His frame was larger, his shoulders broader, and he had an intimidating presence that he hadn’t before. There was stubble scattered across his chin, and he looked like a combination of a model and a Navy SEAL. If Aria hadn’t known him, she would have been far too afraid to approach him.
Not that she had any intention of talking to him.
As far as Aria was concerned, Reid wasn’t there. She was going to pretend she hadn’t seen him, either on her matches or there in the bar. Instead, she was going to have an amazing time, meet all the men she could, and try to find a way to put Reid out of her mind. It was going to take all of her energy, and considerably more confidence than she actually had, but she was going to find a way to move on, even with Reid in her periphery.
Aria sidled up to the bar and waved down the bartender, who was just as handsome as some of the resort guests. She tried to give him a sly grin, but it just came off as an awkward toothy grin, and he laughed. It wasn’t a mean laugh, but it was enough to deflate her confidence a little. However, he was quick to adjust for her benefit.
“Aren’t you just as precious as you could possibly be? I want to put you in my pocket and carry you around.”
Ah, wrong tree, Aria. Good to know. But the knowledge put her at ease, and she felt like she might actually have someone she could talk to now. She leaned forward on the bar, and waved him closer conspiratorially.
“You see that guy in the corner with the sunglasses? Don’t be obvious!”
The bartender leaned around her, pretended to survey the whole room, then leaned back. “Oh, my. That boy is a looker. Want me to set up a meeting?”
She shook her head vehemently. “God, no! That is my ex. I had no idea he was going to be here. So, I need you to make me a drink that gives me the appearance of being far more sophisticated than I am. Something classy and pretty that I can hold and look gorgeous.”
“You don’t need a drink for that, honey,” he said as he waved a hand at Aria dismissively. “But I have something in mind. I’m Andrew, by the way. And you are?”
Aria held out her hand with a smile. “Aria. Nice to meet you, Andrew.”
Andrew set about mixing Aria the most beautiful and intricate drink she’d ever seen. Within minutes, he slid a martini glass across the bar, and the drink was somehow split up in three different, pastel layers. She almost didn’t want to drink it, but then he pushed it closer, encouraging her to take a sip. When she did, she couldn’t believe how amazing it tasted. Like candy, and chocolate, and fruit, all at the same time.
“This is incredible. How do you do this?” Aria asked, taking another sip.
“That’s my job,” Andrew said with a wink. “Pretty drinks for pretty ladies.”
“And what a pretty lady she is, too.”
The voice startled her, but she recognized the accent right away. It was David. She turned on her bar stool, and even as high up as she was, she still couldn’t make eye contact with him.
“My lord, I forgot how tall you are,” Aria said, unable to hide the amazement in her voice. David just laughed. He looked unbelievably gorgeous. He was wearing a white shirt that opened down to his chest, revealing an incredible muscled physique. His skin was tan from a day in the sun, which only made his crystal-blue eyes sparkle more. His blonde hair was swept back, as if he’d just gotten off a surfboard. Aria was pretty sure that was a solid possibility, because he smelled like the ocean. His sleeves were rolled up, revealing tattoos that probably only made sense to him, but that just made him seem even more mysterious.
Aria batted her eyelashes at David. She felt bad flirting with him when she wasn’t sure anything was going to happen; at the end of the day, he was just way too pretty for her. Rough around the edges, but so beautiful, he looked like he could be on the cover of a magazine. She hated to admit it, but Reid was still her type: dark, slightly dangerous, not too big, but with a heart of gold beneath a crusty exterior. Still, it had been a long time since a man as beautiful as David had shown any interest in her, and she wasn’t going to be rude.
David sat down on the stool next to her and ordered a beer from Andrew. Then he turned to Aria.
“That wasn’t a line, by the way. You’re the most beautiful woman on this whole damn resort.”
That accent. It’s like an aphrodisiac, she thought as she sipped from her drink and tried with all of her might not to look in Reid’s direction.
“You’re too kind. Seriously. So, David… tell me about yourself. Are you a…” Aria didn’t know why she had trouble saying the word, but she felt like there was some sort of “bear shifter” decorum she wasn’t in the know about. But David just laughed.
“A shifter? I am. But unlike the American shifters, it’s been more common in Australia for a while. I was born this way, as they say,” he said with a wink. Aria was genuinely fascinated, and she leaned forward as she took another sip of her drink.
“I didn’t know they had bears in Australia! Since the koala isn’t actually a bear. What kind of bear are you?”
David leaned in closer, and suddenly, his blue eyes sparkled, almost like snowflakes. Aria wanted to reach out and touch him; he was like a beautiful painting, and she couldn’t believe he was real.
“I’ll give you three guesses,” he said with a grin as his eyes continued to sparkle.
“Are you a polar bear?” she asked, unable to look away or break their eye contact. David winked.
“Bingo, little lady. You don’t often find polars in warm climates, and Cairns, where I live, is warm all the time. But it’s where I grew up and I don’t see much reason to leave just because I prefer the snow.”
Aria’s curiosity over David’s lineage was almost enough to distract her from Reid, but then, she felt his eyes on her. She looked over David’s shoulder, and saw Reid watching her, his sunglasses tilted down his nose. He almost looked… jealous? Angry? It had been so long, she couldn’t read his moods anymore, and who knew what had changed thanks to his shifter blood. But she just leaned back over and laid a small hand on David’s giant arm.
“This is amazing. Really. I didn’t know much about shifters before I came here, but now that I’m at the resort, it’s like I’m ravenous for information.”
David gave her a curious eyebrow. “You don’t know any shifters? Where are you from?”
“Indiana. Things are… different there. There is a little boy in my school who is half-shifter, but as far as I know, that’s it. People aren’t as open there as other places. I’d honestly love to move to a bigger city, but I’ve just been there for so long.”
David winked at her. “Ever consider Australia?”
Aria burst out laughing, a genuine laugh that made her cheeks rosy, and she realized that Reid’s eyes were on her again. She tried to shake off the feeling that his intense gaze was giving her, and turned her attention back to David.
“I’m not sure Australia and I would get along. I’m kind of a wimp, and isn’t everything there out to kill you?”
David lets out a warm, amused chuckle, and shakes his head. “Not everything is trying to kill you. Just most things. Besides, you’d have a giant, brave polar bear to protect you, and most things down under don’t know what to do when they see a polar bear.”
“I believe that,” Aria said with a smile. Andrew walked up, a happy grin on his face, and gestured at her drink.
“Want another? Though I don’t think you need it.” He leaned over and whispered in her ear, “You ex can’t keep his eyes off of you.”
“That’s what I’m worried about,” Aria whispered back. She looked at Reid again out of the corner of her eye, and he looked angry now. Almost like he was about to lose control. And that was making Aria nervous. Yet, no matter what she did, no matter how hard she tried to focus on David, Reid was always there, hovering. Instead of her usual issue, however, where Reid was just dominating her thoughts, now he was physically there too, making her crazy with his stupid perfect face, and all of those damn memories.
How was she ever going to move on when Reid was, literally, everywhere she looked?
Chapter 10
Reid
Reid felt like his head was going to explode. Every time he looked over at Aria, and thought about that blonde asshole touching her, kissing her, doing all the things to her he hadn’t been able to for all these years. His fists clenched under the table, and it was taking every ounce of his will power not to flip the table over and destroy the other guy right then and there. Reid had no idea how long he’d been staring at Aria, scowling, when Frank put a hand on his shoulder.
“Dude. Are you okay? You look like you’re going to go nuclear or something.”
Reid shimmied out from under Frank’s grasp, not wanting anyone touching him. He did, indeed, feel like he was going to lose his mind, and the last thing he wanted was someone trying to calm him down. Reid forced himself to relax one of his hands, then he took a sip of his beer.
“I’m fine,” he said through clenched teeth. “Never better.”
Frank and Brendan looked at each other, suspicious and not remotely buying Reid’s story. “Nice try, dude. But I’ve seen that look before and I swear to god, if you get us kicked out of here over some stupid turf war, I will never forgive you,” Brendan said with a snarl
Reid forced himself to relax his face, then turned to Brendan, his eyebrows furrowed. “Turf war?”
“You’re glaring at that polar bear like he boned your mother or something. If you have an issue with him, get over it, please,” Brendan said as he poked Frank in the side and pointed at the guy at the bar. But Reid just shook his head.
“I don’t give a shit about that guy. Polar bears? Turf wars? That’s crazy. That’s a thing?”
“I sometimes forget that you’re fairly new to all of this,” Frank said, waving to the waitress for more drinks. “In the past, clans would often fight each other, for no reason other than infringing on each other’s space. And some… less enlightened… shifters get weird about different bear species. Especially when they are more unique. So, your common grizzly shifter would get his fur up over a polar bear, or a sun bear, causing a ruckus.”
“What the hell is a sun bear?” Reid asked, briefly distracted from his anger.
“Super-rare Asian bear. Likes tropical climates. Kind of weird looking. That’s not the point though. If you aren’t being a weirdo about the polar bear, what’s your beef with that guy?”
Reid chugged down all of the beer that had just been delivered to the table. “Nothing. It’s fine. Really. Don’t worry about it, alright?”
“You’re not fine. It’s obvious,” Brendan muttered.
Reid sighed, frustrated that he was being interrogated by his friends. The last thing he wanted to do was try and explain what was going on, or have to lay out the whole horrible story of what he did to Aria. So, he forced a smile on his face, and shook his head again.
“I think I’m just a little more on edge than I realized. All of this is getting to me. And I don’t think I really prepared myself for how overwhelming this place would be.”
Frank and Brendan seemed pacified, but Reid’s bear wasn’t. The bear was restless, annoyed, and pushing Reid to go talk to Aria. But how in the hell could Reid so much as say “hello” to her after everything he’d done? He reached down to his pocket and touched the place where he held Aria’s last letter, and just knowing it was there made him immediately flash back to one of the last times he heard from her.
It was 2009, and Reid had just completed the process to be turned into a shifter. He wasn’t taking to it well. For the first few months, he would shift at random, and had destroyed an entire room at the facility where he was being held. They had been forced to put him in confinement, where he’d stayed for months, lonely, panicked, and in pain as his body adjusted to all of the havoc the procedure had wrought on him. It only made things worse when they gave him Aria’s letters, which had gotten so angry. Not that he blamed her. He felt like a giant asshole for everything he’d put her through, and for everything he hadn’t been able to help her with. As his body practically ripped apart, he felt like he was being torn apart from the inside too, thanks to the guilt and sadness eating him alive.
Before that last letter, Reid had a feeling he was about to lose her. He could still remember every word of the letter that came before the end.
Dear Reid,
Are you ever going to answer my letters? I’m so lost. So, confused. Why would you abandon me like this? Did I do something wrong?
I don’t know how much longer I can go on, wondering, waiting.
I don’t expect you to answer anymore. But I still hope. Stupid hope. Sometimes it’s worse than just giving up.
I might have to just say goodbye to you, Reid.
I’ll love you forever.
~A
Reid felt his heart race as he remembered those words, those stupid words that broke his heart a thousand times over, and made him feel worse than the procedure ever did. He didn’t want Frank and Brendan on his case anymore, so he was trying to keep cool. But at the same time, he just wanted to get everything off his chest, so he could talk to Aria, and explain.
Then he looked at her again, and saw her flirting with that guy, and he had no idea how he was going to keep it together. He didn’t deserve to talk to her, and she didn’t owe him anything, least of all a single minute of his time. Even as he watched her talking to another man, the bear slowly losing control, Reid just sunk further and further back into the chair.
I don’t deserve her, he told the bear as a command to shut it down. So, that’s that…
Chapter 11
Aria
Aria couldn’t stop glancing over at Reid, no matter how hard she tried. David didn’t seem to notice, and he kept chatting to her about his life in Australia, and his job as scuba diving instructor. That snapped Aria back to attention.
“You’re a bear who teaches people how to scuba dive?” she asked with a laugh.
“Well, I don’t teach people how to dive while I’m in my bear form. But I grew up diving at the reef, and I love spreading that excitement and joy to other people.”
Aria looked at David, really looked at him, and she had trouble fathoming that he was real. He was so perfect, she almost couldn’t believe that he was single, or that he belonged at a matchmaking resort. He was beautiful, kind, funny, smart… and yet she felt nothing for him. All she felt was a desire to go over to Reid and scream at him until she felt whole again. But she didn’t want to give him the satisfaction. She wanted to live a life that made the last ten years of misery worth it.
Fuck it. He won’t ruin this for me.
“Do you want to have another drink or two, then go for a walk on the beach?” she asked David, while staring into his eyes. He looked a little surprised.
“Really? I’m going to be honest. You’re lovely and I’m enjoying talking to you, but you don’t actually seem all that present, or interested in being here with me.”
Aria felt guilty. She thought she was doing a decent job of hiding what was going on in her head, but obviously, she wasn’t. “I’m sorry. I guess I’m just a little overwhelmed with everything going on? I’ve never done anything like this before, so it’s all so new.”
David nodded his head thoughtfully. “I get it. I’ve never been here before either, and I can’t say it’s what I expected. But I’m having fun and it has been very nice meeting you, Aria.”
Aria knew she was blushing, but she tried to hide it behind a hand. Then she waved Andrew the bartender back over. He skipped over with a smile.
“What can I do for you, pretty lady?”
“Can you get this man a drink and put it on my tab? I owe him.”
Andrew and David both laughed, and Aria looked around, confused. “What? What’s so funny?”
“You know all of your drinks are included as part of package? You’re not actually paying for anything,” Andrew said with a chuckle.
“Are you kidding?
Hot damn! Drinks for everyone!” Aria said a little louder than she meant to, and she suddenly became aware of Reid staring at her again. That certainly wasn’t her intention, but it was a nice fringe benefit. Andrew set about making her another of the fruity candy drinks, and he gave David another beer. Aria continued to try to put Reid out of her mind, and she found more drinks did the trick. She talked to David, and had fun learning about shifters in Australia. He also explained a lot of the details to her; how many were turned by a government experiment, but a lot of shifters in other countries had just evolved that way, perhaps as a result of breeding with shifters before people were really aware of them. She was so fascinated by his stories, she lost track of time, and suddenly it was almost midnight.
“How about that walk?” David asked her with a winning, sparkling smile. She was just about to hop off her stool to head out with him, when she was totally taken aback by a feeling she couldn’t describe. It was fuzzy, and hazy, like she had walked through a thick fog and it had invaded all of her senses. As much as she wanted to leave with David, something was stopping her, stopping deep inside, and she couldn’t do it.
Internally, she chastised herself. This better not be some lingering devotion to Reid. But she didn’t think that was it. It was something deeper than that, like on a chemical level, she couldn’t leave that bar. Aria didn’t understand the feelings that were taking hold of her, but it was easier not to fight it, or force against it. She embraced the feeling, and decided to just go back to her room.
“David, I’m so sorry, but I think I’ve had too much to drink, and between the sun and the traveling, I’m just exhausted. I need to get some sleep. But could we maybe meet up tomorrow? Take our walk then?”
Furever Always (Furever Series) Page 39