Mated To The Mountain Lion Read online

  Now it was just a matter of fixing up things in the house before Autumn got there. I had a spare bedroom across the hall from mine, but it was upstairs. I had a room downstairs that I could clear out, but that required furniture to be moved and I wasn’t sure I could pull that off in the limited amount of time I had. So since Autumn was still sound asleep, I went off in search of the doctor.

  “Ash! Hey… hey, Ash!”

  She turned around with a small smile on her lips, and I caught myself before I approached her.

  “I mean, doctor. Hey, doctor.”

  “What can I do for you, Bullhead?”

  “I have some questions on how to make Autumn safe and comfortable, you know, given her condition.”

  “All right. Shoot.”

  “Stairs. Yay or nay?”

  “If she’s got help, no problem. But she might get dizzy looking down them with the concussion she’s got, so a general ‘nay’ unless someone’ll help her down every single time for a while.”

  “All right. What about diet? Anything I should stay away from with her swelling and stuff?”

  “Anything that prompts inflammation will be bad, but if you just stick to a healthy diet that isn’t rich in breads and you’ll be good. Lots of water, no soda, and absolutely no caffeine.”

  “She’s not gonna like that,” I mused.

  “No one ever does,” Ash said with a smirk. “Who’s care is she being released into?”

  “Mine.”

  Ash pursed her lips. “Bet her momma didn’t like that.”

  “Not at first, but I gave her a key to the house so she can come by whenever she wants.”

  “That’s good.” Ash smiled. “You’re a good man, Dallas.”

  “Thanks.”.

  “Just know your limits,” she warned.

  “What’s that mean?”

  “Dallas, this is Autumn. There isn’t a person around here, new or old, that doesn’t know y’all’s story. What she did rocked this little Oklahoma town, and there are just as many people worried about you as they are about her.”

  “I’m a big boy. I can take care of myself.”

  “Doesn’t mean you shouldn't be reminded of that every once in a while.”

  The silence that hung between us was tense. I didn’t stop to think about how this would look. A boy whose college love abandoned him the morning after graduation suddenly comes back into town, half kills herself, and then that same boy takes her in to rehabilitate her as he sees fit.

  “I’ll be careful,” I assured.

  “Good.” She smirked again. “Oh! Another thing to keep in mind—no cars. People with concussions get motion sickness very quickly. So once you get her home, no more gettin’ in that truck of yours.”

  “What about grocery shopping and stuff?” I asked.

  “Don’t leave her alone. Which means you’ll need to do that while she’s still here.”

  “Thanks for lettin’ me know,” I said. “Uh…when are we looking at discharging her?”

  “Well, I’m gonna check back in on her tonight before I go home, but if all looks good and her brain swelling has continued to dissipate, we should be able to send her home tomorrow.”

  “Perfect. Thanks, Ash, I mean, doc.”

  She winked. “Anytime, Bullhead.”

  I trotted back to Autumn’s room and saw her father sitting by her bedside. He was drawing circles on the back of her hand while she slept, and when he slowly rose his eyes up and connected them with mine, I gave him a slight nod and left. I knew he’d stay with her until I got back, and that meant I could get some stuff in my kitchen before tomorrow. I reached in and grabbed my wallet off the corner table and told Barber I was going grocery shopping before he shewed me off and down the hallway. I’m sure he wanted to spend some time alone with his daughter, and if I played my cards right, I could even set up her bedroom before I came back.

  I made my way to my truck and headed to the grocery store and stocked up on all sorts of things. I figured the easier it was to eat, the more inclined she would be to eat it, so I picked up ingredients for many different kinds of soups. Knowing Autumn loved my cabbage stew, I picked up a couple heads to get marinating in a pot before I headed back to the hospital. I also picked up some apples and peanut butter, thinking they’d make a good snack for her when she wanted them. Remembering she was a glutton for homemade macaroni and cheese, I piled the ingredients into my cart, planning to make it a staple in her diet. If I ever made too much, it would be easy to spoon out and reheat, which would give her some of her independence back; I had a feeling it was going to be hard for Autumn to let me take care of her around the clock, being all independent like she was. So I was determined to give her as much as she could do on her own as I possibly could.

  I grabbed vegetables for stir fry and tried to remember the meats I had in my deep freezer. And after grabbing some stuff to make pancakes and bacon for breakfast, I headed on up to the check-out line. I’d only been in the store for 45 minutes, and if I got this stuff home and put up, I could rearrange her room a bit before she arrived tomorrow.

  I got back to my house and checked my phone to make sure no one from the hospital had called. Then I hauled the groceries in and got everything put away, and before I did anything else, I washed down both heads of cabbage and placed them in a pot of water. I salted and peppered them before throwing in more seasonings and covering the pot, letting it sit on the counter. Autumn loved the broth from this soup more than anything and I wanted to make sure she had plenty of it.

  I bounded upstairs, busted through the door to the spare bedroom, and immediately got to work. I stripped the bed sheets and put new linens on it, dusted down the furniture and the fan, cleaned the attached bathroom and placed fresh towels out, and made sure the good toilet paper was on a roll. Then I ran the vacuum quickly over the carpet and made sure the lamp by her bed had a working bulb. When I felt like everything was done, I gave myself a moment to take a breath and wipe the sweat from my brow.

  Then I heard the hum of my phone vibrating downstairs. Quickly, I rushed down

  and skidded to the kitchen, seeing Autumn’s number flashing across the screen. A rush of panic clenched my throat shut. “Autumn, are you all right?”

  “It’s just me, Dallas.”

  “Hey there, Mrs. August. Everything all right? I’ve got food in the house for Autumn, and her room is all made up.”

  “That sounds wonderful.”

  “Are y’all all right?” I asked again.

  “Autumn’s just askin’ for ya. Figured I’d call and see where you were.”

  Autumn. My Autumn. My wonderful, soft, spunky, sassy, sensitive Autumn was asking for me, wondering where the fuck I was,while all I was doing was sweating in the middle of my damn kitchen.

  I’d taken too fucking long.

  “I’m getting into my car right now. Tell her I’ll be there in 10 minutes.”

  “Okay, I’ll let her know. And oh… Dallas?”

  “Yes, ma’am?”

  “Thank you.”

  “It’s not a problem. I promise,” I lulled.

  Chapter 12: Autumn

  My head was still wrapped in gauze and throbbing when the doctors finally discharged me. The venom had worked its way out of my system, but it was going to take time for the entrance port at the base of my skull to heal. Cooling packs were wrapped around my head to keep any swelling from the concussion under control, and the doctor was rattling off many different things to Dallas.

  She gave him a list of the things I couldn’t eat, the rundown of the types of activities I needed to stay away from, and told him how long it should take for the concussion to dissipate before we needed to be concerned. The worst was behind us, but I still had a long road to go and was secretly glad my job was letting me off the hook for a month. No, I wasn’t the happiest when Mom had informed me that she’d called my job, but they had promptly filled my hospital room with flowers and bombarded me with emails telling me they wo
uld take care of my designs and my show until I recovered enough to come back.

  Dallas helped me into the car before he slung the brown bag of medications in the back and my parents followed us to his home. My dad, as slow moving as he was, helped me get into the house and up the stairs while Mom unpacked me into the room Dallas had set up for me. I could smell the cabbage soup the moment I walked in, and my mouth started to salivate. Once Mom got me unpacked and Dad got me working with the television Dallas had put in his guest bedroom, he gently laid a bowl of soup in my lap.

  “There’s plenty more where that came from, and you can eat as little or as much as you want,” Dallas soothed.

  “All right,” Mom said, “I’ve got your clothes in here, your toiletries in there, your bath stuff by the tub, and your blanket at your side. Dad’s working on the television. I’ll be by later tonight to check on you before I go to bed.”

  “Thanks, Mom.” I smiled lightly. She squeezed my arm slightly and left me on the couch.

  I tried to spoon the soup into my mouth, but my hand was trembling too much. Before I could protest or try to figure it out myself, the spoon was hovering next to my lips.

  “For once, just go with it,” Dallas said.

  I parted my lips and took in the delicious cabbage liquid. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my dad smirk. He wrapped his arm around my mother and escorted her out of the room. She took one last look down the hallway before helping my father down the stairs.

  “Your father’s really lucky to have her,” Dallas said as he scooped another spoonful into my mouth.

  “Yeah, and she’s lucky to have him,” I mused.

  He continued helping me eat in relative silence, and when my head started throbbing, I closed my eyes and sighed.

  “Here, let me get you something,” Dallas said.

  I heard a bag rustling before some plastic started clinking together. Shortly thereafter, Dallas took my hand and dropped a couple of pills into it before opening a water bottle for me. I threw the pills into my mouth and Dallas held the water bottle to my lips. I gulped the pills down so hard, droplets of water sloshed down my chin.

  Dallas ran his thumb across my skin. My head throbbing and my eyes closed, the warmth of his hand was exceptionally comforting. My mind flashed back to the night we spent in his trailer and how good it had felt to have his body rolling into mine again. The memory sent my hand shaking so badly, Dallas picked it up and kissed it.

  “You need to rest,” he said gently.

  The truth was, I was nervous about being alone in his home with him. All of my confidence in explaining to him what had happened before seemed to have disappeared with the accident. I mean, I knew he wouldn’t hurt me and I knew he would take care of me, but my body was already succumbing to him. My skin puckered at his touch and my thighs involuntarily squeezed whenever he kissed the back of my hand. I knew that if I stayed here longer than I needed to, I would second-guess my flight back to Paris in a month. I’d almost made that mistake once before, and I wasn’t going to make it again.

  I wasn’t going to throw away my dream life for my dream cowboy.

  But most of all, I was scared he would ask. I was petrified that he would ask me why I left and where I’d gone to, and why I didn’t just tell him or ask him to go with me.

  While I was partially afraid that he’d ask me to stay, I also worried that he would instead ask to go with me this time around, and either of these scenarios would present a problem. Staying behind with him meant he could stay in his element and pursued what he loved, while I would be miserable and constantly asking myself ‘what if?’ And that would ultimately cause me to resent him. On the other hand, if he went with me, it would’ve been the same ordeal, but reversed; I’d be happy, but he would grow resentful of me for making him give up his beloved rodeos and buckin’ broncos because those kinds of things didn’t exist in Paris, France.

  I didn’t want him to ask any of the questions I knew he wanted answers to, but I knew if we were alone long enough, he eventually would.

  I laid down when I got the pain medication in me and when I woke up, there was a fresh bowl of cabbage soup near my bed. I held it to my lips and began to slurp, not caring about using the spoon. Just as I finished the silky broth, I heard a little knock at the door.

  “Just me,” Dallas said. “How ya feeling?”

  “Better.”

  “Soup good?”

  “Yes, very. Thank you.”

  “I’m gonna go in here and run you a bath. Figured you’d wanna clean up, but standing up in a shower probably won’t help nausea.”

  “Probably not.” I smirked.

  He retreated to the bathroom and turned on the water, and I took the chance to close my eyes for a moment and then reopen them. The room was still spinning a bit, but my head wasn’t pounding, so I swung my legs over the couch and tried to stand.

  “Hold on a second, Autumn,” Dallas warned. “Lemme help.”

  His arm snaked around my waist, his body feeling incredibly strong against mine. Images of his lips around my pert nipples caused me to shiver into him, and for the first time since that night in the trailer, he pulled me close.

  “Let’s take it slow,” he said.

  We made our way to the bathtub, where he sat me on the edge. It was sweet how he closed his eyes while I got out of my clothes. He held onto my legs so I wouldn’t fall, and when it came time to take my pants off, he raised up his hands and held onto my shoulders. Without opening his eyes once, he helped me into the bath. When he finally did open his eyes though, something in his expression frightened me.

  Dallas was never one to censor himself. “I wanna be with you, Autumn,” he said.

  I sighed and closed my eyes before sinking into the bubbles. Dallas was taking wonderful care of me, but I should’ve seen this statement coming.

  “Dallas, we can’t,” I whispered.

  “Why not?”

  “Because we just can’t.” I groaned.

  “Look. Ya left me, and I get that. But ya came back, and that’s a thing that happened. Ya don’t go knockin’ on someone’s trailer and experience what we did without feelings behind it. I care for you, Autumn. I never stopped.”

  His words wounded me to my core. My entire body buzzed for him, and something inside of me wanted to tug him into this bathtub and hold him close amidst the hot water and the soap suds. But it wouldn’t work. I know I’m a country girl at heart, but a man like him doesn’t care about fashion and a woman like me doesn’t live where rodeos are constantly a thing, not if you want a career in fashion, that is.

  “We can’t,” I whispered again.

  “Yes, we can,” he urged.

  “No, we can’t,” I said stubbornly. I opened my eyes and caught his wild stare, and for a split second, I almost caved. I ran my eyes along his strong jaw line and took in the wild tresses of his hair. I scooped along his strong frame and locked my eyes onto his strong, dexterous hands. My stomach churned at the idea of having him pressed against me again.

  “We’re just…so different now,” I said lightly.

  “‘Different’ don’t mean ‘incompatible’.”

  “We can’t,” I whispered. I cursed myself when I felt tears rise to my eyes. Not wanting him to see, I cocked my body away from him in the tub. My head hurt, my back hurt, my heart hurt, and my soul ached. I wanted him. I’d always wanted him. I’d spent nights in Paris lonely while all the other designers were out drinking. During those nights at home, I would wish to find him throwing rocks at my window. Days when I heard a funny joke or experienced a funny moment, and I’d want to call him up and tell him about it.

  It ain’t just love that makes a relationship work, and Dallas and I—we had nothin’ else but love. One of us would have to eventually give up something to be with the other, and I wasn’t about to do that to either of us.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered for the umpteenth time.

  “I’ll be back to check on ya soon,” he murmu
red. He touched my left shoulder, running his hand over my small star tattoo. My body jumped and a tear slowly barreled down my cheek. I remembered the day I got that tattoo. It was actually a dare I lost to him. We were walking through the apple fields on the edge of town, hand-in-hand while the winds of fall blew us every which way. I kept telling him I was fearless and bold, and he kept bringing up my incredible fear of needles.

  I kept insisting that it was just a one-time deal, that cortisone shots hurt like hell and it was the pain of the shot, not the needle, that freaked me out.

  He then challenged me to a contest. If I could successfully get a tattoo that he chose for me on the part of my body that I chose, he would not only drop the subject, but he would take me to the neighborhood hoedown at his parents’ barn that night.

  Dallas has never been a dancer, but he promised he’d dance with me that night.

  So we went into the first tattoo shop we came across in town and he picked out this little black star. It wasn’t much-- no bigger than the pad of Dallas’s thumb-- but at the time, it felt like I was getting an entire back tattoo. I remembered biting into his arm while the man traced it onto my shoulder, and I suddenly realized in that very moment why the tattoo artist tried to talk me out of getting it right on my shoulder.

  Because it fucking hurt.

  Dallas took me to the hoedown that night and tripped over his feet the entire time. We actually ended up just swaying in the corner for the rest of the night while we smiled and talked in our own little world, and that was the first night we’d had sex with one another.

  It was a night I would never forget, and the memories came rushing back when Dallas rubbed his thumb over that tattoo on my shoulder.

  Before I came to from my memories, I heard the bathroom door quietly click shut, and I was left alone to silently bathe in my tears.

  Chapter 13: Dallas

  Every single time I did something, there was always a linger, be it a lingering stare, a lingering touch, or a lingering smile. Every time I was around Autumn, I felt this drastic pull to her being, and when the linger went on for too long, she would pull back. I could see it in the way her skin blushed where I touched it, and I could hear it in her voice when it involuntarily got smokier when I was around. She wanted me as much as I wanted her, but she denied it every time I attempted to acknowledge it. It made the creature within me squirm, impatient and frustrated.