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"You mind holding the flashlight for me?" She clicked it on and handed it to him, then stripped off her glove and fished around in her toolbox for a handful of odd-size screws and bolts. "A couple of these should do the trick until we get back home."
Kade watched her carefully hand-thread each screw into the mounting, wondering if the other warriors in Boston felt the same pride and amusement when they watched their mates doing what they did best.
The thought jarred him as soon as it entered his mind ... since when had he been the type to think about having a mate, let alone place Alexandra Maguire anywhere near that scenario? At best, she was a temporary obstacle in fulfilling his mission for the Order. At worst, she was a security risk for the entire Breed nation--one that he was duty-bound to silence, the sooner the better.
But none of that mattered to his drumming heart, nor to the crackle of awareness that coursed through every vein and cell of his body as she finished her work not a few inches from him. Behind her, far in the distance, the green light of the aurora borealis was joined by a rising ribbon of red. The color framed Alex as she pivoted her head to look at him now, and he wondered if he'd ever seen anything quite so beautiful as her face haloed by the frozen magic of the Alaskan wilderness. She didn't speak, just held his gaze with the same wordless intensity that he felt coursing through himself. Kade switched off the flashlight and set it down on top of the now-closed engine casing. He took off his gloves and reached for Alex's bare hand, warming her cold fingers between the press of his warm palms. He held her hand in a light grasp, giving her the power to pull away if she didn't want his touch. But she didn't resist.
She entwined her fingers through his, looking up into his eyes with raw, searching intensity. "What do you want from me, Kade? Please, I need to know. I need you to tell me."
"I thought I knew," he said, then gave a slow shake of his head. "I thought I had it all figured out. God, Alex ... meeting you has changed everything."
He freed one hand to cup it along the curve of her cheek, slipping his fingers between the hood of her parka and the velvety warmth of her face.
"I can't read you," she said, frowning as she gazed up at him. "It makes me uncomfortable that I can't figure you out."
He touched the tip of her nose, gave her a wry smile. "Too much gray in your black-and-white world?"
Her expression stayed serious. "It scares me."
"Don't be."
" You scare me, Kade. All my life, I've run from the things that frighten me, yet with you ..." She released a slow, uncertain sigh. "With you, I can't seem to stay away." He stroked her cheek, smoothed the pads of his fingers over the light creases in her brow as she looked up at him. "There's no reason to be afraid when you're with me," he told her, meaning it completely. But then he bent his head and pressed his lips to hers, and the kiss meant to be tender reassurance ignited into something wilder as Alex kissed him back so openly, teasing his mouth with the tip of her tongue. All of the heat that had leapt between them the night before in Pete's parking lot sprang to life again now, only swifter, more intense for the hours of longing Kade had known in between. He was on fire for this female, dangerously so. Kissing her was risky enough; desire already had his fangs stretching from his gums, his vision going sharp with the flood of amber light that would soon fill his irises. Seducing her had not been his goal here, no matter what his mission for the Order was, or how badly he wanted to unravel Alex's secrets to satisfy his own personal curiosity.
He drew back, his head held low, face turned away from her to hide the changes he could not let her see. Changes that would startle her.
Changes that he would not be able to explain.
"What is it?" she asked, her soft voice husky from the kiss. "Is anything wrong?"
"No." He shook his head, still cautious to keep his face shielded as he willed his lust to cool.
"Nothing wrong at all. But it's too damned cold to be standing out here. You must be freezing."
"I can't say I'm feeling any chill at the moment," she replied, making him smile despite the war raging inside him.
"We should go inside." He didn't wait for an answer before he walked around to the passenger side of the plane. "I just need to grab my gear. Go on ahead. I'll be right behind you."
"All right." She hesitated for a moment, then started walking toward the cabin, her boots crunching in the snow. "Bring some firewood while you're at it. Folks use this place as a trail shelter now, so you should find some in the shed out back."
He waited until she had gone inside the log shelter before he pulled his weapons duffel out of the plane and headed around to look for the woodshed. The Arctic air slapped at him as he strode through the unspoiled snow. He welcomed the chafe of the bitter, cold weather. He needed the clarity of the icy wind. And still he burned inside for Alex.
He wanted her badly, and it would take nothing short of a glacier swallowing him whole to douse any of the heat that she ignited in him.
Chapter Fourteen
Alex walked into the one-room cabin and closed the door behind her to seal out the cold and, she hoped, steal a minute of privacy so she could deal with the tumult going on inside her. She leaned back against the weathered panel and exhaled a long, tremulous sigh. "Get a grip on yourself, Maguire." She wanted to pretend the kiss didn't mean anything, that the simple fact Kade had pulled away first should tell her that even he thought letting things get heated between them was a bad idea. Except things were already heated. More than heated, and denying it wasn't going to make the fact go away. There wasn't anywhere far enough that Alex could run to outpace the desire she had for Kade. And the kicker was, she didn't want to run from that feeling. For the first time in her life, there was something that scared the hell out of her but didn't make her itchy to bolt.>"How so?"
It wasn't meant to be a prying question, but she bit her lip as he asked it, a reflexive reaction that said she probably felt she'd already told him more than she'd intended. From the sudden, uneasy look she gave him, he could see that she was trying to size him up somehow, trying to decide if it was safe to trust him. When she finally spoke, her voice was quiet, her gaze turned back out the windscreen as if she couldn't tell him and look at him at the same time. "My, um ... my dad and I moved to Alaska when I was nine years old. Before that, we lived in Florida, down on the 'Glades, where my dad ran seaplane charter tours of the swamps and the Keys."
Kade studied her in the dim light of the cockpit. "That's a whole different world from here."
"Yeah. Yeah, it sure was."
A sudden metallic clatter sounded from somewhere on the plane, and the cockpit gave a vibrating shudder. Kade held on to his seat, grateful to see that Alex wasn't panicking. Her attention went laser sharp to her instrument panel, and she gave the plane some added speed. The shake and rattle calmed, and the ride smoothed out once again.
"Don't worry," she told him, her tone as wry as her expression. "Like my dad used to say, it's a scientific fact that some of the most alarming aircraft noises can only be heard at night. I think we're okay now."
Kade chuckled uneasily. "I'm gonna have to take your word on that." They flew over a sloping peak, then made a gradual direction change that brought them back over the Koyukuk below.
