12. Bexley

12

BEXLEY

“Merida, I need four more gallons of wine before we stock up other things. We ran out at the last celebration.”

“Miss Gausier! I need you to do your orator time before we eat this time around. I want to see if that opens up more time for the kids to participate in the family activities.”

“Voss, hey. Real quick: do I need to send out a hunting crew for another couple of deer? We’ve got a boar we’re going to smoke, and we’ve got a buck Ronyn snagged earlier this morning. But, that’s it for now.”

“No, no, no, no. This is our autumn solstice. I want reds and oranges. Yellows. Evergreens. The whole nine.”

“Do we have the meat marinating? If we don’t, they need to be marinating!”

Dom’s voice pulled me out of my slumber. My brow furrowed in confusion as I tried to make sense of his rapid-fire words. It sounded like he was right there in the room with me, barking orders like a damn madman. But as my eyes fell open, I realized he was beneath me.

His voice just carried that much.

“Jesus, Dom,” I said breathlessly as I rolled over onto my back.

“If we’re going to make our own beer for the celebration, we have to start that today!” Dom barked from below.

“Morning,” Ronyn’s gruff voice said beside me.

“Ah!” I exclaimed, whipping around in bed.

I blinked away the sleep from my eyes and found the towering man standing next to the bed. He had a tray clasped in his hands, and the second I sat up to figure out what was on it, he dropped it into my lap.

“Hold this,” Ronyn commanded.

I was too tired to do anything else other than what he asked. So, with my crooked body still trying to wake up, I held the tray at both ends on my lap. I heard Ronyn slamming his hands into something before plush pillows descended behind me, and he helped me lean forward.

“Oooooh, yeah,” I groaned as I leaned back. “Thank you.”

He chuckled as he smoothed my hair out of my face. “Enjoy your breakfast.”

Dom’s voice filtered through the floorboards again. “What? No! Why would we use winter solstice decorations for the autumn solstice. That’s unheard of!”

I slowly looked up at Ronyn and found him grinning down at me. “Your best bet is to stay out of his way today. Otherwise, he’ll run you over.”

Dom yelled out across his house. “Hey! Voss is heading up a hunting crew to go get us another couple of deer! We need the marinades ready for when they come back!”

“Yikes,” I whispered as I picked up the coffee mug.

Ronyn perched on the edge of the bed, making it groan beneath his weight as it shifted. “Like I said, just leave him alone today.”

I sipped the coffee and hummed with delight. “You cleaned his coffee maker, didn’t you?”

Ronyn’s face fell. “Of course, I fucking did. The nasty fuck.”

I barked with laughter before I took another long pull from the mug. “Thank you.”

His smirk filled me with white hot electricity. “You’re welcome, Bumblebee.”

“So,” I said after taking another sip of my coffee, “you guys celebrate every solstice, right?”

He nodded. “We do.”

“Is Dom in charge of planning all of them?”

“That, he is.”

I put my coffee down and picked up a piece of bacon. “That suits him well.”

“We make sure everyone is suited to their jobs well around here. Helps with morale, especially during times like these.”

I finish my bacon and pick up a piece before I hand it to him. “Want one?”

He shook his head. “You need to eat.”

“So do you. Have you eaten yet?”

“I have.”

I wiggled the bacon at him. “Did you eat enough?”

He looked down at it. “You’re not going to stop wiggling it, are you?”

I moved it closer to his face and kept wiggling it. “Nope.”

He rolled his eyes before he plucked it from my fingers and tossed it into his mouth. A piece of bacon that size would’ve taken me three bites. Maybe even four. But to him, it was nothing but a little appetizer.

“Thanks,” he said after swallowing.

“Want anymore?” I asked as I pointed to my plate.

His hardened gray gaze pinned me to the bed. “Eat, Bumblebee. I won’t tell you again.”

I grinned as I picked up my fork and stabbed at a strawberry. “So testy.”

As a smirk slid across his face, Dom’s voice rose from the hell beneath us. “I need our musicians! Auditions start in thirty!”

Ronyn groaned. “I don’t know why he insists on auditions.”

I furrowed my brow as I kept spearing the fruit. “What do you mean?”

He shrugged. “Dom gives a performance spot to every musician that auditions. I don’t know why he does them if he’s just going to tell everyone they can perform.”

The thought spread a smile across my face. “That’s… actually kind of sweet.”

“Not very time efficient, though,” he murmured.

I reached out and swatted at his thigh playfully with my hand. “Of course, you’d be more concerned about time allotment. But, not everything has to be efficient to serve a purpose.”

He quirked an eyebrow. “You sound like Dom.”

I shrugged as I took another bite from my fruit. “Is that a bad thing?”

He reached for a grape off my plate and tossed it into his mouth. “Guess not.”

“That’s the spirit.”

A comfortable silence fell between us, and yet I couldn’t help but to ask. “How did you get that scar across your right eye?”

He stared at me with a blank expression for a moment, and I panicked.

“I mean, if it’s too personal?—”

He placed his hand on my shoulder and stroked his thumb softly against my neck. “Delilah’s attack on us that killed Voss’s parents?”

My heart sank. “Oh, no.”

He sighed heavily as his hand fell away from me. “Dad and I did our best to get Mom out of there. And, we succeeded. But… at a great cost.”

My stomach dropped to my toes. “You don’t mean…?”

Ronyn nodded slowly. “Delilah’s attack killed my father. I got the scar across my eye trying to save him. But, I didn’t make it on time.”

“Ronyn, I’m so sorry,” I whispered as I reached out and took his hand.

He unfurled his fingers for me, and I watched as the whole of my hand settled into the palm of his. His thick, callused fingers wrapped around my small grip, and his warmth alone shivered me to the bone.

“We’ve gotten by,” Ronyn said, his voice gruff with emotion, “Mom and me. But, Voss isn’t the only one with a personal stake in this fight.”

“What about Dom?”

As if he knew we beckoned him, his voice wafted from beneath our feet. “Fifteen minutes until I need all of the musicians!”

I couldn’t help but giggle while Ronyn snickered and shook his head.

“It’s not my story to tell,” was all he offered.

I squeezed his hand. “Very well. Just know that I’m here for you, okay? You don’t have to carry shit around like that alone if you don’t want to.”

He released my hand and cupped my cheek. “You’re a breath of fresh air, Bumblebee.”

“As are you, Ronybug ,” I said teasingly as I used his mother’s nickname for him.

His face fell flat, which only made me giggle. His voice held a sense of warning to it. “Bumblebee…”

“I know, I know,” I said as I turned my attention back to breakfast. “Mom only.”

He nodded as if punctuating a sentence. “Yep.”

“It’s a cute nickname, though,” I said, cutting into my pancakes.

“Don’t tell her that,” he murmured.

Laughing while cutting up my pancakes, the door to Dom’s bedroom whipped open, revealing a very smiley Dom with a very sweaty forehead.

“Hey,” he said breathlessly, “sweet girl. You wanna come listen to the musicians with me? Auditions will take place for the next couple of hours.”

“Ugh,” Ronyn groaned.

But, I grew excited as I ate my breakfast more quickly. “Let me finish and I’ll be right down.”

Dom smiled brightly. “Perfect. I’ll get another chair set up. Ronyn, you in?”

“Piss off,” he grumbled.

Dom pointed a finger gun at him. “I’ll save you a seat just in case. Bexley?”

I swallowed quickly. “Yeah, Dom?”

He winked at me. “See you soon. We hold auditions at Voss’s place. He’s got the larger living space for it.”

And as I practically shoveled the food into my mouth, I couldn’t help but realize Ronyn watching me like a hawk the entire time I ate. Clocking my movements. He watched my jaw while I chewed. He grinned every time I hummed with satisfaction over the absolutely marvelous meal he brought me. He watched my fork travel to my plate and back up to my mouth in almost a rhythmic fashion.

Almost as if he enjoyed watching me enjoy the fruits of his labor.