23. Oz
Oz
We spend hours trying to get through the door with no luck. We tried manhandling it. We tried pickaxes. We even tried fancy little tools courtesy of Furyon’s tool kit.
Nothing worked. Eventually we gave up for the day and went back to Wilder’s place to change and get ready for dinner at Bluebell’s. There hasn’t been a single moment to talk about last night or anything other than Willa’s intense desire to get through that damn door.
Wilder’s quiet as we leave the Keeper’s mansion and head left toward the outskirts of town. His hands are tucked into the front pockets of his jeans. I wonder how he’d feel if I asked to hold one. Would that be too weird?
He smiles softly at me. “What’s got those elevens between your eyes, Oz?”
I cock my head to the side, confused. “Elevens?”
He chuckles, that low, throaty noise I love so much. “Something my mama says, the little lines between your eyebrows when you’re scowling or frowning.”
“I like it.” I beam up at him. “Your mama sounds sweet.”
He nods, pulling his hands out of his pockets. When he offers me one with a little smile, my heart swells a thousand times bigger in my chest. It can’t possibly be beating, but that little gesture is more than I ever got from Saint.
Fingers trembling, I take his hand, slotting my fingers between his in a way that’s comfy. He’s got five to my three but it works.
Gods it works.
He’s all smile as we walk in silence up the street toward the edge of town. We pass Glimmer Potions House and the Auction House before he says anything else.
“So…last night. Should we talk about it?”
I nod. “Last night was great.” Figure I might as well go first.
He looses a breath. “I was hoping you’d say that. I wasn’t expecting last night, Oz, but it was perfect for me and I thought about it all day.”
“Me too.” I glance up, wrapping my free hand around our joined hands, desperate to touch more of him. “And I kinda wish we hadn’t agreed to evening plans that start in a little bit, because it would be nice to stay in, wouldn’t it?”
He smiles and pulls me closer. Heat from his body warms my skin and I tuck against his side. At the last minute, I second guess myself and look up.
“Is this okay?”
“More than okay.” That’s all he says as he keeps focused on the road ahead of us.
We make it back to his cottage quickly but there’s just enough time to shower and change before we need to head to Bluebell and Hadrian’s place.
Wilder offers to drive, and to my intense surprise, opens the truck door for me like a fucking gentleman. I could cry at how nice that is. A door opener?!
We talk about everything and nothing on the way out to their ranch. Nothing important, really, just everyday things. Last night doesn’t come up again. When we pull up in front of the newly renovated ranch house, he hops out quickly and opens the door for me again.
I’m in the middle of a flustered thank you when someone clears their throat. Glancing up, I smirk at finding Bluebell in a gorgeous sweater dress, standing on the porch grinning at me.
“You two are a sight for sore eyes,” she calls out. “You ever bust Willa out of that lair?”
Wilder chuckles. “Not hardly. She won’t come up for days; she wasn’t kidding about that.”
Bloob waves us toward the front door. “C’mon, guys. Hadrian just found those books about your bulls, Wilder. He’s pretty excited to show them to you.”
When she disappears inside, Wilder and I share a look. The slightest downturn of his plush lips have me wondering how he feels.
Reaching for his hand again, I pull it close. “You okay? We don’t have to do this if it feels too…personal.” He’s having second thoughts about this, I bet. It pretty much feels like a date and—
Wilder steps close, hovering his mouth over mine as he brings a hand to my left ear and strokes the length of it.
“I was buried inside you last night, Oz. Nothing could be more personal than that.”
A shudder wracks me. “Yeah but this is personal and public. I understand if that—”
“Stop worrying about whether I’m comfortable.
” His tone is full of command as he drags those warm fingers down my jaw line.
“If I didn’t want to be here, I wouldn’t be.
It’s as simple as that, alright? Don’t let Saint-Fucking-Ashbourne’s garbage behavior guide your expectations of me.
What you see with me is what you get, alright? ”
Gods is it ever that easy with someone?
“I’ll try to keep that in mind,” I whisper as I nuzzle against his big hand.
He grins down at me. “Good. Shall we?”
“Yeah.” What’s that feeling inside me right now?
It’s happiness threaded through with the most intense butterflies.
Ninety percent of me dreads going inside and losing the way he’s looking at me.
The other ten percent just wants to show him off, to show off whatever this thing is blossoming between us.
He breaks the gaze first and spins us toward the house. We make it inside with minimal fuss other than me staring at his huge, muscular back and trying not to drool over it.
Hadrian meets us at the door with a couple meads in hand, which bums me out because Wilder drops my hand to take one. I take the other as Hadrian waves us back through a beautifully appointed living room toward a glass-ceilinged kitchen.
When we take our seats on the edge of the island, Bluebell smiles from where she’s chopping carrots. She points up at the ceiling.
“Opens up so he can fly out. How cool is that?”
Hadrian beams at her and my mouth goes dry. Wilder looked at me like that last night and I want it all the time, this easy thing my friends have.
“You need a ceiling like that,” Wilder says thoughtfully, eyes drifting to the wings tucked at my back. “Although jumping out of your back wall must be pretty nice, too. For the millionth time, I wish I had wings.”
Bluebell waggles her dark brows at us. “Oh just hop into Oz’s arms. I bet he’d be happy to carry you.”
Hadrian slaps her on the butt with his tail spade, shooting her a look that tells me he probably told her to behave before we came over. He should know by now that behaving isn’t really in Bluebell’s DNA.
Two hours later, we’re all appropriately liquored up and Wilder’s talking about the Sandoval bulls, Hadrian’s books spread out over the kitchen island. Wild points at a picture of a big chestnut and white bull.
“Cherry Bomb was the first Sandoval bull to be a world champion, meaning he bucked off his rider at the championships. Pretty much the backbone of the Sandoval bucking line.”
I’m staring at him with my head in one hand, soaking in this effusive version of the quiet male.
Hadrian’s brows scrunch. “And so you’re buying the bulls. I assume you’ll make changes to the breeding program?”
Wilder nods. “Yeah. I own three bulls out of Brazil. They’re at a ranch down there right now, growing into their muscles.
They’re smaller and they don’t mature as fast as the Sandoval line.
” He barks out a wry laugh. “When I went down on a buying trip the ranchers down there told me their bulls pretty much suck with a bucking dummy until they’re about four or five. ”
Bluebell refills Wilder’s mead flagon. “So how do you know they’ll actually be good, then?”
Wilder shrugs. “It’s a gamble, but some of their older bulls are crushing on the circuit right now so I’m hoping that gamble pays off.
” He looks around our group, eyes wrinkling in the corners as he smiles big.
“See, most bulls come out of the chute and they either start spinning or they just seesaw forward and back. These bulls tend to leap big and high which is hard to hang onto. Then they’re unpredictable; they do a combo of moves and that’s really damn hard to ride. ”
I’m literally going to come listening to him talk about this, because I can picture him riding and it’s so fucking sexy. Gah!
Wilder’s smile grows softer. “It was actually a Brazilian bull from the ranch I bought mine at who injured my shoulder. I was ready for him to be a spinner, but he spun then bucked up high and tossed me like a piece of chewin’ gum.”
He rubs his shoulder and I grimace.
“Good weather detector,” he offers with the partial return of his smile. “But yeah, that bull pretty much killed my career. I was thinking of retirement anyhow…it’s a hard sport on your body.” He glances up at Hadrian. “I’m guessing you can sympathize with that playing skyball, though.”
Hadrian swings a wing around Bluebell, pulling her close. The way they smile at one another is so beautiful, so inspiring.
“If I didn’t have her magic to fix me up, I don’t know what I’d do.”
“I didn’t realize how bad I was hurt,” Wilder continues.
“So I didn’t see a healer fast enough. By the time I realized things were torn up, it was much harder to fix.
A witch did what he could but my shoulder never was the same and I didn’t feel comfortable riding… couldn’t hang on the way I used to.”
I’m about to say I think he rides just fine, but then I realize that’s probably a bit much.
Still, the words are on the tip of my tongue and as Wilder continues talking about the bulls he bought in Brazil, I realize he’s in his happy place.
I’m just thrilled I get to be in it with him.