“Leif?” I murmured, confused. I rubbed a hand across my eyes and the smell of my own sex nearly drowned me. It was all over my hands, and my body. Need - aching female arousal - perfumed the air.
“I’m here,” he told me, and a shadow fell over my cot once more. His hands tucked the sleeping bag closer to my body.
“What…what are you doing here?” My hands twitched, and I curled them into fists so I wouldn’t reach for him and drag him against me. God, he smelled amazing. God, I wanted to fuck him so badly. “You should go.”
“There’s a blizzard outside,” he snarled. “Why didn’t you leave?”
“Can’t,” I gasped. “Why’d you stay?”
“For you,” he sounded incredibly frustrated. As I looked up at him in a daze, he raked his hand through his hair. “Why are you doing this, Nikolina?”
“I have to tell you the truth, Leif.” I clutched at the blankets, miserable. “I’m in heat.”
He stared at me for so long that I wondered if he’d even heard me. The wind was roaring outside, rattling the walls of the ramshackle building. Then, he shook his head. “I know you’re in heat. It’s obvious to any shifter with a nose. God, did you think I wasn’t aware of that?”
I gazed up at him in horror. “You knew?”
“You’ve been throwing off intense amounts of scents for the past week, Nikolina. I’d have to be dead not to notice.”
Mortification swept over me, and I covered my face with my hands and moaned. “I’m so sorry.”
“Why are you sorry?”
Was he truly not getting it? “I came here looking for you.” When he said nothing, I peeked through my fingers and saw him gazing down at me with a wry half-smile, the blue of his eyes blazing. “What?”
“How clueless do you think I am?”
I swung a fist at him - and missed. “Considering you’d forgotten how to speak English last week? Pretty fucking clueless.”
“Okay, fair point,” he said, stepping back out of my reach. “But you’re the first person that’s come looking for me in sixteen years. You’re an old family friend, and a bear shifter going into heat. It’s not hard to put the pieces together, even for my scrambled mind.”
He knew…and he knew I was an awful person. Because I’d known he was grieving, and I still came after him, waving my pheromones under his nose so he’d have to pay attention. It was selfish. I’d manipulated him until we were both backed into a corner. “This is wrong,” I told him.
“Does it matter at this point?”
Hot tears began to seep from my eyes again because no, it really didn’t matter at this point. Our paths were set since my heat was here. I didn’t have any other options, and since Leif hadn’t abandoned me, he’d have no option either.
“Nikolina,” Leif said, and he sat on the edge of the rickety cot. His hand cupped my jaw and brushed my cheek, the feel of his skin against mine so sweet that it started a new round of tears. “Don’t cry. What is it that you want from me?”
His tone of voice was so kind and understanding that I felt even worse. I sobbed. “I want a mate. I want you to come home with me. I want us to be accepted by the clans as a mated couple. I’m tired of being a spinster.” Of being so utterly alone and unwanted.
Leif’s thumb continued to stroke my cheek. “And this is that important to you that you’d risk your life - and the possibility of your child - to come after me?”
“It’s what I’ve always wanted,” I said between hiccuping sobs. To be accepted and loved instead of rejected? To have my own family of people that cared for me instead of a father who was more interested in clan politics than his daughter?
That was my dream – unconditional love.
His thumb brushed my cheek, followed the curve of my mouth. After a long moment, he said, “Sometimes what we think we want is not always the truth of the matter.”
My cheek followed the light touch of his fingers, leaning into his palm. It was hard to concentrate on his words - his fingers were on my face but they might as well have been between my legs, diving against the slick, needy flesh there. “What do you mean?”
“Nothing,” he told me softly. “I’m simply talking because I’m nervous.”
I frowned at that, even as his thumb brushed over my mouth and I bit down on the tip. “Nervous?” I asked breathlessly. He was delicious and I wanted him so badly. I flicked my tongue over his fingertip. Why was biting on his thumb so incredibly erotic?
His gaze seemed glued to my mouth, to where I licked and sucked at his thumb. “It’s my first time, too.”
I stilled. “Um…what?”
“I said, it’s my first time.” And he had the gall to smile at me.
I struggled to sit upright, pulling away from him so I could think without his touch driving me nuts. I stared at his handsome face, unable to believe what I was hearing. “Are you kidding me?”
As I watched, his ears turned bright red. “Why would I joke? Why is it bad? It will be special for both of us.”
I wanted to cry all over again. “It’s bad because I want one of us to know what the hell we’re doing!”
Leif laughed at my expression. He slid a bit closer on the bed, and I automatically shied away, because my body wanted to fling him down on the rickety cot and do bad, nasty things to him. “I’m a guy, Nikolina. I have instincts. I think I can figure out what goes where. And I can think of plenty of things I’ve been picturing doing to you.”
That made my breath catch in my throat. “You’ve been picturing doing things to me?”
“Are you kidding?” His hand moved back to my jaw and he brushed his fingers along it. “You’re incredibly beautiful. You’re strong and brave…and I’m a thirty-four year old man that has never had sex. Of course I’m imagining all kinds of things to do to you.”
I moaned at the husky note his words took on. “Really? You’re not just saying that because of the heat?”
“I’m afraid that some of it is the heat,” he said, sliding a bit closer to me on the bed. His other hand lifted and then he was cupping my face in his hands. “That can’t be removed from the situation. But the fact that you’re beautiful and smart and strong and I’m incredibly attracted to you? That’s all you.”
“Then will you kiss me?” I asked as he leaned closer. My gaze seemed to lock on to his mouth. Why had I not noticed until now that he had the most sensual lips? They were the most sexual thing I’d ever seen. I was fascinated by them, and the way they parted as he neared me.
“You couldn’t stop me,” Leif said, and his thumbs brushed my cheeks a scant second before his mouth touched on mine.
Heat touched my lips; warmth and the taste of Leif. I moaned as his tongue slicked against mine, tasting me in the world’s most gentle caress. Immediately, my body responded, and desire shot through me, so hot and heavy that it made my skin hurt. I broke off the kiss with a whimper.
“What is it?” Leif sounded concerned, and he pulled away from me.
“I hurt. Everywhere.” The smell of my arousal was practically soaking the cabin. “I don’t think I like being in heat.”
He chuckled.
I punched him in the arm.
“Ow!” He rubbed his arm, but the smile remained on his lips. “I wasn’t laughing at you. I was laughing because I doubt most people like being in heat. I imagine it sounds sexier than it really is.”
“Everything aches,” I said, and cupped my breasts to support them. The tips seemed to be two blooms of sensitivity, well past the point of pleasure. “I think I waited too long.”