Flame

by Ophelia Sexton

  Now, in the dim predawn light, he saw that the room was clean and simply furnished with a queen-sized bed, an antique oak chest of drawers topped with a beveled mirror, and a matching oak nightstand. Everything was clean and a little shabby, as if the people who owned this cabin had exiled old pieces of furniture to their vacation home when the time came to upgrade the furnishings in their main home.

  Cassie was curled up next to him, one rounded hip nudging his. It was a nice way to wake up.

  She was still deeply asleep, and no wonder, if she'd worked a double shift before coming home to his fiasco yesterday afternoon. Thor decided to let her sleep as long as he could. In the meanwhile, he'd just enjoy the luxury of not having to go anywhere or do anything.

  Despite his amnesia, he was pretty sure that he didn't get to laze in bed very often, so he was determined to enjoy the hell out of it while it lasted, especially when he had a beautiful woman cuddled up next to him.

  So he dozed and relaxed for the next hour, as bright sunlight gradually crept through the windows, which were bare of curtains or shutters.

  After a while, though, he realized that his need to visit the bathroom was becoming pressing…and he couldn't use the crutches that Dr. Chang had left him, not with a fractured right arm and cracked ribs on his left side.

  Cassie had helped him hobble from the living room to this bedroom last night, her arm looped around his waist and her shifter strength ably supporting him despite the fact that he was nearly a head taller than she was.

  With relief, he saw that Cassie was beginning to stir now, her heartbeat slowly speeding up as she passed from sleep to growing wakefulness.

  "Good morning," he said, when he saw her eyes open.

  She looked at him blankly for a long moment, as if trying to remember how he'd gotten in her bed. Then her eyes widened. "I was supposed to wake you up hours ago! To check on you!"

  "And I'm fine. My headache's gone, and I feel a lot better after a good night's sleep," he assured her.

  She relaxed. "You're not just saying that to keep me from phoning Betsy?"

  Thor decided Cassie was adorable when she was fussing over him. "Nope."

  "And your memories came back?"

  Thor hesitated and bit back his first impulse to tell her that everything was fine. He didn't want to lie to her. "Uh…not quite," he admitted.

  Her face fell. Before she could suggest taking him to the hospital after all, he continued, "Which is why I think that going to Bearpaw Ridge is a good plan. I'm sure something there will trigger the return of my memories."

  She didn't look convinced, but she didn't badger him either.

  "Hey, could you help me to the bathroom?" he asked, a little embarrassed.

  "Of course!" Cassie immediately sat up in the bed and swung her legs over the edge.

  Her hair tumbled over her shoulders and back in an unruly mass of dark golden ringlets. It fell forward to caress his cheeks and chest when she came around the end of the bed and bent over him to help him to a sitting position.

  She shoved her hair out of the way with an impatient gesture and carefully guided him to his feet.

  Once he was standing, Thor realized how stiff and sore he felt everywhere. With Cassie bracing him, he hobbled painfully to the tiny bathroom attached to the bedroom.

  Moving slowly and awkwardly, he managed to take care of his most urgent business while she quickly stripped the bed.

  "I found a toiletries kit tucked in one of your packs," she said a few minutes later, through the closed door. "And there was a toothbrush inside. I put it next to mine in the toothbrush holder—it's the bright blue one. You can use my toothpaste if you like."

  With his right hand enclosed in the cast, squeezing toothpaste onto the brush proved to be unexpectedly challenging. "Um, Cassie, would you mind giving me a hand in here?"

  "Sure. What do you need?" She opened the door a crack and peeked warily inside before opening it all the way.

  He held the tube of toothpaste out to her. "I can't seem to get a good enough grip on it to get the cap off," he confessed.

  She smiled at him, and he felt warmth spreading from his chest down to his groin.

  Down, boy! he ordered sternly.

  To his pleasure, she stayed to talk to him while he clumsily began to brush his teeth with his left hand. One of her golden brows lifted as she observed his clumsy jabs. "So, I'm guessing you're right-handed?"

  He grinned at her around a mouthful of toothpaste. "What clued you in?" he mumbled.

  She laughed.

  After he'd finished and rinsed out his mouth, she asked shyly, "Do you, uh, want to take a shower? I could help you."

  The bathroom did not have a tub. Instead, it boasted a large shower stall, which would make stepping in and out easier with his broken leg.

  "I'm dying for a shower," he confessed.

  "I was planning to take one before we hit the road, so I thought that maybe I could kill two birds with one stone." Her face turned an appealing shade of pink under her smooth tan as she reached up and began unbuttoning her pajama top.

  Don't stare. For God's sake, don't stare.

  But it was difficult for Thor to tear his eyes away from the enticing display as she bared her collarbones and reached for the next button.

  He bent his head and concentrated on rinsing the last bits of toothpaste from the sink down the drain, acutely aware of the soft whisper of cloth sliding over her smooth skin.

  Stop, damn it, he ordered himself, as his disobedient cock began to stir against his tight briefs.

  By necessity, shifters often found themselves naked in mixed company, but the unspoken rule was that you didn't ogle anyone unless they specifically invited that kind of attention. He might not remember what kind of shifter he was, but somehow, he knew that much, at least.

  And Cassie was clearly just being kind and nothing more.

  She edged around him, turned on the water in the shower stall, and then touched his shoulder gently.

  "I'm going to take your underwear off now," she said.

  Her words were like every wet dream he'd ever had suddenly coming to life.

  He swallowed hard, and it took every ounce of his self-control not to move as she came up behind him. He felt her fingers brush his waist before hooking into the waistband of his briefs and sliding them smoothly down his legs and over the bulky cast that covered him from his right thigh down to his foot.

  Cassie helped him step out of his briefs when she reached his ankles, then she moved around him and briskly began to unfasten the Velcro straps of the cast on his leg.

  As she worked, Thor dared a glance down. What he saw horrified him.

  The skin of Cassie's shoulders and back was marred by long, parallel white lines of scar tissue. It looked as if someone had savagely clawed her and then left the wounds unstitched and untreated.

  Thor found felt an immediate surge of protectiveness and anger. Someone had hurt her, and badly.

  Why would anyone want do something like that to her?

  If Thor ever found out who had attacked her like that, he'd have to kill them.

  Alerted by something—a change in his own scent, or perhaps the tensing of his muscles, Cassie glanced up at him.

  The wariness and sudden fear in her eyes bothered him.

  "I'm sorry," she apologized, her hands stilling instantly. "Did I hurt you? I was trying not to jar your leg while I was—"

  "No," he interrupted her. "You didn't do anything."

  She paused, still kneeling at his feet, waiting for him to continue speaking. She still wore a pair of dark pink panties, but her breasts were bare, and Thor's throat went dry at the sight of them. They were glorious, a generous double handful of rounded sweetness tipped with large, dark pink nipples.

  Cassie was so beautiful that it made his chest ache. He wanted to make love to her. He wanted to spend every hour of every day with her.

  Most of all, he wanted to protect her.

  "Look,
" he began. "I know it's none of my business…but who hurt you?"

  She froze, her fingers hooked under the second-to-last Velcro strap around the foot of his cast. "It was a while ago. I—I don't really want to talk about it."

  Her head was bowed, her mass of gold-streaked hair hiding her expression.

  Thor impulsively bent and traced one of the long, white scars that stretched over her upper back and over the curve of her shoulder. He felt her shiver under his touch and saw goosebumps raise golden peach fuzz over the unmarred patches of skin. "Was it that Ed Baldwin guy that your friend called about yesterday?"

  She flinched away from his gentle touch as if he'd scorched her.

  Rage burned through him like acid, bubbling up from his chest in a deep growl. "I'll kill that bastard if he ever tries to—"

  Cassie shot up from her kneeling position and grabbed Thor's shoulders. Her aquamarine eyes were wide, and her gaze bored into his.

  "You don't understand. He's the First of our pride. It was his right to punish me for disobeying him!" Her fingers tightened. "He'll kill any outsider who gets in his way."

  "No one has the right to do something like that," Thor said thickly, his human voice struggling against the rumbling growl that threatened to drown it. His good arm circled the dip of her waist, then his fingertips followed the path of the raised white lines up her back. "These scars—didn't anyone stitch you up, afterwards?"

  He caught a fleeting glimpse of Cassie's stricken expression before she dropped her gaze.

  "He said that he wanted me to see the marks of my punishment every time I looked in the mirror, so that I wouldn't forget the lesson." She shook her head. "And now, I'm ugly."

  "Oh, God, Cassie. And you're not ugly." Thor drew her gently into his arms and tried to ignore the dangerous temptation of her soft breasts against his bare skin.

  Maybe he couldn't remember what kind of shifter he was, but he felt a bone-deep certainty that what had been done to her was pure abuse. "How long have you been on the run from him? And why didn't anyone help you?"

  "Year before last, I went home after fall semester, and then, right before that Christmas—" She stopped speaking abruptly, and he could feel the shudder that rippled through her body. "—and can we just not talk about this right now?" She sighed, her breath warm against his chest. "He's the First, Thor. No one crosses him—that's why he's the First. And it's been a year and a half now. I just want to put it all behind me."

  He felt her arms come around his own waist and the magical moment when she just relaxed against him.

  Trust. She had given him her trust, and it felt like something precious and infinitely fragile.

  "I'm willing to take the chance, if he ever comes around here." Thor bent his head and breathed in the scent of her hair.

  Despite his bone-deep anger at Baldwin for his barbaric treatment of Cassie, Thor also felt weirdly happy now that she was in his arms. He didn't want to let her go.

  He wanted to kiss her and feel her soft lips against his, and…

  His cock throbbed and stiffened, pushing against the sweetly rounded curve of Cassie's bare belly.

  And Thor felt her tense in his arms. She didn't push him away, but the soft, yielding figure in his arms abruptly turned into a statue.

  At the same time, he heard her heartbeat accelerate, and the faintest tang of fear tainted her sweet fragrance.

  He cursed silently and instantly released her. He hated the idea that he had scared her.

  "I'm sorry, he said, swallowing hard. With an effort, he took a half-step back from the seduction of her soft curves. "You're so beautiful…but I shouldn't have done that."

  Once again, he found himself looking at her hair as she bent her head.

  "It's—it's okay," she whispered, but Thor could smell the apprehension in her scent, hear it in her hammering heart.

  Did she think he was going to attack her? Claw her back to ribbons like Baldwin had?

  He might not be able to remember who he was, but Thor was dead certain he'd never force himself on an unwilling woman.

  And even if he had been the type of creep who'd assault the person who'd just saved his life, he sure wasn't much of a threat at the moment.

  Hell, with his leg cast unfastened, he was having a difficult time just staying upright! She'd be able to knock him over with just a nudge of her elbow, if she was so inclined.

  "I'm sorry," she said, surprising him with her apology as she sank slowly back down on her knees and reached for the two lowest Velcro straps on his cast. "I—uh—I don't usually—" Her heartbeat accelerated again.

  "Hey, it's okay," Thor said quickly. "I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable, and I'm sure I'll be okay in the shower on my own if you just help me take off the cast on my arm."

  Cassie looked up at him with a surprised expression, and he fought to keep his gaze from going lower. It was hard, though, because she was so breathtakingly sexy that it took his breath away.

  "It wasn't you. You…you didn't do anything. I'm just being stupid, that's all."

  "I don't think you're being stupid at all." Thor smiled down at her. "And I appreciate everything that you're doing for me."

  To his relief, she returned his smile. It was a bit shy, but genuine. And he felt deep relief that he hadn't messed up his fragile, newborn relationship with her beyond repair.

  * * *

  Cassie's hands were shaking as she continued unfastening Thor's casts. She glared down at her trembling fingers. You are such a mess, you stupid little kitty. And nothing even happened!

  This was the moment she had been waiting for…and dreading. Thanks to her shifter senses, she had known that Thor found her attractive.

  And to be honest, she was drawn to Thor in turn.

  In fact, he was the sexiest man she'd ever met, Ordinary or shifter.

  Maybe she hadn't known him very long, but she liked everything about him—his scent, his breathtaking good looks, his sweet smile, his sense of humor. Most of all, she felt utterly comfortable around him…or she had, until a few moments ago.

  But she wasn't ready to take the next step, not yet, even though her cat half had been pushing her relentlessly, resulting in a bewildering series of mixed signals yesterday and today.

  Given everything she'd done—holding his hand, snuggling up to him in bed, and sneaking looks at his jaw-dropping body—she’d known it was only a matter of time before Thor made his move.

  And in Cassie's experience, shifter males rarely ever took "no" for an answer, especially not from a low-ranking pride member.

  To her deep astonishment—mingled with both relief and disappointment—Thor had backed down as soon as he sensed her discomfort. He'd even apologized for making her feel uncomfortable, when it was all her fault!

  His behavior bewildered Cassie. At the same time, she felt grateful to him.

  Thor Swanson, though clearly a dominant male, wasn't aggressive or grabby in the way she had come to expect from shifter males. He was confident and powerful but also oddly chivalrous.

  He treated her as if she were something special. Someone he actually respected. As if he cared what she thought of him.

  She, Cassie Long, the Fraidy-Cat of the New Braunfels Pride!

  She'd never experienced anything like this before. It made her feel as if a miniature sun had sprung to life in her chest, filling her with warm golden light.

  And in that warmth, she stopped feeling shaky.

  Cassie took a deep breath and finished removing the cast from his arm. She studied the raised purple welt on his forearm, just above his wrist.

  "How does it feel?" she asked, tracing the mark with a feather-light touch.

  In reply, Thor flexed his fingers. She saw the long lines of muscle in his forearm tauten and relax just before he winced.

  "Not a whole lot better," he admitted. "Same with my leg. If you don't mind, I think you might have to hold me upright in the shower."

  She glanced at the tiled cubicle, whic
h was now filled with a nice cloud of steam.

  "I don't think there's much chance of either of us falling over in there," she pointed out. "Not a lot of elbow room."

  Thor widened his clear hazel eyes in a look of mock innocence. "Maybe if I braced myself against the wall, you could wash my back for me?"

  Cassie had a sudden flash of running her soapy hands all over those muscles, then sliding them lower. She swallowed hard and felt her cheeks grow hot.

  Her first instinct was to flee the bathroom and leave Thor to his own devices, because she wanted this just a little too much for her own good, and she was a pathetic coward.

  But she was tired of running, tired of hiding, and Thor had just proven to her that he wasn't going to just take whatever he wanted.

  And damn it, as damaged and pathetic as she was, she wanted Thor like she'd never wanted anyone else.

  She'd handed Ed Baldwin enough of her life over the past eighteen months. She wasn't going to give him anything more.

  She was going to stop running away whenever someone new came into her life.

  Starting right now.

  Cassie took a deep breath that only shook a little. Her cat jumped eagerly to the forefront of her consciousness.

  "That depends on how good a boy you are," she said to Thor and heard the words come out as a purr.

  His breath hitched, and his eyes grew hot as shifter gold hazed across them. She didn't dare look down to see what his intimidatingly large cock was doing.

  "I can be very good," he promised her in that sexy rumble. And then, as if magically tuning into the hesitation that still plagued her inmost self, he added, "And I promise I'll keep my hands to myself…no matter what you do."

  Now, if that wasn't an invitation, she didn't know what was.

  Chapter 6 – In Hot Water

  "Well, then, step inside. After you," Cassie said, tilting her head toward the shower stall.

  She reached down for the waistband of her panties and noticed that her hands had started shaking again. Her heart hammered in her chest, and she felt short of breath.

  Instinctively, she glanced at the bathroom door and instantly hated herself for looking for an escape route.