Page 57

Afterward, he starts to move away.

I tighten my arms around him. “No.”

He freezes.

I smile into his hair. “That means stay.”

He looks between us where we’re still joined. “I need to take care of this.”

Right. Condom.

I loosen my hold reluctantly, and Hewit disappears into the bathroom for less than a minute. When he comes back, he’s carrying a washcloth.

“You don’t have to⁠—”

“Want to.”

He settles beside me and cleans me gently, his touch almost absurdly careful after everything we just did.

“Sore?”

“A little.” I grin. “But very worth it.”

Some of the tension leaves his face. He tosses the cloth toward the laundry basket, then climbs back into bed and pulls me against his chest.

For a while, neither of us says anything. The room smells of sex and rain drifting through the open window. My body aches in unfamiliar places, but I feel warm and loose and happier than I know what to do with.

Hewit’s fingers trace slowly over my back. “You okay?”

I lift my head. “More than okay.”

His eyes search mine.

I kiss him softly. “Stop checking for damage, wolfman.”

His mouth twitches. “Occupational hazard.”

I settle back against his chest, listening to the steady thud of his heart beneath my ear.

For the first time in longer than I can remember, the restless pull and sense that I’m waiting for something I can’t name are gone. I feel settled, as if a question I’ve carried for years without knowing how to ask has finally been answered.

I came to Screaming Woods because something inside me insisted I would find what I was looking for here.

And I did.

Chapter 15

Hewit

When Nora first arrived in Screaming Woods, letting her into my house felt like something irreversible.

Turns out, I was right.

It’s been six weeks since we first had sex, and her favorite mug now has pride of place in my cupboard, painted with yellow flowers and entirely too cheerful for anything I would have chosen myself. The bottle of shampoo in my shower smells like vanilla and oranges. One of her cardigans has been hanging over the back of a kitchen chair for four days because Nora believes that furniture doubles as a closet.

Enough of her things have migrated into my cottage that I’ve stopped noticing them. Mine have done the same in hers. A toothbrush, a clean shirt folded over the back of her bedroom chair. Work boots by her door because she objected to me tracking mud through the house after I replaced Mrs. Landry’s rotten porch boards.

Her laptop charger lives permanently beside my kitchen table now because apparently, mine has better light for video calls. I’ve learned which meetings mean I can put coffee beside her without interrupting and which ones require me to stay out of camera range because, according to Nora, “the last thing a work meeting needs is six-foot-five of brooding man-wolf wandering around behind me without a shirt on.”