Page 212 of Mountain Men Heroes
Guess his instincts were saying the same because under normal circumstances, he’d be out the door ahead of me.
We found a high-top table in the quietest corner and sat with our backs to the wall, beer bottles sweating condensation in front of us.
Eeli shook his head. “Did our guy have a partner?”
I pulled up the email with the bail jumper’s picture and vital statistics. “Negative. No known associates in the area.”
Eeli nodded and took a pull on his beer.
The silence grew between us and damned if I didn’t feel like a high school chick on a first date. I wasn’t exactly known for my chattiness, and Eeli was even more taciturn. Long silences between us weren’t uncommon or uncomfortable. Neither one of us felt the need to fill every void with idle chatter.
But this silence seemed loaded. Maybe it was just me. Maybe feeling torn between Clara and Eeli was fucking with my head, and Eeli had no clue anything was off.
A glance at him pushed that idea right out of my head. Eeli’s clenched jaw and the white-knuckle grip he had on his beer bottle told me he felt it too.
Before I could think how to bring it up, the band stopped, and the guy that’d been singing since we got here introduced someone else. I ignored what was happening on the stage and racked my brain for ways to bring up Clara.
I opened my mouth, but the room suddenly filled with a sweet voice that carried clear to the back of the bar. The lyrics spoke of longing for love. The emotion behind the words made my heart ache and the voice itself danced over my skin like a warm, loving caress.
My eyes flew to the stage. In all my years of service, I’d seen enough that very little surprised me. But what I saw on that stage made my jaw drop.
“Holy shit. Clara.” Eeli’s voice held a strange huskiness I’d never heard from him before.
With effort, I tore my eyes from Clara, her dark hair flowing over her shoulders and her eyes closed as she sang, to look at Eeli. His face held the same expression I’m sure my own wore—shock and awe.
And something else. I studied him, trying to get a lock on what it was.
But I knew. I knew exactly what I was looking at. For the first time in all the years I’d known him, Eeli wore his feelings on his face as clear as day.
Or maybe I only recognized it on him because it so closely resembled the emotions thrumming through me—longing, need, desire...possession.
“Eeli.” My voice even held the same rasp his had just moments ago.
He spun toward me, his gaze raking my face.
“What the fuck, Dyson?” he finally asked.
I stared at the man in front of me, my best friend. The person who carried me through some of the worst moments of my life. And I knew I needed to come clean.
“She’s our soulmate,” I said quietly.
His eyes narrowed.
I jutted my chin toward the stage. “Clara...she’s...I don’t know. She touched me and something happened. The fucking world opened up, swallowed all my pain and something took root inside me.” Satisfaction for getting the words out there was short-lived.
“That’s impossible, Dyson.”
“Eeli, I know we have...whatever this is going on between us. I know it’s the worst possible time, but I have no control over it. Clara. She’s started something inside me. I don’t understand it, hell I think I’m half crazy.”
“No, it’s not possible.”
“I’m sorry?—”
He shook his head and pounded a fist on the table. “I mean it’s not possible. Clara can’t be yours. Because she’s mine.”
Clara
When Will introduced me to sing, an unusual twinge of nerves struck me. Not that I never got nervous about performing in front of the audience, but usually I welcomed the butterflies that came along before getting on stage. That was all part of the fun.