Winter

by Reina Torres

  Aaron didn’t take it personally. He’d known the Olwin family for too many years not to understand what an emotional upheaval that Celeste had just been through.

  She’d likely worked herself past exhaustion making sure the kids had everything they needed for their road trip to their colleges and then she’d probably gone over the Bed and Breakfast three or four times cleaning it from attic to basement.

  Not to mention tending the gardens. Celeste didn’t do anything by half-measure. What she did, she did with love that came from every inch of her body and not just her heart.

  She was a force of nature.

  But even a force of nature needed to sleep.

  Celeste was due a rest to rival some of the best hibernators he knew, but he doubted that exhaustion would keep her down for more than a day. Turning off the engine, he slipped out from the driver’s side and closed the door quickly and quietly, trying to preserve the heat in the cab. It didn’t take him more than a second to reach the other door, grateful that she was asleep and didn’t see his burst of inhuman speed.

  Opening the passenger door, Aaron popped open her seatbelt and lifted Celeste into his arms as easily as he’d once carried her children in his arms.

  There were two steps up from the garage and into the side entrance of the mudroom before Aaron shouldered his way into the living room.

  In his arms, Celeste stirred, her hand reaching up and settling on his chest. She murmured something softly and he adjusted his hold so that he could place a gentle kiss on her forehead. “Shhh… shhh… go back to sleep, Celeste. We’ll talk in the morning.”

  With another mumble, she settled deeper into his arms, but instead of settling her hand against her stomach, her fingers curled against the front of his shirt and slipped between the buttons. Her fingernails threaded through the hairs on his chest, stirring up sensations and emotions that were better left for morning.

  Celeste needed her rest and even his bear, hungry for her taste and touch, couldn’t deny that their first responsibility was to her health and happiness.

  Still, the way she touched him in her sleep wasn’t going to make it easy to ignore how much both sides of his nature wanted her.

  He carried her gently into the bedroom and set her down on the edge of the massive sleigh bed that had been a part of his family for generations. Aaron maneuvered her long woolen coat off her body and lay her head down onto the fluffy pillow closest to her. He crouched down at the side of the bed and untied her shoes before he slowly slipped them off her feet.

  Tucking her under the covers was a kind of exquisite torture for him. Knowing that she was in his home and in his bed was enough to make him tremble with desire and the need to touch her, but knowing that she had come with him to Mystic Mountain made it even more delicious.

  He had her here.

  That was the first big step in building a life with her.

  He just wasn’t sure that the next step was going to help him or hurt him in the long run, but he was going to do his best to make sure she understood how important she was to him.

  She deserved to know that after all of these years.

  She deserved everything that he could give her and that included a nice warm bed and long restful sleep.

  Aaron slipped away from the bed and moved back through the main space of the cottage. He found a note on the outside of the mudroom door and pulled it free of the tack that had held it onto the corkboard.

  A-

  Started the fire in the fireplace, but I’m not all that certain you know how to use that GPS in your truck. So, I’ll wait in the woods until I’m sure you’re back, and then I’m out.

  I hope your little trip was worth the favor you’ll owe me.

  -X

  Xavier Salazar was a panther shifter who also lived in Mystic. His family’s homestead went into the mountain itself in the form of mine claims. All totaled, outside and inside the mountain, Xavier likely owned the largest single parcel of land in the incorporated township, but he didn’t act like it. The panther in him was happy to prowl about in the shadows near the mountain and Aaron didn’t even know exactly where Xavier lived. It seemed like all Aaron had to do to find the younger man was set foot on his property and he’d all but materialize out of the trees and shadows.

  Just the other day, Aaron had caught him on his way out for the season, panthers didn’t love the snow the way polar bears did, and Xavier had a place in the Southwest where he spent the colder months. It had been luck that he’d bumped into the younger shifter at the gas station where they were both filling up their tanks. That was when Aaron came up with a favor he’d asked for.

  “You want me to wait, here in Mystic, until you come back with your woman?”

  “I’d appreciate it if you’d stay long enough to start a fire in my bedroom fireplace. Make sure the bedroom is warm enough for comfort.”

  “Comfort?” That got Xavier’s attention. Leaning against the post between the gasoline pumps, the younger man narrowed his forest-green gaze at Aaron. “She’s human, isn’t she? If she was a shifter you wouldn’t worry about the heat. The two of you,” his slow grin spread across his lips, “could produce enough heat without a fireplace.”

  Aaron’s bear had come dangerously close to ripping free of his human form. “Keep my mate out of your thoughts, cub.”

  Xavier’s panther recognized the set down and the challenge, his eyes flashing emerald under his ink-dark hair. “Watch who you call cub.” The feline snarl of his tone did nothing to make the threat softer or less dangerous than Aaron knew it to be. “You best get on your way if you’re going to bring her back on time. After all, she’s a human. You can’t expect them to have the same stamina as our kind. Then again, at your age-”

  “You keep your mind on your own lack of a mate, Xavier. Do not tempt me to show you how dangerous I can be even at my ‘advanced’ age.”

  Waving off Aaron’s warning, Xavier pushed away from the pump and sighed. “Go, Aaron, get your woman. I’ll wait for your call and start the fire for you.”

  “Thank you.” Some of the pressure lifted from Aaron’s shoulders. “I don’t suppose you gave some consideration to the job offer I made you last week?”

  “Not yet.” Xavier shrugged. “But I’ll have an answer for you by the time I get down to my place in Arizona. Fair enough?”

  Aaron recognized the need riding the other shifter. The need to stretch his legs and run for a while. “That’s just fine with me, Xavier. I can’t start anything for a few weeks anyway. I have to square things away with-”

  “The missus?” Xavier hung up the nozzle and tore his receipt free of the machine. “You’re whipped, Aaron.”

  With that, he’d swung his leg over the back of the motorcycle and started back up the road where Aaron had come from. Xavier was a man… shifter of his word. He’d do what he promised.

  And he had.

  The fireplace had been deliciously warm when he’d brought Celeste inside. He certainly owed Xavier for following through on the favor he’d asked of him.

  Pushing back through the mudroom door, Aaron started to unload the supplies and Celeste’s bags from the back of his truck. He had her in his home. Asleep in his bed.

  Everything else could wait until morning.

  Four

  When Celeste woke up, there was one clear thought in her head. She was alone and didn’t like it one bit.

  Of course, the only time she hadn’t spent the night alone in bed in over a decade was when the kids decided that mom’s double bed could fit three people, leaving her barely able to breathe from laughter and a few stray elbows in her sides.

  But yesterday had been so very different.

  Yesterday, Aaron Winter had told her that her secret crush on him wasn’t just returned, he wanted her to live with him.

  And she’d all but thrown herself at him. Okay, so there had been no ‘throwing’ but there had been kissing and touching and then… She groaned and smacked the empty matt
ress beside her.

  And then they’d made it all the way to his home and she was in his bedroom… and alone.

  Hugging a pillow to her chest she drew in a long, deep breath. Yes, it was Aaron’s pillow. She could smell him on the heavenly-soft cotton pillowcase and felt comforted by the familiar scent.

  As much as she grumbled about laundry duty when it was her time at home, whenever Aaron would come to visit and help around the Victorian, she always found the time to do the laundry on top of her own chores.

  Even when his clothes had gone through the washer and dried thoroughly on the line out behind the house, she could lift the fabric to her nose and breathe in his scent.

  Sure, if anyone had caught her breathing in his scent, they might have thought she was beyond crazy.

  Hugging the pillow, she’d slept on all night, she cuddled it and sighed wondering where they were going to go from there.

  A knock at the door turned her over and she tried to rearrange the pillow under her head as if she’d just woken up at the knock, but the voice that squeaked out of her throat at the second knock sounded like a teen girl caught staring at her crush.

  And Aaron wasn’t even in the room.

  “Uh, hello?”

  The doorknob turned and the door cracked open, barely an inch from the frame.

  “May I come in?”

  The questions seemed crazy. “It’s your bedroom.”

  “And the room you’re sleeping in, Cel. I’m not just going to walk in without asking permission.”

  Her shoulders dropped in frustration before she wiggled up on the bed and looked down to make sure her clothes weren’t pulled in odd directions or making her look like she was bulging in any place. “Come on in.” She struggled to keep her voice easy and calm. “If you have a cup of tea, I just might kiss you.”

  The door swung open and Aaron was standing there with a mug in each hand and an expectant smile on his face. He lifted one mug as he moved closer. “Tea for you.”

  Celeste couldn’t help the giddy little noises that she made as she reached out for the mug. “Oh, you are a godsend.”

  He chuckled and she closed her eyes to let the sound shiver all over her body. “I know a few things about you.”

  “Oh? Really now?” Sitting back against the headboard, she folded her legs and cradling the mug in one hand she gave the bed beside her a pat. “Come and sit down and tell me what you think you know.”

  His smile was warm and did a good job warming her as well. The fire in the fireplace was still burning even though it was mostly embers rather than flames.

  It was probably a good thing that he was a wearing a t-shirt and long, loose pants, because if he’d been wearing anything tight enough to emphasize the body beneath his clothes, she might have found herself acting foolishly.

  Putting a knee up onto the other side of the bed, Aaron easily climbed up and sat beside her, almost shoulder to shoulder. Leaving one knee bent, he stretched out his leg on the far side and took a sip of his coffee.

  “You always did like your coffee strong enough to use as tar.” Celeste couldn’t help the way her nose wrinkled up a bit. The scent was good, but strong. “If I tried to drink it, I was always afraid that it would attach itself to my throat and cut off my air.”

  He nudged her leg with his toes. “A little over-exaggeration?”

  “Maybe a little,” she sighed and lifted her mug to her lips, “but I mistakenly took a sip out of your mug one morning and I had to drink over a gallon of water to get the lump in my esophagus down into my stomach.”

  Aaron’s laughter warmed her even more. “Now I know you’re joking. It wasn’t ever that bad.”

  She started to lift her cup again and waited. “Go ahead and get it all out,” she told him with a knowing look. “I don’t want to take a sip and then you make me spit it out with a laugh.”

  Aaron shrugged. “Go ahead. I’ll do the laundry later if you do.”

  “Laundry?” She set her cup down on her thigh, holding the handle lightly between her fingers. “You do laundry?”

  He sighed at the end of a long sip and gave her a pointed look that was mostly a grin. “Of course, I do laundry. What do you think I do when I’m not around the house helping you out? I have to know the basics to take care of myself.”

  “Well,” Celeste took a sip of her tea and let the delicate taste slide over her tongue, “even when I was just working at the Victorian you knew that Missus Burdick would have given you a room for all the work you did to help out.”

  Aaron lowered the mug in his hands and tilted his head to look at her. “I know. Missus Burdick said the same thing to me over and over, but I already had a place and as nice as it was to be close to you, it was also really hard to be so close.”

  A deep ache settled in her chest. “I know what that feels like.”

  “Oh?” Aaron lifted the mug closer to his nose as he breathed in the fragrance. “I thought I was alone in that… until a couple of matchmakers called me.”

  Some of his words from the day before stirred up in her mind, mingling with the words he’d just said. “They called you? My kids are trying to get me laid?”

  He coughed and then wiped the back of his hand across his mouth. “They didn’t mention anything about that. It was just about your plans to leave and about me coming back to see them off. Yeah.”

  He took a sip from his cup and then met her eyes over the lip of the cup. “I talked to Julia first.”

  Celeste smiled. “Julia would be the one to think she has to help me. She really grew into that nickname you gave her when she was little.”

  “Mama bear?”

  Celeste heard the wistful tone in his voice and she took a long sip of her tea. “It was sweet… when she wasn’t growling at me and swiping with her pretend claws when I tried to get her to leave her cubs.”

  Aaron’s laughter gave her all the best kinds of shivers. “They tell you it’s not wise to come between a Mama bear and her cubs.”

  Rolling her eyes, Celeste turned her head slightly to look at him. “It’s also not a good idea for little girls to ignore their mamas who tell them it’s bath time.”

  His smile turned into a wince. “Yeah, that’s not exactly what I had intended when I gave her the name.”

  Celeste’s shoulder shook in silent laughter. “I know, but it didn’t make it any easier! I had to tell her that it was her responsibility to show her cubs how to take a bath.” She sighed and leaned her head back on the headboard as she found his gaze with her own. “We had days and days of her giving her little stuffed animals play by play instructions on how to take a bath as she did it.”

  “Well,” Aaron huffed out a laugh, “I bet it was a lesson none of them ever forgot.”

  Shaking her head, Celeste giggled softly. “I think they can still recite chapter and verse on ‘The Important Steps to Take a Good, Clean Bath.’”

  Aaron took the last sip of his coffee and set the mug aside. “That sounds like a whole dissertation on a graduate level course.”

  “Julia has always liked instructing us in turn.” Celeste brought her mug up to her lips and took a little sip and then another. “What did Julia tell you when she called?”

  She wasn’t sure what he was going to say to her, but when he lifted his hand to touch his palm against her cheek she leaned lightly into his touch.

  “It was a fairly short call, Celeste. Julia didn’t have to convince me of anything, really. She told me, in no uncertain terms that I should get my head out of my butt and tell you how I felt about you. And before I could give her the same excuse I’d been giving myself for years, she told me you were thinking of selling the Bed & Breakfast and going somewhere new.”

  Just thinking about the words, he heard Julia’s voice in his ear as if he was in the midst of the phone call again.

  “She told me that you were getting ready to move on to a new part of your life and if I wasn’t so stubborn and idiotic, I would have already told you how
I felt years and years ago.”

  “Well, she certainly didn’t pull any punches.” Celeste’s lips twitched at the thought. “What did Jason have to say?”

  Aaron dipped his chin down until it touched his chest. He had to gather his thoughts first because he didn’t want Celeste to think he was making light of Jason’s words.

  Lifting his gaze to meet hers, Aaron couldn’t help the way her scent filled his lungs.

  “He told me that I didn’t have to stay away from you. That holding back didn’t make any sense to him over the years and it was crazy to keep away now.” Brushing his fingertips through her loose waves, he searched her eyes for any sense that he was upsetting her. “That he… that both of them, already considered me as part of the family. Like a… like their father.”

  Aaron turned his hand and captured the curl at the end of a long lock of her hair. He wasn’t trying to hold her still, but part of him worried that she might pull away.

  “If wishes were horses,” she smiled back at him, her eyes widening when air rushed through his nose at the thought of horses. His relationship with them was awkward at best. “Aaron?”

  “If wishes were horses,” he prompted her, unwilling to explain his reaction to her words.

  “Then maybe you could have been.”

  Air pulled into his lungs and his bear rose up and pushed at their link with his broad shoulders. They both were eager to hear what she had to say.

  “I can’t say that I haven’t thought about it over the years, Aaron. Every time you came to a school event and applauded for them at games. The way you patiently worked with Jason and Julia teaching them to fish and know what kinds of things you can eat in the woods and all the things to stay away from.

  “But more than that, Aaron. When they lost their patience, you held onto yours. When they cried and needed a shoulder, you were there for them. If I thanked you several times a day, picking one moment you gave us your time, your help, and your kindness, I might be able to settle accounts in the next century. I should have thanked you before.”