Page 133 of Bound

Braum blinked. Thought briefly of Wren and what she might want. But things had changed, surely? She’d... she’d acknowledged him. Chosen him. That had to count for...

Everything.

It sent a jolt, an ache, just to think it, and he had to fight down the urge to go stare at her once more.

“Of course not,” he offered, turning so the man could gauge his sincerity for himself. “Any of our arrangements have been for your daughter’s sake. She was not interested in sharing her home until recently.”

Very recently, but that did not need to be shared.

Althon hummed lightly, rubbing at his chin as he turned his hand and glanced toward the alcove. He could not even make out the end of the bed from where he sat—Braum was well aware of that. “I have not known of mates that struggled to live with one another.”

Braum shifted slightly in his stance and selected his words carefully. “Wren has only half your blood,” he reminded him, no matter how unnecessarily. “It has made things... more complicated.”

He would say no more than that. Wren could supply whatever else she wanted her father to know. He’d not risk angering her. Not now. Preferably not ever, but he was not so foolish as to think he could prevent every turn of her temper with a well-placed word or kind gesture.

“Complicated,” Althorn repeated, as if the word was distasteful on his tongue.

And maybe it might have been to Braum once. If those complications were solely a mistrustful mate and fearful glances. Of bartering for what came naturally to other couples.

But no longer.

He treasured every bit of it. Every hard-earned smile, every crumb of progress they’d made together.

Perhaps it was not all affection and gladness like Kessa and Cyrras experienced when first they met. Perhaps it was strange that Braum had been her friend first, her mate second.

But those challenges were theirs. Born of private pains and hurts he wished he could expunge from her mind and heart. But he could be a balm to them. And would be, for everyday she allowed him.

“Your daughter prefers to make her own choices, and in her own timing. I am certain you have noticed.”

Althon lost some of his suspicion, a wide smile crossing his features. “Ah.”

Braum gave the broth an unnecessary stir. “Indeed.” He turned back because he was no coward, and this needed saying. “I have the greatest admiration for your daughter, and my commitment to her is no less than if she was mate-born. She is...” Words failed him. She was infuriating. Special. A treasure. Could hold grudges and too much grace all at once, much to his constant annoyance and respect. “Everything,” he supplied, a remnant from his earlier thoughts. Perhaps too personal a confession with a man he’d met only hours before, but regardless of the hows and the should haves, this was Wren’s father. His love for her was more than apparent, and Braum would have them understand one another.

Althorn pushed one of the chairs back with his foot; an invitation if ever there was one. “Sit, Braum was it? I’d like to come to know my daughter’s mate.”

???

Wren insisted on getting up. Then when faced with objections from both men, she glared at each of them in turn and threatened their expulsion if they intended to stop her from using the facilities in privacy.

Then there was the matter of washing.

She wanted to do it alone. To which Braum asked her to reach to her shoulder to mimic the use of a washrag.

There was no hiding the grimace she made, and when he waited for her argument and denials to begin, he was met only with a huff and a glare at the floor as she asked him to assist her.

Althorn did not stay. He promised to come in the mornings to tend the hesper, just until Braum got the hang of them both, he said. “You won’t do much good for Wren if you’ve broken ribs, now will you?”

Braum had thought him teasing, but Wren admitted that there had been an incident with Althorn that involved a rather fierce head turn from Temperance that left him tightly wrapped for a few days.

And he’d left his mate here to tend them alone, day after day.

He pushed the guilt aside. It had been necessary. He might have overpowered her—worn her down with arguments and talk of rights and obligations, but she wouldn’t have smiled when he entered the room. She wouldn’t have thanked him for mugs of warm broth and answered each of his questions about the state of her cupboards and the contents of each of her little bundles.

He knew her. She would have run. Would have rather lived out in the burrow with her grimbles than endure her home being intruded upon.

And Merryweather would have followed. He’d have her house, but he wouldn’t have her, and that was no trade at all.

It was a strange thing, filling a bath for someone other than himself. He often did not have the patience for it, using the creek and hard soap and a rag rather than boiling water and fussing with the tub.