Chapter 50 Nelly
NELLY
My legs were thrown over Wade’s, and my head rested against Wyatt’s stomach.
Boone, Levi, and Cooper were curled around and under us.
We were a tangle of nude bodies. So incredibly vulnerable, hiding nothing.
My Alphas breathed slowly, peacefully. Each of them lost to slumber land.
My body, deliciously aching, wouldn’t let me fall asleep.
I didn’t know how long we’d been resting this way. Long enough for our collective breathing, heavy at first, to settle into normal rhythm. Long enough for them to doze off, one by one, leaving me awake with my thoughts.
Our six hearts seemed to beat together.
Our legs and arms seemed to fit together.
Was this the way it always was when you found your scent matches? Did it always feel so right? Did it always erase every worry, every doubt?
It didn’t matter what others experienced though. What mattered was here, now, and the feelings coursing through my body as I basked in the afterglow of marking and mating.
I shifted slightly, wincing at the delicious soreness between my thighs.
Every muscle in my body felt used, stretched to its limit, then pushed beyond.
My skin was sticky with dried sweat and other fluids.
The surrounding air smelled of sex and alpha musk.
My inner omega purred with satisfaction at the scent.
I'd never been with multiple partners before. Never imagined I could handle the attention of five virile alphas. Yet somehow my body had not only accommodated them but craved more.
I'd been claimed. Thoroughly. Completely.
Amazingly, if they woke up right now wanting more, I’d not say no.
Maybe that was the heat.
Though momentarily satisfied, my need would inevitably flare again, making me reach for them, touch them, kiss them.
But right now, what I wanted most was to snap my fingers and transport me and my Alphas to a giant, warm bed piled thick with comforters and pillows. I wanted to burrow in softness. I also wanted food. Cooper’s food, to be exact.
Turning my head carefully, I took inventory of the men sprawled around me. Wade's arm was flung possessively across my middle, his face pressed against my shoulder. His features in sleep were boyish, soft around the edges, stripped of maturity.
On my other side, Wyatt's chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm against my arm.
His face was turned away, but I could see the strong line of his profile, so similar to Wade's yet entirely his own.
It still amazing me that this man, always in charge, always flowing with confidence, and surrendered so completely.
Cooper lay perpendicular to us, his head using Wade's thigh as a pillow, one hand splayed across Levi's bare chest. His braid had come undone, golden-brown hair fanning out beneath him like spilled honey.
His lips were parted slightly, his breathing deep and even.
He smiled in his sleep as I watched, and I wondered what he was dreaming about.
Levi had somehow ended up half-draped across Cooper, one leg hooked over Cooper's hip, his arms wrapped around himself as though cold despite the warmth our bodies generated.
Even in sleep, he maintained that precise, contained quality that defined him, each limb placed just so.
Yet there was also vulnerability in the way he nestled close to Cooper, seeking warmth and connection.
And Boone—beautiful, stoic Boone with his midnight hair and intense gaze—lay just beyond Wyatt, one long arm stretched out so his fingertips brushed Wyatt's shoulder. His long hair spread out like a raven’s wing, pitch-black across the blankets.
I wanted so badly to touch it. To slip my fingers through it. Maybe braid it for him.
God, what had I done? What had we done?
I couldn't regret it, not when my body still hummed with pleasure, not when I felt more alive than I had in years.
But I hadn't expected this. Hadn't expected to feel so... complete. I’d been missing pieces of myself ever since the injury. Somehow, these men had scavenged the world, finding spare parts to match, and they’d inserted the new bits to make me whole again.
Through the gaps in the barn roof, I could see the sky had deepened from bright blue to dusky purple.
We must have spent the entire day lost in each other, moving from one pairing to another, sometimes all of us tangled together in ways I hadn't thought physically possible. Time had dissolved into meaningless increments measured only by waves of pleasure. Now the minutes were flowing back into place. Ticking towards something I didn’t know how to face.
The conversation I had to have with my men.
The one that would make me stay or force me to go.
I shifted again, carefully extricating my arm from beneath Wyatt's weight. He made a small sound of protest but didn't wake. Carefully, I disentangled myself from the web of limbs, pausing each time one of my Alphas stirred. When I’d reclaimed both arms and legs, I turned my body slightly on my side, trying to wriggle down a narrow channel and then over a set of muscled thighs. Every movement I made highlighted different tender spots, artifacts of our sexual marathon. When I finally stood, free of the trap that I’d choose again in a heartbeat, I felt oddly light.
For a moment, I simply stood there, naked and unashamed, looking down at the five men sprawled across the rough blankets. The fading light painted their bodies in soft shadows. How did I end up here? What made me deserve them? Was this my reward for all the bullshit I’d endured?
They were exquisitely handsome, all of them, in ways that went beyond the physical. I'd never thought I could feel this way about more than one person, let alone five. I’d always thought I’d never find what my grandparents had. Yet here I was, my heart expanding to accommodate them.
What would our story be?
What would we tell at social gatherings about meeting?
I’d always loved when my grandparents talked about how they’d met, even if they fudged the story a little.
“I was in Seattle, and they were in Wyoming. I got on a plane to them and never looked back.”
We could keep it simple.
Omitting the muddier details.
I frowned.
Knowing this all might still go wrong.
Because if I asked for what I needed, and they couldn’t give it to me, then this was over. I couldn’t compromise, not about this.
I turned away, needing to collect myself, and padded barefoot across the barn floor.
My toes curled against the wooden planks, and I realized with a start that they were clean.
The last time I'd been in here, dust had coated everything, no matter how many times I’d swept.
Now, though still worn with age, the floor had been swept and even appeared to have been mopped in places.
Curious, I moved deeper into the barn, my eyes adjusting to the dimmer light away from the windows. The windows…
I turned around, realizing that they too, once coated in thick layers of grime, had been wiped down. Not perfectly, the glass was still streaked in places, but light flowed into the barn with less opposition.
My head slowly rotated back to gaze into the shadow depths of the barn. I’d moved things out of my way to make a dance floor, haphazardly shifting and stacking, but someone had organized everything with far more care and effort than I’d done. They’d tried to make this place better for me.
My eyes took in the details I’d missed while lost in the haze of heat and desperate need, and my throat tightened, emotions overtaking me.
A sweet ache bloomed in my chest, spreading outward until I felt it in my fingertips. They’d cleaned this place without expectations. They’d cleaned it without telling me.
Once, my value was tied into talent.
I danced well, Imperial paid well.
After that, I existed within a world of transactional relationships. Alphas paid for the fantasy of me.
But this was an act of service offered without expectation, and that cut through my defenses like nothing else could have.
My eyes burned. I blinked back moisture.
I didn’t want to cry. I wanted to be happy. I was happy.
When I was happy, I danced. I didn’t shed tears.
It deserved dance.
I moved to the center of the open space, my bare feet finding the smoothest section of floor.
My body felt both leaden and buoyant, exhausted from hours of lovemaking yet somehow energized.
I lifted my arms, feeling the air cool against my naked skin, and rose to relevé, balancing on the balls of my feet as naturally as breathing.
It always amazed me how my muscles remembered this, even after everything.
The injury hadn't taken it from me.
Imperial hadn’t taken it.
And neither had Eros.
My ability to rise, to extend, to feel the pull of gravity and defy it anyway.
My ability to fly across a stage, even if that stage was inside a rundown barn in the middle of Wyoming.
I began to move, flowing like water from position to position, not bothering to devise choreography.
The air in the barn had cooled more, and dancing pressed it against my body with more force.
It caressed my bare skin, raising goosebumps along my arms and legs.
Through the freshly cleaned windows, the sun dipped lower, and lower, until the top curve of it threatened to sink below the horizon.
I danced for the sunset. I danced for my Alphas. My future. Myself.
My breath came faster, my heart pounding against my ribs. A new layer of sweat added itself to the already dried salt on my skin. I hadn't danced like this since before my injury.
With each movement, memories flowed.
Grueling rehearsals.
My first solo.
Geoff.
Chess.
Ceramic birds.
A coffin, lowering into the Earth.
Being forgotten by Grandmother.
Waking up on a plane.
The recollections spun away as I began to pirouette. Arms above my head, lowering, lowering, body tightening together, the twirling reaching a fever pitch.
As the last of the light faded, leaving only deep blue in its wake, I brought my sequence to a close with a series of cha?nés turns that carried me across the floor, ending in a perfectly held croisé position.
My chest rose and fell rapidly, lungs burning with exertion, heart hammering against my ribs.
I stood there, suspended between movement and stillness, head still swimming, until I felt warm arms circle my waist from behind. I didn't startle, his smell colliding into me the minute we touched. He was mountains, open fields, wildflowers in winter.
Boone.
"You don't even realize how stunning you are, Nelly," he whispered, breath warm against my ear. His large hands spanned my waist, his fingers splayed across my abdomen. I remained in my ballet position for a moment longer, then I relaxed, melting back against his hard, smooth chest.
"I thought you were all still asleep," I said, my voice barely audible.
"I woke up," he replied simply.
I turned within the orbit of his arms, looking up at him. In the dim light, his eyes were endless wells. His midnight hair cascaded around him. I reached up, satisfying the earlier urge I’d had to run my fingers through his hair.
Behind him, I could make out the shapes of the others still tangled together in sleep.
The soundtrack of this moment with Boone was their breathing, along with the music of chirping crickets and distant hoot of an owl filtering in through the Swiss Cheese roof above.
Standing there, naked in his arms, I felt no shame. His eyes held unveiled admiration, and a warmth that had nothing to do with the sexual heat of earlier and everything to do with simply seeing me.
"Dance with me?" I asked, my hands finding his, threading together so perfectly it hurt.
Surprise flickered across Boone's features, quickly replaced by an endearing uncertainty. He glanced down at our joined fingers, then back to my face.
"I don't know how," he admitted in a low, rumbling voice. "I can’t even two-step at Shorty’s on line dancing night."
"That's okay," I whispered, squeezing his fingers gently. "Just move with me.”
I guided his hands to my waist, my own going to knit behind his neck.
With a little coaxing, Boone began to sway with me, moving to the melody of the night. After a while, he lowered his head, pressing his cheek against my temple.
"Thank you," he murmured.
"For the dance lesson?" I asked, a smile in my voice.
"For giving us a chance," he replied simply.
Those five words held so much in them.
Five words for five Alphas.
I closed my eyes, letting my body move with his, feeling the steady beat of his heart against mine. Whatever came next, I decided, I’d carry these men with me. Even if I was in Seattle instead of Sagebrush.