Buck Me... For New Year's: BBW Paranormal Were-reindeer Shapeshifter Holiday Romance (Frost Brothers' Brides)

by Anya Nowlan

  Dammit, she was beautiful no matter how Dash saw her—in the snow, sprawled out on his bed, looking sad or happy in a seat next to him… it was uncanny. He’d met a lot of gorgeous women in his life, but none who could make him thrum in anticipation for anything she said or did like Blair.

  “Yeah, well, I guess I like to veer toward the unexpected,” Dash admitted with a chuckle.

  “You said it’s a family business? You guys do air cargo, right?”

  “Long-distance logistics, basically,” he said, nodding.

  “So how can that be a few centuries old? We haven’t been flying around for that long,” Blair said, cocking a brow.

  Dash grinned wryly, licking over his lips. Talking about the business was always something that brought a smirk to the lips of every Frost brother. They weren’t allowed to really say what they did, but playing around the topic was oh so much fun.

  “Well, let’s just say that we’ve gotten a bit more high-tech over the years, but the general concept has always been the same. Get a lot of stuff across the globe in a short matter of time.”

  “So it used to be trains and ships and trucks and it’s now mostly airplanes?” Blair pried.

  “Alternative means of transport, sure,” Dash said, feeling his jaw twitch with the roar of laughter wanting to bubble up in him.

  “How’s your boss, though? If it’s a family business, I imagine things can get tense.”

  “Nah, we’re okay. Nick’s a polar guy, I’ll give you that, but he wants to see the good in everyone.”

  That certainly wasn’t a lie. Old Saint Nick, always the good guy.

  “Does it rub off on you?”

  “Well, I’m polar, let’s leave it at that,” he chuckled.

  Los Angeles was no more than a few minutes away, and when Dash mentioned it to Blair, she fell silent. Dash handled the plane into a smooth landing and as usual for any flight involving a Big Red in LAX, there was a private bus at the door immediately after Dash had been instructed to a spot.

  They got out of their seats and Dash picked up Blair’s jacket and suitcase again. It was much warmer in Los Angeles than it had been in Idaho, and no snowstorm either. Dash led the way through the cavernous jet and the door whooshed open, the stairs unraveling themselves as if they were sentient.

  “Thank you, Dash Frost, for giving me a ride,” Blair said, smiling. “I don’t think I’ll ever forget the guy who took a detour to Los Angeles with his airplane for me.”

  “I’d like to think there are more reasons why you shouldn’t forget me, Blair Welsh,” he said, licking across his lips.

  There it was, that scarlet flush that he liked to see on her so much. Blair bashfully looked down, her long lashes fluttering on her cheeks, and she was absolutely riveting. His body and his buck were screaming at him to make a move, and he knew that he would be a fool not to, but something held him back. An uncertainty. A lack of willingness to fuck it up, maybe?

  “That too,” she admitted with a smile, reaching for her suitcase.

  The moment he gave it to her, he knew he’d blown his chance. He should have pulled her to him and kissed her. He should have told her that he wasn’t ready for her to leave yet and he wanted to spend more time with her. But he didn’t and before she’d even stepped out of the airplane, he knew it was going to haunt him.

  “I’ll see you around,” he said awkwardly, and they exchanged one of those ragged hugs that seems to leave everyone involved less than satisfied.

  Blair nodded and raised her hand in a wave before practically running down the steps and into the bus. He caught her gaze one last time when she stepped into the bus and turned around, and the emotion that reflected in them was an exact match for his own—remorse.

  The hell did you just do.

  Dash was scruffing his hand through his hair and then down the side of his face in what could only be described as complete bafflement at his lack of game as he walked back through the jet. He fell into his chair, looking densely at the controls for a moment, trying to wrap his brain around what had happened.

  What was it about that woman that made him act so goddamn idiotic? He’d never been the kind of man to let an opportunity for a kiss pass him by, let alone something more, but with Blair he was suddenly like a schoolboy with his first crush. Headless. Hapless. Sort of dumb.

  Dash was still shaking his head in disbelief as Big Red hummed to life from an external command while Dash hadn’t said or done a thing. He saw the telltale green light blinking on the dashboard, telling him that he had an incoming call. Morosely, he leaned forward, punching a button on the controls.

  “Big Red Five. Dash. What’s up?” he asked, sounding like a bear awoken from hibernation three months early.

  “Whoa. Who pissed you off?” Ru’s voice came over the comms, clean and crisp as ever.

  Rudy, or Ru as he was called in the family, was the guy who kept the whole engine running. Though he made a few runs himself as well, his main function was to keep the rest of the nine in order, which was an Herculean task for the youngest Frost. However, what Ru might have lacked in age he made up for in cunning and sharp intelligence. And seeing through Dash’s shitty mood was apparently just one of Ru’s superpowers.

  “Life in general. Why?”

  “A-ha. Girl trouble,” Ru announced with a chuckle, and Dash knew the kind of grin he was wearing on the other side of that communication line.

  Dash’s hand curled into a fist on the armrest, trying to restrain his bad mood and keep from lashing out. After all, it was only himself he could really be pissed at. It wasn’t Ru’s or anyone else’s fault that he’d let Blair walk out of there thinking she’d been a simple lay for him.

  “Well aren’t we Doctor Phil all of a sudden,” Dash snorted. “Did you have business or are you screwing around with my plane for your own personal amusement?”

  “Always out to piss you off, brother dearest. But we need a shipment picked up in Dallas and you’re the closest guy. Are you game?”

  Dash glanced at the computer screen spitting out information about the run and the details of the shipment, half-heartedly reading through them. If he left now, he’d be admitting defeat and leaving Blair behind. But hadn’t he already? He knew her name, but nothing about where she was or what she was going to do in Los Angeles. Frustration welled in him, but he tried to force his mind off of it.

  What if she was the one?

  Now that was a horrifying thought. For a second, Dash’s world froze and he sat still, glassy eyes on the screen. The possibility hadn’t struck him before, but now that he thought of it, it seemed so… permanent. So real. He swallowed dryly when Ru’s voice came over the comms again.

  “North to Dash, you there? Do I need to send someone else while you spill icy tears over the skirt that got away?”

  “Shut it,” Dash huffed, buckling in. “I’ve got the details, I’m going.”

  “Good. Let me know if I can do something for you. Maybe find a particular young lady with a black and silver mask, for example.”

  “Vix really doesn’t know how to keep his big mouth shut, huh?” Dash said, shaking his head with a notable lack of amusement as he eased the plane to life.

  “Not really, no. Would you want it any other way?”

  “Probably not,” Dash admitted with a sigh.

  It only took a few minutes for Dash to get Big Red Five up in the air. But all the way to Dallas, he was kicking himself for his dumbass choices.

  Maybe taking Ru up on his offer wouldn’t be the worst idea in the world.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Blair

  I can’t believe I just let him go.

  That was the thought that had been plaguing her since she stepped down the stairs and then into the bus. This constant, nagging, suffocating feeling of having done the wrong thing hung to her like a bad odor, making her gag at her own lack of foresight.

  Nothing seemed to shake it. Not going home and seeing her family. Not having dinner with h
er friends. Not catching up with Delia about her trip to Aubrey’s place. Whatever she did, Dash was at the forefront of her mind, hogging cognitive real estate and browbeating her into feeling completely dumb for not having taken her chance.

  Now, removed from the situation, it became painfully clear to her that she should have kissed him. Just stepped up to him, grabbed him by his shirt, and kissed him until she couldn’t take it anymore. And then asked for his number and made it very clear that she was going to call him. All of those self-confident things she could think of now, but completely eluded her before.

  “Honey, you really need to snap out of it,” her mother said, putting a hand on her shoulder.

  Blair practically jumped up in surprise, feeling the light touch, causing the champagne to slosh out of her glass and spill on the hem of her knee-length powder blue dress.

  “Shit,” she said automatically, before clamping a hand over her mouth and looking at her mother in surprise. “Sorry,” she mumbled through the protective cover of her hand.

  “Blair Welsh, watch your language,” Kelsey Welsh said, grinning a little despite the fact that she was obviously trying to put on her most matronly scowl for the sake of her daughter. “Go clean that up before it stains, honey. And come back soon, it’s not long until the fireworks start!”

  Blair nodded miserably, shuffling into the house and gulping her champagne down in one sip. It had been a day and a half now since she’d seen Dash, since she’d left him on the tarmac like the biggest dolt, and the discomfort it was causing her seemed to be getting worse and worse. New Year’s Eve was upon her and all her family had gathered at their little house in the suburbs, and yet Blair couldn’t muster the tiniest bit of joy for the occasion.

  She made it to the kitchen, piled high with champagne bottles and snacks, and cleared some room at the sink. Dabbing at the spot on her dress with a moist towel, she caught herself chewing on her lip again.

  Usually, she would have left the house by now on her way to meet up with some friends downtown and embrace the new year with style. This time though, she really didn’t feel like partying at all. Staying home seemed like the safest bet. Having a few glasses of bubbly with her parents, watch the fireworks explode over Los Angeles, and then tuck herself in by one to dream of Dash sounded like a perfectly reasonable night.

  Except for the fact that she was completely and utterly miserable.

  Note to self, never let the hot shifter guy get away if you really like him.

  Another one of those clever too-little too-late tidbits that she loved collecting. Scrunching her nose, Blair looked at the big damp spot on her dress and tossed the towel on the counter in frustration. She was making it worse, as far as she could tell, and it wasn’t like anyone was there to comment on it other than her family.

  Surprisingly enough, she hadn’t met a lot of bad blood about the whole Collin thing. Her father seemed relieved, if anything, and the first comment out of her brother Blake’s mouth had been “Good riddance,” which seemed to be an emotion echoed by most of her family.

  Her mother had been the only one showing some remorse, but Blair assumed it had a lot more to do with Mom feeling bad because she was unhappy rather than missing Collin. All in all, it had gone a lot better than she’d expected, but it did little to brighten her mood post-Dash. Funny how one night could change so much, and yet leave everything the same.

  Wallowing in misery as she was, Blair stalked out of the kitchen, grabbing another glass on the way. She stepped out into the backyard, where her family and the guests huddled around in groups. It was getting cold outside, though it was nothing in comparison to Idaho, and Blair joined her mother and one of her sisters near a heat lamp.

  “Five more minutes,” Bianca said, checking her watch.

  As she said that, the first explosions started going off over Los Angeles, drawing a gasp from Blair. It was always like that—some people couldn’t wait for the clock to hit and had to start early. Despite herself, she smiled a little. As far as she was concerned, she was more than ready to be done with this year and the sooner she got rid of it, the better.

  The house was on a small hill and the backyard overlooked a stretch of forest, a rarity so close to Los Angeles. Blair’s eyes were tugged away from the dazzling display of light and color above her by something, a flash in the forest. She frowned, looking into the depths of darkness there and curiously taking a few steps toward it.

  Reds, whites, and blues lit the forest and she clearly saw something moving in it at an amazing speed, seeming to throw off sparks with each stride. When she realized what she was looking at, Blair gasped, eyes going wide.

  The long, graceful legs of the massive buck stormed through the undergrowth, finding a path through the forest so fast it was as if it was nearly flying above it. His antlers were wide and had too many points for Blair to count, and his thick, downy coat was slick against his muscled frame. He was coming straight at her and Blair froze in place, incapable of moving, incapable of looking away.

  Only when it was about ten feet from her did the big animal stop, skidding to a halt as easily as he had covered the ground. It wasn’t that cold outside, but steam rose from his nostrils and his barrel-like chest heaved with breaths, the warmth radiating all the way to Blair. The guests must not have noticed, because no one was saying a word. Their eyes were all turned to the sky as Blair was having her own private vision behind them.

  “Dash?” she asked timidly, thinking she recognized the spark in his eyes.

  The buck lowered his head for a moment, before the shift took him. His huge, powerful body contorted and changed before her very eyes. Gone was the coat, as if sucked into the skin, and the elongated muscles were packed together into a powerful form, tall and broad and strong. So completely different but yet so similar.

  Dash stood in front of her, his hazel eyes burning with something she could barely describe, his skin slick with a sheen of sweat. It looked like he’d been running for a while as fast as he could.

  “Blair,” he answered, rolling his shoulders back.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked in almost a whisper, while people were beginning to count down from ten behind her.

  “I had to see you. I couldn’t leave things like that. I… Blair, this is going to sound presumptuous and forward and I want you to know—that’s exactly the kind of guy I am.”

  The corners of Blair’s lips tugged upward, the countdown to six now.

  “I want to give this a shot, you and me. See what happens. What do you think, are you willing to take a chance with me?”

  The count was down to one now and she didn’t need another second to think about it. She acted on instinct more than anything else. Blair stepped closer to him and Dash pulled her to him sharply, wrapping his arms around her. Blair looked up, her lips slightly parted as the count reached zero, and he kissed her with all his might.

  All those conflicting, confused emotions were put into that kiss. Her hands coiled in his hair and she reached up on her tiptoes as his palms pressed against her lower back, pinning her to him. She moaned into the kiss, the fireworks going off at full blast now, showering the sky with brilliant flashes of light and sparkles in countless colors.

  None of them could compete with the fireworks going on inside of Blair, and between her and Dash. It seemed like both forever and a fraction of a second before the kiss stopped, and it lingered on their lips. Blair’s eyes were hazy as she looked up at Dash, his lips bruised from the intensity of their exchange.

  “Is that a yes?” he asked, wearing that devilish grin of his.

  “Hell yes,” she said, laughing.

  So maybe this year was going to be a lot better than the previous one after all!

  EPILOGUE

  Blair

  Life really worked in some weird ways sometimes.

  Blair had become more and more aware of that lately. It wasn’t the big things that made her think that, but the little ones. Like how fate kept ji
ggling around what she thought was normal to make room for new and better things.

  For example, it hadn’t taken her long to come to the conclusion that Dash hadn’t been lying about being a workaholic. The man could sink himself into his work and not come up for air for weeks, but when he did finally emerge, he was a force of nature not to be trifled with. She meant that in the best possible sense. Dealing with a buck half-mad with lust was a task most befitting a woman like Blair Welsh.

  When their schedules looked like they were impossible to make work together, a bit of luck and maybe that famous Frost magic that Dash kept referring to came around to help. Though after having met him, Blair got the feeling that said “magic” was named Ru, and he had twinkling blue eyes that looked quite a bit different from the prevalent shades of brown in the rest of the brothers she’d come across.

  In any case, it was April now and Idaho was coming to life in blooms of color that surprised and enchanted Blair whenever she got a chance to crawl out of bed and enjoy them. Dash didn’t leave her a lot of chances for that.

  During the past few months, they’d been finding stolen moments wherever and whenever they could, but it wasn’t often. Between her busy schedule as an architect for a big firm in Los Angeles and his mysterious air cargo hauling, they didn’t have a lot of chances to sneak off together.

  But here they were together now, near Shifter Grove in the big cottage Dash’s family owned, thanks to a happy coincidence of Blair getting a gig with the Warfangs and Dash having time off. They had screwed like rabbits for two weeks in a row and naturally didn’t feel a smidge of guilt about it.

  It was pure perfection. Blair realized she’d been head over heels in love with the man since the first time she laid eyes on him, but with every moment they spent together the feeling kept getting stronger. A tiny part of her had feared that being together with him for so long for the first time would reveal traits about him she didn’t like, but she was glad to report that none of that had come to pass.