Tracking the Bear (Blue Ridge Bears Book 1)(13)

“Lucy what are you-”

“Oh God. I’m so sorry. I…I’ll just go,” I muttered. The heat flooding my cheeks was enough to at least dispel the cold in my face.

“Stay.” It was more of a command than anything else, and I stopped, my body turned half toward the door.

“You’re naked,” I protested.

“And you’re freezing,” he countered.

“You don’t know that,” I muttered. His eyes flicked meaningfully down to my chest. I grabbed one of the mini soaps from the counter and threw it at him. It fell woefully short of hitting his broad chest, splashing into the water at groin level.

“Get in,” he said, and his voice was a low, persuasive purr. “There’s plenty of room. I promise I won’t do anything untoward.”

I bit my lip. The Jacuzzi was big and the jets would probably feel like heaven on my cold and battered body. But there was that little matter of having to strip. His eyes were already smoldering as he stared at me.

“Close your eyes,” I commanded. “And don’t open them again until I’m in the water.”

He closed his eyes obligingly and I waited a few minutes to see if he’d peek. He didn’t. Instead he relaxed further into the tub, until I finally summoned the courage to strip off my shirt. I decided to strip off the flimsy sports bra as well. It wasn’t really doing anything for me anyway. I decided to keep my underwear on, so I wouldn’t give into temptation and actually request something untoward from my extremely irritating travelling companion.

“Ooh,” I moaned as I slipped into the steaming bathwater. He smiled at the sound, but didn’t open his eyes to see if I was fully submerged or not. Well, that was…gentlemanly of him I supposed. I’d only said that he had to wait until I was in the water. He could have gotten an eyeful when I’d stepped inside.

“Can I open my eyes?”

“Yes,” I said, stretching out my bad leg. The warmth of the water was doing wonders in easing the ache. If I didn’t move it for the rest of the night, I could probably get away with skipping my pill. I rested my heel on one of his legs, situating myself opposite him.

He opened his eyes and they immediately sought out my face. I didn’t like the look in them. It wasn’t the sex-crazed, lusty sort of look I’d expected and feared. His face softened when he looked at me. It wasn’t the hardness of his cock, which brushed my foot gently in the ebb and flow of the water, that really scared me. It was the happiness, the love I could see in his eyes.

For Pete’s sake, we’d known each other all of two days. He couldn’t be in love with me!

“Who’s Freyr?” I blurted. Maybe I wasn’t supposed to talk about what had happened in the parking lot, but I wanted that look gone. I wasn’t going down that road. Not with him, not with anyone. Not until after I’d finished college.

His brow creased, and his mouth pulled down in a frown. “Why?”

“I read the name somewhere,” I lied. Great, now I couldn’t hold that against him anymore. I just had the feeling that this Freyr guy, whoever he was, didn’t want me to blab to Chance. I had to stop my mate—oh God, was that Chance? —from killing Luke.

“Freyr is one of the major gods in Norse mythology. He was the god of fertility, prosperity, and a good harvest. He had other powers too, but those were the main three. Most of his worship is done by the Were-Boars these days. He’s their patron.”

“Were-boars?” I asked, raising a brow at him. “Do bears have a patron, by any chance?”

He shook his head. “Not really. You’d think so, since we began with the Berserkers. But there’s surprisingly little about us in Norse Myth. I’m an atheist myself, but Mom and Dad worship Frigg, Odin’s wife.”

“Oh.”

So why was this Freyr guy trying to intercede on behalf of my brother? Chance had said that he’d become a bear, right?

“Any reason you’re suddenly so curious?” he asked, stroking fingers over the delicate bones of my ankle. That in itself was innocent enough, but the barest touch of his fingers on me had set my body aching. I wanted to close the distance between us. I wanted to lay a kiss on his soft mouth, feel his body against mine in the steamy bathwater, and let whatever happened happen.

Instead, I drew my foot carefully back to my side of the tub, dropping my gaze from his. That was insanity. I didn’t have any protection, and even if he had something in his bag for just such an occasion, I wasn’t going to jump into bed with a man I barely knew. Hell, this morning I hadn’t even known he could turn into a bear. There could be a lot more that he was hiding from me.

“No reason,” I said, carefully scrutinizing the bubbles instead of meeting his gaze.

The ripples that crossed the bath were the only warning that he’d leaned across. He cupped my chin in one hand, tilting my head up so I could see his face briefly, before his mouth descended on mine. I should have told him no, or reminded him of his promise. Instead, I wrapped my arms around his neck. He grasped my hips and lifted me bodily from my perch.

His tongue delved into my mouth, tasting me, savoring me and I tried to respond in kind. He arranged me carefully so most of my weight was not on the bad leg. One of his large hands came up to tangle in my hair, tugging very gently at the roots. My body bucked at the sensation and his erection nudged my sex. My legs quivered and something inside of me clenched. I wanted the thick, hard length of him inside of me.