“Did you ever find out who the other guy was?” they asked.
Bree felt every muscle in Jace’s body go rock hard. He murmured something unintelligible and said he thought it was time for them to get some sleep. His abruptness did not go unnoticed.
“Are you okay?” Bree asked once they were alone in the guest room.
“It’s something I know I have to own up to, but…I’m not sure I’ll ever be man enough to do it.” He was sitting on the bed, his head in his hands. She sat down next to him and ran her hand over his back.
“You and Tucker need to heal first, Jace. You don’t owe an explanation to anyone else. It isn’t anyone else’s business.”
“Isn’t confessing part of this, Bree? Isn’t that part of making amends, admitting what I did? Admitting what role I played that horrible night?”
“For now, all that matters is you and Tucker.”
She stood and pulled the big, fluffy duvet back. “Come to bed,” she said to him, as if those were the most natural words to pass between them.
She saw the question in his eyes. They both wore jeans and heavy shirts. They had nothing else with them since they hadn’t planned to spend the night. The light on the bedside table remained illuminated, and his eyes remained focused on hers as she unbuttoned her jeans and slid them off.
When she stood and began to unbutton her shirt, she heard him take a deep breath. She expected him to turn, to look away. He didn’t. She shrugged her shirt off her shoulders and eased under the covers.
“Jace, come to bed,” she said again, reaching her hand out to him.
“Bree—”
“Come to bed.”
She kept her eyes focused on his in the same way he had with her. His hand moved to the button on his jeans, and he hesitated, as though he was waiting for her to tell him to stop, but she didn’t. Nor did she turn the light, which she could easily reach from her side of the bed, off.
Her hand rested on the bedding but remained outstretched to him. He let his jeans drop to the floor and pulled the covers back on his side of the bed. As he climbed in, Bree slid over and wrapped her arm around his waist, bringing her head to rest on his shoulder.
“I wish…” he whispered.
“Me, too,” she answered.
His friends were gone when they woke the next morning, but he found a note in the kitchen, apologizing that they’d had to leave. There was a basket of muffins on the kitchen table and a bag of ground coffee near the coffeemaker.
Bree and Jace moved around each other slowly. They’d fallen asleep easily, given the lateness of the hour, but there remained a tentativeness of things unspoken between them.
Last night had been different. She hadn’t crept into his bed in the middle of the night, seeking his comfort. This time they’d found comfort in one another. As they waited for the coffee to brew, Jace opened his arms and she filled them. Bree wrapped her arms around his waist and rested her head on his chest.
“Sometimes it’s almost too easy,” he said.
“I know.”
“I have to come to terms with what I did to Tuck, and you have to mourn Zack. And we both have to do it on our own. The sooner we do that, the sooner we can be together.”
They made the drive back to the ranch in near silence, but it was a comfortable one.
“When’s the auction?” she asked.
“Saturday.”
They had three whole days and four nights, and then it would be time for him to leave. Jace no longer felt the need to ask her if he should find a place to stay in town. He knew they would sleep in each other’s arms, yet neither of them would let it go beyond that.
They spent the next three days fishing. They talked and tried to dance, but Jace’s leg hadn’t healed well enough for him to do more than sway with her to the music. They sat on the porch and looked at the stars, and then held each other close as they slept.
The pretense of Jace staying in the other side of the cabin was dropped. He moved his travel bag over to her room, and came and went from her door.
They invited Red to join them at the bull bucking, and he went along enthusiastically. Bree sat, nestled between the two men on the bench seat of Jace’s truck.