Page 34 of Bearly Yours
Fortunately, I had some pieces I’d been holding back to give them over the next several months to sell, so they’d continue to have something from me. It wasn’t like I was just dropping them cold, but I still felt a little guilty.
I sighed. Sometimes I hated that I was a being who felt things deeply all the time. It could be incredibly inconvenient.
I sniffed again, smelling something other than doughy goodness this time. I think it was cookies? Chocolate chip cookies if I wasn’t mistaken. Yum.
I wondered what movie we were going to watch, and I was wildly curious about the rest of his hoards.
Roarke walked back into the room, and it was like the temperature warmed by a good ten degrees.
Dragons were excellent space and body warmers.
Roarke’s azure eyes gazed at me, and I could read humor in them. “So, you met my rooster. Wanna meet the rest of the gang?”
I held out my hand and he unglued me from his sofa with a warm hand up, and then he just refused to let go. I wasn’t all that broken up about it, let me tell you.
In fact, I felt kind of like a giddy teenager who was holding hands with their crush for the first time. Sadly, this was not far off the mark. I’d never held hands before. It was warm and comforting, but also made my heart race because he was so close, and he wastouchingme. Basically, my mental and emotional landscape was all over the place and I was unashamed of this fact. I was still a little hesitant, in spite of my enthusiasm. This all just seemed too good to be true. But, even if it turned out to be some cosmic joke of epic proportions, I was going to ride this ride until the amusement park shut down and went out of business. I would not pass up this opportunity to be closer to Roarke. Not even for my own insecurities and the near certain feeling that this was all a mistake. That Roarke would never be mine.
Roarke pulled me through the living room and a mudroom that was super-orderly and neat, and then out a side door. I could see a barn in the distance, and multiple pens that held goats, chickens, horses, and cattle in them.
Oh my gosh! He had a whole farm!
I started humming The Farmer in the Dell song mentally, but substituting Roarke’s name for the Farmer.
Yes, my brain is awesome. Moving on.
“You’re singing the Farmer in the Dell song in your head aren’t you?” Roarke said with a laugh.
“It’s scary that we seem to share a brain sometimes,” I replied.
He laughed again and shook his head.
We greeted the goats and the cows, and then he formally introduced me to the terror that squawks in the night—Crew the rooster.
“He’s a big chicken,” Roarke assured me.
“Very droll.”
He grinned. “No, really, he is. He’s like that one animated chicken that constantly thinks the sky is falling.”
“Is that why he attacked me and my SUV today?”
Roarke shook his head. “I honestly have no idea what that was. I didn’t know he had it in him.” He seemed almost impressed that his rooster had the gumption to attack me.
“Glad I could boost his confidence.”
He laughed and tugged my hand toward the horses. They were both grazing. It looked like Roarke went out earlier in dragon form and melted the snow and ice a little, because there was a huge patch of brown grass without snow that the horses were munching on. But when Roarke came to stand at the fence, they both immediately nickered in greeting and made their way over to us. Roarke pointed at a dapple grey. “This guy here is Dimitri. He’s a good boy. And this little lady is Tabitha.” He rubbed her forehead affectionately.
I watched him with his horses with a little smile on my face. Roarke was in his element here. And, dare I say it? He seemed happy and content.
Then my smile fell.
I couldn’t take him away from his home and his animals to a place where he would be living with several other bears and no hoard animals or pillows! That seemed cruel to me.
His gaze immediately found my frown and he frowned in response. “What’s wrong? Is it the horses?”
I shook my head. “It’s not the horses. I just realized I can’t take you away from here. You’re really happy here, Roarke. I don’t see you this content very often.”
I hesitantly reached out when Tabitha nuzzled my chin and lipped my hair, which I had left down today, rather than putting it up in a messy bun.
