Bears of Burden: THORN by Ayers Candace

Author:Ayers, Candace [Ayers, Candace]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: C
Published: 2016-11-25T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

Everly stretched, delighting in muscles that were slightly sore for all the right reasons. Last night had been an amazing experience. Connor had finally let his shields down, and what she found beneath them was spectacular. He had cherished her with his eyes, his words, his body. He had made love to her—no way could last night be described in any other words, though she’d never been one to romanticize sex. Last night had been a satisfaction so complete that a small part of her wondered if she would ever be satisfied with anything less again.

Even if that was true, it might just have been worth it. She hadn’t forgotten that she had been intent on getting inside Connor’s defenses to help him—well, maybe for just a few hours there, but who could blame her? The man was enough to make any woman forget for a while what she was about. He’d opened up to her yesterday. Not enough to begin to confide in her about the last fateful mission he’d been on, but enough for her to hope that he would in the future. And if she had to warm his bed for a while longer before he did? Well, that was definitely fine with her.

She ran one hand down Connor’s back. He shivered in response to her touch, but didn’t wake. With a smile, she decided to make herself some coffee. She would wait for a bit, let him wake up and kiss him goodbye before she left him, maybe even try to make plans to see him again.

She padded softly through the apartment, and found everything she needed to make a pot of coffee. When she went to the trash can to dump out the old grounds, she saw a box upended into the trash can. She figured she would replace the bag with a fresh one, but when she pulled out the box to take the bag from the can, there were several photos in an otherwise almost empty bag. She reached down and began to sift through the items. The photos were of Connor and Jonathan, and there were home-burned DVD’s as well. Some of the pictures showed two boys that she assumed to be them as children. Their arms were around each other in most of them, and they had the too-bright smiles and haunted eyes of children who had already been to hell and back, who were leaning on each other to survive.

She rose when she heard Connor come into the room, one of the DVD’s still in her hand.

“Well, good morn—” The words dried on his tongue, and stoic weariness replaced the sleepy warmth that had been in his eyes.

“What is this, Connor?” She couldn’t understand what had led him to throw these things away. She watched his face as the mask of sarcasm and humor that he’d used to hide his pain from her began to appear. No, that wasn’t happening again. Not this time.

“Don’t, Connor. Just…don’t. If you think

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