“Not even close. Jamie’s right. You need rules. You are not to talk about yourself that way again.” His hand smacked against her other cheek. He wasn’t playing. Hope groaned at the sharp, stinging pain.
Noah continued. “You’re not some chick I banged. You’re Hope. You’re my girl. Maybe sex is some easy exchange of bodily fluids for you, but it isn’t that way for me. You’re the only woman I’ve slept with in years. I do not take what happened lightly.” Another smack, this one to the center of her ass.
Hope whimpered but didn’t complain. The pain bit into her flesh, but his words were a balm.
Two more righteous slaps. “And I am not willing to give up. Jamie might be pissed, but if we play this right, he’ll also be in. He can be mad as hell at me and still want you. I want you. He wants you. You can bring us all together. You’re the piece of the puzzle that’s been missing.”
He spanked her until she’d counted ten slaps, every one a hot reminder that he wasn’t going to allow her to go anywhere. He wasn’t going to let her disappear.
He finally stood, picking her up and setting her on her feet. His face was flushed, and she could see through his jeans that he was hard again. “Now go and do what you were told.”
She turned toward her bathroom, her hands shaking but not with anxiety this time. With a little bit of wonder. Noah was showing her a whole world she’d only dreamt of. “I won’t let you bully me.”
She felt the need to put in some rules of her own.
“I’m sure you’ll let me know when I cross the line.”
She closed the bathroom door with a quiet snick and took a deep breath.
She wasn’t going anywhere.
Chapter Nine
“So he just left Noah there?” Nell asked, smoothing out the canvas that covered one of four tables inside her small, newly erected tent.
Hope picked up the next canvas and began covering the table to Nell’s left. The tables were set up in some weird feng shui that Nell said would bring happiness to her customers and reasonable, economically kind profits to the business. Nell believed in fair trade. “He did. I got into the truck and before Noah could follow, James just took off. I barely managed to get the door closed.”
At least James had waited until Butch was safely in the backseat. The poor boy had whined as he’d watched his master being left behind, but when James had dropped her off, Butch had followed him back to the truck and jumped inside.
Nell crossed her arms over her chest, and her Birkenstocks tapped against the grass. “Well, that just seems rude. It’s bad enough that Jamie drives that gas-guzzling truck, but as long as he’s doing it, he should take as many passengers as he can.”
Henry chuckled as he walked in behind them. “I think Jamie isn’t deeply concerned with his fuel emissions right now.”
“Well, he should be. I left him a pamphlet and everything.”
Henry dropped a quick kiss on his wife’s cheek. “I would bet that Jamie is realizing that Noah is going to be competition for him.”
“Competition?” Nell asked.
Damn Henry. He was too smart for Hope’s own good. “They’re just brothers, and they have a lot to work out.”
“And they want the same woman.” Henry regarded her with a sunny smile. For all his intellectualism, Henry was kind of a hunk. He was leaner than most of the men in Bliss, but there was a strength to his frame. “I have long suspected that Jamie thought you would just hang out and be waiting for him when he was ready to get married.”
“That’s ridiculous.” Except that was what she’d kind of been doing. She hadn’t gone out with Logan when he’d asked. That had worked out for the best because they had been really good friends. There had been a couple of men over the months who had asked, and she’d turned them all down. She’d told herself she simply wasn’t ready to date, but she wasn’t ready to give up on James even while he screwed his way through half the females in Colorado.
“And it’s not very romantic,” Nell protested. She took the end of the canvas and started to help Hope lay it out. “I think I prefer Noah’s version of courtship. He couldn’t take his eyes off you yesterday.”
“And Jamie couldn’t help but stare holes through Noah,” Henry pointed out.
“He’s mad because Noah left,” Hope explained.
Henry sighed and leaned against the table that was meant for environmentally friendly blankets. “I wasn’t here when Noah was in town. I came to Bliss a couple of months later, but I remember how the town was reeling. It was hard. They were counting on him. No one more than his brother.”
Hope was deeply interested in any insights about the way James and Noah worked. “I guess I don’t understand. I mean, I get that Zane and Nate were friends and fell for the same woman and decided to share her rather than fight. I get that. But they didn’t go out looking to share a woman.”
“Oh, I don’t think you understand Nate and Zane at all,” Henry said. “Hope, I actually envy them in some ways.”
Nell smiled brightly. “He says that but he wouldn’t share me.”
“Not at all, my love. But that’s because the relationships in this town aren’t about fantasies or sex. If I’d had a brother I was close to or if I’d had a friend who felt like the other half of me, I would have been happy to share you because you can be trouble.”
Nell didn’t seem at all offended by Henry’s statement. Her eyes sparkled with mirth. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Henry.”
Henry leaned over and touched his nose to hers. “So much trouble.” He turned back to Hope. “If I could have a partner I could trust, I would share her. Look, I’m hetero. I was born that way. So were Nate and Zane, but they love each other, too. The relationships Zane and Nate and Rafe and Cam and even the Doc and Alexei have are deeply intimate. They don’t simply share a woman. They share a life. They share a family and their problems and their worries. They take comfort in the presence of the other. It’s a beautiful thing.”
Nell took a long breath. “It is. You explain it so well, Henry. I’m going to go write that down.” She turned back, her eyes wide. “Not for any reason other than the fact that it’s lovely. I’m not writing a book or anything. I’ll bring back the dream catchers.”
Nell scurried away.
Henry laughed and started to move boxes onto the tables. “You take a seat, Hope. You’re supposed to be resting. I told Nell we could handle this, but she seemed to think you would need a break.”
Nell understood her. “Yeah, I’m not finding the Circle G to be the most relaxing place in the world.”
Except she’d had the sweetest sleep in years the night before because she’d slept between them.
“You could come back with us,” Henry offered.
“No.” The word came out of her mouth before she could call it back. Despite all the crap, she didn’t really want to leave the ranch. The idea of not seeing them again cut through her like a knife.
Henry smiled. “Then there’s your answer.”
Yep. There was her dumb-ass answer. She should be on a bus to god knew where, but she would get back in the truck when James came in a few hours. She would just have to pray that someone picked Noah up and gave him a ride back.
Noah. She could still feel his hands on her, his deep voice commanding her. He had made her forget everything except him. In that moment, there had been nothing except the two of them. What would it have been like if James had been there?
“You talked about friends. Zane and Nate were partners and friends. So were Rafe and Cam. But is it any different for Max and Rye?” She couldn’t help but think about what James had said.