Choices (7 page)

They walked in silence for a few moments. Taylor was unsure which subject she wanted to broach first. Eventually, she decided to bite the bullet.

“I’m sorry that I was with Hale tonight,” she said quietly.

“It’s fine.”

“No, it’s not fine,” she said. “I’m attracted to him. It feels different with him. It’s more sexual, but with you it’s like…”

“You love me,” Alder supplied.

Taylor would have stumbled, had Alder not had an arm around her waist.

“Am I wrong?” he asked.

“No,” she said, her voice cracking. “I do. At least, I think I do. But how can I love you and be attracted to your brother? And for that matter, how could you ever love me?”

Alder pressed his forehead against hers.

“I’m extremely pissed at Hale right now,” he told her. “I think it would be better if we discuss this when I’m less angry.”

She ran a hand across his cheek. “Okay, fair enough.”

The quail coop wasn’t pretty, by any stretch of the imagination, but it did look sturdy. At Taylor’s behest, they had moved the hutch a few yards away from the cabin and closer to the trees, as she was worried the smell would bother any guests with sensitive noses. A fence wrapped around the hutch, sectioning off an area of grass and dirt where the quail could scratch, peck, and stretch their legs.

“You did a great job,” Taylor remarked, smiling at Glenn.

He returned the smile. “I wouldn’t have been able to do it without your help.”

That was generous, to say the least. She’d helped with the frame, but Glenn had done everything else while she’d been away the night before, eloping with Hale and then Alder.

Her body ached at the memory of the previous night, and it wasn’t the good kind of ache. After feeding her and handling some business with Fenix, Alder had taken her back to his room.

It had been the first time she’d seen Alder’s room and it was wonderful. Part of the wall was open, letting in the night air and providing an amazing view of the stars. Taylor wished she’d been able to get a better look at the room, but Alder had pounced on her as soon as they’d entered.

They’d had sex,
twice
. Not wanting to remind him of how he’d found her with his brother, she couldn’t complain about how sore she was. Alder did seem to pick up on it, though, and during the second time he slowed down, taking her gently.

It had just been starting to get light out when they’d fallen asleep together. That had been, hands down, the best part of her night. Alder held her in his arms and she didn’t even care that it was too warm or that they were sweaty. She slept like a kitten.

“I suppose we actually have to find a quail now,” said Lark, stating the obvious.

Their heads turned in the direction of Fenix, who leaned against a nearby tree. The hawk shifter appeared to be wholly focused on cleaning his fingernails, but Taylor knew better. She doubted anything escaped his notice.

“We’d like to go quail hunting now,” Taylor said, aiming her sweetest smile in his direction.

He didn’t look up. “I don’t see why you need to go.”

Taylor bristled with annoyance. “I want to help.”

“What are you going to do, cheer them on?”

Before she could respond, Glenn put a hand on her shoulder. “He’s sort of right, Taylor. You won’t be much help. Lark and I will go. We’ll be back before you know it.”

“No, you go,” said Lark, waving her hands in a shooing motion. “Taylor and I have some things to do around the cabin.”

“We do?” Taylor asked.

Lark nodded with enthusiasm, taking Taylor by the hands. “Yup! We have to decorate.”

It was only once they were inside that Taylor realized Lark had only been trying to keep the peace. She was still annoyed that she couldn’t go with Glenn, but she was glad Lark had stayed with her to keep her company.

“I feel like a kid, lately,” Taylor said, flopping down on her bed. She’d given in and used the furs Hale had given her, making a pallet that was far more comfortable than she wanted to admit.

Lark cracked open a window, letting in a gust of cool air. Today had been the first day since Taylor had come to the valley that it hadn’t been sweltering out. She wondered if it was an off day or if the summer really was coming to an end. How long had she been there now? A week? It felt like so much longer.

“How so?” asked Lark, taking a seat beside her.

“I hate not being able to go where I want,” she said. “Even worse than that, Alder and Hale seem to think it’s okay to make decisions about my life without consulting me.”

“They only want what’s best for you,” Lark said. She must have sensed that that wasn’t the answer Taylor wanted to hear, because she hastily added, “But they really should ask you first.”

Taylor laughed. “I know you’re right. It’s not safe out there, so long as we’re still fighting with Whiteriver.”

She hadn’t told Lark what she knew about Hale’s part in the Whiteriver conflict. Though Alder hadn’t said as much, she knew that it was one of those things that would be kept within their inner circle, which now must have included her.

It felt nice to vent about the twins, but it wasn’t what she really needed to talk about. Leaning back against the wall, she tilted her head towards Lark. Her lips opened and closed several times before she was able to force the words out.

“I slept with Hale.”

Taylor had wondered if Lark had already known, but the look on her face told Taylor she hadn’t. Her eyes bulged and her mouth hung open in a comical display of shock.

“And Alder,” Taylor added. “Together.”

“Like, at the same time?” Lark choked out.

Taylor nodded and the words came tumbling from her mouth. She told Lark about their encounter in the river, the night she spent with Hale, and how they both seemed bizarrely okay with sharing her. Lark listened intently, a faint blush staining her cheeks.

As soon as Taylor finished her recounting of the events, Lark blurted, “Who’s better?”

Now Taylor was blushing, too. “I don’t know, they’re both too different. Alder makes me feel loved and cherished. Hale is…”

She trailed off, unable to put her finger on what it was about him. Before last night, she would have considered him to be a couple hundred pounds of muscle and sex, but now she wasn’t so sure.

“Are you in love with them both?”

“No,” was Taylor’s immediate response. “Alder, yeah, but not Hale.”

She wanted to tell Lark about her feelings for Hale, but they were too new. She didn’t understand them herself. She also couldn’t tell Lark about how Hale had flipped his lid when Alder had threatened to take her away, as she’d have to divulge the circumstances surrounding Whiteriver.

“But you’re still okay with the, um, arrangement?” asked Lark.

“I am…”

“But?”

But Alder wants to have kids and he thinks I do, but I don’t. But Hale is going to sleep with other women and he thinks I don’t care, but I do.

She went with the safest topic. “I feel like one of these days, as soon as I let my guard down and start getting comfortable, they’re going to make me choose.”

Lark frowned and pulled Taylor into an impromptu hug. Taylor hugged her back, not caring that Lark was topless.

Lark said, “I suppose the real question is, why are you telling
me
all of your secrets?”

Taylor laughed. “Who else am I going to tell, Glenn?”

Lark made a face. “I see your point. I’ll keep it a secret,” she said, holding up a pinky. “Promise.”

Taylor hooked pinkies with her. “Okay, now I really do feel like a little kid.”

They both leaned back against the wall and fell into silence. Given that it was her home, Taylor wondered if she should find something for them to do. She tried to think of activities to pass the time, but found that she still wanted to talk.

“Remember how I told you about my mom?” Taylor said. “How she just showed up one day when I was fourteen?”

“Yeah,” Lark replied, giving her a look of curiosity.

“Well, at the time, I was living in a foster home with this family, the Smiths. They owned a farm. That’s how I learned about gardening and taking care of animals.”

“Did you like it there?”

Taylor shrugged. “They were pretty strict. They made me do most of the chores which, believe me, on a farm can get pretty insane. They also made me go to church on Sundays, which I hated. Then, when we got home from church I’d have to clean the barn and weed the garden. By the time I was done, I’d have to help my foster mom with dinner.”

Taylor ran a hand through her hair. “I’d never been in a home that had so much structure. I was used to being able to do whatever I wanted. I used to think they were trying to torture me, but looking back, I realized that they were just trying to make me a better person. I know now that they were acting the way normal parents did and despite the fact that I was always complaining, they really cared about me.”

Lark scooted closer, so that they were shoulder to shoulder. “What happened to them?”

“I was with them for a while and eventually they decided to adopt me. Before the adoption was finalized, my mom came into the picture. She showed up out of the blue one day, with her nice car and her hair all done up.”

Taylor paused, searching for an adequate analogy for what she wanted to explain, but couldn’t pinpoint one.

“I think it’s only something you can understand if you’ve never seen a biological parent before. It was amazing to be able to look at her face and see parts of myself. We looked so much alike. She was a skinny, grownup version of me, without the acne or braces.”

Lark gave a wan smile. “I looked a lot like my father. I suppose I always took that for granted.”

“I was in awe of her,” Taylor said. “She told me all about her life, how she’d had me when she was a teenager and that her parents made her give me up for adoption and she always regretted it. She told me that she’d been looking for me for years and that she wanted to be a part of my life. She wanted to adopt me.”

“But what about the Smiths?”

Taylor bit down on her lip. “I didn’t think twice about it. I went to live with my mom.”

Her eyes became distant as she thought back to when she first went to live with her mother.

“My mom was nice, her husband was nice, my little sister was a brat, but she was a good kid.” Her brows furrowed. “I should have been happy with them, but from the very first night I laid down in my new bed, I had this terrible feeling in my gut, this feeling that I’d made the wrong choice.”

“Did you go back to live with the Smiths again?”

Taylor shook her head. “My mom knew I regretted choosing her. She never said it, but I knew that she knew. If I would have asked her to let the Smiths adopt me, I think she would have said yes. But I couldn’t go back to them, not after I’d turned my back on them. I don’t believe they would have held it against me, but at fourteen I lacked that level of insight.”

Taylor let out a heavy sigh and closed her eyes. “I don’t know who I would have been happier with. I think if I had chosen the Smiths, I would have always wished I went with my mom.”

Lark said, “And you’re worried that if Alder and Hale make you choose, you’ll regret not choosing the other?”

Taylor silently nodded.

How long had she been there now?

A week?

How had already she fallen for both brothers?

How was she in so deep?

The female came barreling towards Hale like a blonde-haired, blue-eyed nightmare, throwing her arms around him and squealing his name. His entire body went rigid as he shot Alder his trademark what-the-fuck-is-this look.

The meeting room was a wide cavern with several tables and chairs. The multitude of carved windows kept it well-lit during the daylight hours, and Hale could clearly make out the smile tugging at Alder’s lips. Although Hale was supremely agitated by the female attached to his midsection, he was glad to see Alder was no longer pissed at him.

Hale put his hands on the female’s shoulders and gave her a firm push. She looked up at him, her large eyes shimmering with tears.

Tulip.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

“Silas cast me out,” she said, her bottom lip wobbling. “I thought they were going to kill me.”

Just what he needed, more bullshit from his past popping up. His past, of course, being everything that’d happened before Taylor showed up.

When he’d originally agreed to give Mount Ezra to Whiteriver, Hale had been certain that Silas would fail as an alpha and the wolves would come crawling back to him, begging to rejoin Halcyon. But when they hadn’t, it put Halcyon in an awkward position.

To the west was another mountain valley, this one claimed by two wolf packs, both only slightly smaller than Halcyon. They had never been a threat to Halcyon, mainly because they’d been at war with one another for decades. Their alphas were aging, though. In a few years, their sons would rise to power. Hale knew very little about the two future alphas, but he did know that neither approved of their father’s warmongering.