Chapter 10Goldie

Chapter 10

Goldie

"W ell, well, well, would you look at our pretty pretty Rusty!" one of the guys booms mockingly as all of the brothers come back inside in droves from wherever they've been off to. "Ain't he looking just as sweet as a peach!"

That's followed by whistles and catcalls.

Rusty's makeover is as done as done can be and he looks insanely hot. I wish I could take him shopping too, but I made do with an unbuttoned flannel and a pair of low-slung jeans.

Lord, but this man is dreamy. Rusty's beard—now shorter, tamer, and impeccably styled—frames his strong jawline, somehow accentuating his ruggedness and showing off the dimples I knew were under there. His tousled locks of copper-colored hair, which fall effortlessly across his forehead, are now framing but not hiding his face. I had to take off about five inches to get all the split ends, but it's still long and, now, luxurious. Damn, I'm good. Both his facial hair and the hair on his head are soft as hell now too.

"My, my, our man has such stylish stubble!" Clay teases, touching his own wild beard. "Brothers, I think we've got ourselves one of them male supermodels."

"Is that the chin stubble or the chest stubble that's stylish?" another brother calls out teasingly from behind me. "Did you let her shave your legs too?"

I did trim his chest hair, all the way down to his happy trail. Which was more like a happy four-lane highway to heaven. But I did not shave his legs.

"He doesn't have stubble! I didn't shave his face or chest, because that would've been a crime," I say, giving Rusty a flirtatious smile. "It didn't take much work, and he looks go-ood. So sexy . "

"Did she mow your lawn too, Rusty?" Clay asks.

Rusty's ears—which are now visible—flame red. So do mine when I understand what Clay is asking. No, in fact, I did not touch Rusty's pubes.

"Very lumberjack chic," Lynx says—almost approvingly?—his rumbling voice drawing tingles along my spine.

"I think the term is lumbersexual ," I say, and then I'm blushing for about the zillionth time in one day, and I'm probably going to die of high blood pressure because of these guys and the way they have my heart pumping much too fast. "I mean, that's something I read in Cosmo magazine, once. It's a term. Not that I'm thinking of Rusty sexually…"

Oh, Lord, what am I saying now?

Because I definitely have been thinking of Rusty sexually…

And now I'm thinking of ALL of them sexually…

"I think she's right," Rusty says, lifting his chin. "I look go-ood . And I would let her mow my lawn or do anything else she wanted to do to me."

I think what happens next is technically called whoopin' and hollerin'. There's also some foot-stompin' and cat-callin'.

Change the subject, Goldie, quick!

"Anyone else up for a makeover before dinner?" I say brightly, thankfully a better question than the first thought that zings through my mind which is, So, who does want their lawns mowed, though?

Generally, I would not enjoy the thought of grooming someone else's down-there hair, but it would almost certainly mean I'd get to touch those cocks, right? Even with an accidental brush of the back of my knuckles…

Before anyone can take me up on my offer to make them over, Grumpy Luke shuts the idea right down, claiming it's time for dinner. How is that possible? It seems like we just had lunch.

But never mind that. Dinner is made, served, and gobbled up as fast as lunch was. While we eat, I catch several of the brothers shooting curious looks in Rusty's direction.

After dinner, one by one, each of the mountain men goes to a spot that seems to be their usual spot, and pulls out a book. Over the tops of their books, I observe as the peeks they sneak at Rusty change from curious to admiring, and even a little envious.

"How the hell are your fingernails so damn shiny?" Ash finally asks Rusty.

"I gave him a mani-pedi. It's clear nail polish."

"Oh," Ash says.

He returns his attention to his book, but every once in a while he pulls his focus away, his eyes darting from me to Rusty and back again. They're all doing that.

Every once in a while, Grumpy Luke seems to notice their lack of focus and clears his throat loudly like they're in study hall and he's the teacher, and they go back to reading, their unkempt eyebrows—except Rusty's which are quite kempt now—furrowed in concentration.

I'm not sure what I was expecting their evening to look like but it wasn't this.

Pain is creeping back into my ankle. I get up from the table and hobble to the window seat, which no one has occupied—probably because they would have to fold themselves up like origami to fit.

"Is it okay if I sit here?" I ask.

No one responds. I don't think they're ignoring me. I just think they're immersed. I can't see the covers of anyone else's book, but Nash is reading Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. I don't know what to make of that. He moves his lips as he reads, which I find endearing.

I tuck myself into the window seat and watch as the sky grows darker and darker. I steal glimpses here and there at the brothers, trying not to stare, but that's almost impossible.

"Would you like a blanket?" Brooks asks, and they all say no in unison. Then Grumpy Luke looks up, realizes Brooks was talking to me, and shushes him.

I nod.

Brooks brings an Afghan that looks like it belongs draped over the back of the couch on the set of an eighties sitcom. A cloud of dust puffs up when he unfolds it, spreading it out across my lap and legs.

"Sorry 'bout that," he says.

"No worries," I reply with a smile. There's a tickle in my throat but thankfully I don't cough in his face.

"Thanks so much for this." I pat it and it's scratchy against my palm, but I smile at him and try not to think of my chunky knit weighted blanket, made of the world's softest organic cotton, back at my apartment. I'm sure someone made this with love. Decades before the brothers picked it up for a nickel at a garage sale.

I'm not snobby, I swear. I'm just not sentimental and believe that if something can be replaced with something better…well, why wouldn't you?

Maybe they can't afford any better, you Snobby McSnobSnob, I chide myself.

But if Lynx had gone to medical school, he could be a rich doctor by now. Certainly they all have ambitions to be more, to do more? If only they weren't stuck on this mountain, living like recluses. It's not fair.

Brooks is still standing over me—way over me—looking down at me expectantly.

"I might want one of those makeovers," Brooks says, real fast and real hushed. "Tomorrow?"

I give him a nod and a smile. When he goes back to his spot, I study Rusty.

Yes, he's still a very large man. And yes, if he were out and about with the general populace of the world, people would likely stare, because of the sheer size of him. Ask him if he was a basketball player or in the NFL. But once they got past that initial curiosity, they would see what I see now. After my makeover, he's more beauty than beast.

And tomorrow, Brooks will be too. With any luck, the others will follow suit. Unless Luke makes me leave at sunrise…

"Did you say something?" I ask Ranger, because he's looking at me like he's waiting on a response from me.

"I asked if you'd like to borrow a book. We have a whole heap and you look bored."

"Shhhh!" Grumpy Luke glares at us. He's definitely making me leave at sunrise.

If he doesn't have any ambitions beyond mountain man, maybe I should suggest he'd make a helluva librarian?

They do have a ton of books—teetering, precarious piles of them, all around. Where did they get all these books? I try to see what everyone is reading. Hunter has a novel that I know was published fairly recently. And Grumpy Luke…

I gasp.

Grumpy Luke has J.J. Hartley's Big Book of Quotations Volume 11 . There are thirty volumes total, and I know because I have them all on my e-reader.

"You like quotes?" I ask him, quietly, so as not to disturb the others.

"Yep," he says without looking up.

Yes! This is something we can bond over. I do a little happy dance in my seat. Well, it's more of a shimmy of my shoulders because the pain from my ankle is slowly migrating up my leg. I try to ignore it.

"Do you have a favorite quote?" I ask Grumpy Luke.

"In pregnant silences, peace gestates, and at the proper time, through quiet labor of meditation, enlightenment is born," he says.

Impressed that he has that memorized, I start to ask who said it, but then I realize, since I am talking to Grumpy Luke, in all likelihood he is not actually sharing his favorite quote with me. He's telling me to shut the fuck up.

"Seeing as you're staying the night, and all," Rusty whispers, "can I give you a grand tour?"

I'm equal parts intrigued and frightened. What are the odds that there's no taxidermy in this cabin? Zero.

"She needs to stay off her foot," Grumpy Luke says, "so she can get better and be on her way. At sunrise, preferably."

First: How did he hear that? Second: Told you so.

"She'll be off her foot. Both her feet, in fact," Rusty says, and before Grumpy Luke can respond or I can process what's happening, I'm in Rusty's arms. These men really do have the whole bridegroom-style carry down pat, don't they?

"You've already seen the kitchen and the living room and the dining room," he says. "And of course, the bathroom."

Holding me with one arm, he slides open a pocket door I hadn't even noticed, which takes us into another room. A bedroom. A bedroom with bunk beds. Three sets of the biggest bunk beds I've ever seen, one set against each wall.

"You sleep in bunk beds," I say. Then I quickly add, not wanting to sound judgmental about it, "The woodwork is impeccable."

It really is. You don't get furniture of this quality at a store these days.

"Did you guys build them?" I ask.

There's a long pause. "Our father did. He was an incredible woodworker. We're just decent at it."

I note his use of the words "did" and "was" in reference to their father, and the way his voice trips a bit on the word.

"I'll bet he was an incredible man," I say gently.

He doesn't respond.

"Which bed is yours?" I ask.

"I'm not in here," he says and carries me across the room, through another door. In this room, there's three individual beds. As I'm doing the math in my head, he says, "Luke sleeps upstairs. In the attic. Don't go up there."

"Okay," I say, even though the don't go up there ignites my curiosity and makes me immediately want to go up there, though I'm generally not a fan of attics because they're typically filled with boxes and boxes of useless crap. But maybe since they have so much useless crap down here, the attic is spic-and-span. Or maybe Grumpy Luke sleeps on a mattress on top of boxes of useless crap. Either way, now I need to know what's up there.

"Do you want to be on top or bottom?" Rusty asks, pulling me out of my musings.

I gaze into his gorgeous hazel eyes and see no innuendo there, but a very naughty image of me riding him pops into my head. In the image, his hands cup my tits with no spillage—I am a busty girl, but they bounce in his huge palms as I bounce on his huge cock, both of us making obscene sounds of pleasure. I blurt, "Top, definitely. But, um…I can't take one of your beds. I can sleep on the couch. I don't mind."

And that's how I find myself alone on the couch, stretched out under an old Afghan, long after they've turned in for the night. I'm wide awake, and it's so quiet. Shouldn't this place at least creak or something?

If there's one thing I can't stand, it's total silence. I need some white noise. If only my phone wasn't destroyed, I have the perfect app that doesn't require a WiFi connection, with the settings optimized to usher me to sleep quickly and keep me there for my full eight hours. Without it, I don't know if I'll ever reach a REM cycle.

And the total darkness is worse. The moon's not even out, so I can't see my hand in front of my face. I feel like I'm in a tomb.

Of course, there's a silver lining—it's warm and cozy in this cabin. Despite the drawbacks, this is a way better arrangement than freezing my ass off in a tent, which if Ash is correct, would likely collapse on me underneath the weight of a foot of snow.

Still, I feel like I'm in a tomb, so when I finally drift off, I dream I'm in a tomb.

That's what my subconscious decides to go with? With the naughty image of me riding Rusty in there as an option?

I'm in a tomb, and I'm not dead but I'm not quite alive either, and I realize I'm dying, suffocated by piles and piles of stuff. No, not stuff. Piles and piles of my mother's ex-husbands' corpses. Clive, the latest casualty, is on top of me, lifeless eyes staring into mine.

Then a giant hand is on my shoulder, shaking me.

I jolt awake. "Don't touch me, Dead Clive!" I shriek.

"Gold, are you okay?" a voice that is definitely not Clive's asks.

"Oh my God." I throw off all the covers—I started out with one blanket but now there are like a dozen on top of me—and heave myself up. "Who's there?"

"Buck. Buck Bj?rnsson."

I try to control my breathing. My heart, oh my Lord, my heart is going to spontaneously combust. Or is that a bat in my chest, flapping its wings in a panic? Could I have swallowed a bat in my sleep?

I hug myself.

"You were screaming," Buck tells me, his voice grumbly with concern.

"Oh," I say. "I'm sorry I woke you."

"I was awake. I had to take a piss…I mean. I had to…relieve myself. I was about to bring you another blanket in case you were cold, but it looks like someone or multiple someones beat me to that. Are you cold, though, because I can bring you another?"

I nod, because I am. Despite all the blankets I was under, I'm shivering, my teeth chattering.

"Do you want me to build you a fire or…"

"Or?"

"You can come sleep in my bed with me. I'll keep you warm. I won't try anything, I swear."

Rose-Gold! That's what they all say! He's probably a somnophiliac and as soon as you doze off, he'll whip it out!

Maybe I wouldn't mind if he whipped it out, Mother!

Why am I so fricking horny?

I have not waited thirty loooooooooooooooong years to have sex, just to give it up to the first set of ten brothers that come along.

But that's it, I realize. It's Winnie and her Hammer brothers.

Their exception-to-the-rule love story is what makes the idea of having ten brothers of my own so appealing. And like Winnie…I'd have to start with one.

Oh my God. What is wrong with me? I know that's not for me. Not with the…Bj?rnsson brothers or any other set of ten men.

The Hammer brothers are one thing. The Hammer brothers and Winnie make sense, I remind myself. So much sense. Me with ten mountain men, living happily ever after in their cabin off the grid? THAT makes no sense.

But it doesn't have to be a happily-ever-after…it could just be…a happy ending.

"Goldie?" Buck prompts. His warm brown eyes are so sincere and kind.

Part of me wants to go with him, to his bed. Part of me wants to stay on this couch alone and rub one out underneath all these covers, hoping to get some of this pent-up desire out before I do or say something I can't take back.

But I've already woken up one brother, and I can never make myself come when I'm worried about someone else hearing my sounds…and even if I could get myself there, when I fall back asleep, I might fall back into that nightmare. I shudder.

"I would love to sleep in your bed," I say impulsively. I've never done anything impulsive in my life and it hurts a little, not gonna lie.

"But first…" I add, because without Grumpy Luke to interfere, why not? Even in Buck's bed, I'm not ready to go back to sleep, to risk seeing the lifeless eyes of Clive, to feel the weight of all my mother's ex-husbands pressing down on me again. "Would you let me give you a tiny little makeover before we go to sleep?"

I'm about to gently state my reasons, making sure to focus on how nice it will feel to have his beard softened and sculpted, and even throwing in the idea of a scalp massage as I shampoo, but before I can utter another persuasive word, Buck scoops me up against his chest, rumbling out a silent laugh that feels like a seismic event. He heads for the bathroom, and just like Rusty did, he deposits me with the utmost care on the closed toilet seat.

"I would love for you to make me a lumbersexual, Gold," he says. "I mean, if you think I could look go-ood like Rusty."

"Of course you will," I assure him, because he sounds uncertain.

He meets my eyes, and his mouth melts into his easygoing, laid-back grin, but I still catch some nervousness in his eyes.

"You're going to be a hottie," I say with a definitive nod. "And," I add because it feels uber-important, "it's not going to take much at all!"

Like I did with Rusty, I pull out all the supplies and explain what everything is.

"That itty-bitty bottle of shampoo's supposed to wash all my hair?" he asks, unruly eyebrows high. God, once I have all the stray hairs plucked and shape those brows up just a little, his kind brown eyes are really gonna pop.

"Yes," I tell him, though honestly I'm hoping that itty-bitty bottle of shampoo will wash all his hair and all the others' too, once I have their consent. But it's gonna be a stretch. "It doesn't take much."

Despite talking and laughing with Buck through the makeover, almost like we're old friends, we're quiet enough that the rest of the household sleeps soundly, and by the time I have his curls trimmed and his beard sculpted, we're both yawning.

"You think it looks nice?" he asks me earnestly as he glances at himself in an old mirror that's been kept at the back of the bathroom cabinet, a layer of dust on top. He turns his head this way and that, and his neat, strong brows furrow, as if he can't quite reconcile that it's his own reflection he's peering at. "That's all that matters to me."

Buck Bj?rnsson looks gorgeous, enough to give me flutters in my stomach—and those flutters slip deliciously lower too—as he scoops me into his arms again.

"You look amazing, Buck," I tell him. "And it really, truly didn't take very much. I can show you how to maintain the look before I leave, if you'd like."

"Mmm, well. To be honest, I don't really want to think about you leavin' just yet. Are you ready for bed, Gold?"

I yawn, and nod against his chest. He carries me to his bed. He has one of the singles. Gently, he lays me down and then climbs in next to me.

"Can we cuddle?" I whisper. He envelops me. I feel so small against him. So right. Safe, even.

I don't want to think about leaving just yet, either.

I press my head against his chest and feel it rise and fall. His breathing evens out. I close my eyes and feel myself relax, and then I drift off too. I don't think I've ever felt so secure and protected in my whole entire life. There's a very stable, very dependable vibe I get from the Bj?rnssons. And I like it.

When I wake up again, it's not morning yet, or what I would call morning, anyway, but it's getting lighter out.

I gasp when I realize I've somehow wound up on top of Buck. Like, not just an arm or a leg draped over his body, but my entire body on top of his.

Holy fuck.

We're both still clothed, but his hand is on my butt. Or rather, my butt is in his hand. I have some serious junk in the trunk, and yet one of my ass cheeks fits perfectly in his palm, as if his palm were made to hold it. Just like Rusty was holding my boob in my fantasy. A perfect fit.

Beneath me, there's a serious case of morning wood happening.

No way is my palm big enough to hold that, but damn if I wouldn't give it a go, given the opportunity.

Maybe.

No, not maybe, I realize.

Definitely.