He was scared of Turning her. And if Aaron was unsure if he could control his grizzly during intimacy, she should be, too. At least, that’s what she’d been telling herself for the past half an hour. So why did each minute that ticked by get harder and harder to resist tiptoeing into the living room and crawling onto the couch beside him?
Alana rolled over on her side and hugged a pillow to her chest. Softly, through the dark, she asked, “Would it hurt?”
After a moment, Aaron’s deep voice drifted through the open doorway. “Would what hurt?”
“You know. The bite.”
He huffed a sigh, and she could make out the rustle of fabric. She could imagine him sitting up now, hands scrubbing his face. “I haven’t ever thought about it before. I was born like this. I imagine it would. Shifter healing makes wounds seal up fast, but I still feel pain. Maybe worse pain because the healing happens so quickly and is so intense. Yeah, I think it would hurt.”
“Bad?”
“Yeah.”
“I hate pain.” She rubbed her fingers lightly over the bandage on her neck. She’d taken a couple of pain killers at Aaron’s instruction, but it still ached. Or maybe it was the flashes of Aric’s teeth coming at her that made it sting worse. “It seems like shifters have to get used to being hurt.”
The floorboards creaked under Aaron’s bare feet as he sauntered into the bedroom. His hair was mussed, and the blue moonlight that streamed through the window contoured his pecs, abs, and strips of muscles over his hips in delicious shadows. He hesitated at the edge of the bed, but Alana pushed back the covers and tossed the pillow she was hugging to the other side of the bed to make room.
He looked back at the doorway, as if he was debating an escape, but Alana yanked his hand down before he could scurry away. Aaron laughed and crawled under the covers with her. How was he so warm?
Snuggling against his chest, she admitted something she had never told anyone in her life. “Lissa was always the strong one out of us.”
“How so?”
“She was tough. Like when she would get sick, she didn’t want anyone fussing over her. She would hole up in her room, and if anyone mentioned her having a cold or stomach flu, she would deny it and force everyone to go about their business like nothing was wrong. She hated being coddled. And then there was me.” Alana laid a kiss on his chest, then murmured, “If I broke a nail, I was done for. Wailing, crying, telling my dad I thought I was dyin’. At Christmas last year, he told me I used to scare him to death because I always made him think my injuries were serious. He used to call me his ’lil drama momma.”
Aaron’s chuckle was deep and vibrated against her cheek.
The smile dipped from her face before she admitted the rest. “I always thought Lissa should’ve been the one with the cleft lip and palate. Not because I would wish it on anyone, but because she would’ve gone through the surgeries, no complaints, and when they were through, she would’ve just gotten over it. Moved on. She would’ve owned it a lot sooner than I did. I always wished I was strong like her.”
“Mmm,” Aaron rumbled. “You don’t know how she would’ve reacted to what you went through. Not for sure. Maybe your sister got quiet about her hurts because she watched what was happening to you. Maybe she hid her pain on purpose so it wouldn’t add to what your family was already going through.”
“I was always a daddy’s girl, too, and I got to keep him, you know? When we lost my mom, Lissa got quiet. She was closer to her than she was to Dad.”
“Were you and your sister close?”
“Oh, hell yeah. Sometimes I miss how we used to be. We still talk on the phone and see each other on Fridays when I watch my nieces, but life got in the way, you know? She had a husband and then kids, but I just stayed still. Just…waiting around for whatever attention she had left to give. I guess that’s part of the appeal of moving far away, so I don’t have to feel like I’m just sitting around, wasting my life for a connection that can’t ever be the same as when we were kids.”
“Did you tell her about me?”
“Yeeees,” she drawled out. “I called and told her you were tall and nice and a firefighter, but I left out the tattooed, motorcycle-riding, demon-eyed shifter part. Baby steps with her.”
Aaron snorted and hugged her closer, and that was when she felt it. He was rocking one massive boner behind the fabric of his briefs.
“Good God, Aaron, is that a tree trunk, or are you happy to see me?”
“Woman, flattery gets you everywhere with me.” He rested his hand behind his head and grinned. “Keep talking about my big dick, and it’ll keep getting bigger.”
“I meant bonsai tree trunk.”
Aaron tickled her ribs, and she went to giggling and kicking at the covers. “Stop, stop!” she punched out through her laughter.
Aaron rolled smoothly on top of her, straddled her hips, and pinned her thrashing arms above her head. His eyes were too bright now, too animalistic, and his chest heaved with a sudden breath as the smile faded from his face.
He dragged his hungry gaze down her body, all the way to where their hips met, then back up to her face. “I don’t want to hurt you,” he whispered, releasing her arms and leaning up straight.
“You won’t, Aaron. I trust you.”
He shook his head, back and forth, back and forth, his eyes locked on hers. She could see a million thoughts churning there.