because he couldn’t seem to hide his feelings worth a damn where Lydia was concerned. “We both know you’ll just bolt anyway.”
She left the suite without looking back.
“Bro!” Cody nodded at Eric as he slinked into the kitchen for breakfast the next morning.
It was a sometimes tradition to eat breakfast in the lodge’s kitchen behind the dining hall. Nothing fancy. Just him and his brothers sitting around the long kitchen island, scarfing down Cody’s omelets or French toast or Eggs Benedict as they complained about guests or told bad jokes or razzed each other.
The vibe was just a little different now, because Nathan’s mate, Alanna, joined them too. Eric found he really liked having her around. She softened things. As much as he loved his brothers to the death and knew them better than anyone else, just as they knew him, sometimes things could be irritating and edgy between the four of them. Male bears could get awfully surly. It was nice having someone’s mate around to shift the mood. And Alanna was sweet. Even if all Nathan ever wanted to talk about was the prospect of his coming cub, Eric could deal with that. It was a long time coming. He was looking forward to being an uncle.
“What’s up?” Cody said, setting a coffee down in front of Eric as he took a seat at the counter. “You look...um...perturbed.”
“Perturbed,” Eric said with a snort. “Yeah, I’m perturbed.”
“What happened? Some asshole couldn’t get their opera tickets?”
“If anyone needed opera tickets, I would be able to get them,” he said, narrowing his eyes.
“Oh.” Cody snapped his fingers and waved his dish towel at Eric before throwing it over his shoulder. “It’s Lydia. She’s back, huh? I guess that’s not going well after all?”
“Yeah, well, I guess some part of me was dumb enough to think she came because, ya know…”
“Because she wanted to be your love muffin,” Cody said, dry as a bone. He grinned at Eric, completely oblivious to Eric’s agitation. Which, in a way, was a relief. Cody had a mop of messy brown hair and a goatee growing in. As usual, he was wearing a white button-down under his apron and he looked weirdly dapper for a chef who always had his hands elbow deep in grease and sauce. “And she doesn’t want to be your love muffin, I take it?”
“I didn’t even realize how much I was hoping for that until, ya know…” Eric sighed. “She made it perfectly clear she wasn’t here for that. Like how many times can this girl break my heart, ya know?”
“So then, like, why is she here?” Cody said.
“She’s having nightmares about me,” Eric snorted, shaking his head in derision. “It was all complete bullshit.”
“What kinda nightmares?” Cody frowned and sat down across from Eric, setting down a plate of eggs and bacon for him and stealing a piece of bacon as he did so. “Like premonition stuff?”
“I don’t know, man. It’s bullshit. She’s dreamed of me being torn apart or something. The same dream a bunch of times. She thought I might be in danger. So she came all the way down here. Comped her a suite and a bunch of shit for her too. Not that… I mean that’s fine, she needs the break. I just…” He pinched the bridge of his nose. The whole thing was giving him a headache and it was taking a lot of strength to keep his bear in check.
His bear was pissed, not even so much at Lydia directly as the whole situation. He was mad at himself too.
It was confusing.
“Where did she come from?” Cody said.
“Washington. I guess that’s where she ran off too way back when.” He nibbled on his bacon and he could practically feel his brother’s disapproving eyes boring into him. “Dude. What?”
“Isn’t she like…” Cody licked his lips. “I ran into her before you met her for dinner. She’s been working some shitty telemarketing job. She was working there because it was all she could find, and you do realize she had to quit her job just to come down here?”
Eric grunted and rubbed his eyes. He had known that and forgotten. It made him feel like kind of a tool suddenly. “Yeah, I know.”
“She came all the way to Colorado from Washington just because she had scary dreams about you,” Cody said, grimacing as he got in Eric’s face. “Because she was worried about you. And it sounds to me like you’re pouting about it because she