Chapter 42
Lineout Reset: Restarting play cleanly after a disruption.
Translation: A metaphor for reconciliation.
Wolf
“Your Dragon Daddy is home,” I say, stroking my lizard under his chin from Everly’s bedroom, where she’s been keeping him.
“He’s been depressed since you left,” she says, her voice soft and teasing.
“He’s not the only one,” I murmur, closing the tank and sighing heavily.
I turn and lean on her dresser, grateful to be done with the event and finally allowed a moment alone with the girl who has
consumed all my thoughts this week.
She’s standing at the foot of her bed in her sweet little dress. Her skin glows from the bedside lamp, and the familiar scent
of this space makes me ache inside.
“That was quite the show you put on down there tonight,” I offer, flashing back to the frantic look on her face as she jumped
off the stage and bid on me like her life depended on it.
“Tell me about it.” She winces with an adorable, bemused expression. “Was it too much?”
I lose all sense of humor, my heart thundering in my chest at it. “You know it wasn’t.”
She sighs with relief as she eliminates the space between us, sliding her hands up around my neck.
“Does this mean the whole Fletcher family is Team Wolf?” I ask as I recall the way her uncles all eyed me with knowing smirks as I held Everly’s hand most of the night.
“I dare say yes.” She presses her body against mine in a way that makes my blood heat. “I think they knew it before me, even.
And I don’t have any excuse other than everything you said to me at the bench. I was just scared.”
“I’m scared too,” I reply, running my hands up her sides, trying to soothe that furrow in her brow. “I’ve never been this
vulnerable either, but recently, I decided to quit fighting my past and just let myself be happy with today.”
“Oh yeah?” Everly’s brows lift curiously. “What inspired this development?”
“You, Stretch.” I lean in and press my lips to hers, drinking her in like a drug. “You inspire me in so many ways.”
Her tongue teases mine in a light, sensual kiss. One of connection and understanding. She pulls away to say, “So what, now
we’re both going to end up in Denver and live happily ever after?”
My brows furrow. “Are you moving in with me?”
“What? No!” she sputters, her face turning red instantly.
I can’t help but smile and squeeze her close. It’s fun to watch her struggle through all this. The girl who has dedicated
her life to helping people fall in love has trouble managing it all herself.
But I can be patient.
She’s worth it.
“I am thinking of applying for this job in Denver with a tech company,” she says by way of explanation.
I jerk my head back to get a good look at her because she hasn’t mentioned this to me before. “Denver? Really?”
“Yeah, I mean . . . this job with Trista was always temporary. And obviously, I have to get the job first, but I think that’s
my next step.”
I struggle to hide the fucking elation pulsing through my body, my smile completely giving me away.
To have Everly in Denver near me . . . it feels like a dream.
Like somehow, I’m getting everything I want without having to fight for it.
It’s fucking incredible. I lean down and press a kiss to her lips, unable to keep myself off her after this news she just casually dropped.
“So, you want to be in Denver, then? You could be happy there?”
“Yeah, for sure. It’s close to home but not, like, in the backyard close. And I’m ready for a place of my own . . .” A dirty
smile spreads across her face. “But I’m hoping you’ll come by for sleepovers.”
I groan as I pull her into my body, showing her just how much I like that plan.
She pushes back against me to continue talking. “But if you end up going back to Ireland for that other team, we can figure
that out too,” she says, her blue eyes wide and blinking rapidly as her brain enters that planning mode that it loves so much.
“I mean it, Wolf. I don’t want you turning down a dream team opportunity for me. I won’t freak out. I love Ireland too . .
. maybe I could even move there with you.”
“With me?” My heart stutters inside my chest at the gauntlet she just dropped. “You’d do that? You’d move away from your whole
family for me?”
“Yes.” Her face twists in pain as she shrugs helplessly. “I love you.” She adds it in an exasperated, surrendering tone. “I’m
sorry I couldn’t say it sooner,” she rushes out, clearly registering the shock on my face. “One minute, I was just . . . doing
what I always do. Talking. Selling. Playing the part of Everly the Matchmaker . . . and then suddenly . . .” She trails off,
shaking her head with a laugh. “I wasn’t talking about why other people should love you. I was admitting why I already do.”
I drink in her words . . . letting them soothe a wound inside of me I’ve long suppressed.
For so long, I’ve carried this gnawing ache that I wasn’t worth loving.
That if I let someone close, I’d only hurt them, the way I once hurt Finn.
The way I’ve hurt myself more times than I care to count.
But in a way, it feels like Everly’s been stitching me up from the inside without even realizing it.
Letting myself fall for her has eased that fear and anger that I’ve carried since I was a kid too scrawny to stand up for myself.
And I’ve never wanted to kiss anyone so badly in my life.
However, this girl I love still has more to say, apparently. “If we get serious, we could figure out a move to Ireland together,”
she continues, her brows furrowed deep in thought. “I’m sure I could find work out there, especially with a degree from Trinity.
Or maybe I go back to school and get my master’s.”
“If we get serious?” I laugh and tilt my head at her. “Love, I’ve never been more serious about anyone in my life.”
She quirks a brow, clearly pleased with that response. “That’s good because we have a child to think of now.”
My jaw drops as my heart comes to a dead stop in my chest.
“I can’t be in love with a Deadbeat Dragon Daddy.” She bites her lip and giggles, and I slowly close my eyes and shake my
head. She squeezes me teasingly, and I growl as I press my forehead to hers and fight against the burn in my throat.
The burn isn’t from holding back anger like it usually is. It’s from relief. From this impossible, bone-deep comfort that
settles over me as I hold her in my arms and listen to her laughter, accepting her teasing like a drug I can’t get enough
of.
I move in and capture her mouth with mine, no longer able to be patient. I need to feel this girl’s skin on mine again. Being
apart from her was more painful than I could have ever fathomed.
Fergie’s flat felt like a prison cell as I lay in bed alone, thinking of her on Fletcher Mountain, at a place I grew to love this summer.
I hated the idea of ending it all in such utter misery.
Fletcher Mountain gave me a gift—a sense of family and connection that I had never experienced before.
To have it all end in such heartbreak of losing Everly felt like another painful loss.
But now, all is right in the world. She is mine . . . this place I’ve created here is mine, and it’s going to take a hell
of a lot more than her fear of being too much to push me away again.
Our tongues dance as I move us to the bed, leaving a trail of clothes all the way back to our dragon. She grips my cock, and
I hiss into her shoulder, grumbling a noise deep in my chest as I let her push me onto the bed and watch as she climbs over
top of me.
I inhale sharply as she positions me against her center, sliding my head along her slick heat. The familiar skin-on-skin contact
between us jolts me back to life. Every breath, every heartbeat, every brush of skin is like a medication I was in desperate
need of.
My body knows what it needs.
Her.
Always her.
She releases a stuttering breath as she inches me inside of her. “Come inside me, Conri. I want to feel you dripping out of
me.”
“Christ, love,” I groan as I slide my hands up over her rib cage and around her breasts.
My grip tightens as I let her have this control when every instinct in me wants to take charge. To roll her over and fuck
her until we can’t see straight. But the way she looks at me . . . like I’m worth something, like I’m more than my mistakes
. . . it’s something I want to savor.
I glance down and watch her sink down onto me, seating herself fully on my lap. She’s so wet I could come right here, right
now. But I hold back. I fight off my own arousal as she grinds over me, her expression one of wanton abandon as she takes
what she needs from me as well.
“Tell me you missed me,” I command, my voice rough as I ache to hear her confirm everything I’m feeling.
“I missed you, baby,” she pants, lifting herself up and slamming herself back down.
Baby.
It’s intimate and pure. A term of endearment I’ve never had. And one I want forever.
My fingers flex on her hips. “Tell me you want me,” I croak, needing even more.
“I want you,” she says on command like the good girl she is.
My pulse thunders in my chest as I strain to hold myself back. “Tell me you love me,” I say on a sigh, desperate to combine
the lust and the love in this beautiful moment.
She stills on top of me, her closed eyes opening and finding mine in the warm lamplight. A small smile tugs at the corner
of her mouth as she glides one hand over my cheek. “I love you so much.”
And it’s those words that snap my control. I roll her over and grip her wrists above her head and drive hard into her. She
screams with pleasure as the sensation of her slick flesh drives me fucking feral. Her legs grip me, her cries frantic as
her cunt tightens around me as I pump into her hard and fast. Having this girl in my arms, in this bed, around my cock—it’s
all too much. Too perfect. Too everything I always tried to never dream of. A wayward thought of putting a baby in her hits
me out of nowhere, and I feel my heart explode in my chest.
But that’s what this girl does to me. Everly Fletcher is endgame for me. She’s the light to my dark, the optimism to my pessimism.
She makes me dream about a future I didn’t even consider for myself. And I want it all with her.
I cover her mouth with mine and feel the gasp behind her lips, knowing her orgasm is close. I drag my lips down her chest and pull her nipple into my mouth. The harsh suck causes her to cry out again.
“Conri . . . oh my God.” Her nails dig into my back as she suddenly quakes around my length, her orgasm ripping through her
as her limbs tighten around me.
The pressure of her flesh around mine forces all the blood to rush to my tip, and before I can stop it, she pulls my own release
from me as well. I thrust hard into her one last time and give her what she asked for, pouring every bit of me inside of her.
I want her to have it. Every part of me belongs to her now, and I don’t want to know what life is without that reality.
I drape my sweat-soaked body over top of her, my head on her breast, chest burning with exertion as our hearts thunder in
unison against each other.
I press a kiss to her pulse and murmur against her collarbone, “Not to risk freaking you out again, but I think you might
be my soulmate, Everly Fletcher.”
She makes a clicking sound with her tongue. “I’m afraid you’re too late.”
“What do you mean?” I lift my head to look down at her because I know there is no way she didn’t feel everything I just felt.
A half smile teases her lips. “I can’t be your soulmate because that title already belongs to your sister.”
My brows furrow as I glare back at her. “In the future, can you possibly not mention my sister when I’m still inside of you?”
Her stomach shakes with laughter as she giggles in a way that erases all thoughts of my twin. I smile fondly at the girl I’m
madly in love with. “And I can live with you not being my soulmate as long as you still love me as much as I love you.”
She presses her lips to mine, murmuring against them, “I do, Conri. I love you way too much.”