by Zoe Chant
Hunter looked over his shoulder.
Where there had been a limp red-tailed hawk lying on his bed, now there was a beautiful naked woman curled on her side.
Hunter froze, then laid the poker down and straightened up slowly.
She was curvy and smooth and gorgeous, curled on the bed, her tousled brunette hair spilling around her perfect face. And she was also, from the look of her, freezing cold. Goose bumps prickled the flawless skin of her shoulders. The damp towel had been thrown off when she'd changed, and lay rumpled under her.
Hunter snapped out of his shock. He had a warm quilt draped over the back of his chair for cold nights. He draped it carefully over her still, unconscious form, and then touched the cold skin of her throat. Her pulse beat strongly, but she was going to need more warmth than that.
Climb in with her.
If he'd known her—if she'd been one of the neighbors, say—he would have done it. But he balked at the idea of wrapping himself around an unconscious stranger. It would have to be a last resort if he couldn't get her warm any other way. Instead he brought more blankets and a deerskin robe. Carefully and gently he bundled her up, wrapping her in fire-warmed fabric and fur, checking frequently as he did so to make sure she was still breathing steadily, her heart beating in a strong rhythm.
Little was showing of her now except the spill of dark brown hair, the same color as her glossy feathers.
Now that he'd discovered she was a shifter rather than an animal, he wondered if she ought to go to a hospital. There was just one tiny problem with that: he didn't have a phone in the cabin. The nearest phone was at his neighbor Bill's place, a couple of miles down the road. If her condition got worse, he'd wrap her up warmly and put her in his truck, but it was a couple hours' drive under good conditions to the hospital in Grand Rapids, and the roads would be absolutely terrible in the ice storm. It was safer to stay here unless he had absolutely no choice.
A hawk shifter. It shouldn't have been such a shock. He hadn't known there were any around here, but of course, in the storm, she could have blown down from somewhere much farther north.
A powerful, deep tenderness arose in him as he watched her sleep. He wanted to protect her, to cradle and cherish her. It had been a very long time since he'd been this close to a woman. Not since Christine—but no, he wasn't going to think about Christine right now.
Instead he stirred himself, got up, and began to busy himself around the cabin. She was going to need something warm inside her; it would help with the hypothermia when she woke up. He put the coffeepot over the fire, and opened a can of soup into a tin pan. Then, needing something to do with his hands, he started tidying—hastily picking up the chain saw parts spread on newspaper on the table, putting away the heap of laundry piled on the floor, stuffing books back onto their shelves.
It had been a long time since he'd had company. He was used to being alone in the cabin. Even when he wasn't looking at the sleeping stranger, he was aware of her: the soft sound of her breathing, the light and clean female smell of her.
She seemed to be sleeping deeply and naturally. Her breathing was slow and even. Hunter checked her pulse again, sliding a hand down her neck to feel its gentle flutter at her collarbone. The touch of her soft skin warmed something in him that had been very empty and very cold since Christine left.
She stirred a little, and her full lips parted in a soft moan; she leaned into his hand.
"It's okay," Hunter said quietly. "You're going to be okay."
He wasn't sure if she heard him, but she seemed to respond to that. Her breathing quickened, and her lashes fluttered. With some effort, she opened her eyes sleepily and looked up at him.
Green eyes, flecked with gold. Beautiful eyes. Eyes a man could become lost in.
The shock of recognition was instant and powerful, a live wire down his spine. He'd never felt anything like that before. Never dreamed he'd feel it for someone he'd just met, a hawk shifter of all things. But his bear had responded to her like it had to no one else. Certainly not to Christine, who had used him and left him.
This was different. This was something he'd never felt before.
This woman, this hawk shifter with eyes like a sun-drenched summer forest, was his mate.
3. Felicity
Felicity was .... warm. Sleepy, drifting, she burrowed a little deeper into the pleasant warmth and tried not to notice the painful tingling of sensation returning to her hands and feet.
Someone was speaking. A deep, rich voice. It was a voice she'd never heard before, and yet somehow familiar, like coming home to a place she'd never been.
Sleepily, she opened her eyes.
For an instant, she couldn't think at all. Then her first thought was, Wow.
There was a man looking down at her, the most gorgeous man she'd ever seen. His face was strongly masculine and yet, as close to beautiful as she'd ever seen on a guy. Warm brown eyes gazed at her.
She had to be dreaming. The last thing she remembered was getting caught in that ice storm. She must be lying in the storm, freezing to death, and hallucinating.
Yet it all seemed so real. There were warm blankets wrapping her, and some kind of soft, tanned fur brushing her cheek. And this guy, this stranger ... Her drowsy gaze roved from his mesmerizing eyes, across his amazing shoulders and powerful arms, and the trim waist under the checked shirt he wore.
But her eyes kept returning to his, as if drawn back by a magnet. Something about his gaze captivated her. As she woke up a little more, she became aware of the warmth of his hand against her cheek. It sent thrills racing through her. She'd never responded to the touch of a man like that before. It wasn't even sexual, just the gentle touch of his palm against the side of her face, but it woke something hungry and quivering inside her.
Actually ...
Actually, maybe that was just hunger. She was very hungry.
"Excuse me," she said. Her voice came out as a quiet rasp. The gorgeous stranger jumped and quickly pulled his hand back. "Where am I?"
"You're pretty far from anywhere," he said in a slightly embarrassed kind of way. "You're in my cabin. We're a few miles north of a little town called Falls Creek."
"Oh." Felicity swallowed, her mouth dry. She really had been blown pretty far; she'd never even heard of that town. Of course, she'd also been outside her usual flying grounds to begin with. "How did I get here?"
"I found you." He blushed, a flush of color rising in his cheeks. "You hit the roof of my cabin. I found you outside and brought you in, and you, uh, changed."
Now it was Felicity's turn to blush. She would have been completely naked—in fact, under the blanket and deerskin that she seemed to be wrapped in, she was still completely naked. On the other hand, it seemed he'd been a perfect gentleman about it.
Also, she was pretty sure he was some kind of shifter himself. She didn't think she'd be responding to him like this if he wasn't. Even now that he was no longer touching her, she could feel his electric presence, vibrating against her skin like a live wire.
"I'm Felicity Groves," she said.
"Hunter. Uh, Hunter Holt." He turned away quickly, and Felicity became aware of a warm, rich smell filling the cabin. "I just heated up some soup. Do you want some?"
"I would love some."
Though she still felt weak and shaky, she was able to sit up, propping herself against the bed's wooden headboard. She untangled her hands from the covers enough to accept the bowl of soup that Hunter handed her. He ate, too, sitting on the only chair in the room.
It was a very tiny cabin, and it was obvious to her from looking around that Hunter must live here alone. The bed was comparatively huge, easily big enough to accommodate two people, but there was only one chair, and only one cup sitting on the narrow plank table under the window. The one thing the cabin did have in abundance was bookshelves. They might be rather crude compared to the tastefully modern shelves in her apartment—these were wooden planks, though neatly planed and sanded—but
they were loaded with well-used paperbacks and hardcover novels. She saw a thick dictionary, some animal field guides, a book on tracking animals ...
She realized she was leaning out of bed and tilting her head to see the titles, which seemed rude. Hastily she went back to scraping out the last of the soup from the bottom of her bowl. "Do you read a lot?"
"Not much else to do," Hunter said, with a shrug of his broad shoulders.
"Don't you get bored?" She saw no signs of a television or a computer in the cabin. In fact, she couldn't even tell if he had electricity. The only light came from the fireplace and a kerosene lamp on the table, casting a warm, homey glow.
Hunter shook his head. "No. There's always something new to look at."
Then he blushed again and dropped his gaze. Felicity smiled. He was shy! But probably he didn't get a lot of visitors out here. "It's all right," she said, a spirit of flirtatiousness seizing her. "I don't mind if you look at me."
Now his blush flamed all the way up to his ears. He cleared his throat. "So, uh, do you want some coffee? I make pretty good coffee."
"Sure," she said. "I'd love some."
She was able, with a bit of squirming, to redistribute her blankets so she could move her arms more freely without being completely indecent. Still, whenever she did move, she noticed that Hunter's gaze kept dropping to the fold of the quilt covering her generous chest—and then breaking hastily away. Still trying to be a gentleman.
Which she did appreciate, but she'd also realized that she didn't mind at all if he decided not to be a gentleman. It was just the two of them in this cabin, and they were both adults, after all. She wondered if he, too, felt the electric sense of connection between them. From the way his fingers lingered against hers when he handed her the hot cup of coffee, she thought perhaps he did.
"You're some kind of shifter too, aren't you?" she asked, sipping her coffee. Oh please, she thought, please be some kind of bird. She didn't think he was, though. There was something very solid and grounded about him. Hunter wasn't a shifter who had his head in the clouds. Whatever he was, it was something land-based.
He nodded. "Bear," he said.
Bear. Her first thought was Oh dear, but then she decided to keep an open mind. She really hadn't met very many bears in Minneapolis at all. Most of them didn't like the city. They preferred a semi-solitary lifestyle in rural country. This certainly seemed to be the case with Hunter, considering the way he was living out in the middle of nowhere like this.
Which means, she thought, stirring her coffee, that he's never going to go back to the city with me. Which also means he definitely isn't my mate, no matter how this feels, so I don't have to be all full of nerves about this. I can just enjoy myself, and perhaps, if he's interested too, we can both have some happy memories to take with us when we go back to our lives.
Mel would probably laugh at her, but would also encourage her. Felicity wasn't sure if it was just the lingering effects of her brush with death, but she felt daring and alive. Hunter was here, and so was she. Outside the cabin, rain and sleet rattled against the windows, but inside it was warm. There was nowhere to go and no one to see whatever they did.
What happens in the cabin, stays in the cabin, she thought, and almost laughed.
She could tell that Hunter wanted it too. His eyes were dark with arousal.
However, since it was becoming clear that he didn't plan to make the first move, she carefully let the blanket slip down—not enough to be completely indecent, just enough to expose her generous cleavage and the swelling curves of the tops of her breasts. She saw his eyes flick down. He was definitely taking interest, and the hawk inside her gave a wild cry of eagerness.
4. Hunter
Hunter wondered if Felicity felt the same instant, electric connection that he'd felt. It was hard to tell. It had been a long time since he'd talked to a woman at all ... and a very long time since he'd been with a woman.
His bear was leaving no doubt what it thought of Felicity's presence in his cabin. The cabin was so small that he couldn't get far enough away to avoid being thoroughly aware of her ... and the fact that she was naked under that blanket.
"Are you feeling all right?" he asked her, pushing his bear forcefully down and yanking his eyes away from her cleavage. "You hit pretty hard. I didn't think it was a good idea to risk the roads in this weather to take you to the hospital."
Felicity tilted her head, listening to the wind outside the cabin and the heavy drumming of rain on the roof. "No," she said. "That's probably a good idea. I'm okay, I think. Or I will be."
"Rough weather for flying in," Hunter said.
Felicity smiled. Her smile was as amazing as the rest of her. "I work in Minneapolis, but I like to come up here and go flying on weekends. I don't get out as much in the winter, and this was my first long flight of the spring. I guess I got a little carried away."
"Good thing you flew this way. It's wild country around here. You could've flown for hours without finding anyone."
Her smile grew brilliant. "I know. I'm very lucky you found me."
Hunter wasn't sure what to say to that. Flustered, he got up and gathered the soup bowls, and refilled her coffee cup.
"So what do you do out here, Hunter?" she asked.
"I'm a lumberjack. I work on a crew down the valley a little ways."
"A lumberjack," she said, approving. "No wonder you have those ... arms." Her green eyes darkened, the pupils widening.
Hunter glanced down at his arms. They were just arms, weren't they? Okay, they were pretty big. But that's what happened when you threw logs around for a living.
"I'm a fashion designer," Felicity said, wrenching her gaze away from his shoulders with apparent reluctance. "I have my own business, Groves Design. It's probably not the kind of runway-model thing you're thinking, though. I like to design clothing that's pretty but practical, the kind of thing a woman can feel comfortable in. Or a man!" she added. "We do men's fashions as well. And we have some very popular plus-sized lines. Actually, that's what got me started in the first place. Er, do you mind me going on about this?"
Hunter shook his head. "Guess the fashion industry was something I never thought too much about."
"Well, most people think of fashion and they think of Project Runway and things like that. But it's not just making dresses out of gold lamé and feathers. What made me interested in doing it myself was all the trouble I used to have finding pretty clothes that fit me in our little town." She glanced down at herself. "I'm not exactly a size zero, you know."
"You look great to me," Hunter said, and then could have kicked himself, but she looked delighted and even blushed a little. For a moment she seemed to lose her train of thought, and then recovered.
"Mostly I wanted bigger girls to have stylish things too. Not high-end stylish, just a nice summer dress or a classy jacket to pull on when the fall weather gets chilly. Though, like I said, we've branched out a lot, into menswear and other things." She laughed. "Listen to me going on. Hunter, why don't you tell me more about yourself?"
"Not much to tell," he admitted. "I've lived around here most of my life. Left for a little while, tried living in the city ..." A sharp flash of Christine crossed his mind, the lingering taste of a hurt that had never gone away. "It wasn't for me," he finished in a rush.
A shadow seemed to cross Felicity's face—why, he wasn't sure. But then she smiled that lovely smile again. "Well, it was lucky for me you were living out here. I can't think what would have happened to me if you weren't."
"I'm the lucky one here," he said without thinking, and then winced at himself. Damn it, Hunter, you just met the lady! She's going to be thinking you've been living alone too long ... which you probably have.
Felicity met his eyes with a little smile, then dropped hers somewhat shyly. She started to stretch, and winced. "I may have spoken too soon when I said I was okay. I think maybe I bruised my shoulder when I hit the roof ... could you look at it for me?"
Felicity slipped the blanket off her shoulder, baring her arm and part of her back. "How does it look?" she asked, bowing her head to get her hair out of the way.
The words perfect and wonderful came to mind. The exposed expanse of creamy skin was an open invitation to touch. He brushed his fingertips lightly across her shoulder, and she shivered. Her skin was just as soft as it looked. "I don't see any bruises," he admitted, breathless with wanting her.
Felicity looked up through a curtain of dark hair. "I think you should look for other bruises," she said, and let the blanket fall completely from her shoulders. "I might have hurt myself in places I didn't even notice."
Hunter's breath caught. He cupped a hand over her smooth shoulder, then tipped up her chin with his fingertips. Her lips parted, an open invitation. He bent down and covered her mouth with his own.
Kissing her was a shock and a revelation. It was like plunging into an icy mountain stream in June: a jolt to the senses, a rush of sensation so overwhelming that he couldn't even find words to describe it. She opened her mouth to him, inviting him in. So warm, so wet, so wanting ... When they both finally came up for air, Hunter could tell he wasn't the only one who was gasping and on fire with need.
He wrapped an arm around her and pulled her into his lap. She was just as warm and delightful an armful as he'd thought she'd be. The blankets and the deerskin robe fell away onto the bed like a butterfly's shed cocoon. She was still cool to the touch, but no longer so terribly cold.
Felicity threw her head back and kissed him again with passionate abandon. Hunter cupped his hands under her generous buttocks and stood up, lifting her with him. Felicity gasped into his mouth.