Gradually she sank back to the mattress, but she kept her eyes closed, as if she didn’t want to look at him. He bitterly regretted that he hadn’t been able to give her what she’d asked for.
Leaning down, he brushed his lips across hers. “I wanted to, Rachel.”
She took several shaky breaths and kept her eyes closed. “I don’t believe you.”
“Please believe me.” He kissed her again, more fully this time, taking his time to enjoy the velvet texture of her mouth before lifting his head. “I couldn’t. Too much is at stake.”
At last she opened her eyes, but her gaze was accusing. “It’s because I’m human, isn’t it?”
“Yes, and I take all the blame for what just happened.”
“I was embarrassed. And angry.”
“My fault. All my fault.” He felt like a jerk. “I shouldn’t have touched you when you were bottoms up like that.”
A smile threatened to break through. “What a way to describe me. Accurate, though.”
“You were temptation personified.” He began moving slowly within her because he simply had to. He needed that sweet friction. Maybe it would work for her, too.
“Apparently not tempting enough.”
“Rachel, that position is very special. It’s reserved for the moment when werewolves choose a mate.”
“Oh.” She went still. Then her voice went up an octave. “I almost became your mate?”
“No.” He rocked steadily back and forth. She was so wet that he created liquid music with each thrust. “I wouldn’t have let that happen.”
“But if you’d . . . if we’d . . .”
“Both of us would have had to agree it was what we wanted.” His cli**x pressed closer and his breathing grew heavy with anticipation. “Didn’t want to take a chance of . . .” His focus on the conversation was gone.
“Of what?” She lifted to meet his thrusts with a soft moan.
“Maybe . . .” Talking became a luxury. “In the heat of passion, we might . . . Rachel, you feel so damn good.” He shoved in deeper. “So good.”
“You’re humoring me.”
“No! I swear!” He drew back and surged forward again, touching her womb. “I’m in heaven.”
“But is it better?”
He avoided answering her question. “It’s damn fine.” He gulped for air and kept stroking.
“Better than the wolf position?”
His groan was a mixture of pleasure and frustration. “Don’t think about it.” He was quickly moving past all thought. Fireworks erupted in his veins as he approached nirvana.
“I can’t stop thinking about it.”
“Let’s see what I can do about that.” Bracing himself on one arm, he reached down with his free hand to the place where they were joined. As he continued to slide rapidly in and out of her hot body, he teased the spot that should set off a four-alarm fire. Her reaction was all he could wish for.
She began to pant and squirm beneath him. “Oh. Jake. Oh . . . oh!” And she erupted, ending the conversation and his attempt at controlling his own cli**x.
With a roar of satisfaction, he shot home once more and came so hard he was afraid he’d damaged himself. If so, he didn’t really care. He was living for the moment, and the moment was filled with splendor . . . and Rachel’s cries of ecstasy.
• • •
Rachel discovered that really good sex made her sleepy. Obviously she’d been deprived of really good sex her entire adult life if she was just finding this out. Ignoring the implications of that realization, which included the letdown when Jake exited the picture, she gave herself up to sleep for the second time that night.
In her dreams, a dark wolf loped through the trees in the perpetual sunset of an Alaskan summer night. As he moved away from her, she called to him, but he didn’t slow his pace. When she could no longer see him in the shadows, she turned away, desolated that he was gone.
Turn around, Rachel, called a voice that sounded like Jake’s. I’m here. She did, and the dark wolf was back, his bold and majestic form silhouetted against the golden sky. Come with me.
Torn by indecision, she hesitated.
The wolf stayed only a moment before wheeling and trotting away. The forest wrapped him in shadows once again, and he was gone. She’d lost her chance.
When she opened her eyes, birds chirped outside the window and Jake no longer lay beside her. Her disappointment in not finding him there echoed the sadness of her dream, which had obviously been based on wishful thinking. Jake wouldn’t invite her to come with him and share his world. He’d made that clear.
Her feeling of loss was slightly eased when she smelled coffee and something even more tantalizing . . . fresh bread. Waking up in Jake’s cabin had its advantages.
Although she was in desperate need of a shower, using his without asking seemed wrong. Walking nak*d into his living room to ask shouldn’t have been an issue after the night they’d shared, but full daylight took some of the wind out of her sails.
She decided to put on some clothes and go find him after she’d made one little raid on his toothpaste. Climbing out of bed, she crept into a bathroom that was scented with mint aftershave. The thought of a werewolf shaving struck her as funny, especially after the way he’d reacted to her attempt to shave his fur.
Fortunately he’d left a tube of toothpaste, squeezed in the middle but with the cap on, sitting on the counter beside the sink. She squirted a dab on her finger and worked it over her teeth. Cupping her hand under the faucet, she rinsed her mouth and patted it dry on Jake’s fluffy bath towel. Much better.
She walked back into the bedroom and surveyed the clothes they’d flung off the night before. Her T-shirt wouldn’t cover the subject, and getting completely dressed to go ask about a shower made no sense. She spied his green button-up shirt lying in a heap on the floor. That would do nicely.
As she slipped her arms into the sleeves, she had a renewed appreciation of how big he was. The cuffs hung inches below the tips of her fingers. She pushed them back so her hands were free to button the shirt, which reached to midthigh. No man had ever made her feel so tiny and delicate.
Then again, Jake wasn’t a man at all. The night before she’d accepted that and reveled in it. She’d reveled a bit too much, in fact. Besides being a teensy bit sore this morning, she’d apparently skated dangerously close to engaging in a werewolf mating ritual.
Good thing Jake was dead set against a Were-human combo. If he’d shared Duncan MacDowell’s philosophy, she’d have a whole new set of problems. With Jake, the situation was clear—she didn’t want to mate with a werewolf and he didn’t want to mate with a human. Their goals were aligned.
Except they both seemed to enjoy burning up the sheets. She couldn’t speak for him, but she’d be sorry to end that activity when they inevitably went their separate ways. The sooner they did that, the better, though. She was becoming more attached by the minute.
Wearing his soft cotton shirt against her skin felt good. The material had absorbed his scent—even her human nose could recognize his special aroma, one that she happened to love. But now she understood that her puny senses picked up only a fraction of what was out there. She wondered what life was like for Jake. He must be able to separate and catalog every birdcall and record the smell of each creature venturing past his cabin.
The prospect felt like sensory overload to her. So many signals coming in. How did he manage to concentrate on anything? Yet the night before, he’d certainly been focused exclusively on her. She shivered at the memory of his single-mindedness and how that had turned her into a wild woman.
They’d need to tone down their sexual response to each other this morning or they’d never get their issues sorted out. Much as she might daydream about spending several more days alone with Jake and sharing fabulous sex with him, that would be unwise for many reasons. They wouldn’t be able to keep the relationship secret that long. Plus they both had work to do. Most important, they ran the risk of falling in love.
Jake would be easy to love, especially if she didn’t think too long about the reality of loving a werewolf. She needed to think about that, though, to keep herself from being stupid. Once she’d buttoned the shirt, she walked out of the bedroom.
Jake sat on the sofa with his laptop and a mug of fragrant coffee next to him on the end table. He glanced up immediately. His smile warmed her down to her bare toes. “That shirt never looked half as good on me.”
She noticed his change of clothes, freshly shaven jaw, and damp hair. Could she have slept through his morning routine? Maybe. Other than her sad dream, she hadn’t slept so deeply and peacefully since childhood. This morning she felt energy coursing through her. She itched to go into her shop and tackle a promising piece of wood.
“The coffee smells great.” She returned his smile. “Do I also smell bread baking?”
“Yep. I hauled out the bread machine this morning. There’s nothing like fresh bread for breakfast.”
“You’re spoiling me.” Happiness bubbled in her, fizzing like champagne. Being here with him felt so right.
“I’m just grabbing the chance while I have it.”
As the significance of that statement sank in, a little of her happiness drained away. “It’s probably good that you said that.”
“Why?”
“Before I came out here I reminded myself that this is temporary, but between the coffee, the bread, and you, I started to lose focus.”
He frowned. “Rachel, I—”
“It’s okay. We’ll live for the moment but plan for the future, right?”
“Something like that.” He switched off his laptop and closed it. “Let me get you some coffee and check on the bread.” Setting down his laptop, he picked up his mug and stood.
“Doesn’t bread take a long time to bake in those machines?” She was no expert, but her mom had one and she remembered a several-hour process.
He shrugged. “I’ve been up awhile.”
“How long?”
“Two or three hours.”
Something about the way he answered her question tipped her off that he hadn’t been working on his laptop in the predawn hours while she slept. “Did you go for a run?”
“Yes.” He looked wary. “Running helps me think. But don’t worry. I didn’t shift in the house. No one’s around at three in the morning, so I could go outside and do it. I know a quiet place back in the trees.”
“You could have shifted in the house. It’s your place, after all.”
“I didn’t want to scare you.”
“I wouldn’t have been scared.” She realized with some surprise that was true. No matter what form he took, he was still Jake. She’d known him as a man and as a wolf, and he was the same soul, as he’d pointed out the night before.
Another image flashed, of dancing light coming out from under her closed kitchen door. Of course that’s why he’d gone in there, to try to heal himself. She should have figured that out sooner. “You give off light when you shift, don’t you?”
He nodded.
She wanted to see him do it. Yes, partly because she was curious and hated to miss something she’d never have a chance to witness again. But that wasn’t the main reason. They’d shared so much—the fear and drama of the bear attack, her misguided attempt to care for him afterward, and now their intense sexual connection, which fostered an intimacy she’d never known with anyone else.
If she never witnessed his shift from man to wolf, or from wolf to man, she’d miss a significant insight into what made him who he was. She’d never forget him, but when she did remember, she wouldn’t know the whole story. That seemed important.
But she wasn’t sure how to ask. If her request came out wrong, she might offend him, as if he were a trained dog being asked to perform tricks. She had far more respect for him than that.
Taking a deep breath, she searched for the right words. “Jake, I know this might be inappropriate, and if so, you can tell me, but I would love to—”
“Yes.”
Her eyes widened. “Yes? How do you know what I was going to ask?”
“It wasn’t rocket science.” His green eyes were gentle. “You’d just asked a question about my shift, and then your forehead got all crinkled up, and you stared at the floor for quite a while. I could almost hear you thinking.”
She gazed at him as she remembered something else. “That reminds me. After I let you go that evening, I imagined getting mental messages from you as you ran through the woods headed for home. Did I make that up?”
“No, you didn’t. I seem to be able to communicate with you, at least a little bit, when I’m in wolf form.”
“I knew it!” The idea thrilled her.
“It shouldn’t be possible. Werewolves can communicate telepathically with one another and with many other animals, like the bear, for example. But I’ve never heard of a werewolf connecting mentally with a human.”
“Wow. That makes me special, huh?”
“Extremely. But then again, you’re special without that.” He held her gaze. “Special enough that I trust you to watch me shift.”
“Thank you. I’m honored.”
“But let’s not rush into it. We can have breakfast and head out on that hike you envisioned to give us more time to figure out our next move. The hiking idea was brilliant, by the way.”
She smiled. “I have my moments.”
“I can attest to that.” He gave her a once-over that made her blush.
Thinking of those moments reminded her of her clothes scattered over his bedroom floor. She couldn’t spend the day in them. “I want to stop by my place so I can change.”