Chapter 22
Chapter Twenty-Two
ETHAN
T he cinnamon rolls aren’t nearly as good as Joan manages, but Camden squeals in delight as I pull them from the oven anyway, clapping his hands where he sits at the island coloring.
“We need to give them a chance to cool before you try one,” I say. Camden’s eyebrows furrow as he pouts, but he doesn’t directly protest. I offer him a smile and then I pull the pre-made icing Joan had handed me when I’d relented about trying to make the rolls last night. Just as I’m finishing covering them with the sticky mess, a set of footsteps echo down the hallway.
And then I hear a second set, and my heart fucking stops .
Brielle steps into the large open living room first, her hair messy where it falls over her shoulders, her shape drowned out by one of Caleb’s hoodies. Hickeys cover her throat, and that jealous rage boils in me, hot enough it tries to claw up my throat.
I drop my eyes.
Camden screeches a heartbeat later.
“Bri!” he says. “Did you come for the cinnamon rolls? Daddy and I made them last night.”
There’s a stretch of silence, just long enough that my determination to not see her crumbles a bit. I chance a glance over my shoulder. Her cheeks are flushed, the bright red tracing all the way down onto the small bit of her throat that isn’t covered with the hoodie and bruises.
Caleb’s focus is on me, his eyebrows drawn low, a smile nowhere to be seen on his face. I scoop one of the rolls onto a plate and set it in front of Camden.
I need to get the fuck out of here before Caleb realizes I’m two seconds from losing my shit on him.
It’s bad enough that he took her out a couple weeks ago, bad enough that Molly fucking Bailey found out and so now the entire town knows that he’s interested in her. It’s bad enough that Camden is already obsessed with her from all the times Emily’s ended up having to watch him the last month.
And now he brings her home ? Marks her and leaves his scent all over her and makes it abundantly obvious that they’ve spent the entire night fucking each other? All it’ll take is one damn comment from Cam and the entire town is going to know that they’re hooking up when Caleb’s home.
This time, I don’t manage to stifle the growl. It rumbles through me, low and full of anger. Caleb stalks around the other side of the island, dishing out a second cinnamon roll and handing it to her. He kisses her temple.
“Why don’t you and Bri eat on the porch, bud?” He directs the question to our son, but his eyes are locked on Brielle’s.
“Okay!” Camden says, climbing down from the island and then grabbing his plate.
The front door closes a heartbeat later.
Caleb traces her chin, the touch more intimate than a casual hookup demands. His body softens infinitesimally as some of the worry she holds in her body eases away. Worry I can only tell she feels because she’s a goddamn Omega and her worries call to me like not much else can.
He kisses her, an easy mingling of their mouths. Her scent explodes through the kitchen between one breath and the next.
My growl grows louder, more violent.
Brielle pulls away from Caleb and looks at me. Her face pales, and then she ducks her head and practically runs to the front door, the small plate held in a white-knuckled grip. Caleb growls, low and dangerous. It bounces off the walls of the room. The possessive reaction stokes my rage until it’s a burning inferno in my chest. The door closes just shy of a slam.
“What the fuck was that about?” Caleb asks, the growl still a dangerous vibration in his chest.
I ignore his question and cross my arms, turning so I’m not tempted to watch Brielle’s retreat from our house.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” My voice rumbles through the room. Caleb runs a hand down his face, clearly trying to keep his own reaction in check. “It’s not enough to come home smelling like her? Now you need to get Camden attached to her? How the hell are we going to explain this to him in another month when you two fizzle out because you get called to a fire for longer than a week?”
“We’re not going to fizzle out,” he says, the words surprisingly restrained given the rage blazing in his eyes.
“Please,” I scoff. “You haven’t done more than fuck a random Beta since Kayla died.”
He takes a step toward me, his hands clenched tight, the veins on his forearms standing out from the strain of it.
“Because you’ve made it abundantly clear you aren’t ready for anything more. Did you ever think I’ve been keeping everything to the fucking shadows because you made it clear just last month that you aren’t ready to move on?”
“I’m not ,” I growl.
“Then don’t move on, but do not imply that this thing I have with Brielle is going to fizzle out, Ethan.”
“Then stop lying to yourself about it at least,” I say, practically yelling. “She’s the new meat in town. You’re not even the first one to pursue her since she showed up. You know that? You’re probably the fourth man she’s fucked here.”
The thought slashes across my chest, but I ignore it, clinging to the rage instead. I ignore the possessive flavor of it, though. I haven’t had her for a literal decade. I don’t need her now.
“She hasn’t.” Caleb shakes his head. “And you better watch your fucking mouth. You’ve never once called a woman a whore, and I won’t let you start with her.”
His voice gains a lethal edge to it, something I haven’t heard since Kayla first moved in with us and Alex Dean gave her a hard time. It draws me up short.
“She hasn’t been with anyone since her husband, not aside from me,” he says. He takes a step closer to me and then another, putting a single hand on my sternum, shoving his index finger into the bone. “I will say this once and only once. She is not the type of woman to hop from bed to bed.” He scowls. “Not that there’s anything wrong with that if that’s the dynamic that’s been established, and you fucking know it.”
I clench my jaw hard enough a muscle flexes in my cheek.
“And I know it won’t fizzle out because she’s my goddamn scent match.”
The words are a slap across the face, stunning me. I stumble a half-step back.
“What?” I ask, my voice just as shell-shocked as the rest of me.
“It’s lavender. Her scent.”
Yeah, I already know that. Did I not just mention that he smells like her all the fucking time? Not that I need him to remember the way her scent feels. I can still smell it in my dreams. And sometimes in the shower when I succumb to the need and fuck my hand while pretending it’s her warm heat instead.
He pulls out an envelope from the back pocket of his jeans and shoves it against my chest. I grab it on instinct.
His voice is cooler now, the heat of his rage gone. “And she’s my match.”
He drops his hand and pushes past me, right out the front door and onto the front porch. I twist, staring at him as he closes the distance between him and Brielle where she sits on the edge of the porch with Camden. She bites her lip as he settles beside her, her eyebrows furrowed and her shoulders rolled in. A small smile graces her lips as he intertwines their fingers, and some of the tension in her body falls away.
I drop my eyes. The envelope’s already been opened. I slip the single piece of paper out, my stomach dropping as I realize it’s an official notice from the Council. I read the words, trying to make them change, reorder themselves.
Holy hell, he’s even done the bloodwork to confirm it. They’re matches. Literal soulmates. I drop the paper and practically run to the garage, intent on getting to Cottonwood before I can say something I won’t be able to take back. Camden waves from where he’s playing on the porch, a wildflower in one fisted hand and a piece of chalk in the other. Brielle doesn’t look up as I drive past them, but Caleb’s eyes are cold and calculating, the rage still simmering just under the surface.
Scent matches .
God help me.
CALEB
Brielle freezes beside me as we watch Ethan disappear down the road and turn onto the main highway in the direction of the Monroe Ranch. Though he could be running off to Jackson, I suppose. Camden sets down the flower he’d picked the moment he came outside and attacks the cinnamon roll with renewed ferocity.
I don’t break the silence, trying to ignore the uncomfortable edge of it and enjoy the morning with my son and my scent match. After a while, Brielle sighs and sets aside her half-eaten breakfast. She glances at me, her eyebrows furrowed, and starts to say something before shutting her mouth and looking away, focusing on the swath of mountains that jut out toward the west.
“Papa, can I ride my scooter?” Camden asks.
“Of course, bud,” I say, getting to my feet and grabbing both of their plates. “You need shoes on, though.”
Camden nods and follows me into the house, grabbing a set of his shoes from the basket beside the door, a pair of socks already tucked into them. I raise an eyebrow but don’t fret over it. I’ll just add it to my list to get done before my reset ends next weekend. As he rushes back out front, I set the plates in the sink and then head to the garage, pulling his scooter from where it’s leaning against the far wall. I take the walk back to gather my thoughts, cool my body, slow the rage that’s still seething through my veins.
Brielle’s moved to one of the oversized chairs we have positioned on either side of the large window that looks into the living room. Her feet are tucked under her and her shoulders are rolled in, but her eyes hold an unspoken laughter as she chats with Camden next to her.
“Here, bud,” I say, setting the scooter next to the stairs. He smiles and runs over, pulling the helmet from where it’s looped over one of the handlebars. Instead of having me help him, though, he crosses back to Brielle.
She doesn’t say anything, just helps him with a small smile curving the edges of her lips. It fades as he rushes down the stairs and starts down the sidewalk, giggling the entire time.
When I sit on the other chair, she sighs and turns to me. There’s a resolve in her posture that hadn’t been there before.
“I didn’t want to say anything in front of Camden,” she says.
My stomach clenches.
“I’m sorry,” I say before she can decide that it’s really her that needs to apologize for Ethan’s asshole behavior. “He had no right to freak out like that.”
She offers a sad half-smile and shakes her head.
“He does. I don’t like it, but he does.”
I frown, and she picks at the strings of the hoodie, adjusting them until they sit perfectly even.
“Ethan and I dated.” The words are quiet and rushed, nearly identical to how she told me she’d filed as Matchless. They hit me harder than that admission, though. Confusion races through me.
“What?” I can’t help the single word question from falling out of my mouth.
She ducks her head as she grimaces.
“When I spent that summer here during college,” she says.
Oh hell, Brielle is the nameless Omega he was so twisted up over? I’d come home after that fire season to find Ethan doing his damn best to work himself to death, as angry as I’d ever seen him. All he’d say was that there’d been a girl—and now there wasn’t.
I focus on my son, trying to keep the confusing mix of emotions roiling within me off my face.
“It started small. We’d see each other nearly every day since I was staying with Melissa,” she says. “He’d swing by most mornings before he and Brandon went out to work the cattle for Misty Mountain. We’d chat, flirt. And then it slowly morphed into something more.”
I glance at her. Her gaze is locked on the mountains again, her teeth biting into her lip. She sighs.
“Anyway, I should have told you earlier instead of letting you be blindsided by him being so angry this morning.” Her look is full of apology when she focuses on me, a sad tilt to her lips that’s almost a smile. Almost. “The short of it is that I went back to school. He didn’t want to make it long distance.”
Her eyes give away just how painful it must have been even as her voice stays steady.
How in the world was this not something that was plastered across every single gossip post in town? How had Ethan—and Melissa, clearly—managed to keep the nosy asses from getting word that her and Ethan had dated? Had clearly been at least moderately serious, if her nervousness in telling me and fragile look in her eye are anything to go by?
“He’ll deal with it,” I tell her, reaching across the open space so I can take hold of her hand. “I’ll handle it, all right?”
She nods and then climbs into my lap, tucking her head against my shoulder. Her scent surrounds us, clean and breathtaking. After a minute, the acidic feel creeps in. I wrap my arms around her and kiss her temple.
“I’m glad I found you,” I whisper.