Page 18 of Unleashed
"I think everyone here has seen my dick already, don't you?"
Hunter runs a hand over his face, exhaling through his nose. "Unfortunately for us all, yes. Piercings included."
"Wyatt, Lola is making pancakes. Put Gary outside first," Hunter tells his son. Wyatt slides off the bed, grabs Gary by the collar, and drags the goat out of the room. Gary goes willingly, because even the goat knows better than to argue when Hunter uses that tone.
I look at my brother. Really look at him. He's just like Dad. Same dark hair, same dark eyes, same way of standing in a doorway like he's holding the whole frame up. For a while after Dad died, I was scared the light behind those eyes was fading, like the weight of everything was slowly crushing him from the inside out. But since Lola, Hunter's come back to life. Not all the way. Enough to laugh. Enough to love. Enough to stand here grinning about a baby.
"Do I get pancakes? Seeing as I'm a guest."
He rolls his eyes. "Yeah. Then get your ass to work." He pauses, studying me. "You know, if you'd gotten laid last night, I'd have probably given you the day off."
I run my hand through my hair and look at the floor. "Well. Instead, I texted my ex. I've become that fuckin’ guy. Just shoot me."
Hunter chuckles, resting his hand on my shoulder. "I believe that's what they call yearning. Or pining? I don't fucking know. Women are into that."
"Desperate," I correct him.
He laughs. Then stops and studies me with that darkness in his eyes that misses nothing.
"You fuckin' said it, bro. Wait." He tilts his head. "You have fucked someone else since, right? You've been using your dick the last six years?"
I don't answer. I got a Jacob’s ladder to impress my girl. And she’s the only one who is ever going to make use of them.
"Ace Trent Sterling. Fuck off. You haven't?"
I shake my head. I can hear the shock in his tone. It ain’t something I publicly announce. I just have no interest in anyone else. My dick ain’t getting hard for another woman. Just my woman.
The one who doesn’t want me and lives in another damn state.
"For the last six years, I've been helping you run a one-hundred-and-fifty-thousand-acre ranch. Building a mafia empire. Oh, and becoming a bull riding champion. When the hell do I have time?"
He stares at me for a long beat. Not judging. Just… recalculating. Adjusting whatever picture he had of me in his head.
"Last night, for one." His voice is gentler now. "Do you think maybe it's time to let Harper go? She's not coming back, Ace."
I take a step back. The words land like a fist to the sternum.
"How do you know?"
"I don't. But how long are you prepared to wait for her? What if she's moved on?"
I rub my chest. Right over the spot where it hurts. Where it always hurts.
"Ouch."
She hasn't. I know she hasn't. Because I'm pretty sure when my soul mate moves on, I'll fuckin' drop dead. I'll be out on a bull, and my heart will just stop, and that'll be it—Ace Sterling, taken out not by two thousand pounds of angry Brahma, but by a five-foot-six journalist with honey-blonde hair and a smile that could end wars.
"I say this because I care about you, Ace. You've got a lot to offer. Settling down is the best damn thing to ever happen to me. Just maybe… consider the option there's someone else out there for you."
I nod. I get it. I understand where he's coming from. He's not being cruel, he's being a brother.
"Do you give Colten this same lecture?" I ask, grabbing my T-shirt from the floor.
"Colten ain't pining over a woman. He's doing just fine."
I scoff and pull the shirt on, catching sight of the tattoo on my hip as the fabric drags across it. A small sun. Golden ink, faded a little now, the rays reaching out across the bone.
I got it the week after she left. Walked into the shop on Main Street, sat in the same chair where she held my hand while I got my dick piercings, and asked the artist to put a sun where only I would see it. Because that's what she was. My sunshine. My Goldie. And even if she wasn't mine anymore, I wanted to carry her somewhere close.
