35. Henry
HENRY
W hen I step out of the washroom, clean and ready for another day of trying to contain my new wife, Harlow stands in front of her bed, folded in half, stretching the backs of her legs.
I can’t decide if she’s trying to tempt me, persuade me, or if she doesn’t consider my presence at all.
Fortunately, she’s no longer fighting me on picking out her clothes. She’s wearing the sweater I laid out for her. Unfortunately, she’s forgone the pants, so I have a perfect view of her round, lace-covered backside.
She sways from side to side, shaking out her arms. “Can I go for a run today? I’m getting stiff. Surely word of my misdeeds has spread enough and everyone already hates me. May as well enjoy myself.”
My own restlessness has made me weak. I don’t like being stuck in this room, either, and after last night, I don’t want to deny her this simple pleasure.
It doesn’t matter that it’s a terrible idea—staying in this room and watching her stretch in her underwear is not an option.
“Fine.”
She straightens, and her face is immediately brighter. “Really?”
“Really. But you have to listen to me. You can’t just run off, and if I tell you to do something while we are out there, for the love of the Divine, don’t fight me. Just do it. ”
She smirks. “Of course. I wouldn’t dream of disobeying my husband.”
I huff a laugh. “Get changed and I’ll run with you.”
By the time I walk back to my room and change, Harlow is waiting at the threshold of my closet, practically bouncing on her toes with excitement. If I knew that this was the thing that would make her agreeable, I would have considered it sooner.
Her dark hair is pulled back, and she wears a pair of fitted black pants, a wool sweater, and a pair of boots.
I’ve seen her sleep-mussed, post-orgasm, and meticulously styled, but there’s something about seeing her in casual clothes, lit with excitement, that makes me feel like I’m seeing the real Harlow Carrenwell for the first time.
She looks down at her clothes. “Is this not appropriate attire for a run?”
I shake my head. “It’s fine. Let’s go.”
Gaven is waiting for us outside the bedroom door.
“We’re going for a run,” Harlow says.
A hint of surprise flashes on his face. “Are we?”
“You can stay here,” I say.
He crosses his arms. “I go where Miss Carrenwell goes.”
Harlow waves a hand. “We’ll run a loop. You can time me, Gaven.”
He gives her a long, hard look. “Fine. Tell me where you’re going and how long the loop is.”
“Is five miles too long?”
Harlow smiles widely. “Not for one loop.”
Fuck me . I wasn’t counting on running more than five miles. This is going to be painful, but maybe it will wear me out so I can get some sleep tonight.
“Fine,” Gaven says. “Check in after each loop, and if you’re more than two minutes off time, I’m coming to find you.”
Apparently, he knows her well enough to know her five-mile time.
Harlow starts down the hall without waiting to see if either of us is following. Several servants give us startled glances as we pass, but no one asks why the newlyweds are out of their room and dressed in activewear.
We head downstairs, and I stop in the kitchen for a water pouch, and then we head out into the cold morning. As I explain the loop to Gaven, Harlow stretches her legs and tightens the laces on her boots.
Then, we’re off, and I’m lost in the discomfort of the first mile of a run.
Despite the fact that I’ve been running for years—that running distance is the first survival skill everyone at the fort learns—the first couple miles of a run always feel like I’ve woken up in a new body that I don’t know how to work.
Every step feels out of time, my entire body in rebellion to moving at such a rapid pace.
It takes the first few miles to settle into a rhythm.
Harlow doesn’t seem to suffer from the same discomfort. She’s grinning, her body moving with rhythmic grace as she jogs along the wooded trail behind the manor.
The run wouldn’t be a problem, except Harlow is fast. She starts at a sprint, and I have to race to keep up.
She dodges tree roots and low branches with ease—as if this is her normal trail and I’m the interloper. I struggle along, trying to breathe through a cramp in my side, pine-scented air sawing in and out of my lungs.
I keep expecting her to fade, but she just seems to get stronger and steadier as we go. Everything about it kicks my hunter’s instincts into high gear.
It’s been too long since my last true hunt night.
I want to tackle her to the ground and fuck her however I’d like.
I want to watch her pretend not to like it—to watch how well she takes it.
She wanted me to be rough the other night, but I wanted to spite her by making her come from something more gentle.
Now the itch to fuck her rough and dirty, to do what I want instead of worrying about some power struggle between us, is relentless.
When I look over at her, she’s still smiling. Her ponytail swishes behind her, and her cheeks are dark, flushed with cold.
I’ve never missed color as much as I do with her. I’d like to know exactly what shade of pink her face is right now—how violet her eyes are in the sunlight.
She takes note of the scenery in a way that’s both appreciative and calculated. “I’ll need to do this loop at least three times, and a couple of times a week, I should try to do four loops just to stay in shape. I can already feel myself lagging.”
“Four times! Slow down, you fucking menace,” I growl.
She speeds up to spite me, but then glances back, and with a roll of her eyes, slows to a stop .
I jog to catch up and step alongside her, pulling the canteen on my chest up to drink. My side is cramping. I run plenty, but not at an all-out sprint like this. “What on earth would possess you to run twenty miles in a day?”
She swipes the water from my hand before I can drink any more, unclips it, and gives me a look that says I’m a moron.
It hits me. Twenty miles is the distance between Mountain Haven and Lunameade. She wants to be able to run home.
“I thought I told you not to run from me, Harlow.”
She licks water from her lips and hands the canteen back to me. “Who said I was running from you? Maybe I just want to go home.”
“This is your home now.”
She smirks. “And what a cozy home it is, with my husband who wants to snuggle me to death.”
She glances at the granite rock face beside us and the bits of foliage strewn about the bottom, her eyes homing in on one spot.
The elaborate natural cover we’ve woven for the entrance to the mountain caves.
I try not to react, but she must see something in me because she cocks her head and smiles wickedly. “Something wrong, my wolf? Cramp? I didn’t expect you to be so out of shape.”
When I don’t say anything, she walks straight toward the entrance, as if she knows exactly where it is.
I rack my brain, trying to figure out if I slipped up.
I must have, though I can’t remember mentioning the tunnels to her.
When she asked where we had been for ten years, I said underground, but that could be anywhere.
How did she manage to find the primary entrance to the caves so quickly?
It’s not the only way in, but it is the most frequented and largest. It’s the primary evacuation route in case of trouble.
I was going to have to show her eventually—the fort has fallback and safety protocols, just like Lunameade.
Her job as my wife is to help ensure that all of our people follow the fallback plans and escape safely.
I just wasn’t expecting her to know this a few days into our marriage—or, at least, not without me telling her.
“Harlow?”
She shoves her hand between the edge of the pine boughs and tugs.
“It latches to keep out animals.” I step up beside her, caging her between the granite wall and my body. I bend down so my mouth is right next to her ear and guide her hand to the latch, trying to ignore the Stellarium-Blossoms scent of her skin.
The latch pops free. The hinges squeak softly as the large, round door swings open.
We’re immediately assaulted by the musty smell of the caves and the faint noise of farmers working deep within the tunnels.
Harlow squints into the dim sunstone glow. “Bigger than I expected.”
“Not the first time I’ve heard that.”
She glares at me. “My wolf, was that a joke? Are you well?” She touches her hand to my forehead. “Did my exceptional speed disorient you too much?”
I swat her hand away. “How did you know this was here?”
She leans against the lip of the cave, one hip jutted out.
Divine dammit . I thought the lingerie stretching was bad, but the fact that I know she’s not wearing anything under those stretchy skin-tight pants is worse. She looks sinful.
“I didn’t know until you helped me open the latch.”
“Bullshit.”
She had to have found it. Maybe in the library archives. We have never needed to hide such things, so it’s possible that I missed tucking a map away.
She drags the toe of her boot across the dirt in an arc and licks her lips. “Gaven may have talked to one of your huntsmen when he was a bit in the bottle.”
“Divine deliver me,” I grumble under my breath.
“What’s in there?” she asks.
“Farms grown by sunstone. Small rooms for families. We spent a year fully underground and then slowly took back the fort level by level.”
She doesn’t tease me about that. For all of her terrible qualities, a lack of compassion isn’t one of them. It’s possible she just feels guilty that it’s her family’s fault we have to rebuild in the first place.
Still, I saw it when we first rode into the fort and she stared at the scar in the wall. I see it again now as she peers into the dim tunnel and listens. She respects our grief.