Chapter 7
Valley couldn’t fall asleep Tuesday night, no matter what she tried.
She showered after Luke took her home, put on her favorite pjs, and climbed into bed like the sort of responsible adult who had a long day of driving ahead of her.
But despite telling her brain she needed to rest so she wasn’t a zombie tomorrow, all that was happening was her staring at the ceiling and replaying everything that had happened with Luke since they met.
Four days.
How had he come to mean so much to her after only four days?
And how did four days feel like a lifetime already?
She picked up her phone from where it was tucked under her pillow and groaned when she saw the time. Two a.m.
She opened her texts and re-read the last one Luke had sent when he’d gotten home after dropping her off.
Sleep well, sweetheart. Text me when you get up. I’ll be thinking of you.
She read it a few more times, although she had it memorized at this point.
Frustrated, she put the phone upside down on the mattress next to her and folded her hands across her chest.
Everything seemed very simple to Luke. She had a job waiting two hours away, so he was going to follow her there.
Just… walk away from his den and friends and job and house.
She knew that all mattered to him, and he mattered to his den.
But he still made it seem like it was just a logical choice to him.
While she was over here hemming and hawing about her choices.
She’d seen firsthand how he was respected by the den when he’d made a planter box for Maggie.
Not because she asked for one, but because he’d noticed that now that she was five months pregnant, she was having trouble tending to the flowers on her patio.
So, he’d made her a planter box on legs so she didn’t have to bend over to prune and water them.
Maggie’s mate Tyler had come home while they’d been there helping to move the plants over to the new box and he’d been so happy that Luke had built it for her, he’d clapped him on the shoulder like they were brothers.
Luke belonged in King Lake.
But he’d said the simple choice, the right choice for him, was to follow her to a town where he would be the only bear.
He would leave everything for her.
It was insane on a hundred different levels, but it was also the damn sweetest thing she’d ever had anyone do for her.
She sat up with a grumble and rubbed her eyes.
Resting her hands on the bed, she focused on the meandering thoughts in her head. She’d met him Friday. People didn’t fall in love in four days. They fell into bed and bad decisions, but not into forever. Love was supposed to take longer.
Right?
She stood and looked for slippers, but couldn’t find them, so she dug flip-flops out of one of the boxes and headed outside.
She made her way to her parents’ house under a sky full of stars, the warm June night smelling of the wood from her dad’s workshop and the honeysuckle her mom had planted around the house.
The back steps creaked as she walked up them, and when she opened the door, Kevin was there, wagging his tail and grumbling a greeting.
She patted his head.
She was going to call for her mom when she heard her parents’ bedroom door creak open and then shut, and her mom appeared, robe tied and hair loose around her shoulders.
“Hi, honey.”
She hugged her. “Did I wake you? I mean, I meant to but I’m sorry if I did.”
Her mom smiled. “I was reading. I should have gone to bed ages ago, but your dad was snoring and I couldn’t sleep, and then the book got really good.
” She gestured to the back door and they walked out and sat on the swing.
Kevin followed them, slumping to the deck with a sigh at their feet. “What’s up?”
Valley shared about how things had gone at the tavern on Tuesday, and what a great day they’d had. And then Margie’s call and Luke’s assurance that he would follow Valley anywhere.
“That’s a lot for a Tuesday,” her mom mused.
Valley snorted. “Yeah.” Then she sighed. “Mom, how can I be in love with him already? It’s been four dang days and I’m supposed to leave Friday.”
“Is the timing bothering you? Like do you feel that four days is too short to be in love?”
“Isn’t it?”
Her mom shrugged. “Love hits people differently. And Luke is a shifter. He has an intuition that you wouldn’t have as a human.
So the quick love feelings you’re having aren’t necessarily bad or wrong, they’re just not what you’re used to.
And you don’t have an animal nudging you toward your future like he does.
” She paused, staring out over the dark yard and field beyond, and then she said, “Some people build a life a brick at a time, carefully stacking and arranging, making sure everything is where it should be. And some people just go with the flow. They follow their hearts and their instincts. So you think that Luke doesn’t know what he’s doing when he says he’ll leave King Lake behind and follow you anywhere.
But he probably doesn’t understand why that is odd to you. ”
“I just don’t like the idea of him giving up everything for me when…” She didn’t finish her sentence.
“Because part of you is wondering why it’s so easy for him, when it feels impossible for you to do the same.”
“That makes me sound awful.”
“No, it makes you sound human. Luke has instincts you don’t.
His bear belongs with you and that’s all he needs to know.
You’re battling the human worries of this new romance hitting fast and what the future looks like, while you’re also navigating a career and move.
” She hummed out a sigh, and then continued, “You know my mom had big plans for me. When I strayed from her plans, she thought I was throwing my future away.”
She looked at her mom. “Were you?”
“No. I was choosing a future that was mine. It was my life to live. And although she never really forgave me for not choosing her safe, respectable path, I never doubted that I did what was best for me.”
“Was that choosing dad?”
She nodded with a smile. She reached over and took Valley’s hand.
“Honey, I’m not saying that Luke is right because he’s got shifter truemate instincts or that he’s clearly very devoted to you.
And I’m not saying the job with Margie is wrong.
I’m just saying that you’re allowed to ask yourself whether the plan still fits what you want your life to be, or if you’re clinging to it because it’s what you’ve been preparing for. You’re allowed to change your mind.”
Valley let the conversation settle between them as she leaned on her mom’s shoulder, the swing moving gently as her mom’s foot pushed off the porch.
It all sounded too simple. But hadn’t Luke said that? That the choice to go with her was not easy, but simple.
“I hate the idea of disappointing Margie. She gave me a chance when I needed one, and she kept giving me more responsibilities. And she’s trusting me to help her get the new location going.”
“Just because you’re grateful to her for what she did for you doesn’t mean you have to commit yourself to her forever.”
“True.”
“You’re not betraying her. Your life changed in a way that you didn’t plan.
And I’ll point out that she didn’t decide to relocate based on you.
She relocated because it was best for her.
Yes, she wants you to come with her, and yes she’s relying on you to an extent, but it was her decision to move where she did.
You should be honest with her about your relationship with Luke, repay the money, and be grateful for everything she did for you. It’s interesting.”
“What is?”
“That you don’t have to choose Luke or your job, you just have to choose here or there. Because he seems committed to going with you. And you never once said that you didn’t want to be with him.”
“I do want to be with him.”
“So here or there is the question. But you’re muddling it up with thinking about how fast you’ve fallen for him.
I gotta tell you, I fell for your dad so fast. Oh!
People thought I was nuts, your grandma included.
But I knew it. I knew the moment I saw him, beat up pickup truck, picking up a discarded school desk at the side of the road to turn into something wonderful, that he was the guy for me. ”
“Luke’s definitely the guy for me. I think I just need to talk to him.”
“That sounds like a very good idea.”
They sat in comfortable silence on the porch for a while longer, and then Valley kissed her mom on the cheek, patted Kevin on the head, and walked across the yard to her apartment. After changing out of her pjs into regular clothes, she got in her car and drove to King Lake.
The sun was just starting to peek over the horizon when she parked next to Luke’s truck and got out.
His house was dark and quiet. She wondered if she should have called or texted.
As she reached for her phone in her back pocket, the front door swung open and Luke – wearing only boxer briefs and looking far too yummy for dawn – stood in the doorway. “Valley? Are you okay?”
She opened her mouth but nothing came out.
His expression changed immediately, the surprise disappeared and sweet concern replaced it. In a heartbeat, his arms were around her and she sank against his warmth and strength as tears stung her eyes.
“I’m okay,” she said thickly.
He hugged her a little tighter. “You don’t seem okay. What’s going on? Talk to me.”
She spread her fingers across his warm back and listened to his steady heartbeat. “I couldn’t sleep.”
“I’ve been tossing and turning myself. Then I felt you before I heard your car pull into the drive.”
She stood in his embrace for a little bit, and then she said, “Can we go for a walk?”
“Yeah, let me grab some clothes.”
She stayed outside and faced the sunrise while he went into the house. By the time he came back out, the sun had cleared the treeline, bathing the lake in pretty golds and pinks. Linking their hands, they set out for the lake at a slow pace.
When they were about halfway around the lake, she stopped and stared across at the bears’ cul-de-sac. Other small subdivisions were around King Lake, all empty except for the bears, the wolves behind the tavern, and the dragons on the ridge.
She found her voice finally, and told him about her chat with her mom, her feelings about Margie and the job.
“When you said you’d follow me wherever I went, it caught me off guard. And it made me feel crappy for not dropping the job for you.”
“I don’t want you to feel that way. I want you to have your dreams, Valley.”
She turned to face him.
Damn, he was becoming her everything.
“I didn’t want to ask you to leave everything for me. You belong in King Lake,” she said.
“I belong with you. And you didn’t ask me to leave, I chose you. And I will, every time. Here, two hours away, the other side of the world? I’m with you.”
She inhaled shakily as everything cleared in her mind, the fork in the road suddenly making sense.
Fate had brought her and Luke together at this point in time because it was right for both of them.
If she’d not let Eisley talk her into going to The Howl, she would have packed up and moved away, never knowing the sweet bear was just across the bridge.
She couldn’t picture her life without him in it.
And even though he’d agreed to go with her, she couldn’t picture either of them away from King Lake.
“I love you.”
His brows lifted. “I love you too, Valley.”
“You do?” she asked, blinking at the tears.
“Yeah, of course. You’re my mate. I can’t imagine my life without you in it, and that’s how I know that you’re mine and I’m yours.
It might be fast, but that doesn’t mean it’s not right for us.
I love how talented you are in the kitchen.
How funny and sweet you are. I can’t wait to talk to you, to see you.
I feel like I’m half living when we’re not together. ”
The tears came then, and she couldn’t stop them, but she didn’t really try.
Luke held her until she stopped crying.
“I want to stay here,” she said, brushing at her wet cheeks when she was finally able to speak. “I have to call Margie and tell her I won’t be joining her. I was worried about her being mad at me, but I’m mad at myself for pushing you away so much in the beginning.”
“I’m not mad about that, you were still figuring me out.”
She smiled at him. Sexy bear.
“King Lake feels like home, and I think it’s because you’re here,” she said.
“We’ll figure it out as we go along,” he said. “If you want to stay here, I want to be by your side.”
She chewed on her bottom lip. “I don’t know what the future looks like. And despite my parents being free and breezy hippies, I do like to make plans.”
“Oh? You don’t say,” he said with a grin.
She laughed. “Just small plans. Like moving in together. Me finding a job.”
He moved close and cupped her face. “You becoming my mate in truth.”
She shivered. “I want all of it. With you.”
“You’ve got me. Forever.”
He kissed her and the world fell away as all the plans she’d made morphed and rearranged to include staying in King Lake and being with her mate.
It might only have been four days since they’d met, but she felt like she’d lived a lifetime in that short time. And in that lifetime? She’d found the love of her life.