the guest bedroom, Ethan’s words were still echoing off the corners of my mind.
“Remember what you deserve and remember we’ll love you no matter what.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO - OWEN
Harper was making dinner while the rest of us sat at the table. I was dazed from the wonderful encounter that had just taken place and I knew Harper felt the same way. He was cooking up some chicken, but all I could think about was how Kyra gave herself over to us willingly again, despite all the shit she was currently going through.
Rowan and Blake came back in from the other room and sat down. They took it upon themselves to clean up the fucking mess we all made in there while Chance and Ethan talked about the modifications they could make to Kyra’s house. Mark would need help after he came home from the hospital and I was just glad to see those two fuckheads doing something else besides punching each other’s dicks in.
Rowan and Blake sat down, joining the conversation on what we could all build and install and all that shit and, suddenly, I felt a little stifled. My head was still swirling with all the shit that had just taken place, so I slipped out onto the porch to get some fresh air.
Kyra had been asleep for about three hours now and I wondered how she was doing. I wondered if it was best for her to wake up alone after something like this. I debated on whether or not to go lay down with her. To just curl up next to her so she wouldn’t have to wake up alone with her thoughts. But as I stepped onto the porch and drew in a deep breath of air, I heard a familiar voice come from around the corner.
“Fancy seeing you out here.”
I turned around and saw Kyra, her body bundled up in a blanket. She was in clothes that were obviously not hers and her little nose was cherry red from the cold. She was shivering, even with the blanket around her, and her hair was mussed and whipping around in the wind.
I immediately walked over to her and wrapped my arms around her to warm her up.
“What are you doing out here?” I asked.
“I woke up and just… needed some air, I guess.”
“I know how you feel,” I said.
She pulled away from me pretty quickly despite being cold, so I shoved my hands into my pockets and looked out onto the beautiful mountain landscape.
“How you feeling?” I asked.
“Overwhelmed,” she said, sighing. “My father’s in the hospital. Landon’s blowing up my phone. And I’ve complicated things so much between all of us that I just don’t know what my next move should be.”
I smiled at her use of the word “complicated.” Things had always been fucking complicated in this family. Raising six boys just about drove our mother up the wall. Out of all of us, Harper was the only one that got our father’s loner tendencies. So, she had five wild children and one that would never talk to her.
Complicated was a concept we’d already fucking mastered before she came along.
“You going back to Landon?” I asked.
And, to my delight, she shook her head no.
“I don’t think I could. I just don’t think I could be happy with him. What he’s offering my father is… incredible. And maybe not going back to Landon will cost my father what he needs. But my dad wouldn’t want me to sacrifice my happiness for his well-being. He’d find a way to kill me, even if he couldn’t move.”
I chuckled at her response but I could tell her mind was still very preoccupied.
“If it makes you feel any better, I think you’re doing the right thing,” I said.
I watched Kyra turn her head to me, her red nose glaringly obvious against the white background of winter as a smile crossed her face.
“You might be a bit biased,” she said.
“Maybe so,” I said, grinning. “Doesn’t mean I’m less right, though.”
“But even still,” she said. “That brings me to another roadblock.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m torn between you guys. Isn’t that obvious?’
Her question stopped me in my tracks and I studied the way her body tensed up again.