his. They’re still hot from our kiss and I’m dizzy with longing, as if it’s been months since we made love.
Bren’s fingers slip under my dress and gently close around the curve of my breasts. “I want you, Lou,” he says roughly in my ear. “Here and now.”
I giggle, suddenly embarrassed. “We’re in the middle of the Navapaki camp and there’s no door to lock. What if someone comes in or hears us?”
“No one will come. Everyone’s eating right now,” he murmurs against my neck. He kisses me again, passionately and full of wild, unbridled desire.
The yearning in my abdomen grows. It burns. Everything within me begs to feel him inside me. I press closer against him and he groans, burying his head in the crook of my neck and shoulder. His rapid breathing bursts against my skin and a tingling sensation spreads over the area, circling like a stone thrown into water.
A demanding sound comes out of my mouth. Bren grabs my butt with both hands and grips me even tighter. I feel every one of his tense muscles, and when he kisses me again, I’m absolutely lost. The darkness of the teepee envelops us and the coolness of the night caresses my skin. Somehow, he manages to take off my panties and his shorts, then picks me up and slides me over him.
I gasp because it’s happening too fast. Finally, I sit firmly on top of him, encompassing him completely, deep within me. We don’t move for a moment. He pulls my braids back, holds the back of my head, and kisses me again so intensely that everything around me starts spinning.
“I love you, Lou,” he whispers breathlessly in my ear once his lips let go of me. Sweet intoxication rushes through me, hunting my heart. I’m dazed by his love, by his desire.
He wraps both arms around me like ropes, capturing me with his body in a possessive, passionate way that sends me floating away. Closing my eyes, I cross my feet behind his back to connect us even deeper and feel his heated skin against mine. This is all I need. He and I.
Everything after that I experience as if in a trance. Bren grabs my hips and sets the rhythm. I glow, burn, melt, surrendering everything to his movements and the heat that washes over me far too quickly, making me gasp. And then, as everything dissolves around me, he holds me down tightly. His arms hold me fast and I feel the rhythmic twitch, hear him whisper my name. Words like the wind. Lou-isa. Lou-isa. His head falls forward, his cool forehead resting against mine.
I’m shaking all over and Bren holds me tight.
He can never leave me. Never.
That night, we lie entwined on Bren’s mat, a fur covering us, without talking. Words are not needed, maybe there even aren’t any for this kind of state. And maybe it’s fate that tonight, the wolves are howling especially loud. I think about Grey, my dear little wolf, who now roams the woods, lonely and lost, if he hasn’t starved to death. I experience happiness and sadness. Love and pain. I miss my brothers.
I get up in the middle of the night and grab my phone out of the trunk where I stowed Liam’s shawl and my belongings when we first arrived.
Since there is no signal here, I switch it on without hesitation. I sit wrapped in a fur in front of the teepee, looking at the photos: Jay, the dreamy writer, Liam, the eternal seeker, and Avy, our heart, who brings us all together again, if necessary, with a few lemon cookies.
I don’t look at the picture of Ethan, the knife of his betrayal is still stuck in my back. Because of him, we were forced to run, and because of him, Bren almost died. He will never understand me and I will never forgive him.
I scroll through the pictures and find a photo of our wooden house in Ash Springs with the scrawny apple tree in front and desert sage all around. It seems so long since I’ve walked the parched ground and sucked in the herbaceous smell. At the beginning of summer, I never thought I would miss it because even though I have Bren now, I long to go back there at this moment. Maybe it’s not the house I’m longing for, but a feeling.
Chapter
Seventeen
When I wake the next morning, Bren isn’t lying next to me. For a horrible moment, I think he might have left, but then I find him outside, sitting in his usual spot by the campfire, sanding arrows. His hair is braided, secured by a leather cord, and a few strands fall across his face, which has become gaunt. Despite the chill, he’s only wearing the brown T-shirt Coven gave him and my gaze falls on his athletic, sinewy forearms. As always, just from looking at him I immediately feel that tingle in my belly, the desire to feel his hands on my skin, and his warm whispers in my ear.
I walk a few steps through the grass, dewdrops glistening like bubbles on the tips, the faint sun glowing red in the early morning mist. From somewhere comes the thud of an axe, and Coven and his wife, Aiyana, are returning from the stream with full water jugs.
