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I let Nate drape my jacket over my shoulders to fend off the worse of the chill and then tugged the rest of my clothes on as quickly as I could. I was shivering before I was halfway done. I hurried over to the fire, where Nate had already brought the hare and Aaron’srabbit.
My eagle shifter was just pulling on his shirt. The glimpse of his well-muscled chest—seriously, was that an eight-pack?—disappearing under the fabric was enough to send a completely different sort of shiver through me. Okay, now I waswarm.
Marco was lounging by the fire, looking a lot less pained now too. But I knew the poison had hit him harder than it had Nate, probably because he’d gotten a bigger dose of it. His mouth still twisted a little when he bent over to grab the granola bar West tossed to him. And his joking didn’t have quite the same lightness as it usuallydid.
“Those rogues had better not mess with us again,” he said flippantly. “Ireallyhave a bone to pick with them now. And a few I’d like to shove into various parts of their body. A nice sharp rib through the gut would be just thething.”
West rolled his eyes. He leaned over to poke at the fire. We were getting low on wood too, I knew. It’d been too heavy for us to carry very much, and we hadn’t been able to scavenge any to replenish our supply since we’d entered the caves. Maybe I’d need to make a different sort of trip above ground tomorrowmorning.
“They obviously didn’t do that much damage to you,” West said to Marco. “You’re still shooting your mouth off just as much asalways.”
Marco gave him a baleful look. “It takes a lot more than a couple of tainted biscuits to take down the leader of all felinekin.”
“We don’t know what they’ll try next.” Nate dug a knife into the hare’s pelt to skin it. “We’ll have to stay extra alert on watchtonight.”
“Do you really think we have to be worried about... people other than the rogues?” I ventured. I still wasn’t sure how wise it was to mention the fae directly. West hadn’t done more than insinuate that they might be involved thismorning.
Aaron clearly realized what I meant. “There are treaties between all the major supernatural communities,” he said. “Attacking the leaders from one community, unprovoked, would bring about major consequences. It would be a hugerisk.”
“If it could be proven who was involved,” West muttered. “Just make it easier for someone else to do the job, and you can get off scot-free.”
“Have relations between the different communities been so bad they’dwantto get rid of us?” Iasked.
Aaron shook his head. “I wouldn’t have thought so. It’s possible, but West is jumping to the most dire explanation, not the mostlikely.”
“Easy to say when you can just fly on out of here if the going gets that tough, eagle boy,” Marcosaid.
His tone was teasing, but I saw Aaron’s jaw twitch. He’d told me a few nights ago how the other kin-groups tended to see the avians as something lesser—and therefore to see him as the least important of the alphas. He didn’t buy into that belief, but off-the-cuff comments like that must still carry a bit of a sting. I knew he’d never leave us behind no matter how tough the goinggot.
“Except he wouldn’t,” I said. “We’re all doing the best wecan.”
“The best we can would be to get out of this mountain already,” West said. “I don’t suppose you have any idea how much longerthatis going to take,Sparks?”
I grimaced at the nickname, but my gut knotted at the same time. I’d still been feeling the internal tug toward whatever was waiting for us—but I had no idea how much farther we had to go. If I could have just raced ahead on myown...
But that would be stupid. And exactly what anyone trying to get rid of me would want. These attacks had always been about the dragon shifters first. The rogues wanted my line eliminated. My alphas had only gotten hurt because they stood in theway.
“It can’t be that much farther,” I made myself say. “There can’t be that much moremountain.”
“And tomorrow Marco and I should be able to keep up the usual pace,” Nate said. He set the skinned carcasses over the fire. The flames licked up over the meat, sending a mouthwatering roasting scent into the air. “There’s no point in stewing over things we can’t know. We just prepare as well as we can, and we’ll be ready for whateverhappens.”
I wished I could feel the same easy confidence. I couldn’t even be sure of holding a shift for more than ten minutes at atime.
But even if West’s question had been a little harsh, he wasn’t wrong. The four of them were here because of me, because of this quest Mom had sent me on. If Marco or Nate had gotten more than just sick that would’ve been on metoo.
My fingers itched with nothing around to pilfer. Everything around me was an unappealingtarget.
Because it was all too close to being mine, I realized. Somewhere during the last few days, my mind had completely adjusted to the idea that the four guys around me and I shared an inexplicable connection, one that made them part of my inner circle—which until now had included only me, my mom, and Kylie. There was no relief in stealing from the people I trusted to be on myside.
The unease stayed coiled in my belly all through dinner. My hunger had faded, but I forced a decent portion of rabbit down, followed by a granola bar, just to keep my energyup.
Marco and West took the first guard shift. I went to help Aaron set up the tent while Nate finished securing thecampsite.
As my fingers grazed Aaron’s here and there, as he brushed past me to fix one of the poles, another kind of hunger started to well up inside me. The need to feel that connection between us, to remind myself that it was right for them all to be here withme.
When we ducked inside, I took his hand and pulled him down to sit on top of my sleeping bag with me. He gathered me in his arms and kissed me. In that moment, with his lips parting mine and the heat of his body against me, all my worries faded. I was here, where I was meant to be, with the men I was meant to bewith.
I eased us down onto our sides on the padded surface, wanting to feel him against me from head to toe. He hooked his arm around me, his thumb teasing over the bare skin of my back just beneath my shirt. I quivered with pleasure and kissed himharder.
