Chapter 4

Despite the unease of the first week or two, by the end of her first month staying with them, Jayne was feeling reasonably good about where she was, and a lot of that had to do, not just with her best friend, but with Pace.

The confrontation she had been dreading that night never came to be. She'd been dreading seeing him that next morning, but, in fact, he didn't mention anything to her about it at all, and the subject hadn't come up again between them. He'd been just as friendly and supportive as he'd been from the moment she'd arrived, too. He hadn't gotten all sullen or resentful, as some men would have at her lack of response to his confession that he had feelings for her. As her husband most definitely would have.

He continued to keep Braeden occupied when he could, and between him and Brownie, she practically felt like a third parent. Jake had never been a partner in raising their son, but the two of them were making up for that in spades, always deferring to her, of course, though, in how she wanted them to handle him when things cropped up.

Like the inevitable tantrum that Braeden threw upon learning that Pace wasn't going to be spending the day at his beck and call, as he had been for quite some time now, but that he had to go to work—not that he hadn't been told that that was what was going to happen.

They all had breakfast together that morning—minus Brownie, who wasn't an early riser. If she allowed herself to think about it, it was almost as if they were a family, but Jayne refused to let her avid imagination go down that dead-end street.

It was bad enough the first time she saw him in what had to be an incredibly expensive business suit. He was gorgeous coming home every night in dirty jeans and a worn shirt from the range, caked head to toe in dust, and she didn't want to consider what else. But this…he was friggin' unbelievably handsome.

The suit clung lovingly to his incredibly broad shoulders in a way she wished she could, fitting him to a T. His tie matched his handkerchief, and the suit pants—when he doffed the coat to sit down and eat—revealed the enticing curve of his butt and the size of his muscular legs.

She'd gotten up early to make him breakfast before he went—it was the least she could do. She was up anyway and had fallen into the habit of making the three of them breakfast.

This morning, it was pancakes, sausage and eggs. She put a hot plate of food down in front of Pace first then a much smaller version in front of her son before bringing her own to the table, which was a bit less than half of his but would definitely hold her until lunch, along with a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice for him.

Unfortunately, Braeden reacted to orange juice—he got sores in his mouth from the acidity—so she gave him apple juice instead. She'd just sat down to dig into her meal when she popped up again, murmuring to herself, "Forgot the coffee."

Pace reached out to touch her arm but didn't. "Sit down and eat. I'll get it. Anything else I can get while I'm up?"

"Not that I can think of."

A few minutes later, he handed her a full mug of coffee—her fixin's were already on the table—then he sat down to dig into his meal. "Thank you very much for breakfast."

"You're very welcome, but it's all your food."

Pace frowned at that, but he didn't say anything.

"Speaking of which, I thought I'd go into town this morning and get some groceries. Is there a list I could add to or should I start one?"

"We keep a shared list on an app. I'll send you an invite."

"I don't want to impose."

The look she got from him at having said that made her mouth dry and her heart start to beat faster, especially considering the two very intimate things she'd learned about him yesterday.

"You are never an imposition, Miss Jayne. You couldn't be if you tried."

That got an out and out smile from her, which made his heart practically burst in his chest. "You, sir, obviously don't know me very well."

Pace winked audaciously at her. "I'm workin' on it. Gimme time, woman."

She was even more beautiful to him when she blushed.

They kept up a nice, companionable conversation throughout the meal that included Braeden asking Pace every few minutes when he could "wide" Lady. The man had the patience of a saint with him, and he always responded to Braeden's queries calmly, often asking him questions in response.

But when Pace got up and headed to the door, kissing the toddler—who had gotten down immediately when his hero had—on the cheek and saying good bye, his little shadow had a fit in his wake, screaming and yelling and stomping and waving his hands around angrily, not wanting him to leave.

Jayne made as if to intervene in the situation, but Pace put his hand up as he bent down to Braeden. She noted that he didn't squat, and he didn't kneel, which he often did when he was talking to the boy.

This time, though, he bent from the waist and said two words very quietly and firmly, "Enough, Braeden."

His use of his first name alone probably caught the little boy's attention, and he stood there, looking up at the man in front of him, his lower lip flopped down to the floor as he panted from his exertions. Usually, he was "sport" or "partner" or "buddy" or some other affectionate nickname. He was also used to hearing only positive, upbeat comments and praise from Pace, who always used a very loving tone with him. But the big man wasn't smiling like he usually did whenever they talked, either, so he'd stopped somewhat out of confusion and a slight wariness that crept in from past experience.

Pace saw that edge of fear in his eyes and wanted to drive his fist into the boy's father, but he was very careful not to let his anger show in any way.

When he spoke, his voice was very soft and level. "What did I promise we would do when I came home?"

As if he'd totally forgotten, his eyes widened, and he answered with a reverence that said everything about how much he was looking forward to doing just that. "Widing lesson."

"Exactly. Good job."

Braeden was surprised to hear praise from the big man, when he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that Pace wasn't too happy with him at the moment. It was a measure of just how much Braeden trusted Pace that he hadn't run from him at the first sign of Pace's displeasure.

If it had been his father standing in front of him, Braeden would already be cowering behind his mother, or would have run away into his room.

But Pace didn't sound angry, like his father always did.

"I'm afraid that's not going to happen if you act like that, my man." He sounded genuinely regretful about that possibility, but he could still see fear in the boy's eyes, and it made his guts twist. "I'm not mad, though, Braeden. Is my voice loud or angry sounding?"

Braeden shook his head.

"That's because I'm not. But that kind of behavior is unacceptable. It upsets your mother, and it upsets me, and, if you keep doing it, you will lose yourself the privilege of riding Lady when I get home."

Brae glanced back at his mother, then back to Pace, then down at his feet.

When he spoke this time, his voice was more conversational but still firm. "I know you don't want me to leave, buddy, but I have to. The day will fly by. Your mom will probably bring you into town and you'll get busy helping her and forget all about me. And when I get home, if your mother says that you've behaved well, we'll set you up on Lady, after you've helped me groom and saddle her."

He'd deliberately waited to touch the boy, not wanting to frighten him any further, but he caught his chin gently and brought the little boy's eyes to his. "It's okay to be unhappy with me leaving. I want to stay home and play, too, but I can't. You can feel that way, and you can say that you feel that way, and that would be perfectly fine. But there's no need to pitch a fit, and I won't have it." Then he changed his tone to be more coaxing and less firm.

"Can you tell me what I just said, partner?"

Brae thought hard, then he said, "Be sad, but don't pitch a fit. It's unceptable."

That had Pace grinning. "That's exactly right. It's 'unceptable'," the big man agreed, sweeping him up into a big hug. "Smart boy! Now gimme a kiss, and I'll be on my way."

He kissed and hugged Pace very tightly, laying his head on the big guy's shoulder.

Jayne came to him and put her arms out to take the boy, but he didn't want to be held by her, clinging to Pace instead. But Pace needed to head out, so he put Brae down, saying, "Why don't you go draw me a picture of Lady to show to me when I get home, hmm? Then we'll put it up on the fridge."

His feet barely hit the floor before he began running toward their bedroom to get his drawing paper and his crayons.

Then Jayne felt Pace's somewhat stern gaze fall on her.

"I do have to leave, but before I go, I wanted to mention to you that we have charge accounts at Meserve's, which is the market in Bath, one for the business and one for the house. Charge whatever you get to the house account."

Jayne didn't respond to that in any way as she avoided his eyes and opened the door for him. Pace didn't move, but she could still tell that he was staring down at her from under a drawn brow.

"Jayne. Do I need to tell you that I would consider it 'unceptable' behavior if I don't see a charge for groceries for today appearing on that account?"

That got her to look at him for a second, all delightfully flustered by what he'd said, but fighting a smile at him using Braeden's mangled version of the word.

"Yes, but I want to contribute!"

Damn, she was so cute—she was practically stomping her feet herself, Pace thought errantly.

"I don't want to just leech off you, and groceries are what we're consuming the most of, I think."

He straightened, and his tone was sterner than she had ever heard him use. "I'm not going to argue this point with you, hon. Brownie and I have told you many times that that's not how we see you being here at all, and I'm not going to say it again. And I have no interest in frightening you at all, but I want you to think about how differently I might deal with your misbehavior as opposed to Braeden's."

Pace snuck a kiss to the top of her head before it snapped up suddenly at what he'd said, with a disbelieving look on her face. Then he ducked out as quickly as he could, before she could respond in any way. "Bye! I'll be home around five or so. Sooner if I can."

Jayne just stood there for the longest time, not really sure what to say or do. What he'd said drifted around in her head for a long time, until Brownie surfaced at about eleven and began scavenging for something to eat.

* * *

Brownie never ate actual breakfast foods for breakfast, so she was reheating some of the leftovers from last night in the microwave. Jayne had long since accepted her weird eating habits.

While she was making coffee for herself, Jayne wandered into kitchen. "Good, you're up. I have a couple questions for you."

"I'm not awake yet, but shoot," Brownie replied.

Jayne shook her head. "How could you not be awake? It's almost noon."

Brownie just raised an eyebrow at her. "And your point would be?"

Sighing, Jayne said, "I'm going into town to get some groceries. Do you want to come, and/or is there anything you want or need?"

"Uh, I think it's all on the app, and if you don't mind, no. If you'll be okay, I'm going to fly to Denver. Hank is playing there tonight, and we're going to go to dinner afterward. I probably won't be home until sometime tomorrow."

"Pace sent me an invite to the app, and I'll be fine. I'm glad you're getting to see him." She opened her mouth, closed it again, then opened it again, not sure if she should even ask what she wanted to ask. "Your brother dropped another bomb on me on his way out the door this morning that has me a little confused. And surprised. And…I don't know, on edge."

"Oh? What'd he say?" Brownie asked, kind of surprised to hear it, considering that she and Pace had spoken not long after he'd confessed to Jayne that he wanted to date her. Pace had decided it might be best just to back off and give her some space, unless she came to him and said she would like to date him, but he didn't hold out a lot of hope about that happening.

Brownie suspected that he didn't want to open the subject again between them because he didn't want her to turn him down. Pace didn't usually hide from uncomfortable situations, and what that meant, she thought, was that he was more into Jayne than maybe he even realized.

Jayne followed Brownie into the dining room and sat down with her while she ate, as she'd been doing nearly every morning since she got there.

"Brae had the meltdown I told you he was going to have eventually. He's really attached to Pace, and he did not want him to leave this morning."

Brownie nodded. "Yeah, I was afraid that might happen."

"Well, it did."

"How'd my brother handle it?"

Jayne found herself frowning for an unknown reason. "Annoyingly well."

Her friend laughed. "Yeah, he's like that. He's so freaking perfect sometimes, I just want to punch him, but then he's too fucking nice and I can't."

"That sums him up pretty perfectly." She cleared her throat a little nervously then said, "But then Brae had gone off to do his bidding, and it was just us standing at the door, and he said something that I'm not sure how to take."

"Oh?" That drew Brownie to the edge of her chair.

"Yeah. I told him I was going grocery shopping, too, and he warned me off paying for it—which is wrong in and of itself—but it was the way he warned me."

"The way? How'd he do it? Morse code? Sky writing? What?"

Jayne shifted in her chair. "When Brae had a fit, he was very kind but very firm with him. He never lost his temper, but there was no doubt in Brae's mind that he'd screwed up. Pace was perfect with him, very calm and reassuring, but no nonsense at the same time."

"Sounds like Pace."

"Yeah, but when he was talking to me about not wanting me to pay for the groceries I'm going to get, he was like…kind of almost…threatening."

Brownie's eyes got very round at that. "Really? That would be very unusual for him."

Squirming a bit, she replied, "Well, he didn't say it all nasty and evil. He had much the same tone as he'd used with Brae."

Her friend looked confused at that. "But what did he say, exactly?"

Damn her tendency to blush!

"He said something off color?" Brownie deduced.

Heaving a sigh, Jayne ripped the Band Aid off. "He said something to the effect of 'if you misbehave, the way I would handle it would be very different from how I handled Brae'."

Brownie almost smiled at that, and it didn't make Jayne feel any better at all. "Oh."

"'Oh'? That's all you have to say? Some help you are."

"Well, I can tell you what I think it means, but you should probably go to the source for confirmation." She took a sip of her coffee then looked back up at her friend, as if she was barely holding in a secret.

"What are you not saying?"

"Before I tell you, you need to decide just how much you want to know about my brother."

Jayne craned her head back as she looked at Brownie a little warily. "I don't know how to answer that."

"Well, you know he's interested in you."

She tried to bluster, but there was no way she could get away with it with Brownie. The woman knew her much too well, and she was entirely too close to her brother for them not to have discussed the fact that he'd confessed his interest in her. She wasn't sure when that happened, but it didn't really matter, anyway.

"He did mention that to me, although I didn't really say anything back to him about it, and he hasn't brought up the subject again."

"Well, I can promise you that it's not gone away. He just doesn't want to overwhelm you. He recognized—almost as soon as he said it to you—that you have a lot on your plate right now."

She wasn't sure how she felt about that, although she knew she should have been delighted.

"But he has an…interest that he might have been feeling you out about, in what he thought was a non-threatening way."

"An interest?"

"Yeah." Brownie drew a breath before she spoke, and when she did, she looked her friend directly in the eye. "Pace likes to spank the women he's with. And not just in the bedroom, I gather. He's a Dom, and he likes that lifestyle."

Jayne's eyes were nearly popping out of her head. If she'd been standing, she would have been flat on the floor by now at that information. "How do you know that?"

Brownie shrugged, as if it was no big deal. "I've been friends with some of his exes. And every woman I've ever been friends with eventually—sometimes within about six seconds of meeting them—talks with other women about her sex life."

"Oy."

"Yeah. I really wasn't interested in hearing it, the first time especially, but I've gotten the same story from multiple women. And it's not really something you can unhear, like you can never unsee it if you accidentally see your parents having sex."

"Oh God! I'm so sorry!"

Brownie wasn't fazed by much, and even that hadn't bothered her for very long, once she got over the shock. "I was really surprised to find that out, frankly. He's such a gentleman, and very pro-female and women's rights and everything. But I guess you can never tell what anybody's into." Her eyes flitted to Jayne's, who was looking down. "But if you want to confirm my theory, all you have to do is either talk to him." She gave her friend a sly look. "Or you could pay for the groceries yourself."

"Yeah," Jayne agreed absently. She was too wrapped up in what her mind was conjuring—at least, until Brownie began to speak again.

"Can I tell you something else?" she asked quietly, and when Jayne looked up, it was to see that her bold, brash friend was actually biting her lip.

"Something else about Pace?" she asked back, almost afraid to hear the answer.

"No. About Hank."

"Oh. Well, sure, of course."

Then she watched as Brownie opened her mouth, but nothing came out.

"Jesus, are you speechless? Let me grab my phone—I need to get a picture of this!"

"Jayne, I'm serious. I'm hesitating because it so surprised me when it happened."

"Oh, dear. I'm sorry. Is it that bad?"

Her friend swallowed hard. "It's not bad, exactly, but, well, uh, Hank is into the same thing that my brother is."

"Really?" It had to be true. She was blushing, which, unlike Jayne, was something Brownie rarely did. And she didn't seem very eager to confess it, either, which was also unusual for her friend.

"Yeah. He and Pace were really close when they played together, and they're still really close, like we are. The distance or time apart doesn't matter—you just pick right back up where you left off the last time. He knew that Dad had spanked the both of us, although not very often, and he told Pace that he wanted to continue that tradition. Anyway, Hank and I talked about it, and he set some rules for me, and he, uh, spanks me. Pretty regularly, or as regularly as we get to see each other."

Jayne couldn't even begin to process that bit of information, especially not on top of what she'd heard from—and about—Pace, and she said as much to her friend, "I have a heap of questions about this, but I can't at the moment. I just can't handle it right now."

"I know, and I'm sorry if I've dumped too much on you." She reached out and pulled her friend into a hug.

"I'm okay. I'm just going to have to digest this for a while."

"That's understandable."

For her part, Brownie figured that that might well be the nail in the coffin in regards to her brother and her best friend getting together. She couldn't see Jayne—after what she'd just been through—allowing any man to touch her for quite a while, much less spank her. Perhaps she shouldn't have told her what she knew, but if Pace was going to make cryptic remarks to her like that, Brownie felt she had a right to know.

She knew that if they grew closer, Pace would definitely talk to Jayne about what he liked, but that comment had opened the doors a bit faster than he might have anticipated that it would.

* * *

Jayne was quite conflicted about what she'd just learned about Pace, and she spent the day chewing on it more often than not—and much more often than she wanted to.

When it came down to it, Jayne essentially dismissed what Brownie had told her about her relationship with Hank, because it wasn't really relevant to her own problems. It was interesting as all get out, and when she'd sorted herself out better, she was going to have to get Brownie soused and interrogate the crap out of her.

But not now. She just couldn't with Brownie at the moment. She was having enough trouble with her sexy, handsome brother.

If she was honest with herself, which she tried—and often failed—to be, spanking was something she had been into before Jake cured her of it. She had often fantasized—as she was growing up—about celebrities or fictional characters spanking her and being dominant with her. And although she knew Pace at that point, she'd never dared to fantasize about him.

It had always been big guys, too. It appeared that she had a type, although, again, she figured that Jake had dissuaded her of that interest, too. Her attraction to Pace kind of belied that argument.

She hadn't had sex with very many men before her husband had come into her life. He was her longest sex partner—if you could call it that. He was very rough with her, and at first, it was a novelty. She thought that perhaps she could confide to him what she was into and perhaps they could weave that into their sex life—mainly because she wasn't getting anything out of it. He manhandled her, fucked her, and then fell asleep. There was no foreplay, during play, and there was certainly no cuddling afterward.

But the way he quickly began to treat her disabused her of ever wanting to confide anything to him, especially something so intimate. And he would use it as another weapon against her, she knew.

What she craved was a Dom who was loving and affectionate, verbally and physically first and foremost but, also, firm and occasionally stern, who would take her to the heights she'd only read about online, in books, and fan fiction that catered to her interests.

But she'd never experienced anything like that, even with the men she'd been with before Jake.

And it had been a very long time since she had indulged herself in a fantasy where she was spanked. She couldn't get past Jake's abuse and allow herself to do so.

But Pace…Pace was the exact opposite of Jake. He was everything she wanted in a man. But she didn't want to want him, and she definitely didn't want to want him to spank her. She didn't think.

Jayne had to force herself to stop thinking about all of that and just get on with her day.

She and Braeden headed into town after lunch. It was a very small place, but it had a surprisingly bustling, well cared for Main Street. The small market—Meserve's, Pace had said—was very small indeed, and, wary of what she knew was going to be the higher prices that she was inevitably going to encounter there, she pushed on to Casper herself, stopping at the first Albertson's she encountered.

She didn't mind grocery shopping at all and was glad to be able to get some things that were specifically for the little guy. Luckily, he was already out of diapers, so that expense was gone. But he could be picky about fruit, so she got him some of the toddler versions of it from the baby food aisle, as well as some treats like fruit roll ups and mac and cheese, along with the rest of the things on the list.

It was surprising to note that meat was almost entirely missing from the list, but then, they grew their own. The only things she got for meat were some deli products for lunches.

Still, it wasn't cheap, but considering what she might have been paying for housing and utilities, not to mention groceries, she knew she was getting off cheap. But if she stayed here much longer, she was going to brave the siblings' anger and offer them rent, although she had a feeling that they were never going to let her pay them to stay there.

By the time Pace got home, everything had been lugged in and put away, and she had a nice dinner for them bubbling away in the crock-pot.

With Brownie gone, it was, again, very much as if they were a family, with Pace coming in the door and hanging his cowboy hat on the rack, Brae charging at him like a little freight train until his hero lifted him up into the air and spun him around.

"If he pukes, it's on you, literally," Jayne warned as she watched him with a jaundiced—and experienced—eye while she filled out online job applications for everything from dog catcher, which she fervently hoped she didn't get because she'd want to bring every one home with her, to a waitress at the café in Bath, as well as lots of places in Casper, too, since it wasn't that far away. Certainly, one of them would work out.

Pace chuckled at her comment then flew Brae into where his Momma was, putting him down so that he could go back to playing with his trucks on the floor.

"How was your day?" he asked, loosening his tie.

"It was good."

"Where's Miss B?"

"Gone to see Hank in Denver."

"Ah—playing the Broncos."

Jayne's face was a complete blank. "If you say so, although I don't know how well horses are going to play football."

The big man groaned. "Well, I'm going to get changed, then someone I know is going to ride his first horse."

Brae perked up visibly at that, and as always, he shadowed Pace right down the hallway and into his room. That man had the patience of a saint, which was a nice contrast to Jake.

A few minutes later, he reappeared with the boy on his shoulders, clutching the "pitcher" he'd made of Lady at Pace's request. They hung it in a place of honor on the fridge, then, as they were heading out, he threw over his shoulder to her, "You gonna come watch, Momma?"

"Yes, please," she answered pertly, tucking her phone into her pocket so she could take some videos and pics of his first ride.

She leaned against one of the empty stalls as he took Lady out of hers, cross tied her, and began to groom her. He'd put the brushes and combs he was going to use on a bench at Brae's height and would ask him for specific ones, even going so far as to hold him up so that the boy could brush the horse, and praising him effusively when he was combing through the horse's tail.

Braeden certainly couldn't carry a saddle, but he very proudly held the bridle until Pace needed to use it, then "helped" him walk the horse to the corral, where, at first, he had Brae tell him what the parts of the tack were, and Jayne, who had no idea he'd learned so much, was amazed at his recall.

"Excellent! Very good job!" Pace said, high fiving Braeden when he'd answered nearly every one correctly. Then he swung himself into the saddle as if he'd been born there.

"Hand him up to me, Jayne, would you?"

Despite her trepidations, she did as he asked, and he put Lady through her paces while holding the child in front of him, murmuring things to him as he did so.

Pace could feel that Jayne was fretting a bit, and it didn't help when he swung down off the horse not far from her, leaving her son perched all the way up there, all alone, although Pace was more than tall enough that he had his hands on the child at all times, just in case.

"Hey," Pace caught her attention. "I promise you he's absolutely fine, Momma. I would never let him do anything that would hurt him. Why don't you take the lead and walk her for us? You look really nervous, and that'll get some of that energy out."

She did, walking very slowly as he acted almost as training wheels for Braeden, although she could see that he didn't need his help much. All the while, Pace was constantly praising Braeden, as well as giving him gentle pointers about his seat and how his hands and feet were placed.

It was wonderful to see him concentrating so hard on something, and learning so much at the same time.

It wasn't a long lesson—they only went around the ring two or three times—but Pace didn't want to tire the kid out his first time—so he reached up and lifted him off after he'd only been riding for a very short time.

The both of them could see that he wasn't at all happy with that, looking as if he was going to yell his head off at being on the ground instead of on the horse.

But all it took was Pace saying in that authoritative tone of his, "Braeden," once.

Her son looked up at him, his face a thundercloud, but Pace just met his eyes and stared back, and Braeden backed down. "Do you want to help me put her away, partner?" he asked.

Distracted from his impending doom, Brae nodded enthusiastically.

"Can I help, too?" Jayne asked.

"Most definitely. Many hands, etcetera." He smiled at her.

"I always love the smell of it in here," she commented, taking a deep breath as they headed into the barn.

"Yeah, 'it' is often quite pungent," he teased.

"I find it weirdly familiar and soothing, even though I've never spent any time around horses before."

"Maybe you were a cowboy in another life."

"I hope I was an outlaw. Someone who had an exciting life, unlike my own."

Pace looked surprised to hear that. "Well, lady outlaw, do you want to see if you can heft the saddle on to the sawhorse? It's pretty heavy," he said, pulling it off the horse as if it weighed nothing, "so maybe not."

It was incredibly heavy for her, and she had to shuffle over to the sawhorse, with all of those straps and buckles hanging, ready to trip her.

"Want help?" he offered, watching her as closely as he always did her son.

"No, I'll do it myself, thanks," she grunted back at him.

When she finally succeeded—after a couple of aborted attempts—he was looking straight at her and smiling broadly when she turned around. "What?"

"I like watching you—you're very pugnacious and stubborn and determined. All characteristics I like in a woman."

"I try to be," when I'm allowed, she added to herself. "Now what can I do?"

He had them give the horse a light grooming, under his watchful eye, then he put Lady back into the stall, letting each of them give her a peppermint as a reward.

That evening, they were eating the stew that she had made—and Pace was raving about it, especially the buttermilk cheddar and chive biscuits she served with it—when Brae accidentally knocked his small bowl of stew off the table while reaching for his glass of milk, and before anyone could react, he got himself down off his booster seat and ran, as fast as he could, into the bedroom he shared with his mother.

Pace looked at Jayne, not in the least perturbed by what had happened, but genuinely concerned about the boy's reaction. "Is he okay?"

Jayne knew exactly what the problem was, and it was a holdover from Jake's violent response when he'd done the same thing to his cereal bowl one morning. Jayne had taken the brunt of her husband's anger—as she always did—physically placing herself between him and his son.

"No. His father—"

Pace put his hand up. "You don't have to say anything more unless you want to."

"I have to go to him." Jayne was already well down the hall.

"Can I come, or do you think I'll make it worse?"

Braeden already loved Pace, but Jayne told him exactly what she was thinking. "I don't know, but he's already more bonded to you than he ever was to his father, so that would probably be a good thing."

And he did follow her, as she'd known he would.

The entered the bedroom, but the little boy was nowhere to be found—not on the bed, not under it, or in any of the corners, either. But then they heard a soft sob, and it was coming from the large walk-in closet.

"Hey, punkin'. I know you're scared, but I'm right here. You don't have to come out, but I'm going to stay right here until you do," Jayne promised quietly through the doors.

"I'm here, too, partner. You don't have to be afraid. It's perfectly okay that you are, but you don't have to be. Accidents happen. Why, I once knocked an entire big bowl of salad off the table when I was little, like you, and my Dad, who was big like me, ended up wearing most of it. He had a lettuce on his head, like a hat, and carrots in his lap, and some of the dressing leaked down into his shoes. And do you know what he did?"

Pace didn't wait for the scared little boy to answer him but forged on.

"He laughed with the rest of us and said just what I just told you—accidents happen. Then he told me that I could have just said 'no, thank you' if I didn't want to have any salad. We all, Dad and Mom and Brownie and I, cleaned up the mess together, and we had a great meal.

"Of course, as we passed the food around after we'd cleaned up, he had to ask me, every time he was holding a new dish of something, if I wanted to throw it at him, but I decided not to."

Was that a slight giggle she heard?

"Everyone has accidents of all sorts of kinds, sport, and the best thing to do—the thing we do in this house—is to know that and try to laugh about it. I mean, my big strong dad wearing a lettuce leaf hat is pretty funny." He paused then, but there was no response to his rambling speech. "Your mom and I will be right here, whenever you decide you want to come out, but I want you to know—and hear in my voice—that I'm not at all angry. When you're ready, we'll all go back to the dining room and clean up the stew together, and then we'll finish dinner and maybe watch Frozen together before bedtime."

As he was speaking, Pace arranged himself so that he was leaning up against the wall next to the closet, as Jayne faced him while leaning against the end of the bed.

They didn't have to wait long, though, because Braeden appeared shortly after they got settled, flinging himself at Pace and crying fit to break his heart. Pace hugged him and rocked him, patting his back, and murmuring reassuringly to him.

Then Brae leaned away from him. "Not mad?"

"Not even the teensiest, tiniest, itty-bittiest bit, my man." He held his enormous hand up. "High five me, bro." Braeden threw his entire body into it, and Pace made as if he was hit by a sledgehammer. "Good job being brave and coming out, Brae. When something happens and you get scared like that, try to remember—if you can—that you and your mom are safe here. 'Kay, partner?"

Braeden nodded solemnly.

Pace stood with the boy in his arms. "I don't know about you, but I'm hungry."

"Me too! Me too!"

He put his hand down to help Jayne, but he didn't think she saw it, because she was already on the way up.

And they did exactly what he'd said they would. They cleaned up the mess together, Braeden eager to help and Pace and Jayne giving him age appropriate tasks to do until there was no trace of stew on the floor. Pace got Braeden and himself back into their seats while Jayne brought in reheated dinner, and afterward, they watched Frozen for the gazillionth time.

When they put him to bed, a ritual into which Pace hadn't inserted himself at first, but Braeden had quickly begun requesting his presence soon after they'd gotten there, so that now he was just a part of the whole thing, and Jayne had only too happily given up the task of reading "Goodnight Moon" to him.

She hadn't felt awkward around him, really, until Braeden had gone to bed, but then it was brought home to her that it was just the two of them in the house together. She didn't have a tablet, and her cell phone was from 1972, but she had a small Chromebook that she'd gotten very cheap on a Black Friday deal, so she opened that up, just to have something to occupy herself with that would hopefully calm her nerves.

But Jayne knew that she was likely to forget what had been on her mind to say to him, so she did it while she was thinking about it.

"I want to thank you for the way you were with Brae tonight. You're so good with him—it's very touching to watch."

Pace cleared his throat, answering a little gruffly, "Well, he's easy to be good to, as is his beautiful mother, I might add."

He meant what he said, but he also liked watching the color bloom in her cheek.

"Stop."

"All right, but sometime I'm not going to. I know you don't like compliments, but I'm of a mind that that's because you haven't heard enough of them. But I don't want to make you feel uncomfortable."

"Thank you."

"Are you settling in okay? Is there anything we could do make things better?"

"Absolutely not," she returned a bit too vehemently, but it just made him laugh.

"Well, that was—"

His sentence was cut short by her phone ringing beside her. Pace had never seen anyone's face blanch white before, but hers did. She was looking at her phone as if it was a water moccasin or vial of Ebola.

Although he knew he had no right to ask, he did it anyway.

"Is that him?"

Still staring at her phone as if she was mesmerized by it, Jayne nodded slowly.

"Has he been contacting you since you left?"

"Sometimes. Not often."

"Just enough to renew your terror." Pace's voice was hard, but not because of her.

Without thinking, she nodded again, cringing away from the phone as if it was the physical embodiment of her husband.

"Again, I know I have no right to ask, and you don't have to answer me, but have you responded to him?"

She nodded again, slowly, still staring at the buzzing phone. "A-at first. To l-let him know we w-were all right. But n-not lately."

He wondered unkindly if the man even cared whether or not they were safe, but he kept that distasteful thought to himself. But he couldn't stand seeing her look like this, so he got up and put her phone in his room, where they couldn't hear it ringing.

When he returned, he realized that he might have overstepped the mark with her yet again, although he didn't look angry, and she hadn't tried to stop him. "I'm sorry, but you can't expect me to see you so afraid and not doing anything about it. Do you want your phone back?" he asked, coming to stand as close to her as he dared, grimacing when he saw how she was shaking.

"N-no, thank you, if you don't mind."

"I absolutely do not," he stated as vehemently as he dared.

Pace stood there for a few minutes, watching her tremble, hands flexing but not angrily. Instead, they were desperate to hold her and soothe her. Restraining himself from doing so was one of the hardest things he'd ever had to do.

"Damn, I wish Brownie was here," he muttered, shuffling his feet in place, arms literally aching to hold her. "Would you—would you let me hug you?"

It surprised him—and he knew it was a measure of just how scared she was—that she nodded and stood but didn't come any closer to him, and now she was looking even more scared and uneasy despite what she'd agreed to.

So, he took one of his enormous steps toward her, watching her closely the entire time, arms out. He ended up standing in front of her. "Why don't you come to me, and then, when you're sick of me, you can just back away, and I'll let you go?"

Again, Jayne surprised him with the way she practically launched herself at him, glomming onto him in a way that was somewhat reminiscent of how her son sometimes hugged him—but that was where the comparisons ended.

Damn. She was warm and disturbingly fine and delicate, and she felt fucking amazing in his arms, which he closed very slowly and carefully around her. His face ended up in her hair, and he could smell the light perfume of it and her. He was doing everything he could not to become aroused, but it was pretty near impossible not to be. All he could hope was that she wouldn't notice it. But one of the drawbacks to being so big was that he was that big all over.

But he put that out of his mind as best he could. If she said something—which he doubted she would—he'd confess to it and tell her not to worry about it, but he knew it would add a dimension of tension to their hug that he really didn't want her to have to bear.

If she was his, or anywhere near close to being his, he would wrap his arms tightly around her and bury his fingers in her hair where her head was lying on his shoulder while he kissed the top of her head and murmured low, reassuring nothings to her. Then he'd lift her in his arms and sit down in the big man-and-a-half sized recliner that was his and hold her on his lap until she felt better and had relaxed.

As it was, he wasn't really sure what kinds of attentions she might welcome from him, but he finally decided to quit worrying about it and just do what he thought might help her. He was amazed that she was even there, in the circle of his arms, and he was going to do his damnedest to comfort her.

"I won't let him hurt you, Jayne. I promise," he whispered, rubbing his hand up and down her back. "You don't ever have to talk to him again if you don't want to."

Without thinking, he began to rock the two of them, just slightly, feeling her beginning to calm, the shivers only occasionally overtaking her, causing him to hug her more tightly when they did, until they disappeared again.

And she wasn't just standing in his embrace, either. Pace could feel her clinging to him, her arms not able to get very far around him, nor her hands very far up his back, but he could feel them there.

She wasn't crying, but he certainly would have understood if she had been.

"Is this okay? Not too tight or anything?" he asked, sounding utterly sincere.

"Yes, please," she breathed, relaxing even further against him.

Jayne was quite sure she shouldn't have been letting him do this, but it felt too good to be held like this for her to convince herself to step away. She'd thrown herself at him without thinking much about it. He'd offered solace, and she'd been unable to convince herself that she didn't need it.

She did; so much so that that scared her, too.

And it was everything she'd thought it would be. He was big and strong, but, in him, those were good things. She wasn't afraid of his size. She didn't worry that he would try to cop a feel or suddenly get angry for no reason and take his fists to her. He felt like a warm, human haven. She would have paid him to just hug her for the rest of her life if she could have afforded to.

It felt that good.

Surely, she would be invincible with a man like him at her side.

It was a fanciful thought, but not one that she put any stock in.

Eventually, before she overstayed her welcome, she moved a bit away from him, and he immediately let her go, staying right where he was, arms dropping from her, then hands, both with obvious reluctance.

Jayne tucked a curly strand of hair behind her ear a bit nervously, not looking at him. "It seems that I am forever in your debt. Thank you for that. It helped enormously."

"You have never been in my debt, angel," he crooned quietly. "And you never will be. I mean that." He wanted to emphasize what he was saying by bringing her eyes to his, but he didn't.

"I think I'm going to retire, if that's okay."

"Of course. Sleep well." He sat back down in his own seat, using his tablet to cover his painful erection. "I'll be up for a while, if there's anything else you need, and I'll put your phone on the dining room table so you can get it anytime you like."

"Thank you. Night."

* * *

Meanwhile, the man who had given her such solace did something he wasn't particularly proud of, although it was much less than he really wanted to do.

After she'd gone to bed, Pace went to his room to retrieve her phone—but he didn't immediately put it on the dining room table. Instead, he put it on the coffee table in front of him, where he could see his face come up every time it buzzed. He'd called more times than Pace could count before he finally went to bed himself, but not before he remembered to leave the phone where he'd told her he would.

* * *

Alone in her room, she headed for the bathroom to pee and perform her evening ablutions.

While she was sitting on the toilet, she happened to look down at her panties and noticed something about which she wasn't sure how she felt. It was a big, dark wet spot on her otherwise pristine panties—something she'd never seen before in conjunction with any man. But she refused to acknowledge what that meant about how she felt about Pace.

Jayne bit her lip, took them off, and threw them into the hamper as if that was going to be the end of it, even though she knew it was just the beginning.