He smiled and let out a breath. “Jessie Ann, if you wanted something fancy, you just had to say.”
“Fancy?”
“Yeah.” He carefully placed her back on the porch. “We can wait until we get back to the city, and then we can go somewhere real nice. Just what you’d want. I know you’re used to better now, and I should have thought of that before. I’m sorry.”
When she plowed that fist into his stomach, all he could do was stare at her.
“What was that for?”
“You think it’s all about money? Is that what you think?”
“Woman—”
“Don’t you ‘woman’ me. For you to think I’m that shallow and insipid and that it’s all about money is just rude!”
“Then what do you want?”
She threw up her hands. “Everything!” She stepped away from him. “And until you can give me that, we have nothing else to say to each other.”
Without another word or punch, she walked around him and headed back to the house.
He followed. “Jessie Ann—” But she slammed the door in his face, leaving him standing outside in the cold.
Jess leaned back against the door, fighting tears she’d never allow to come. He wasn’t worth one damn tear. Not one.
She glanced around the room and every dog stared at her. Pup and adult. All she saw was sympathy and warmth. They all loved her as only dogs could. They knew what she wanted. What she needed from Bobby Ray Smith. Because they understood her completely. Even if he didn’t.
Sabina walked up to her and handed her a bag of dark chocolate chips.
“Here, my friend.”
“Thanks.”
“You want hug?”
Jess nodded, feeling particularly pathetic but not caring. Sabina hugged her tight, then her Pack was there in one massive group hug that would completely freak out most people.
Ronnie jumped when the front door slammed open, and she blinked in surprise when she heard Bobby Ray Smith of all people yell, “She is driving me insane!”
He yanked off his jacket, threw it across the room, and stormed into the kitchen. She scrambled over Shaw and the back of the couch, making it to the kitchen as Smitty grabbed hold of a bottle of tequila from one of the cabinets.
“Oh, no, you don’t.” She took hold of the top and yanked. He yanked back. “Bobby Ray, you give me that bottle this minute.”
Bobby Ray snarled at her—he’d never snarled at her before—and yanked the bottle with one hand while shoving her back with the other. Ronnie stumbled back and watched as he unscrewed the cap. He almost had it to his lips when his sister walked up behind him, slammed her foot into his instep and, when he gasped in pain, snatched the bottle from his hand.
“What happened?” she asked, walking to the other side of the kitchen.
“None of your damn business.” He stormed toward her. “Now give me—”
Sissy Mae held the bottle up, aiming right for her brother’s head. “Just try it.”
Smitty stared at his sister, probably debating whether she’d really hit him with it. He had to know she would.
“I’m out of here.”
They watched him storm out the back door, strip, shift, and take off into the woods behind Shaw’s house.
Ronnie let out a breath and looked at her friend.
“What?” Sissy asked. “You think I’d waste all this good tequila on that fat head?”
“Well, you did have me worried.”
The rest of the day went by slowly and uneventfully. Jess mostly stayed in the kitchen with May under the pretense of helping her bake cakes for Johnny’s birthday the following day; but since she couldn’t bake anything but chocolate chip cookies, she really stayed in there because no one would bother her. May said little and Jess sat in a corner and re-read Tolkien’s The Two Towers for perhaps the ninety millionth time.
But even J.R.R. couldn’t distract her from thoughts of Smitty. It hadn’t been easy walking away earlier. But she knew she had to. Knew she had to walk away and not look back. Not if she wanted all of him. The man who came to her that afternoon might as well have been a full-human for all the passion he showed her. A Beta with extremely low expectations of his mate.
As soon as he took her hand, she could see their lives played out in front of her. Nice quiet, simple lives with about as much passion and love as you could get out of a vibrator. She’d rather be alone than live that way. She’d only known her parents fourteen years, but what she always felt certain in was their love of each other. It was passionate and wild and beautiful, and she was the product of that.
If she wanted a solid but passionless relationship, she’d start returning Sherman Landry’s calls. But she didn’t want Sherman Landry or the boring relationship he could offer. Jess wanted more. And in that disgusting bathroom off the turnpike, she really thought she’d found that with Smitty. Then he’d pushed her away. Not comfortable with what he’d felt. With the Smith inside him.
Sure, she could tell him what her problem was. She could tell him how she wanted a true Smith mating because that’s how she’d know she meant everything to him. But she knew Smitty enough to know he’d simply fake it to make her happy. He’d take her to bed, fuck her stupid, maybe get a little rough with her, and mark her. But it wouldn’t change a damn thing. It wouldn’t make him okay with who he was and always would be simply due to his DNA strain.
Jess now realized, as she dragged herself up to her room on the top floor, that she’d never have him—hell, never want him—until he could accept who and what he was. You had to accept it before you could go beyond it. Instead, Smitty probably spent more time fighting his desires than moving to the next stage of his life.
It broke her heart, but to be blunt, it wasn’t her problem. As her mother used to say, “Some things a body just has to figure out on their own.”
Jess walked into her room and closed the door. She really hoped she could shake this by tomorrow morning. They had a full day planned for Johnny and she wanted his seventeenth birthday to be a blast for him. What she definitely didn’t want was to bring the whole thing down by being a sad sack.
She sat on her bed, untying and toeing off her boots. She briefly debated changing into night clothes, but she simply lacked the energy or desire. So she flipped off the light and stretched out on the bed.
After a few minutes, she caught his scent. She hadn’t noticed it before since she’d been unable to get the essence of it out of her head in the first place.
She sighed. “What do you want, Smitty?”
He stepped out of the shadows. At least he looked as miserable as she felt.
“I know you don’t want to see me right now.”
“You’re right.”
“But I don’t want to sleep alone again tonight. I miss you, Jessie Ann.”
“The same way I miss my dogs after I dropped them off at the kennel yesterday?”
He went from miserable to angry in about two seconds. “What the hell does that mean?”
Too tired to argue, she turned on her side. “Forget it. It doesn’t mean anything.”
She heard him take a deep breath, trying to calm that temper he insisted on hiding from her. “Do you mind if I stay?” he asked.
“Whatever.”
She heard his coat drop to the floor, followed by his boots. Then, fully dressed, he crawled into bed with her. He spooned her from behind, one arm tight around her waist, the other curving over her head on the pillow. She reached down and pulled the comforter over them before she settled back in.
He snuggled in closer, burying his face in the back of her neck. She placed her hand over the one on her waist, her fingers sliding between his. He closed his hand, locking his fingers around hers.
Like that they fell asleep and Jess realized nothing in her life had ever felt so right before.