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“Maybe. It’s not just that. I don’t know how I can be even half of the things I’m supposed to be. What if... What if I’m ruined, because of all those years when I didn’t know who I was, growing up the wrong way, without any idea about any of this? What if Ican’tever be a fullshifter?”
“Oh, Serenity.” He opened his arms, and I stepped closer to him automatically. That pull, that need to be near each of the guys was getting harder to deny. He cupped my face, and I tilted my head to meet his kiss. The heat of his lips coursed through me. It didn’t take away my doubts, but it was an awfully nicedistraction.
After the kiss, he eased me back slightly, keeping his hands on either side of my face. His head bowed until the fringe of his hair brushed my forehead. “I’ll tell you something,” he said. “Something I’ve never really talked about with anyone. I spent most of my life wondering if I wasn’t exactly what a shifter was meant to betoo.”
“What?” I pulled back far enough to stare into his eyes. “How couldyouthink that? You’re not just a shifter—you’re the one chosen to be your whole kin-group’salpha.”
“By a man who might have changed his mind if he’d been alive long enough to see me through to adulthood, for all I knew,” Aaron said. “There are always cracks where doubt can creep in, no matter how secure your position seems. And mine never felt all that secure. The avian shifters... We’re not always considered equal to the other groups. Most of the canine and feline kin see us as somethinglesser.”
“That’s ridiculous,” I said. “If anything, they should be jealous. You canfly.”
He chuckled. “Of course you’d appreciate that. But it is what it is. And even among my own people—I’ve told you how important it is to me to lead with my mind more than my animal side. That’s not a common attitude among shifters of any kin-group. Some of my kin have been wary of my interest in learning and history. There’ve been more than a few who thought it meant I was making up for a lack of the ‘real’ strength an alpha needs tolead.”
I gave him a look up and down, knowing my appreciation of his sculpted body must show in my expression. “So, those people must have been blind, I’mguessing.”
Aaron’s smile grew into a grin. “It’s easy for people to distrust what they don’t understand. But I’ve proven myself by now, more than once. When push came to shove, and I had the opportunity to let go—to let the alpha role pass to someone else—I knew I couldn’t. That I wanted this. That I was meant for it. And here I stillam.”
I hesitated, remembering what he’d told me before about how another shifter could become the alpha. “You had to fight. People challengedyou?”
“Yeah.” The good humor in his expression faded for a moment. He glanced away, toward the trees, recalling events I could tell he didn’t enjoy thinking about. “The worst was one of my advisors. He got used to having the extra authority. When I turned twenty-one and was meant to take over my full role as alpha, he attacked me. I hated having to fight him. He’d been like an uncle to me. But I was smarter and faster, and that can beat brutality if you know how to useit.”
“And here you still are,” I said, repeating his words back tohim.
“Here I am.” He drew his gaze back to me. Right then it was so intense I almost forgot how to breathe. My heart thumpedfaster.
He wasn’t just strong and overwhelmingly sexy. He wasgood. Thoughtful and brave and compassionate. The kind of man I’d never been sure I’d be able to have in my life. The kind of man I could fall in lovewith.
Not just could. I was already falling. Right into those clear blueeyes.
“Well, as far as I’m concerned, anyone who thinks you’re anything less than those other guys is an idiot,” I said, for something to say. “As well as beingblind.”
“Probably,” Aaron said agreeably. “I don’t worry about it anymore. And I find it equally hard to believe that anyone could be around you and think you’re anything less than a true shifter. It’s in your blood. That’s all that matters. The rest will fall intoplace.”
My fingers had curled into the front of his shirt without my even noticing. I tugged, and he came tome.
He kissed me hard this time, nudging me a step backward so I could lean against the trunk of a tree. So I didn’t even have to think about staying upright, only about the heat of his body against me and the slide of his mouth against mine. His hand traveled down my side to my thigh and back up to my shoulder, as if he wasn’t sure what part of me he wanted to touchmost.
Everywhere. I wanted himeverywhere.
His hips brushed mine, and an ache started to form between my legs. Where Nate had gotten me off so skillfully less than a day ago. I whimpered as Aaron stroked my breast through another kiss, but one last thread of uncertainty held meback.
I grasped the side of Aaron’s face. He eased back to meet my gaze. His was full of desire, so hot every nerve inside me caughtfire.
My voice came out ragged. “You don’t mind, do you, that it’s not just you? That I’m supposed to be with the other guys too?” That I had been, in ways he’d witnessed or at leastsensed.
Aaron bumped his nose against mine in an affectionate nuzzle. “Not at all,” he murmured. “You deserve nothing less. It takes more than one man to satisfy a dragon.” His fingers teased up under my shirt. I arched my back off the tree trunk to give him room to unclasp my bra. He circled my nipple with his thumb before flicking right over it with a speed that made megasp.
“You deserve every bit of pleasure they can give you,” he went on, moving to caress my other breast. He kissed the corner of my jaw, the sensitive skin of my throat. His words spilled out with his heated breath. “Anything that fulfills you, whoever it’s with, fulfills me too. The flush in your cheeks after you’ve been kissed. The sound you make when youcome.”
So he had heard Nate and me in the back of the car. My face outright flared. But, God, Aaron was turning me on so much with every graze of his lips, every stroke of hisfingers.
“I’m looking forward to someday seeing how much pleasure we can bring you together,” he said. “But fornow...”
His hands slid down my body. I whimpered, my hips canting toward his. Seeking every inch of contact I couldget.
“I need to see you,” he muttered. He yanked my shirt up. I raised my arms so he could pull it off in one smooth movement. My bra slid from my shoulders to fall to the ground by our feet. Aaron took me in, my smallish breasts with the nipples pebbled from his attentions, the flush creeping down between them. Then he ducked his head to suck one of those peaks into hismouth.
I moaned, pleasure racing over my skin. His steady tongue slicked over my breast with the slightest graze of his teeth, until I was trembling against him, my fingers tangled in his hair. He gave the nipple one last lick before attending to my other breast with equalenthusiasm.
