Shooting for the Stars (26 page)

“Maybe.” She yawned.

He smoothed her hair away from her face. He’d always wanted to touch her like this. They’d both been lonely. And now they didn’t need to be. If a family wasn’t in the cards, that only meant more time for naked affection.

They lazed together for a while, and Stella’s head began to feel heavy on his chest. Holding her, Bear listened to her lengthening breaths. Then he joined her in her dreams.

Twenty-Seven

T
HE
NEXT
MORNING
, S
TELLA
woke up to the sensation of her new boyfriend reaching over her hip to stoke her tummy. As she came to, his hand slipped between her legs. While his fingers slowly teased her, she let out a sleepy sigh. “What time is it?”

“Only seven thirty,” he whispered, his fingertips skimming all the right places. “Nobody will be looking for us for a while.”

She shivered with pleasure as he tightened his grip on her body. Even better, he drew her knee up, fitting the length of his erection between her legs where she could reach it. She tightened her thighs around him, and he reached both arms around her, palming her breasts, his mouth on the back of her neck.

There was nothing like a little hotel room sex to heat a girl up fast.

When she took him in from behind, he groaned. After a minute, he rolled her onto her elbows and knees, his hands cupping her breasts while he rocked into her. Stella closed her eyes and enjoyed the sensation of his powerful body curled around hers.

“You could not be any sexier,” he whispered as they moved together. “But I want your mouth on mine.” With a lusty grunt, he pulled out and rolled onto his back. “Come here,” he demanded.

It was funny how Bear’s bossy tone was so much more appealing when they were both naked.

He lifted her onto his broad chest. Their eyes locked. Slowly, she slipped him inside, and his eyes squeezed shut in appreciation. “Damn, lady,” he said. “Even if your brother decks me, it will be worth it.”

Stella ground her hips onto his. “Hush,” she said.

“Shut me up, then.”

She dropped down, tilting her head, capturing his mouth in a wet kiss. Beneath her, Bear’s hips jacked up. He took control, steering her hips against his. And then there was no more talking, only gasps of pleasure and the steam of skin against skin.

They lay there afterward, holding each other as the clock ticked forward. “I don’t want to get out of this bed,” Stella said.

“I hear you. But we have to turn up in the lobby eventually. You can have the first shower,” Bear offered.

Eventually, she talked herself into getting up. After a shower, she tossed all her belongings in her bag, straightened up the bed and combed her wet hair. Then she tapped on the bathroom door, where Bear was showering. “Yeah!” he answered.

She opened the door. “I come in search of a hair dryer,” she said.

“I think I saw one somewhere.”

She looked around the hotel bathroom, but then heard a knock at the door. “Room service.” The voice was muffled by the sound of running water.

Stella hadn’t heard Bear order anything, but she went to open the door anyway.

And there sat her brother, smiling up at her.

Stella’s mouth fell open. The sound of the shower ended, and the next thing she heard was Bear’s voice. “Did you find it, buddy?”

Hank pushed the door open just as Stella turned around to see, as she feared, Bear standing completely naked in the open bathroom doorway.

“Oh, I’m sure she found it,” Hank said.

Never had a man moved so quickly to grab a towel than Bear did right then.

“Actually, dude, I’ve seen your junk before,” Hank said. “And I’m guessing my baby sister has too.”

Stella was still rooted to the rug, too surprised to speak. She could only watch as her brother rolled past her, flicking the door closed behind him. He crossed over to the display of mini bar items on the console. Hank chose a small can of mixed nuts and popped open the top.

“Hank,” Bear said quietly, the towel around his waist. “You’re up early.”

Hank chuckled and put an almond into his mouth. “Just think, Bear. What if I’d been
even
earlier?”

Bear closed his eyes. “I was going to talk to you tomorrow after we got home.”

“What? And spoil the surprise?” He pointed a pecan at Stella. “You two are a couple of knuckleheads. Why all the secrecy?”

“I just thought…” Bear shook his head. “Your little sister.”

Hank shook the can of nuts. “Look, if you hurt her, it won’t be mixed nuts that I’m cracking. It will be yours.” He grinned at his own joke. “But if you’re both happy, I don’t have a problem with it.”

Stella sat down on the edge of the bed, relieved Hank wasn’t going to make a big deal about this. Although Bear still looked worried. With his mouth tight, he took his boxers and his jeans into the bathroom and shut the door.

“Stella, Stella.” Hank chuckled. “You should have seen your face when I opened the door. If only I’d had my camera ready.”

She picked up a bed pillow and bonked him over the head with it. “You don’t have to gloat.”

“Why would you rob me of my fun?” he asked, wrestling the weapon out of her hands.

When the bathroom door opened, Bear came out dressed from the waist down. “Actually, Hank, we didn’t tell you because we just don’t like you all that much.”

Hank threw the pillow at Bear. “Put on a shirt. Let’s all go out for breakfast.”

“I’ll just be one minute,” Stella said, ducking into the bathroom to finally dry her hair.

* * *

Bear took her spot on the edge of the bed and began pulling on his socks. When Stella closed the bathroom door, he cleared his throat. “Look… I…” Unfortunately, he hadn’t prepared the speech yet. And there was so much riding on it. “Uh, I know I’m not much of a catch. And maybe we caught you off guard. But this is not just a fling. I hope your parents aren’t too pissed.”

Hank made an irritated noise. “I love you, man. But you’re kind of an idiot.”

“I know,” Bear said quickly.

“
No
, you fucking
don’t
know. First of all, I know you’d never treat Stella like just a cheap fling. You guys have been friends forever. You don’t have to explain that shit to me, okay? And anybody with eyes can see you two have been circling each other for years. But that’s not
even
the dumbest thing you said. My mom, for the record, would lie down in the road for you. And not just because you’ve been my fucking hero for the last fifteen months. Are you listening to me?”

“Yeah.” Bear was listening. It’s just that the back of his throat had begun to burn, and he was having trouble looking Hank in the eye.

“My parents have always thought the world of you. And not because of all the shit that went down at your house. It’s because you’re such a rock. I guess my mom never said those things to your face. But she loves you to death, man. She always has. This will make that more convenient for her, okay?”

Now Bear was finding it really hard to swallow. “That’s…” He cleared his throat again. “Nice to hear, man. Your mom has always been good to me.”

Hank put a hand on his shoulder. “Not nearly as good as you’ve been to me. I don’t think I would have made it through the last year and a half without you. Felt like the whole world forgot about me. But not you, man. You kept showing up. So I kept getting out of bed in the morning and putting a brave face on it. Because I knew I was going to hear your tires in my driveway eventually, and you’d knock on the door and hold me accountable. That’s all that kept me going for a while, until I got over the hump. Maybe I should have said this before, okay? But I notice that shit. Thank you.”

“It’s nothing,” Bear choked out.

“It’s a whole lot more than nothing. And that’s why my parents aren’t going to lose any sleep over the fact that you’re in flux with your life, the same way that Stella and I are. Because if you put even half as much effort into taking care of Stella the way you took care of me, that’s better than anyone else could ever do. I always had a hunch you two would end up together. That’s why I asked you to look after her when I left for Utah. I didn’t want to see her end up with some loser.”

Of all the things Hank had said this morning, none of them shocked him quite as much as that. It was a long minute until Bear could find his voice. “I…” He tried once more to clear his throat. “I plan to take very good care of Stella. If she lets me. She’s even tougher than you.”

Hank snorted, and then socked him in the hip. “Good luck with that, actually.”

“Right?”

The bathroom door opened, and Stella marched out. She flashed Bear the first shy smile he’d ever seen on her face. “Okay, boys. Your moment is over. Let’s eat breakfast. Because you know there won’t be anything edible on that airplane.”

“I call shotgun on the way to the airport,” Hank said, opening the room door.

“Not fair!” Stella argued. “The vehicle isn’t visible!”

“I saw it out the window when I was talking to your lunkhead boyfriend,” Hank said.

“Liar!” Stella smacked him in the back of the head.

Bear’s heart was too full to jump into the fray. He could only hold the door open for his two favorite people in the world. And then follow them out into the bright morning.

Epilogue

Two Years Later

W
HEN
THEIR
CAR
REACHED
the gravel portion of her brother’s mountain road, Bear removed his hand from Stella’s knee, and she missed the warm weight of it. But since the man needed two hands to steer up the curing road, she had to settle for the rough sound of his voice as he sang along with Phish on the car stereo.

The surface beneath them was rutted, which made the car bounce. The motion did nothing for Stella’s queasy stomach, unfortunately. For more than a week, she’d tried to fight off a lingering bug. It might have been a good idea to stay home again today. But Stella was tired of feeling tired, so she’d insisted that everything was fine. And anyway, they’d driven all the way here.

Her brother’s house swung into view, and Bear parked beside her parents’ car. Inside, mayhem awaited. Today was Hank’s birthday, and Hank and Callie had invited everyone they knew for barbecue and cake.

Stella had been looking forward to this gathering. If only she weren’t so tired.

“Are you sure you’re up for this?” Bear asked, his hand returning to her knee. “You still look a little pale, buddy.” There was a flicker of worry in his eye, which Stella did not like. So even though she felt pretty crappy, she gave him a big smile.

“I’ll be fine,” she said, unclipping her seatbelt and swiveling to grab the gift she’d stashed on the backseat. “And we drove all the way down.”

She stepped out of the car, hoping she’d made the right decision. After all, she didn’t want to give her three-month-old nephew a virus. But she was probably over it by now, and only feeling a little groggy from a lack of caffeine.

Yesterday was the first day this week that she hadn’t thrown up. The only blessing was having no commitments right now. The competition season had just ended — she’d placed second in the world for women’s freeriding — and classes didn’t begin again for another six weeks or so.

These days, Bear and Stella shared an apartment in Burlington, about ninety minutes away. Living together was important since their wintertime schedules were so haywire they might never see each other if they lived apart. During the summer and fall, they both took courses at the University of Vermont. But during the winter months, their separate activities took them to disparate corners of the snowboarding world. Stella did freeriding competitions, and Bear worked on back country film shoots.

It was hectic, but life was good. Stella needed only a couple more credits before she’d graduate. And the winter travel was fun. Both of them were just coming off the busy season. It’s no wonder that Stella had succumbed to a bug.

Hand in hand, they climbed the front porch together, and the cool March air steadied her. “Are you ready?” she asked Bear, squeezing his fingers. “Crying babies? Family members asking why we haven’t driven down for dinner in a month?”

Bear bent his head, tucking a kiss behind Stella’s ear. “Bring it,” he said. And when Bear met her eyes, she found a reassuring wave of affection there. When the love of her life looked at her that way, Stella felt herself capable of anything.

The door was yanked open by Callie’s friend Willow, who had her toddler son on her hip. “Hi!” she said, smiling up at them. “Welcome to chaos. But there’s both coffee and beer.”

“Hey!” Stella said, kissing her on the cheek. “I didn’t know you were in town.”

“We surprised Callie, because it’s been too long since we’ve seen each other.”

“
Cookie,
” her young son interrupted.

“You had a cookie,” Willow argued, closing the door after Bear ducked in.

“Cookie,” he said again, his fat little hand pressed against her shoulder for emphasis.

Stella kicked off her shoes and did not allow her gaze to linger on his chubby toddler fingers. These last few months, since Hank and Callie had their own little baby, Stella had sometimes found herself pitching between exhilaration and despair. Her newborn nephew was so cute. She didn’t sit around and mope, exactly. But she would turn thirty soon. And it was hard not to wonder how her life would be different if it hadn’t been for her childhood cancer.

Chin up, and all that
. She let Bear lead her by the hand into Hank’s swank dining area, where the table was piled with appetizers and drinks.

“Stella!” her mother cried. “Sweetheart, you haven’t been returning my calls.” Mrs. Lazarus crushed her against her cashmere-covered shoulder.

“Sorry, Mom,” Stella said, her words muffled by the soft fabric. “I’ve been really tired this week. And I knew I’d see you today.”

With a frown, her mother put a hand on Stella’s forehead. “You look a little peaked.”

“It’s nothing. A little bug, and I’m over it.”

That was the wrong thing to say. Her mother took a step back and looked Stella up and down, worry settling over her features. “Did you see a doctor?”