Chapter 113: The Bear Heard No the First Time

Dove dropped her bag beside the bed. Outside their window, Hollis was still admiring the necklace she had already refused. "If he offers that necklace again, I’m going to make him eat it."

"That’s my girl," Thorne said, setting down the blankets. Edrik chuffed from the front room, and Dove felt considerably better about their choice of company.

Their rooms stood at the quiet end of the truck stop’s rear courtyard. Edrik’s cot faced the outer door; the bedroom opened behind it, with a window overlooking a narrow fenced service gap. Across the courtyard, their pickup sat beside the repair bays. The diner was through the main gate, close enough that she could smell onions frying when the wind changed.

They ate hot sandwiches and soup, then went to bed before Hollis could invent another reason to visit.

Day Fifty-Three began with her pond-water wash and Sprout complaining that she had dismissed three suggestions about her romantic progress.

"You survived," she told it privately. "I’m proud of you."

Today’s stock was four boxes of breakfast burritos, six large ones in each. She kept one for four Favor and sold the others to workers for soap, flour, and canned fruit. Thorne added fried potatoes to their breakfast, and Edrik ate enough to make her grateful she hadn’t tried feeding him one sad tortilla.

Sprout displayed a food chest upgrade. Could she see the stock for the next few days instead? She needed to plan meals and sales. It would only show what was available now. Dove shut the screen. Fine, she would plan around what she owned, starting with breakfast before it went cold.

After breakfast, Thorne went to check the truck’s straps and fuel. Dove stored the soap, then found Edrik folding his blanket in the front room. His shirt pulled across his shoulders when he bent, and she took a moment to appreciate having a very good reason to stand in the doorway.

"Do you always make your bed, or are you trying to impress me?"

"Is it working?" Edrik asked. Dove smiled. "A little. Don’t ruin it by becoming unbearable."

He sat on the cot, leaving enough room for her to pass. Dove stepped between his knees instead and took his hand. She placed it at her waist before he could spend the morning politely wondering where it belonged.

"That clear enough?" she asked. Edrik looked up at her, smiling. "I’d hate to misunderstand."

She kissed him before he could become any more pleased with himself. His arm settled around her, drawing her closer without making her fight for room. When she broke the kiss, she stayed against him and touched the rough hair along his jaw.

"You’re very distracting for somebody who barely talks." "I could start talking."

"Don’t threaten me with a good time." He laughed, and Dove buried her face against his shoulder, giggling because his hand had found a ticklish place at her side. She caught his wrist, but she didn’t move away.

A knock sounded. Before anyone answered, the outer door opened.

Hollis stood there with a folded dress, staring at Dove tucked against Edrik. "What the fuck? He isn’t even your mate."

Dove’s laughter stopped. She had left the door unlocked for Thorne, not invited the keeper’s son into her morning.

"And you aren’t my anything. Get out." Hollis stepped inside anyway. "I’ve been courting you, and you’re letting him put his hands all over you?"

Edrik set Dove safely on her feet, stood, and caught Hollis by the throat. The gorilla grabbed his wrist, suddenly looking much less certain of himself. Edrik walked him backward through the doorway as though his enormous body weighed nothing.

Then he threw him across the yard. Hollis hit the fence shoulder-first and went down among broken boards. Thorne was already crossing from the pickup. He stopped between their room and the gathering workers, making it clear nobody else was coming through that doorway.

Dove stared at Edrik’s back. "Damn. That was hot."

He turned immediately. Hollis coughed behind him, very much alive and apparently reconsidering the morning. Edrik came back before the gorilla could recover enough breath for another complaint.

"You did let go of me, though," Dove added, smiling despite the mess.

"Sorry I left you, my little Dove." He brushed his knuckles along her cheek, and her stomach did something deeply inconvenient.

"Little Dove, huh? Okay, I like that." For a moment, with his attention entirely on her, she forgot the audience. Then Hollis swore at Thorne for blocking his way, and Edrik’s expression changed.

Dove pressed a hand to his chest. "Stop right there, mister. Let me handle this part."

He stayed beside the door while she walked into the yard. Thorne left her a clear path, and she stopped well beyond Hollis’s reach.

"I kissed him because I wanted to," she said. "I refused you because I didn’t. This is not a difficult puzzle."

Hollis struggled upright against the fence. "You didn’t have to let him do that."

"You didn’t have to come into my room. Look at all the choices we had."

A worker suddenly found his boots fascinating. Dove didn’t wait for the gorilla to invent a better excuse. She told him to take his dress, his necklace, and whatever remaining optimism he possessed somewhere else.

Back at the doorway, she caught Edrik’s hand. "I like the bad boy. I also like finishing my coffee without somebody dying in the yard. He’s outside now, so leave him there."

"Unless he tries again," Edrik said. Dove squeezed his hand. "Then we’ll deal with again. Right now I’m asking you to stay with me."

His fingers closed around hers. "That part is easy."

Thorne glanced at the room’s flimsy catch. "We’ll fix the door and this gate. I’m not spending every meal waiting for him to wander in."

Dove agreed. Thorne could reshape scrap from the repair bay into bars. Edrik could hold it firm while touching it, but she wanted something that worked when both men were asleep. They would need ordinary fittings too.

Sprout waited until she was back beside Edrik before reporting Favor from their earlier affection. The sales and kept stock were settled, but her exercise task remained unfinished. She dismissed it as Caldwell hurried through the yard’s main gate.

He stopped beside his son, taking in the broken fence before looking at Dove.

"Somebody," he said, "is going to explain why my son can barely breathe."

Dove picked up the rejected dress. If he expected an apology to come wrapped inside it, his morning was about to get worse.