Chapter 16
ROZI
I lay with my back to Brody, but sleep wouldn’t come.
The conversation in the hot spring about dominance and submission kept replaying in my mind, sending unwelcome heat through my body.
I’d never admitted my preferences to anyone before, the desire to sometimes take control, to be the one giving commands rather than following them.
The way he’d responded without judgment, without that fragile masculine defensiveness I’d come to expect, had caught me completely off guard.
“When you’re ready, you have to make the first move,” he’d said, his eyes dark with promise.
The memory of those words made my imagination spin scenarios I had no business entertaining.
I could almost see it, stepping into my power, telling him exactly what I wanted, watching his powerful body respond to my commands. The fantasy was intoxicating: a man with all his strength and alpha energy willingly yielding to my desires, trusting me enough to let me lead our dance.
My cheetah stretched beneath my skin, purring with approval at those thoughts. The primal part of me recognized something my human side was reluctant to admit, that true dominance required trust, and trust required vulnerability. Something I’d denied myself for a long time.
I pushed the thoughts away, mortified by my own imagination.
This was dangerous territory, not just physically dangerous, but emotionally treacherous.
Every nerve ending in my body remained acutely aware of his presence just inches away, the heat radiating from his powerful frame, the steady rhythm of his breathing, the intoxicating scent of him that filled my lungs with each inhale.
My cheetah paced restlessly beneath my skin, purring with satisfaction at our proximity to our mate while demanding more. Closer, she urged. Touch. Claim.
I firmly pushed her down. Years of independence, of carefully constructed walls, couldn’t be dismantled in a single night, no matter how my body hummed with awareness.
Something invisible but undeniable vibrated in the inches between our bodies, like plucking a string and feeling the resonance in your bones rather than hearing it with your ears.
It pulled at me with each heartbeat, a persistent tug that seemed to whisper closer, closer with every breath.
Yet I couldn’t deny what had happened in the pool.
The way my skin had tingled under his gaze, the electric current that had seemed to arc through the water between us.
The way my nipples had hardened, not from the cool air but from the naked hunger in his eyes.
The liquid heat that had pooled between my thighs when he admitted to dreaming of me.
I reached for scientific facts like armor, wrapping formulas and data points around me the way other people clutched blankets during thunderstorms. Numbers didn’t abandon you.
Equations didn’t promise forever then disappear.
The periodic table remained unchanged, no matter how many times you woke up alone.
But science couldn’t explain away the simple truth.
My body remembered him on a cellular level, recognized him as mine despite decades of separation.
My palms went clammy at the recognition, heart racing faster than it had facing down fanged predators.
I could prepare for physical threats, map escape routes, calculate risks, but this?
This left me exposed. My hands trembled as I fought the urge to flee.
External threats I could handle, but this internal one, this crumbling of carefully constructed defenses, left me feeling more naked than any physical nudity could.
In the steaming pool, with his eyes devouring every inch of my exposed skin, I felt beautiful. Powerful. Desired in a way that transcended simple physical attraction. The way he’d looked at me, like I was a miracle he’d never expected to witness again, had awakened something I’d thought long dead.
My chest fluttered with something I hadn’t felt in decades. A weightlessness that made me dizzy. My fingertips tingled. Dangerous. Fragile.
The memory of his arousal sent answering heat through my core. Science explained the biology driving our attraction but not the emotion in his eyes when he’d confessed to dreaming of me for years.
That wasn’t just biology. That was something deeper, something uniquely human mingled with something primal and shifter.
Moonstones in the ceiling cast the bed in blue-white light. Night sounds filtered through the window as the Fae dwelling hummed with subtle magic, soothing my heightened senses.
Despite my racing thoughts, exhaustion eventually pulled me under, dragging me into a sleep deeper than I’d intended.
I woke slowly, gradually becoming aware of unfamiliar warmth surrounding me.
My body felt impossibly relaxed, muscles I hadn’t realized were perpetually tense now unwound completely.
A steady rhythm beat beneath my ear, the sound strangely comforting.
Sandalwood and citrus filled my lungs, wrapping around me like an invisible blanket.
My eyes snapped open as consciousness fully returned. Horror flooded through me as I realized my position.
Somehow during the night, I’d actively moved toward Brody.
I should move away. Create distance. But my body refused to cooperate. This, his warmth, his scent, his heartbeat beneath my cheek, was the most peaceful I’d felt in a long time.
Panic shot through me. I shouldn’t need this. Couldn’t need him. I’d built my entire life around never again depending on someone who could leave.
“I’m awake.” His deep voice rumbled through his chest beneath my ear. “Have been since you moved closer.”
I tensed. Thank goodness for the darkness that hid my expression. “I didn’t mean to—”
“I know,” he interrupted softly, his voice little more than a whisper in the moonlit room. “You don’t have to move unless you want to.”
The lack of triumph or smugness in his tone gave me pause. I heard only gentle acceptance, an acknowledgment of this unexpected moment without demanding or expecting more.
I should pull away. Put distance between us. But the words that came out of my mouth surprised even me. “How long have your symptoms been getting worse?”
His body stiffened slightly beneath mine, but his arm remained gentle around my shoulders. “The tremors started six months ago. At first, I could hide them.”
“Why didn’t you reach out for help sooner?” I asked, my voice matching his whispered tone. There was something about speaking in darkness that made honesty easier, as if the words might dissolve with the dawn.
A long pause followed, his heartbeat accelerating slightly beneath my ear. “Pride. Fear,” he finally admitted. “The belief I deserved it for what I did to you.”
My throat tightened at the raw honesty in his voice.
“No one deserves this, Brody,” I said softly. “Not even you.”
He tightened his arm fractionally around me, as if my words had touched something vulnerable. “That might be the nicest thing you’ve said to me since arriving in the Ridge.”
The gentle teasing broke some of the tension, and I found myself smiling despite everything. “Don’t get used to it.”
His free hand came up, hesitated, then gently tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. The touch was featherlight, almost reverent, and sent electricity cascading down my spine. I should have pulled away. Instead, I found myself leaning into the contact ever so slightly.
“Your hair,” he murmured, his voice rough with emotion. “Since Kenya, I’ve dreamed about touching it.”
The confession, so simple yet so intimate, made my heart stutter in my chest. For years, I’d told myself he’d forgotten me entirely, moved on without a backward glance. The thought that he’d carried memories of me through all those years hit me with unexpected force.
We lay in silence for several moments, the moonlight painting silver patterns across the bed. Against my better judgment, I remained where I was, telling myself this was just biology, just chemicals and hormones and nothing that could break me if I lost it again.
His fingers traced idle patterns on my shoulder. His left hand, the one not holding me, rested on his stomach near mine. Even in the dim light, I could see the subtle tremor running through it, the fingers twitching with involuntary movements.
Without conscious thought, I moved my hand to cover his, my fingers wrapping around his larger ones. The trembling continued for a moment, then gradually stilled beneath my touch.
“The mate bond’s proximity effect is already stabilizing your symptoms,” I observed aloud.
“Yes,” he agreed simply, no triumph in his voice, just acknowledgment of the biological reality.
The implications terrified me. If my mere touch could calm his tremors, what might full acceptance of the mate bond do?
The data point confirmed everything I’d theorized about mate ties and neural stabilization, yet this wasn’t a clinical trial with an anonymous subject. This was Brody. This was us.
“It scares you,” he said, not a question but a statement of fact.
“Yes.” I saw no point in denying the obvious.
“Me too,” he admitted, surprising me. “Not the symptoms or what’s happening to me. The idea that after years of thinking I was protecting you by staying away, it turns out I was wrong. That all this time…”
His fingers tentatively interlaced with mine where our hands met, the simple gesture more intimate than our naked encounter in the pool had been.
Skin against skin, palm to palm, our hands fitting together as perfectly as they had when we were eighteen.
I should have pulled away. Instead, I found myself tightening my grip ever so slightly.
“Do you ever wonder,” he asked, his voice barely audible, “What might have happened if I hadn’t walked away that day?”
The question was heavy with all the might-have-been.