SHIVER (24 page)

She grabbed towels, wetting them with the pan of melting snow on top of the stove, and returned to Aidan. Placing the wet cloth on the back of his head brought another groan from him.

“Where the hell did you come from?” he grumbled.

“My place.” She almost sobbed in relief. “What happened?”

“Someone hit me.” He cocked a brow, his eyes still closed. “Sure it wasn’t you?”

“Not this time.” She continued to carefully clean the wound, his dark hair making it hard to tell if she was getting all the blood. A huge goose egg had formed, which relieved her. If his head was swelling on the outside, it wasn’t swelling on the inside. “Did you get a look at him?”

“No. It could have been a
her
.”

He was quiet for a long while, and Raven began to think he might have slipped into unconsciousness again. She gave him another shake.

“Stop doing that. My head hurts bad enough without you tossing me around.”

“Keep talking to me then so I know you aren’t dead.”

“Having me dead would make your situation easier.”

“Haven’t you figured out that I prefer things complicated.” She changed cloths, glad to see the new one coming away cleaner. Good. It didn’t look as though the wound was still bleeding. “Eva needs to look at this.”

He groaned. “Just kill me now.”

She choked on a laugh. “You’ll be better for it. You might need stitches.”

“Is it still bleeding?”

“No…I don’t think so.”

“Then I don’t need Eva, but I do need to get up off this floor. I’m freezing.” He pushed his upper body off the floor. She helped him get to his feet, catching him as he wobbled.

“Steady.”

“Hold the room still then.” He blinked a few times, took a few steps, leaning heavily on her.

“Do you want the couch or the bedroom?”

“Gotta lie down.” He shivered. “With lots of blankets.”

“How long do you think you were out?”

“I came here from your place. Got out of the car, walked down the path, and bam…stars.”

“How’d you get into the cabin?”

“Crawled. Can we stop with the questions? My head hurts.”

He was also cold. Raven worried over his shivering. He was wet from crawling through the snow, and she needed to get him out of his clothes…and warmed up.

They reached his old bedroom, and he went to lie down on the bed. “No.” Raven pulled at his arm. “We need to get you out of these wet clothes first.”

He gave her a sardonic look. “Not tonight, honey. I have a headache.”

“Funny.” Relieved if he could joke, he couldn’t be hurt that bad, she reached for the zipper on his coat and pulled it down. He didn’t make any attempt to help her, just watched her with his dark eyes, lids at half-mast. She pushed the parka off his shoulders and the heat in the room seemed to rise. Must be just her, because Aidan continued to shiver. His shirt was dry, thank goodness, but his jeans were wet from his body melting the snow he’d crawled through. She looked at his fly.

“Can you take your pants off?” She raised her gaze to his.

His hands fumbled on the button, slow and clumsy. He hadn’t had gloves on when she’d found him. He’d been in the cold, crawled through the snow, and then laid on the floor with the door open. It was fifteen below.

“Let me see your hands.” She reached for them herself. They were red and frozen, his fingertips white.

She reached for his fly and tried to put out of her mind what she was doing.

“Careful,” he grunted. “I’d like to keep what’s behind there.”

Heat bloomed in her cheeks. She didn’t need to be reminded what lay behind that zipper. Or how she much liked what he could do with that particular appendage.

Get a grip. The man was frozen and probably concussed. Plus, he was mad as hell at her.

She pulled the jeans down to his ankles. “Why aren’t you wearing your medical boot?”

He fell onto the edge of the bed, his hands holding his head. “It got in the way.”

She knelt at his feet and worked at loosening the laces on his boots. Once those were off she discarded his socks. His eyelids lowered as he surveyed her every move. Again she felt heat. Her face was right in line with what had been behind the zipper. From the glint in his eyes, he was thinking about that too.

“Not that I don’t like your current position, but I’m freezing my ass off here.”

She finished yanking off his jeans and flicked her gaze up his body. “Are your boxers wet?”

“You don’t want me to lose those,” his voice was soft and heavy with warning. “And I haven’t wet my shorts in decades.”

She swallowed. “Swing your legs over.” She tucked him into bed and piled him with blankets. “I’ll be right back.”

“Grab one of Earl’s pistols,” Aidan muttered. “I want you armed.”

Not a bad idea. She went to the gun cabinet and helped herself to a thirty-eight special over the shotguns, loading the cylinder and tucking the weapon into the pocket of her jeans.

She boiled water for tea. While the water heated, she opened the cast-iron door to the wood stove and stoked the dying coals. Adding in wood, she blew on the coals until the flames caught, licking greedily at the dry timber. She added more until she was satisfied that it would heat on its own for a few hours. She prepped the tea and carefully walked the mug back to Aidan.

He was shivering, his teeth chattering as he shook in the bed, hands folded under his armpits in an attempt to warm them with what body heat he had.

She set the tea on the end table.
Damn
, she’d have to crawl in there with him. Shaking like he was, the blankets and tea weren’t going to be enough to warm him. She’d discarded her coat in the other room but now kicked off her mukluks, set the gun on the end table, and edged into the bed with him.

“I don’t want you here,” Aidan said through chattering teeth.

“I know.” Scooting over to him, she took his hands and pulled them under her shirt, catching her breath when the frigidness of them branded her skin.

He moaned and drawn by her heat, snuggled closer. She pulled the covers over them, and her body curved into his with a sigh. The rightness of lying next to him, her arms around him, brought tears to her eyes.

This was the man she’d loved. The man who’d haunted her all these years. The man she’d lied to.

They lay like that for a long time. The only sounds that of their breathing. She waited for his to become rhythmic, hoping he’d fall asleep, but then he probably shouldn’t sleep since he’d taken a good hit to the head. Should she talk to him, keep him awake? What did she say?

How about what she’d rushed over here to say? But then she didn’t want to bring up Fox right now with Aidan hurting. It would only add more hurt. Except she needed to get him to agree not to reveal the truth to Fox. Not yet. She didn’t want her child hating her for her lies too.

There were other things she could bring up. Like that hard bulge pressing into her hip. No, she definitely needed to keep that quiet. Right. Like Aidan wasn’t aware of his—

Okay, really not going to go there. She took a deeper breath, hoping to settle her nerves. At least she hoped it was nerves tightening her belly. She had a sneaky suspicion it was something all together different.

Making love with Aidan had never made her nervous. Not even that first time. It had been a rush of hormones, colliding together in a frenzy of lust. The second time they’d slowed, savored, explored.

She swallowed, gulping back a batch of tears. How she’d missed that euphoric summer when everything had seemed bright and promising. Anything had been possible. Dreams had been reachable. Love had been simple. Then death had darkened everything.

Love was anything but simple now. Case in point, the evidence of Aidan’s desire growing thicker and harder causing her inner muscles to clench, to weep. To want.

She turned her face up to tell him to move back and found him watching her, his eyes full of hurt and shaded with need. Her heart ached. How did she tell him to back off when her arms wanted to pull him closer, cradle his head against her breast? They’d been destined for each other. Soul mates. He was her sun, she his raven.

He must have read the conflict in her eyes, for his lips tightened, and a hard glint entered his. One that had real nerves fluttering frantically in her belly. Suddenly he flipped her onto her back and pressed her into the mattress with the weight of his hard, muscled body.

His mouth smothered her gasp.

C
HAPTER
F
IFTEEN

No way in hell was she rejecting him again.

Aidan swept his tongue into Raven’s mouth while his hands held her down. He was angry, wanted to hurt, demand she give herself to him. She fucking owed him. Years of not knowing he was a father. Years of not being a part of his son’s life. Not being a part of hers.

He’d seen the want, the desire she’d tried to hide, and the denial she’d been ready to utter. He’d just have to keep that mouth of hers busy. It was time for her body to speak. Maybe that way he’d finally get the truth out of her.

He forced a knee between her legs, claiming room for his hips as he pressed and ground against her. Hard couldn’t begin to describe his condition. Hard, hurting, and unable to stop himself from thrusting against her soft warmth. She moaned, her arms wrapping around his back, pulling him closer.

Why wasn’t she fighting him? He was in the mood to fight, to force, to take. Hurt her like he hurt.

He tore her shirt up and over her head, recaptured her mouth to silence any objections, and stripped off her bra. His need drove him to feast like an animal. He bit, sucked, nipped, taking her breasts into his hands, roughly squeezing, grazing the nipples until they hardened like rocks. Capturing them one at a time in his hot mouth, he sucked hard, flattening the nipple to the roof of his mouth, nipping the end until she squirmed and gasped in his hold. Reaching behind him, he grabbed a handful of his shirt and snatched it off, feeding off the pain pounding in his head. He needed to feel her breasts tight against his chest, his flesh pounding into hers, as her heat warmed him to the core.

He’d been cold for so very long.

“Wait,” she gulped as his hands wrenched off her jeans, yanked at her underwear until the silk tore free from her body. “Aidan, wait.”

There would be no more waiting.

He recaptured her mouth, speared her with his tongue as he spread her legs wider. Twelve years of lies and betrayal had been long enough. He kicked off his shorts, positioned himself at her opening, grasped her hips in his hands, and drove into her heat with a hard, unforgiving thrust, taking him in to the hilt.

She cried out, her body arching in his embrace.

The sound snapped his mind out of the storm he seemed lost in. Each ragged breath he dragged into his lungs was swift and sharp.

“Raven,” he gasped.
What the hell had he done?
Oh, God, he’d let the beast rage. “Raven? Oh God, Raven, I’m sorry.”

Tears leaked from the corners of her shut eyelids. Feeling the lowest of creatures, Aidan inched out of her wet, tight sheath.

Her legs came up and clamped around his hips, keeping him in place. “It’s okay,” she whispered, opening her eyes. Eyes that reflected pain and sorrow. “It’s just that I-I haven’t done this in a while.”

He groaned her name, trying once more to pull out of her, but she kept him locked inside. He wasn’t going to last if she didn’t let him go. As it was he teetered on a sharp edge, barely keeping a leash on the beast.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t want to hurt you. No, that’s a lie. Part of me does want to hurt you.” He dropped his forehead to rest against hers, not wanting to see the shame added to the pain in her eyes. “But not like this. Never like this.”

“Aidan,” she said softly, her fingers brushing the hair back from the his face. “Look at me.”

He raised his head and steeled himself to meet the condemnation in her eyes, but what he saw made him catch his breath.

“I want you, this. I just wasn’t…prepared.” She arched her hips, and he slid deeper inside her. The sensation, the friction, was the most unbelievable pleasure, causing him to clench his teeth. “I’m ready now.” She lowered her eyes and licked her lips, causing the blood to leave his brain. “But if you need more time…”

She wasn’t shoving him away? With what he’d done, how he’d pushed, how he’d taken? His eyes never left hers as he slowly slid into her, his heart pounding as she gasped and bit her lip, her eyes shuttering closed in pleasure. That look had haunted him all these years. Showed up in his dreams, catching him unaware when his mind wandered.

A mad, twisted desire had started this, now wonder joined the mix, along with a need so great his body quaked with it. His hands trembled as they reverently caressed her breasts. Breasts so much softer and fuller than before. Lovely, beautiful, womanly. To touch her like this again after all these years had him choking on emotion. They had missed out on so much. He’d barely learned what she’d liked when they were eighteen. What had caused her to lean into his touch, gasp when he licked, moan and claw when he stroked deep inside her. He knew her, but he didn’t. There was so much that he wanted to learn about the woman she was now.