by Reina Torres
She did as he asked. There really was only so much strain she could put on her heart. And she wanted Aaron Winter to be everything she dreamed he was.
Those beautiful blue eyes peered down into hers with a gentle light.
“Oh, I’m going to see what’s under your suit soon enough, Celeste, but right now… I’ve been imagining this moment for longer than I care to admit. I just haven’t said it because I keep worrying that you’re going to think I’m some kind of creep for thinking about you in a swimsuit.”
Her laughter was quiet. “Well, I wouldn’t worry too much.”
She was happy to know that she inspired his imagination, but she was also happy to know she could make him curious.
“Really?”
She stepped back, easing her arm from his gentle grasp. “If you’d said something earlier, Aaron, you might have found out that I imagined you too.”
Celeste saw the surprise on his face and kept walking, hoping to put some distance between them, because she really needed to gather up some courage.
She made it about twenty feet away before she heard him speak again.
“In a swimsuit?”
Laughing out loud, she turned and walked backward for a few steps, smiling the whole way. “Sometimes.” She bit into her bottom lip and turned back around again, walking along the path to the changing room. The longer she spent time with Aaron the more comfortable she felt in talking about things, joking about things. She could only imagine what would happen the longer she spent there in Mystic… the longer she spent with Aaron.
It would feel like freedom, she supposed, like a big breath of fresh air at the top of a mountain.
What would happen when she was neck deep in a hot spring with Aaron?
Would she end up in over her head?
She paused for a moment at the door to the changing room. Looking back over her shoulder she saw the inviting waters of the hot springs and the thick trails of steam rising out of the water. Even with the chill in the air due to the season, she had a feeling that the waters would feel like heaven.
But what she wanted, more than a long soak in the waters, was to feel his arms around her again.
Stepping inside she dropped her bag on the bench and reached for the hem of her blouse. To get what she wanted, she was going to have to change… in more ways than one.
When she walked to the edge of the hot springs, she looked around but didn’t see Aaron anywhere. Wrapped up in a long cardigan to keep the chill from her skin, she stood there at the edge for a moment or two until even the shoes that she’d slipped back on weren’t enough to protect her feet from the cold.
Slipping them off, she stepped up onto a flat rock at the edge of the spring and then dipped her toes into the water.
A sudden sensation of heat suffused through her toes and reached almost up to her ankle. She swallowed at the tight sensation in her throat. It couldn’t be that simple, could it?
Stepping into the water, the heat rose through her leg, drawing her in deeper. She put her other foot in and felt as if the heat was chasing away the cold that surrounded her.
Easing her cardigan off her shoulders she stepped further into the water, letting it rise to mid-calf and then her knees.
Folding the cardigan in half, she folded it again and laid it over the edge of one of the larger boulders that edged the vibrant blue waters of the hot spring.
Further in and the water lapped at her thighs. She just couldn’t stop and bent her knees until she sank into the water up to her waist. There was a rocky ledge under the water, wide enough for her to sit down and relax in the heated water.
It was incredible. The soothing nature of the hot springs felt like a miracle. All the tension that had knotted and tensed her muscles just seemed to float away and if Aaron didn’t return soon, she was in real danger of falling asleep. The sensations that the water wrought from her body were almost… indecent.
And she was enjoying them, all alone.
The tree line across the way moved.
Or at least she thought it did.
Celeste drew in a breath and held it for a moment as she scanned through the trees and shadows. Winter in Mystic was like anywhere else in the area, darkness descended earlier and the shadows stretching out from the maple trees made it difficult to see exactly what was there.
Another hush of sound moved through the trees.
It almost sounded like wind moving through the branches, but she didn’t really know. She wasn’t someone who spent a lot of time out in the wilds. She liked being cozy and warm at home.
She tensed as a rough huff of air reached her ears.
Her heart kicked up in speed and her hands flattened against the rocks at her sides. Something was moving through the trees.
Biting into her lip, she moved her gaze about, looking for some sign of Aaron.
“Aaron?” The two syllables scratched through her throat. “Aaron, where are you?” She could barely hear the words through the rush of her heartbeat pounding in her ears.
The dark red bark of the maple trees at the center of the foliage parted and the shadows pulled back, revealing the broad head of a bear.
A bear. Her mind locked up and she froze.
Broad shoulders and forelegs followed and then the rest of him.
It had to be a him, right? Female bears weren’t built like trucks.
Right?
Oh God, she really wished that she’d paid more attention when Julia did her earth sciences project on ‘Bears of the World.’
Looking at the distance between where she was sitting and any sort of door, she had a feeling she could make it to safety, but she couldn’t seem to make herself move.
The bear didn’t seem to have any problems. Step by step, he moved out of the trees and between the large boulders until he paused at the edge of the water. Finally, free from the shadows and the shade of the maples, Celeste was finally able to see exactly what he was.
White. Lots and lots of white fur, flattened ears, a long, sloping nose tipped in black. Holy cow. A polar bear.
And Celeste knew they were nowhere near their natural habitat. Sure, there was snow on the ground, but that wasn’t enough to make Mystic a place where polar bears were a normal occurrence and-
What the hell was she sitting here worrying about this?
Pushing her feet against the ground she tried to stand, but the bear lifted its head and roared.
Her hands slipped on the wet surface of the rocks and she sat down hard, her eyes staring wide and wild at the animal across the way.
It didn’t run away.
It didn’t charge.
It stood there, one paw in the water, his eyes staring intently at her, waiting.
She just didn’t know why.
Carnivore. She almost laughed as that fact popped up in her head. Polar bears were exclusively carnivores. Great. She was fattened up like a nice juicy seal. That wasn’t going to do her any favors.
Another roar and she struggled to sit still. Her instinct should be to run, but she sat there watching him right back.
Goodness, he was beautiful.
All that wild power in a beautiful form.
A soft splash dropped her gaze down and she saw both front paws in the water, and then a back leg, and another. She watched, fascinated as he slipped into the water with hardly a splash.
Graceful.
Every movement he made was amazing as he swam through the icy blue waters.
By the time he’d made it halfway across the hot springs pool, she realized that she just didn’t have the strength or the need to move away. It might very well be the end of her, but the sight of this incredible creature moving unerringly through the water was mesmerizing.
Bringing her knees up against her chest, she wrapped her arms around her legs and sat as still as she could, hoping to make the moment last as long as it could.
When the bear was less than ten feet away, she knew that time had run out. Anything she could
try to do at that point wasn’t going to work. He was powerful, too powerful to escape. His massive form and advanced muscular structure would close the distance before she could manage to put together any kind of decent escape plan.
It was her fault.
She’d had more than enough opportunities to leave, but she had stayed, entranced by the sight before her. At that point, she couldn’t even blame the bear if it attacked her.
There was just one face that appeared in her thoughts.
It was probably the icy blue of the water that was the only thing separating her from powerful claws and teeth.
Sighing, she stared right at the bear. “Aaron. Where are you?”
A seismic wave of some sort shot through the water, buffeting her back against the wall, stealing her breath.
The broad head of the bear sank beneath the surface of the water and she leaned in, training her eyes on the surface, looking for any sign of where he was.
“Good job, Celeste,” she grumbled at herself. “Take a trip with the hot guy. Get all hot and bothered, then try to wait and be responsible. And,” she sighed, “just when you think it’s going to happen, you get eaten by a bear.”
Leaning back against the rocks she looked up into the sky and realized just how dark the world had become around her. Any trace of sunlight was gone overhead and the diamond-like pinpricks of starlight were twinkling in the heavens. “At least for my last few moments I’m going to have a beautiful view.”
A soft splash turned her attention back to the water.
Something, no, someone pushed through the surface of the water. She watched as water sluiced down over the muscular frame of Aaron Winter.
Quite simply, he took her breath away.
And made her question her sanity.
“Aaron?”
His smile sent shivers down her spine and while she wanted to reach out to touch him, she wondered if he was just a figment of her imagination.
Fear did crazy things to people.
“Are you…” she shook her head and started again. “Is it… is it really-”
“Give me your hand, Cel.”
The sound of his voice made her shake. That delicious, deep vibration that filled her dreams with breathy sighs and aching need washed over her body.
And yes, she gave him her hand.
What else could she do?
His skin was rough against hers. He smoothed her hand between his callused palms and shared his warmth with her.
“Are you okay?”
“Okay?” She laughed out loud. “I’m losing my mind! I was sitting here, waiting for you, and I saw- I thought… I thought I saw-”
“A bear?”
Her laugh came out more like a cough of sound. “Yeah, can you believe it? I knew I was losing-” She froze. “How did you know?”
He didn’t answer her immediately.
He didn’t even answer her after a minute. Aaron just held her hand sandwiched between his, bleeding warmth into her through their contact.
“Aaron?” Her voice was pitched a little too high. “Aaron, how did you know?”
He moved a step closer and she felt droplets of water peppering her skin. When he stopped moving, she had to tilt her head back to look up into his eyes.
It wasn’t until her breaths matched his in rhythm that he spoke to her.
“Just remember to breathe.”
Confused, she felt the skin between her eyebrows furrow. “Breathe? Why?”
For one moment she thought he was just teasing her, but then everything changed. The warm hand on top of hers moved… swelled. Knuckles disappeared beneath thick white hairs and the weight pressed down on her hand doubled.
She tried to pull away but couldn’t. The weight on her hand wouldn’t allow her any leeway. “Aaron, stop-”
Looking up, her lips parted in shock. Like a blur of movement, Aaron’s familiar face began to change. His handsome beard went from salt and pepper white and black to white. And the nose that she loved to feel against the nape of her neck had stretched and sloped into an ursine profile.
The urge to scream rose up inside of her. Faced with this… this revelation, her mind was struggling to process the reality of what was literally staring her in the face.
But even as she tried to mull it over, he reached out to her, through his eyes. His brilliant blue eyes. That’s what she held onto.
That’s what helped her remember to breathe.
The bear’s eyes weren’t the midnight black that she would have expected, they were still Aaron.
And heaven help her, she loved him even more.
She still had a hundred questions turning over in her head though. “How?”
Everything seemed to happen at once. Paw became hand, and bear became man again. She was almost lightheaded with… relief?
“Hey,” he put his hands on her upper arms, “you should sit down.”
“Me?” She laughed. “You just became a bear… twice!”
Still, she let him lower her back down into the water until her backside met the solid stone bench beneath the surface.
“Well, I’m used to it.” He lifted his hands from her arms and set them on the edge of the spring and from his height she could only lean back and look into his eyes. “I’m more concerned about how you’re feeling.”
“I’m feeling a little shell-shocked, and I don’t think I could stand on my own two feet right now even if my life depended on it.”
He smiled and she drew in a soft breath. The look on his face and in the pure blue of his eyes took on a feral glint. “So, I actually made you weak in the knees, Cel?”
Laughter. She hadn’t expected laughter from herself at that moment. Then again, what could she have expected from this moment, when the concept of a shapeshifter had only been a fantasy until that moment.
But it all seemed better than the other options. Losing her sanity. Losing her life to a predatory animal.
This, she slipped her hand free of his and raised both of her hands to his chest, smoothing her palms over his wet flesh, this was real.
He was real.
And he wasn’t shying away from her.
“It’s nothing new,” she told him as she drew her hands up and over his shoulders and felt his muscles flexing beneath his skin, “being weak for you.”
His muscles felt like heaven under her hands and as she traced her palms back over his pecs, she let her fingertips brush over his nipples.
“Being able to touch you,” she let out a shuddering breath, “is what I’ve wanted for so long.”
“Hmm,” she heard the hum of his voice in his throat, “how long?”
Celeste looked up at him with a sigh. “Too long.” The heat of the hot spring didn’t hold a candle to the heated flush that blossomed across her cheeks. “I know that sounds silly-”
“Cel-”
“You probably didn’t even know.”
“Celeste-”
“And if you had, I wasn’t going to lose you in our lives because I wanted something you didn’t.”
His kiss was like a wave rising to meet her, his lips rubbing against hers as he leaned into it. The way he hovered over her shielding her from the falling snow, felt good.
When he tilted his head slightly to the side and relaxed his arms to lower himself closer, she felt his leg slip between hers. Her skin tightened all over her body, her knees drew together holding him close.
Aaron’s kiss deepened, rubbing her lips, opening her mouth, sweeping his tongue inside to taste hers.
She squeezed her eyes shut and let him lean her back until she felt the edge of the pool against her shoulder blades. It was only too easy to give herself over to the feelings that she had for him. She’d been hoping for so long that every sensation he wrought from her body felt like lightning or electricity arcing through her flesh.
And there he was, dripping water from his body and onto her like dozens of delicate fingers trailing over her skin. Electrifying every inch of he
r exposed skin.
Heaven help her, she wanted more.
Her hands smoothed over his skin and around to his back, scraping her fingertips over the hard ridge of his spine. Lower still, so her fingers dipped beneath the surface of the water.
And lower to the curve of his muscled backside.
It was then that she realized, her eyes fluttering open in shock, that Aaron wasn’t wearing a stitch of clothing under the water.
He caught her gasp of surprise in his mouth and replaced it with a heavy sweep of his tongue and a hard groan.
Her hands shook as she looked up into his eyes wanting to know what was going through his head.
When he broke off his kiss and rubbed his cheek against hers, he met her curious eyes with his own heated gaze. “Something wrong?”
“I want,” she swallowed and felt her own heart thundering in her chest, “I want… I can’t put it into words.”
“You don’t have to say anything, Cel.”
She worried that he might step back and away from her, but Aaron was nothing if not a surprise. Lifting one hand from the rock wall, he slid his hand down her arm and wrapped his fingers around her wrist. He set her hand against the thick curve of his backside and pressed her hand tight against him.
“Just show me.”
Ten
It occurred to Aaron that putting the reins firmly in Celeste’s hands could have been the wrong thing to do. All it would take was one moment of indecision that led straight to her pulling away.
And if they were suddenly thrust back to square one, he wasn’t sure when he’d get to this point with her again.
Celeste Olwin may be one of the most self-sufficient and stubborn women he knew but wasn’t necessarily the best thing for either of them as she was more than happy to sacrifice the things she wanted if she felt that it was in someone else’s best interest.
So, standing there in the pristine waters of the hot springs, with one leg caught between her thighs, and his hand holding hers over the rise of his ass he felt like he was finally standing on the precipice of the unknown.
All he wanted in the world was for her to take that step with him and jump headfirst into their future. He knew that she was everything he wanted. The only woman who could make him happy. But he couldn’t just reach out and take her for himself. She had to make the decision to be his.