She pulled back. "What were you trying to say?"
Heat scalded his face. "I didn't hear anything after you called me baby."
Kateri laid her hand over his cheek at the anguish she saw on his face. Her heart lurched. Given what she'd seen of his life, she was willing to bet it was the first time anyone had ever used an endearment for him. While most people grew up being called "sugar" and "darling" by others, he never had, and he'd secluded himself to the point that he most likely hadn't even been called that by a waitress, let alone someone who actually cared about him.
"I know that place deep down inside where it feels like no one cares. No one sees you. No one knows you. But I see you, Ren, and I do care. I know exactly how it feels to be alone in this world." She laughed bitterly as she remembered something Fernando had said to her about one of the most influential innovators in the field of archaeology and anthropology. "Margaret Mead once said that one of the oldest human needs is having someone to wonder when you are coming home at night."
She smiled at him. "There's nothing lonelier than an empty house when you're going to bed. I've lost everyone I've ever loved and I'm scared as hell at the thought of letting you or anyone else into my heart to hurt me like that again. Because every time I lose one of them, a part of me goes to the grave with them and I'm not sure how much of me is left anymore. But I'm willing to take that leap again ... for you."
Ren swallowed as he understood what had motivated her to burst into tears. No one had ever said anything kinder to him. Her words touched a place inside him he hadn't known existed. A part of him that had never been touched before.
"I could never hurt you, sweetie," she breathed.
In that single moment, he was completely lost to her. I'm such an effing idiot. He hadn't even gotten laid first, this time, and he had no business letting her get close to him, yet somehow she was already there. He had no idea how it'd happened, but he'd basically been a goner the first moment she smiled at him.
"Are you going to say anything?"
Ren didn't trust his voice. So instead, he kissed her slowly and tenderly, savoring every stroke of her tongue against his. Breathless, he laid her back against the ground and covered her with his body. Stars blinded him as an unbelievable pleasure tore through him.
Kateri smiled as Ren left her lips to trail hot kisses down her neck. Had she not understood why he didn't speak, she'd be offended. But that wasn't his way. He was a man of very few words. He spoke through his actions, not with his voice. In a way, she preferred it. There was no way to misinterpret his tenderness.
He slowly unbuttoned her shirt, then ran his hand over her breasts. Arching her back, she moaned at how good he felt. The hunger in his eyes was searing as he struggled with her bra.
She smiled at his confusion. "It snaps in the front."
He still had no clue.
"I guess they didn't have these back in the day, eh?"
"No. It's like a puzzle box."
Laughing, she took his hands and showed him how to undo it.
Ren sucked his breath in sharply at the sight of her bare breasts. He'd assumed some of their size was from padding, but that was definitely not true, and while he didn't have a lot of experience in this department, he knew she was well endowed. "You're so beautiful."
She took his hand into hers and led it to her mouth so that she could kiss, then nip his knuckle. A shiver went over him. She returned his hand to her breast before pulling his head down to hers to nibble his lips. If he could, he'd die right now in this perfect moment of sensory overload.
Kateri felt the muscles in his jaw tighten as he clenched his teeth. Damn, he was the sexiest man she'd ever been near. The raw strength and power. The adorable vulnerable innocence that shouldn't exist inside someone like him. It combined into the most irresistible package imaginable.
Wanting to please him, she pulled his shirt off, over his head, then rolled him onto his back. She paused as she saw the scars and injuries that riddled his body. But the scar that wrung her heart was in the center of his chest. Jagged and raw, it was bigger than her fist.
Her hand shaking, she placed it over his heart to finger that scar. The moment she did, a brutal vision came to her with a clarity so clear, it stunned her.... Ren and Coyote were in a grand dining hall where they were fighting over the corpse of a man who'd been beaten so badly that she couldn't tell who it was.
His entire body coated in blood, Coyote sneered at Ren, who gaped in horror at what his brother had done. "This is all your fault," Coyote sneered. "You and your petty jealousy. Why couldn't you have been happy for me? Just once in your miserable life. Why? Had you left us alone, none of this would have happened. There would have been no Grizzly Spirit. No need for Guardians and he"-Coyote gestured to the floor with a knife-"would never have come here to claim her."
Ren didn't respond. His gaze was fastened to the red on Coyote's hands. It went from there to the floor where ...
Buffalo lay dead in a pool of blood. She only knew the man's identity because Ren knew.
He winced as unmitigated grief tore through him. "How could you do this? He was a Guardian." And my best friend in the world. The one and only person who'd stood by him without question.
Even when evil had claimed possession of his body and he'd served it willingly, Buffalo had stayed with him. Protecting him.
Now he lay slain by Ren's own brother.
My cruelty drove him mad....
His brother had been pure and decent until Ren had tortured him. It's all my fault. All of it.
Coyote spit on Buffalo's body. "He was a bastard and he stole her heart from me."
Ren shook his head slowly as guilt and sorrow ripped him apart. "Hearts can never be stolen. They can only be given."
Coyote sneered at him. "You're wrong! That's your jealousy speaking."
But it wasn't. Ren had learned to banish that. He no longer felt anything except guilt and remorse.
Now it was too late. He'd destroyed everything that was good in his life.
Everything.
Sick to his stomach, he went to Buffalo and knelt beside him to whisper a small prayer over his body.
A shrill scream echoed through the room.
Looking up, Ren saw Butterfly as she ran to her Buffalo. She sobbed hysterically, throwing herself down on top of him. She paid no attention whatsoever as his blood soaked into her clothes and left her covered in it.
Her features twisted by rage and accusatory grief, she glared at Coyote. "Why? Why? Why would you hurt me so?"
Coyote curled his lip. "You tore my heart out."
"And you killed mine." She laid herself over Buffalo and wept with shrill screams that raised the hair on Kateri's arms.
Ren stood up and left her there to grieve while he confronted his brother.
That was his mistake. He didn't think about what would happen if Butterfly was allowed to cry her misery out to the gods and spirits. To wail and shriek for her lost Buffalo.