A full day passes after our return to Hardin that I don’t see Marshall, which is a full day longer than I was expecting.
Maybe Dayne told him to stay away, I don’t know.
But that night, as I’m in my studio, having finished up my client’s work but busy now with another important task, I feel his presence outside my small cabin.
Since I didn’t hear his car, I’m guessing he ran here, which, if Dayne realizes he’s shifted and run off pack land, he’s going to find himself in a world of trouble. That’s one rule Dayne enforces most strictly because the forest around Hardin, in rural Colorado, is popular with hunters.
His knock on my door is light, but not hesitant. Nothing about Marshall is, nor ever has been, hesitant. He’s always been the type that once he knows what he wants, he goes for it, and nothing will stop him. Part of that is probably to do with his being a dominant wolf, but I think part of it is just him. Marshall has never been shy about telling me or anyone else what he wants.
So, pretty much the opposite of me.
After a long pause, I set a handful of markers down in a box and go to the front door, taking a second to glance at my reflection in the mirror over the entry table.
The second I do, I regret it. I look terrible. Although I slept once we returned from Dawley, I’m sure I spent more time tossing and turning than sleeping. My normally pale skin looks washed out, I have dark circles under my eyes, and I’m in an old sweatshirt Marshall left here months ago, and nothing else.
I should change in case he reads me wearing his sweatshirt as a sign I’m wavering about my decision to leave. At the very least, I should go put some pants on, but I won’t. I’m too tired to think about changing.
All my energy has to remain focused on getting through the next couple of days. If I stop and think too long about what I’m doing, doubt will overwhelm me, and I’ll change my mind.
My first thought once I’ve pulled the door open is relief that I don’t have any neighbors because the sight of a naked man leaning against the side of my door would attract some attention if I lived closer to town.
“Marshall, what are you doing here?” I ask as if it isn’t obvious.
But he doesn’t respond. He’s too busy peering over my shoulder and taking in the boxes spread out across my hardwood floors. Some are still empty, and some I filled and taped, ready for my move.
“You’re packing.” Nothing in his voice gives away the turmoil in his eyes. He sounds cool, in control, when I know he’s anything but.
I step outside and pull the door closed behind me. “Yes.”
Marshall lowers his gaze, no doubt reading the exhaustion on my face as I am on his. He’s been working today, and if the scent of oil and iron wasn’t enough to clue me in, the dark marks on his jaw will always give him away.
Before my mind is even conscious of it, my fingers are rubbing at the mark. “You always miss-” I stop because it’s not a good idea my touching him. Me doing this is just another reminder of the way we were. The way we can never be again.
His hand closes around mine, halting my attempt at pulling my arm back. “Jenna…”
“You shouldn’t be here, Marshall,” I murmur.
“I had to see you, jellybean. You’re in my thoughts, my dreams. Your scent is everywhere, haunting me.” He steps closer, close enough for his erection to press against my lower belly.
My body softens against his, the way it always has. “Marshall…”
None of this is new. I’ve lost count of the times Marshall has come to my door after working all day at his garage in town. He’d press me against my door for a lingering kiss that would always end with him carrying me inside to bed.
The memory of him doing it has my arousal simmering. I should tell him to leave. I should push him away, and I’m not. I’m leaning my back against the door and waiting for him to kiss me. Just like always.
He lowers his head. But just before his lips touch mine, he stops a breath away. Since this is a departure from what usually happens, I lift my gaze from his lips and find him studying me.
“You’re so beautiful, jellybean.”
My lips curve in a reluctant smile. “That name is still ridiculous,” I tell him. “And I refuse to believe it’s because I’m achingly sweet. There’s more to it than that. There has to be.”
His eyes crease with mirth. “But you love it.”
He’s not wrong.
“It makes you go all soft.” He curves a hand around my nape. “I can see it in your eyes.”
My eyes again, betraying me. I lower my gaze, but as always, Marshall grips my chin with his other hand and tips my head up.
He bends his head lower, and I hold my breath in anticipation of his kiss.
At the first touch of his firm lips against mine, my eyes flutter close and I release a soft sigh.
Marshall lifts his head a little. Enough that I can still feel his breath on my lips. That’s how close he is. “Stay, jellybean. Don’t leave me.”
I shake my head. “I can’t.”
He kisses me again. “You can. You just have to choose to follow your heart instead of whatever this thing is that’s telling you to leave.”
“Marshall…”
“You want me as much as I want you.”
I don’t deny it. For a long moment, we stand leaning against each other until I give up fighting against my need. He’s right, I do want him. I will always want him.
My kiss is an echo of his first, a soft touch only, and I feel his hand tightening around my nape in response. Inching forward, I part my lips and slide my hands up his bare chest.
When Marshall slants his head for a deeper kiss, feeling takes over as the rest of the world just falls away. My hands continue their journey up his hot, muscled chest and over his shoulders, clinging to him. With a muffled curse, Marshall hauls me so close we’re pressed flush against each other as our kiss turns hungry.
Just as he’s lifting me, no doubt intending on carrying me inside to bed, is when I sense that we’re no longer alone. I break the kiss despite Marshall’s attempt to hold me against him, and my newly opened eyes go over his shoulder to the equally naked man leaning against a tree a few feet away from my cabin.
“I had a feeling I’d find you here,” Dayne says.
Marshall’s arms tense around me. “Everything is fine here, Dayne. You can leave,” he says, without turning around. Even though my gaze is on Dayne’s right ear, I feel Marshall’s eyes searching my face.
Dayne ignores Marshall. “Jenna, is everything okay?”
I hesitate.
Marshall’s arms clamp around me as if he already knows what my response is going to be.
I shift my focus away from Dayne and prepare to break Marshall’s heart. Again. “Marshall, you need to leave.”
His growl is pure frustrated wolf. “This isn’t what you want. I know it. I feel it. I don’t understand why you’re doing this.”
This is why I shouldn’t have kissed him. This is why I should’ve told him to leave the moment I realized he was here, or even better, not opened the door. To prevent hurting Marshall even more than I already am.
Closing my eyes, I lean my head against his chest. “I love you so much,” I murmur against his skin, feeling my eyes burn with the promise of tears.
His grip loosens a touch as if my words have made him a little less desperate to hold on to me. He lowers his head, and I feel his lips brush against my hair. “And I love you. So, don’t leave. Stay. Stay with me.”
For one long moment I hold him tight, knowing the longer I do, the harder it’ll be to let him go. But even though it hurts, even though it feels like my heart is breaking, I make myself let go of him and lift my head.
My eyes go to his. “It’s not enough. A dominant shifter doesn’t mate with a submissive, and when they have, it’s never worked.”
His grip tightens again. “We’ll be the first.”
I force myself to meet his eyes, ignoring everything in me screaming to look away, to lower my head. He needs to see I mean it, no matter that my eyes are filling with tears at the thought of never seeing him again, of living my life without him in it. “No, Marshall. We won’t.”
He stills against me because this is a first. I’ve never looked someone in the eye and told them no before. If anyone knows this better than anyone, it’s Marshall.
“Marshall,” Dayne says, interrupting our stare. “You heard her. Time to go.”
But Marshall doesn’t let me go. He lowers his head. His next kiss is so fierce, so desperate, and so filled with love that my eyes overflow with tears.
When he lifts his head and his arms slowly release me, I spin around. Blinded by my tears, I grab for the door handle.
Marshall’s voice stops me. “I love you, jellybean. Now, tomorrow, the day after. A year from now, I will love you. A decade, I will still love you then. I will never love anyone more.”
His voice is husky, determined, but I don’t turn around. I can’t bear to see the tears in his eyes that I can hear in his voice. It would break me.
Instead, I shove the door open and rush inside. I slam the door shut and stand there staring at it, knowing Marshall is on the other side but feeling like he’s a million miles away.
I dash my tears away, but that doesn’t stop fresh ones from falling as I step closer to the door and lift a hand to press it against the wood.
“Come to the house tomorrow, Jenna,” Dayne calls, his voice as crisp through the solid wood door as if he were standing beside me. “Talis wants everyone back for a pack breakfast.”
I don’t know how he or Talis can care about breakfast. If I never ate again, I doubt I’d miss it. But this won’t be an ordinary pack breakfast, this will be when I tell Dayne I’ve finished my client work and I’m ready to leave. It will be about me saying goodbye to the Blackshaws. Forever.
Since words are beyond me, I don’t respond.
“Marshall, let’s go,” Dayne says.
A long minute passes, and then my awareness of Marshall slowly fades as he moves away from my front door. Soon it disappears entirely, and that’s when I know I’m on my own.
For the next ten minutes, I stand in the middle of my lounge, surrounded by half-filled boxes, fighting off the urge to forget about packing and crawl into bed instead. I shake off the feeling and retreat to the bathroom. Once I’ve washed my face with cool water and patted it dry, I return to the lounge and resume packing.
It’s a mindless task that will take a long time to complete, but it offers a distraction from the memory of Marshall’s parting words. Words that have the power to change my mind if I dwell on them too long.