Page 52 of Stubborn as a Shadow

“I’m totally going to be watching your butt,” he said. “Just so you know.”

I stared at him for a second, not sure what to say. He shot me an exaggerated wink. Okay then. I was going to pretend that hadn’t happened.

The nearest cabin was small, but it appeared okay. The roof didn’t have any obvious holes, and the windows weren’t broken. What more could we want, right? At least we should be dry and protected from the wind and the snow. And if it had a fireplace and wood, we’d be golden.

Well, with one little exception. I’d need to find something to amuse Morgan too. From all his flirty comments, grins, and batting eyelashes, I could guess how he might like to pass the time. But that was risky.

Way, way, way too risky.

Because if we were fated mates…

I let out a shaky breath at the idea of him, a being of light and color, mated to a dreary shadow like me. But it was looking more possible by the moment, particularly when every second we spent together heightened my attachment to him.

I swallowed hard.

I had to save him. From the hunters. From that wolf who’d been sniffing around after him. And especially from me.

He deserved so much better than to be saddled with me as a mate. So we couldnotdo anything physical together. Naked, sweaty activities that would tell me if he tasted as sweet as he smelled werenothappening. We would remain fully clothed. We would do other things, platonic things like…

My mind blanked.

Damn it. What was I going to do? Alone? With Morgan?

I was so fucked.

19

RABID RACCOONS AND SPIT RAGS

MORGAN

When we arrived at the door of the nearest cabin, Nelson didn’t whip out a lock-picking kit or break a window. He was clearly a more sophisticated kind of break and enter artist. He shifted into his super cool, fog-like shadow under the faint glow of a row of weak exterior solar lights instead.

I’d seen his shadow a few times now, but it still amazed me. Then I watched, mesmerized, as he slipped through the keyhole into the cabin. He must have switched back to his human form as soon as he was inside, because the lock turned, the door swung open, and he was waiting there for me.

And just like that, we were inside.

“Neat trick,” I said as I kicked snow off my shoes before I entered.

Having that kind of magic would come in handy. It was so much more useful than my own magic. I mean, making rainbows when you laughed wasn’t exactly a sought-after or overly marketable skill set.

Could you even call it a skill when it was just biological? Probably not.

My horn was a little more useful, since I could use it to gore people. I hadn’t tested that theory, but it seemed possible. Although I did think I’d enjoy sticking something long and hard into Nelson, but it wouldn’t be with the horn on the top of my head.

Oh, this would make a brilliant Reddit. I could already picture the title: “How do I tell if the mysterious biker (35M) who just saved me (26M) is into me?” Nelson said he was older than he appeared, which I took to mean over a hundred. But I couldn’t exactly use that—it’d make people think I had a weird geriatric fetish, and they’d fixate on that instead of the important things. So thirty-five was close enough.

Hmm... Did using the word “biker” give the impression that Nelson was a burly man with tats and a grizzly beard?

Maybe I should go with: “I (26M) am super-duper attracted to a guy (35M) who saved me from a bad situation. Should I make the first move?” Nah, if I posted that, a bunch of people would say I had some kind of white knight crush or whatever. But he wasn’t my white knight. He was my magical sidekick.

Huh, maybe it wouldn’t make a great Reddit.

I bent down to tug at the laces on my shoes. It took longer than it should have to undo the ice-caked laces with my numb fingers, but I managed to kick them off eventually. I wiggled my toes. They all felt okay, so I didn’t think they’d turn black and fall off. Hurrah.

I grabbed a pair of abandoned slippers by the door and jammed my feet into them. That was better. I wasn’t ready to give up my… or rather, Nelson’s… jacket yet, but if I could find a blanket in here, I could be convinced.

“Do you want to look in the cupboards while I make a fire?” Nelson said from where he was kneeling in front of the fireplace.“See if there is any food? I know we ate supper already, but we should know what we’re dealing with in case we’re here for a few days.” Then he glanced at the screen on his phone. “Or do you want to sleep first? It’s late. Yeah, why don’t you go and see if there are extra blankets in the bedroom?” He nodded toward the door on the far wall. “If there are, grab me a few, and I’ll sleep out here on the couch. Unless you want to sleep out here with the fire. Yeah. That probably makes more sense. We should pull the bed out here for you, so it’s closer to the heat.”