Chapter 4
S o warm. I snuggled against the heat source, unwilling to open my eyes and assess anything further. The last thing I remembered was collapsing in the snow, trying to chase after Brandon in the dark. Had he come back for me? Maybe I’d died out in the snow and I was floating in a cedar and woodsmoke scented heaven.
That didn’t make sense either. Brandon smelled kind of like wood shavings, not cedar and smoke. The scent of campfires in midwinter forests wrapped around me, waking up parts of me I rarely acknowledged.
My body tingled. A quiet whisper of desire I didn’t quite understand brushed up my spine. I burrowed deeper, rooting around against the wall of warmth, drifting in and out of wakefulness. A cozy weight at my back shifted and something cold stuck against my cheek, jolting me fully awake. I tugged the blankets overhead away, instantly regretting it as goosebumps washed over me. A chocolate-colored dog swiveled her head to look at me.
What the hell?
I shifted away from it and right back into what felt distinctly like bare skin. Reality descended like a sledgehammer and I leapt out of the bed, tripping over the dog in my haste. It hopped out excitedly, barking happily.
“Shh!” I hissed.
An enormous alpha sat up on the bed, drawing attention to what I’d been wholeheartedly trying to ignore. His warm brown skin was on full display without a shirt, showing off his solid, stocky form, his deep brown eyes assessing me.
“What happened? Who the hell are you?” I demanded, my voice coming out like I was fresh off a bout of laryngitis. Apparently the cold and screaming had done a number on me.
He held up one finger and got to his feet, dragging one of the blankets over my shoulders. His hands moved slowly, and it took my brain a second to wrap around a pattern.
“Know ASL?” he signed.
I nodded carefully. I wasn’t fluent, but I had taken quite a few classes. “Yes. You’re Deaf?” I signed back.
He looked instantly relieved, but shook his head and tapped his throat.
“Oh. So you can understand me when I talk?” I asked.
He nodded.
“What happened? Why am I in here? Who are you?”
He smiled softly and held up one finger, attaching his incoming answer to my first question. “I found you outside,” he signed. He held up two fingers and simply pointed to the woodstove.
“You brought me in here to warm up? Did you seriously do the whole ‘strip down to stop hypothermia’ thing?”
He nodded, and held up three fingers before spelling out “B-E-A-R.”
“There was a bear?!”
He shook his head with an amused smile.
I traced back through my questions. Thinking felt a little bit more difficult with how exhausted I was. “Your name is Bear?”
His grin was answer enough.
“I’m Morgan.”
He wasn’t what I would call pretty, but he was solid, handsome in a rugged sort of way, exactly what I’d expect of someone looking completely at home in the middle of nowhere. His eyes were bright with curiosity as he looked at me, strands of hair the same shade of brown peeking from beneath his beanie.
The cabin was warm, but not warm enough to be down to my underwear. My nerves lit up to have his eyes on me despite him being a stranger. It should have been creepy, and would have been if it was Brandon in his place, but Bear didn’t feel dangerous.
Somehow climbing back into the bed seemed more palatable than putting on my woolen layers that had been tossed over one of the chairs. I gave in, my body still aching from my trek, and Bear paused, as if waiting for me to grant him permission to join me.
“You can lie down, but no funny business.”
He climbed in on the side against the wall so I was closer to the fire. The dog leapt joyously on top of us.
“What’s the dog’s name?”
Bear leaned close and whispered into my ear, “Pumpkin.”
I startled away from him. “I thought you couldn’t talk?”
Bear sucked his teeth, looking like he was trying to sort through how to explain. “It hurts,” he whispered. “So I don’t.”
“Oh. I didn’t know that was a thing.” I wedged the dog between us even though my instincts demanded I burrow into his cedar and woodsmoke scent. Now wasn’t the time to be cuddling up on a stranger, even if it did appear he had saved my life.
“What happened to you?” he whispered.
I picked my way through the events of yesterday. Or at least I assumed it was yesterday. I didn’t really have any concept of how long I had been outside after Brandon had abandoned me.
Bear growled lowly.
“Do you think he meant to hurt me?” I asked quietly, both knowing the answer and terrified of it.
“He meant to kill you,” Bear whispered. “No other explanation.”
“Him being too dumb to realize it was that dangerous isn’t an explanation?”
Bear gave me an are you serious? look.
“I don’t like thinking a friend was capable of that.”
Bear did the sign for friend and rolled his eyes.
“I never said he was a good friend. I have to go home.”
“Storm,” Bear signed.
“Are we just supposed to stay here?”
Bear shook his head. “Home closer than road.” He swallowed hard, pressing his fingers to his throat. I suppose it helped to leave out unimportant words so he had to speak less.
“How many hours to home?”
He held up three fingers.
“And to the road I was trying to get to?”
He held up five.
“Shit. And probably no truck even if I got there. Brandon drove us out here. Does your home have road access?”
Bear nodded.
“Okay. I guess I have no choice but to trust you. Please don’t murder me in the woods. I’ve already had enough of a brush with that.”
Bear looked insulted by the very idea. He tucked me tightly into the blankets and climbed out, pulling on his discarded clothing before passing me my own. He bustled around, looking like he was preparing to abandon the cabin. I hastily dressed, thankful the fabric was warm from its proximity to the stove. I chugged down some water he offered, infinitely grateful to soothe my parched throat. I was still starving, but I could survive a few more hours.
Bear passed me the last protein bar from a plastic bag in one of his numerous pockets, gesturing for me to eat while he got us ready to leave. In a matter of minutes, the fire was banked and we were ready to leave. He offered me a set of snowshoes from a locked box outside the cabin, raising his eyebrow in question.
“I know how to use them. That’s how we got out to our campsite.”
Satisfied with that, he hitched me up onto my pair and ushered me on ahead of him while he grabbed my empty sled and Pumpkin sprinted around us.
“I don’t know where we’re going.”
Bear clacked his mittens together, a sharp metal sound striking through the quiet of the forest. He pointed up a slim trail to the right and tapped the mittens again.
“Does that mean walk in that direction until you tell me otherwise?”
Another nod.
We set off, my legs protesting with every step, but I couldn’t exactly ask Bear to pull me along in the sled. That wouldn’t be fair.
Half an hour in, I was regretting everything. I had done entirely too much hiking the last few days but not nearly enough rest for fuel to keep me going.
Bear stopped our journey and helped me out of the snowshoes, offering me a drink of water from the pack on his back. It was an odd intimacy to be so close to him while drinking, and being this close reminded me how good he smelled and how much I wanted to crawl up inside his coat for a nap. He set the snowshoes on the sled and scooped me right off my feet.
“You don’t have to carry me,” I protested, but not too hard because it was heaven being off my feet.
“Faster” was Bear’s only response, his warm breath sending goosebumps dancing over my skin beneath my woolen clothes. We set off again, at nearly twice the pace I had been walking.
I clung to him, trying not to think about his linked hands supporting my ass or the way I was spread out and pressed against him. My brain should be focusing on the fact that Brandon had apparently tried to kill me because I wouldn’t sleep with him. I shouldn’t be thinking about sleeping with anyone after that. My body had not gotten the memo. Bear was warm and sturdy, and he smelled like all my favorite childhood memories—few though they were.
Snow cascaded down around us in thick clumps. It took hardly any time at all for our trail to disappear behind us. As the hours passed, the wind picked up until it was brutal, icy needles stinging every bit of exposed skin. I tucked myself tightly against Bear, burying my face against his coat.
He shifted my weight onto one arm and tapped against my ear with the other before holding up a bright orange whistle. I leaned into him, pressing one ear against him and covering the other before three sharp sounds cracked through the air followed by three longer ones and three more short. I risked a glance and saw the vague outline of a large cabin through the snow.
“Was that SOS on a whistle?”
Bear nodded and Pumpkin barked.
A series of whistles sounded in return but I didn’t recognize the pattern. I covered my ears again as Bear took a breath and shot off another round of SOS.
A lone figure rushed through the snow toward us in neon orange hunting gear. “Bear!” he shouted.
Bear set off a single whistle to reply.
We sat down on a drop-off of snow, the ground ahead cleared. Bear kicked off his snowshoes and tossed them into the sled that he carefully set down on the other side of the ledge.
The figure finally got to us, an unfairly beautiful face peeking out from the hood. “Holy shit. You found someone on the trail? Damn good timing. The storm is set to bury us.”
Without waiting, this new alpha scooped me right up and marched back toward the cabin, Bear following in our wake. This new alpha smelled like spruce resin and beeswax, sweet and earthy, matching the forest just like Bear. It wove through my body like something primal, my omega nature reacting in a way I didn’t quite understand.
What was so great about these two? I had never wanted to plaster myself over an alpha before. This close I could catch snippets of his black hair and amber brown eyes set against reddish brown skin a few shades warmer than Bear’s.
He kicked in the door to a spacious garage and deposited me onto my feet, still keeping an arm snugly wrapped around me while we waited for Bear and Pumpkin to join us.
“Where are we?” I asked.
The alpha looked down at me almost like he had forgotten I was there. “You’re at the Elk Ridge Hunting Lodge. Looks like you’re gonna be here for at least a few days. Half the roads around here are already closed.”
“And who are you?”
“Mukitou Maskwa, but you can call me Kit.”
I pulled down my hood, scarf, and beanie, shaking myself to get my circulation going, and Kit’s eyes widened. His scent erupted, crashing over me and loosing an omega whine from my throat.
Bear stepped up next to me, placing a hand on my shoulder.
“You’re—” Kit began.
“Yes,” Bear whispered.
“I’m what?” I blinked up at the two of them, uncomprehending.
“Ours,” they chorused.
“ What ?!”