Chapter 9 - Autumn
He'll be here in the morning.
This man who turns into a bear, who saved my life, who's been punishing himself for five years for something that sounds more like tragedy than crime.
He'll be here.
I should still be terrified. My rational brain is screaming that I should be terrified. Shapeshifters are real. The man sleeping in this cabin can transform into a creature that could kill me without breaking a sweat.
But I'm not terrified. Not anymore.
Curious? Yes. Overwhelmed? Definitely. Confused about what this means for everything I thought I knew about the world? Absolutely.
But not scared. Not of him.
Maybe I'm in shock. Maybe my brain has just given up on processing reality and decided to roll with the impossible. Maybe I'll wake up tomorrow and this will all feel like a fever dream.
Or maybe, and this is the thought that settles deep in my chest, warm and certain, maybe I trust him. Despite the bear, despite the violence in his past, despite every logical reason not to.
I trust him.
"Get some sleep, Autumn," he says from his side of the bed. He's lying on top of the blankets again, still maintaining that barrier between us.
"Are you going to sleep?"
"Eventually."
"Will you—" I hesitate, not sure how to ask this. "Will you stay? In the bed? I don't want to wake up and find you've decided to sleep on the floor after all."
There's a pause. Then: "I'll stay."
"Okay." I settle deeper into the blankets, my body finally acknowledging how exhausted it is. "Goodnight, Rhett."
"Goodnight."
I close my eyes, and despite everything, I fall asleep within minutes.
Next Day
I wake to pale morning light filtering through the windows and an empty bed.
My hand reaches across the space where Rhett should be before I'm fully conscious. The blankets are cool. He's been gone for a while.
Panic flares in my chest. He left. Despite his promise, despite everything, he decided it was too complicated and he left.
I sit up too quickly and my ribs protest. The injuries from yesterday make themselves known. My palms sting, my knee aches, my whole body feels like it was used as a punching bag.
But that's not important right now. I scan the cabin frantically. The fire has burned down to coals. There's no sign of him.
"Rhett?" I call out, hating how my voice cracks.
Nothing.
I throw off the blankets and stand, wobbling slightly. My clothes are still hanging by the fireplace. I grab them. Mostly dry now, thank God, and pull them on as fast as my sore body will allow.
He promised. He looked me in the eye and promised he'd be here.
Unless something happened. Unless he decided that keeping me safe meant leaving. Unless he's out there right now, convincing himself that disappearing is the noble thing to do.
"Rhett!" I call again, louder this time.
Still nothing.
I'm halfway to the door, my heart in my throat, when it opens.
And there he is.
Shirtless, covered in a sheen of sweat that makes his muscles somehow even more defined, carrying an armload of split logs like they weigh nothing. His hair is damp, his beard has droplets of moisture caught in it, and he's breathing slightly hard from exertion.
He stops when he sees me, his dark eyes widening slightly.
"You're awake," he says.
The relief that floods through me is so intense I actually sway on my feet.
"You're here," I breathe.
"I told you I would be." He carries the logs to the fireplace and starts stacking them. "Did you think I left?"
"Yes. No. Maybe. I don't know." I sink back onto the edge of the bed, my legs suddenly unsteady. "I woke up and you were gone and I thought—"
"I've been up since dawn," he interrupts, still focused on the wood. "Needed to split more logs. The storm brought down some trees, so there's plenty of fuel, but it doesn't split itself."
He's been doing manual labor. Not running away. Not abandoning me. Just... being practical. I should probably feel embarrassed about my panic. Instead, I just feel relieved.
And also very, very aware of the fact that he's half-naked and sweating and the morning light is doing absolutely sinful things to the planes of his chest and stomach.
Stop it, I tell myself firmly. This is not the time.
Except maybe it is the time, because now that I'm looking, I'm noticing things I was too terrified or hypothermic to process before.
He's not just muscular. He's sculpted. Every movement shows the flex and release of muscle groups I didn't know existed. His chest is covered in dark hair that trails down his stomach and disappears into the waistband of his jeans, which are sitting low on his hips, and—
"How are you feeling?" he asks, turning toward me.
I jerk my eyes up to his face. "What?"
"Your injuries. How do they feel this morning?"
"Oh. Um. Sore. But okay. Nothing broken." I hold up my hands, showing him the scraped palms. "These sting, but they're not bad."
He crosses to me in two long strides and takes my hands in his, examining them with a gentleness that doesn't match his size. His hands are rough, calloused, and warm against my skin.
"They're clean," he says. "That's good. I'll put some salve on them after breakfast."
"You have salve?"
"Make it myself. Comfrey and calendula. Good for cuts and bruises."
Of course he makes his own medicinal salve. Is there anything this man can't do?
He's still holding my hands, his thumb brushing absently over my knuckles. I don't think he realizes he's doing it.
"Rhett," I say softly.
"Hmm?"
"Thank you. For staying. For keeping your promise."
His eyes meet mine. "I don't break promises. Especially not to you."
"Why especially not to me?"
"Because you're—" He stops, jaw working. "It's complicated."
"Everything about this is complicated."
"This more than anything else."
"Then help me understand. Explain the complicated parts."
He releases my hands and steps back, running a hand through his damp hair. "You remember what I told you? About shifters?"
"That you exist, that there are different kinds, that you've been hiding in plain sight. Yes."
"There's more to it than that. There are...
bonds. Connections between shifters. And sometimes—" He struggles with the words, like they're being dragged out of him against his will.
"Sometimes a shifter will meet someone, and everything just...
clicks. Like the universe saying 'this one, this person, they're yours. '"
My heart starts beating faster. "Like soulmates?"
"Fated mates," he corrects. "It's more than soulmates. It's biological, primal. The bear recognizes its other half and refuses to let go."
"And you think—" I can barely say it. "You think I'm your fated mate?"
"I know you are."
The certainty in his voice makes my legs tremble.
"Since when?"
"Since the moment I caught your scent. The bear knew immediately.
I've been trying to deny it, trying to convince myself it wasn't real, but—" He looks at me.
"I can feel you. Your emotions, your heartbeat, your presence.
It's like there's a rope tied between us, and it just keeps getting stronger. "
I should probably be freaking out about this. This is a lot to process on top of the whole shapeshifter revelation. But instead, I feel something slot into place. A puzzle piece I didn't know was missing.
"Is that why you were so hostile when we first met? You were trying to push me away?"
"Yes. If I scared you off, if you never came back, I could keep pretending the bond didn't exist."
"But I did come back."
"You did," he says roughly. "With chocolate and oranges and that smile, and every time you show up it gets harder to remember why I'm supposed to stay away from you."
"Maybe you're not supposed to stay away." I stand up, closing the distance between us. "Maybe the universe is smarter than you're giving it credit for."
"The universe doesn't know what I've done. What I'm capable of."
"The universe gave you a mate anyway. Maybe that means something."
He's looking down at me now, and I'm craning my neck to meet his eyes. This close, I can see the gold flecks in the brown, the way his pupils are dilated.
"You don't know what you're saying," he says, but there's no conviction in it.
"I'm saying that I feel it too. This pull. I thought it was just attraction, just me developing a crush on the grumpy mountain man. But it's more than that, isn't it?"
"Autumn—"
"I felt safe with you from the beginning. Even when you were growling at me to leave. Even when you showed me the bear. I should have been terrified, but all I could think was that you'd never hurt me. That you'd protect me."
"I would," he says immediately. "I'd die before I let anything hurt you."
"I know. That's what I'm trying to tell you. I know." I reach up, placing my palm against his chest. His heart is racing under my hand. "Whatever this bond is, I feel it. And I'm not scared of it."
"You should be."
"Why? Because you might lose control? Rhett, you had complete control last night. You shifted and shifted back on purpose. You've been in control this whole time."
"Because you're here. The mate bond helps. The bear wants to impress you, wants to show you it can be trusted. But that doesn't mean—"
"It doesn't mean you're fixed, I know. This isn't some magical cure for trauma. But it means you're not as dangerous as you think you are."
His hand comes up to cover mine against his chest. "You're so sure."
"I'm sure of you."
We're standing so close now that I can feel the heat coming from his skin. Can see the rise and fall of his breathing. Can smell pine and smoke and that wild, musky scent that's purely him.
"This is a bad idea," he says, but his other hand is moving to my waist, settling there like it belongs.
"Probably," I agree, my voice barely above a whisper.
"You barely know me."
"Then let me get to know you."
"I'm broken."
"I'll help with that."
"I haven't—" He swallows hard. "I've never done this. Never had someone. Never wanted someone until—"
"Until?"
"Until you."
I don't know who moves first. Maybe both of us at the same time. But suddenly his mouth is on mine and I'm being kissed like I've never been kissed in my life.
It's desperate and hungry and fierce, like he's been holding back for so long that now that the dam's broken, everything is flooding out at once.
His beard is rough against my skin. His hands are in my hair, tilting my head to deepen the kiss.
I grab onto his shoulders for balance and feel the muscles flex under my palms.
When we finally break apart, we're both breathing hard. His forehead rests against mine, his eyes closed.
"We shouldn't have done that," he says.
"Probably not."
"I don't do relationships. Don't know how."
"Neither do I."
"This is going to be complicated."
"Everything worth having is complicated."
He pulls back enough to look at me, and there's something almost like hope in his expression. "You really want this? Want me? Even knowing what I am?"
"Especially knowing what you are," I say firmly. "No more secrets. No more hiding. You show me who you really are, and I'll show you who I really am, and we figure out the rest as we go."
"What if I hurt you?"
"What if you don't? What if this is exactly what both of us need?"
"You're either the bravest person I've ever met or the most reckless."
"Can't I be both?"
Despite everything, he smiles. It's small, barely there, but it transforms his whole face. Makes him look younger, lighter.
"Yeah," he says with a smile. "You can be both."
And then he's kissing me again, slower this time, like he's savoring it. Like he's allowing himself to believe this might actually be real. I kiss him back and try not to think about how my whole world just tilted on its axis.
How yesterday I was a travel vlogger who thought she knew how the universe worked.
And today I'm standing in a cabin on a mountain, kissing a bear shifter who might just be my fated mate.
Life is weird.
But also?
Life is pretty damn good.