An odd expression crossed his face—and I remembered that his dad had died. “I’m sorry. That was thoughtless—”
“No big deal. It’s not like it was any great loss to the clan.”
“But it was to you.”
“Not really. So is this the dullest summer solstice celebration we’ve ever had, or have I just outgrown them?”
It was obvious that he wanted to change the subject. His dad had died in a car crash that he’d caused after getting behind the wheel drunk. I accepted the new topic with grace. “Oh, it’s definitely the dullest.”
“You want to sneak away for a while? I’ve got my bike.”
I felt a spark of pleasure that he’d asked, and abruptly realized how inappropriate my reaction was. “Thanks, but I can’t.”
Because I couldn’t get that dream out of my mind, or the way he’d watched me during the meeting. And if we were alone, out in the woods…
The truth was that I didn’t trust myself. Would I give into temptation? Rafe called to some part of me, something inside me that I didn’t understand. He made me think about getting up close and personal with him—and Connor had already claimed that privilege with me.
I looked back toward the game, watched as Connor raced out and caught the pass thrown by Lucas. Only a few people cheered. It was as though everyone wanted to make sure that no one in the forest heard us—as though we’d reverted back to being ultrasecret. The way we were acting, we might as well have been afraid of our own shadows.
“You know they’ll play for a couple more hours,” Rafe said. “We’re legendary for our stamina. Even the old guys are like Energizer bunnies: They just keep on going and going.”
“I know, but—”
“Come on, Lindsey. I’m just talking about a ride on my bike. It’s way more fun than leaning against a tree.”
And here I’d always thought he was a guy of few words.
But he was right. I was bored out of my mind. Rafe and I were friends. I could go with him and not do anything to betray Connor. Couldn’t I? Sure I could. I never wanted to hurt Connor. It was one of the reasons that I was keeping buried so many of my doubts about us. “Connor and I—”
“I know,” he said with a hint of wistfulness. “You’re destined for each other. He’s got your name inked on his shoulder and everything.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “You have a tattoo. Whose name is it?”
Usually a guy declared his mate before he had a symbol representing her name etched on his skin, but Rafe wasn’t about following rules. Only recently had we learned that he had a tattoo.
“Come with me,” he dared. “Maybe I’ll tell you.”
“I’m not going to do anything Connor wouldn’t like.”
“I won’t ask you to.”
His voice held a resignation that I didn’t quite understand. It made me wonder again if he felt the same pull toward me that I did toward him. Besides, I couldn’t deny that I was curious about his ink.
“I can’t stay away long,” I said quietly. When the game ended, Connor would be looking for me. I didn’t want to give him any reason to question my loyalty. And the more time I spent with Rafe, the greater the chance of me doing something I shouldn’t. Like finding out if his kisses in reality were as amazing as the one in my dream.
“Just a quick ride. No one will even miss us,” he promised.
I glanced back at him and nodded. It was easier to do things I wasn’t supposed to if I didn’t actually give voice to them.
THREE
As the wind whipped my white-blond hair, which flowed like silk behind me, I felt carefree, unburdened by the future. I tightened my arms around Rafe and pressed my cheek against his strong, broad back. His headlights remained off. I knew it was probably crazy, but I trusted him not to get us killed as he sped through the dark forest on his motorbike. Even for a Shifter, he has excellent night vision.
I laughed just for the hell of it, simply because I could do so with no one but Rafe to hear me, and the sound reverberated between the trees, echoing off the thick canopy of leaves overhead. Rafe’s booming laugh drowned out mine. It was so wonderful to hear joyous laughter again. I hated that Bio-Chrome had taken it away from us, had turned our celebration into a wake.
Rafe and I had grown up in Tarrant, a small town near the entrance to the national forest. Although he’s two years older than me, we’d gone to the same schools. We’d even been in a couple of the same classes. I was an academic whiz; he wasn’t particularly. What was advanced for me was normal for him. I’m into using my brain, while he’s all about using his hands.
A shiver coursed through me as I remembered the dream—the way his large hands had caressed my back and held me close.
Among the guys, Rafe is known for what he can do with mechanics, with a motor. Evidence of his skill was purring beneath me now as we raced over ground where there was no actual trail. It was a prototype he was working on: a two-wheeler all-terrain vehicle that could cut a neat swath through the forest without struggling over rugged ground. He’s a mechanical genius.
He cut a curve around a tree, and we leaned into it. I squeezed him tighter, refusing to scream, but my heart was galloping. It was a real rush. He laughed again, and I knew it was because he lives for danger. He isn’t afraid of anything.
He swung the bike around and skidded to a stop at the edge of a cliff that would have scared the hell out of me if I’d seen it coming—but with my face pressed to his back, all I’d seen were the tall trees rushing by.
He turned off the engine and everything went quiet. I needed to pop my ears, so I slid off the back of the bike, not expecting my legs to feel like jelly after the ride. I stumbled back and almost fell but came to an abrupt halt when Rafe grabbed my arm. I hadn’t seen him move. That, too, was a result of the initial change: a swiftness that was beyond human. Bringing his arms around me, he tucked me in against his chest, supporting me. I knew I should have pushed him back, should have welcomed falling to the ground. I knew standing so near to him was wrong, but he felt so good, so strong. Why did this feel so different from when Connor held me? Connor was a Dark Guardian. He wasn’t someone to be messed with. But I felt so safe with Rafe holding me, as though nothing could ever hurt me.
“Just give your legs a minute to adjust,” Rafe said quietly, and I heard him inhaling my scent. Smell is one of a Shifter’s most powerful senses. We aren’t into perfumes or artificial fragrances. Pheromones, the very essence of a person, appeal to us.
“Why aren’t your legs unsteady?” I asked, wondering why I sounded breathless when I hadn’t been running. Being near him made it difficult to breathe, no doubt adding to my sudden embarrassing inability to stay upright.
“Because I’m used to riding.”
I could smell his earthy scent. It was richer, more powerful than anything that could be bought in a store. He was wearing a T-shirt that clung to him like a second skin, and I could feel the comforting warmth of his body seeping through it. Even though today the sun had warmed Earth longer than on any other day of the year, here in the forest near the Canadian border, the night was cool.
I wanted to stay nestled against him all night, but there were too many reasons why I shouldn’t. Or maybe there was just one powerful reason: Connor. I could never cheat on him, and I fought to convince myself that being here with Rafe now wasn’t a betrayal. I hadn’t done anything to be ashamed of. Where was the harm in simply riding a bike, even if it was with a hot guy who had visited my dream last night? I couldn’t control my dreams, could I?
“I’m okay now,” I said, pushing against him just a little.
I felt his reluctance to let me go as his arms slowly eased away from me. Suddenly I feared that I was on far more dangerous ground than I’d realized. Maybe to Rafe I wasn’t just a convenient solution to a boring night.
Skirting around him, I walked carefully and slowly to the edge of the cliff, testing the ground with my toe to make sure it was firm before I gave it
my full weight. I’d grown up near these woods. They’d been my playground. I was comfortable in them. Looking down, I saw only the black abyss, but I knew trees and shrubbery followed the steep slope down into a valley. Only the stars served to delineate the ground from the night sky, which was so vast that I felt incredibly small.
On silent feet, Rafe came to stand beside me. “Guess it’s too late to make a wish on the first star,” he said quietly, but his deep voice still carried on the light breeze that was stirring my hair.
“The first one came out hours ago.”
“Which one do you think it was?”
Rafe was a warrior, a protector, a Dark Guardian. He didn’t strike me as someone who believed in the whimsy of wishing on stars. But still, I pointed upward. “That one right there, near the tail of the Big Dipper.”
“That’ll do. I wish—”
Quickly, I pressed my fingertips to his warm lips. “If you say it aloud, it won’t come true.”
“Since it involves you, it won’t come true anyway, unless you know what it is.”
Not for the first time, I regretted leaving the festivities, regretted that I’d put myself in this position. I loved to be adventuresome, but I was moving out of my comfort zone now. We were traveling into unexplored territory that was both thrilling and terrifying.
“You shouldn’t say anything that you might regret,” I warned him.
“I spend a lot of time thinking about kissing you.”
Not exactly what I wanted to hear. Oh, who am I kidding? Every girl wants to believe that a great guy thinks about kissing her. The problem was that now I knew I had to deal with it.
“You shouldn’t,” I insisted sternly, trying to stay in control of this situation when I felt it slipping away from me.
“I shouldn’t want you for my mate either, but I do.”
The shock of his somber confession left me light-headed. Yes, we’d stared at each other from time to time, but he’d never truly indicated that he saw me as anything other than part of the pack. I felt as though the ground was shifting beneath me.
“What about the girl whose name is tattooed on your shoulder?” The Celtic symbol is always intricate and unreadable, decipherable only by the male until he shares it with the female.
“God, Lindsey, you have to know by now….”
I felt as though all the air had been sucked right out of me. “It’s my name? Why would you do that? You knew Connor and I…that we were…why would you choose me?”
“Because you’re the one I want.”
His voice held such surety—no doubts whatsoever. How could he be so convinced?
“You don’t…you can’t mean it. Come on, Rafe, you know I’m with Connor.”
“Why? Because you’ve always been with him? What if he’s not the right one? What if he’s not your true mate?”
It made me angry to hear him voice the doubts I’d been having lately. “That’s not fair, Rafe. Why tell me this now? Why not last year before Connor declared me as his mate?”
“Because I didn’t know last year that I would feel this way. The first time I saw you after I came back from college I felt as though a tree had fallen on me. I’ve tried to fight this…attraction. You have to believe that. But it’s just growing stronger.”
I was unsettled. I couldn’t think. I didn’t know what to say.
Into the silence, he asked, “Do you ever think about kissing me?”
The dream roared into my head. Obviously my subconscious had given some thought to kissing him, but I wasn’t about to admit that.
“I’m with Connor,” I repeated sternly. I had been with him since I turned sixteen. He was like the old robe that you wore even after it got all frayed and ratty, because it had molded itself through the years until it was perfect for you.
“That’s not an answer,” Rafe insisted.
“It wouldn’t be fair to Connor.” That was as close as I was going to come to admitting that, at the moment, I wanted nothing as much as I wanted to kiss Rafe.
He sighed deeply. “Why couldn’t Connor be a jerk? It’d make things a lot easier. I could just challenge him—”
“Don’t you dare!” Suddenly I was almost shouting, about to go into panic mode. We were human, but we were also beast, and in our world a challenge wasn’t made lightly. A challenge was a fight to the death.
“So you do care about him,” he said as though he was surprised by the revelation.
“Of course I care about him.”
“But do you love him?”
I knew I was supposed to respond with a resounding yes, but my doubts surfaced once again. I did love Connor, but was my love for him deep enough?
I peered over at Rafe, who was staring up at the sky as though he’d find my answer there. The little bit of crescent moon and starlight limned his profile, revealing the strong jut of his chin, the sharp blade of his nose. His silhouette was powerful, as powerful as he was. He’d always seemed older, stronger than the others. Maybe because he’d worked in his dad’s auto shop when he wasn’t a sherpa. Late at night, he still did so. I often saw the light on in that old shed when I drove by. Sometimes I thought about stopping, but just like now, I knew it would be a bad idea. So why had I agreed to go on this ride with him? To quell my adventuresome spirit? For a last chance to do something I wasn’t supposed to do?
Our kind work in the outside world just like humans do. My dad is a lawyer; so is Connor’s. They share a very successful practice. I’ve never gone without; I’ve always had anything I wanted. Rafe, on the other hand, must have always wanted things he couldn’t have, things he’d never been able to afford. Was he suddenly interested in me because I was unattainable?
Instead of answering his question, I posed a scenario of my own. “Maybe you just want me because you can’t have me. Forbidden things are always sweeter, right?”
He turned around to face me squarely. “You really think that’s what this is?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
“Easy enough to find out…. Kiss me,” he challenged. “If that’s all it is, one kiss should satisfy this hunger I have for you.”
“Hunger? You make it sound like you’re going to devour me.”
“That doesn’t even begin to describe what I’m feeling, Lindsey. It’s primal. It’s like my wolf prowling inside me, waiting for yours to emerge.”
“So it’s just the wolves?”
“You can’t separate them. It’s not two different beings. I’m the wolf. And I’m the human. I think about you all the time, think about kissing you—I want to be with you during your first full moon.”
The intensity of his words terrified me. Connor was fun. He laughed and teased. Rafe was all serious, dark, and foreboding.
I moved around to face him.
The ground beneath my feet suddenly crumbled. I shrieked, my arms flailing as I felt myself dropping. Rafe grabbed me, but I had fallen too far away already. He couldn’t pull me to safety.
All he could do was wrap himself around me as we both tumbled into the black abyss.
FOUR
Much to my astonishment, the landing wasn’t nearly as painful as I’d expected. I only had the wind knocked out of me. Rafe had somehow managed to twist around so he cushioned my landing. I was straddling him. One of his arms held me close. My face was buried in the curve of his neck, and his wonderful scent filled my nostrils.
Lying incredibly still, he gave a low groan.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“Yeah.”
It sounded as though he’d forced out the word, and I realized that with me on top of him, he was probably having difficulty breathing. I knew I should have rolled off him. Instead I stayed where I was, relishing the firmness of his body beneath me when I knew I shouldn’t. If he turned his head just a little and I lifted mine a fraction, our mouths would meet and…
“You shouldn’t have said everything that you said up there, Rafe,” I whispered. I should have been scolding him,
but my words came out more wistful than forceful.
“I thought you should know.”
“It’s too late.”
“No, it’s not,” he said vehemently. “Not until the full moon.”
I couldn’t do that to Connor, and whatever it was that I was feeling toward Rafe—well, maybe it was just temporary insanity.
“I’ve seen you watching me,” he said quietly. “I thought maybe you were feeling the way I feel.”
“Honestly, Rafe? I don’t know what I’m feeling.” Other than scared, and I wasn’t going to admit that.
I scrambled up and crouched beside him. It was so very dark down there, but I heard movement, so I knew Rafe had sat up. He moaned again.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” I asked.
“Okay enough.”
What did that mean? But he sounded petulant, so I didn’t pursue it. His ego had to be bruised. I wanted to tell him about my dream, tell him that I had been noticing and thinking about him lately, but that confession would only make things worse, and it would be harder on us both. It was best that we just forget this night ever happened. And the best way to achieve that end was to get back to Wolford before anyone noticed.
“So how are we going to get out of here?” I asked.
“I can see. I’ll lead the way.”
I stood up. He took my hand and guided it to his back.
“Hang onto my belt, so it’s easier to follow me.”
“Wouldn’t it be easier if you shifted into a wolf?”
“Not until I can get you to where there’s some light—you can use the headlight on my bike.”
“You’re not making any sense.”
“Lindsey, I landed at a bad angle. I think I broke my arm.”
“Oh my God, Rafe! Why didn’t you say that before?”
“Because it wouldn’t change anything, and I didn’t want you to worry.”
“God. Sometimes you are such a…guy.”
He actually chuckled, while I wanted to shriek. Now I understood the strain in his voice. He was fighting the pain. I didn’t know whether to have an aw-isn’t-that-sweet-for-not-wanting-to-worry-me moment or a how-stupid-can-you-get-you-obviously-need-help moment, because he was trying to protect me in a strange kind of way. I settled for keeping my voice even when I asked, “How bad?”