Page 37

THORIN

“ I want to drive,” Aurelia announces when we finish topping off the snowmobiles with the gas cans.

She’s bundled from head to toe in gear to protect her from the cold and hide her identity. Thanks to the balaclava, there isn’t so much as a single golden curl visible, but it doesn’t help untwist the knot in my stomach. The only part of her visible to us is her brown eyes, but even Aurelia has been careful to keep her thoughts guarded. She knows we’re watching and waiting to see if she’s playing us.

God, what the hell are we doing?

We knew she was working Seth, but maybe she’s working us too. One look at the devastation on her face this morning, and I knew I’d give whatever to make sure I never saw it there again.

We’re at the base of our mountain, preparing for the fifty-mile journey to the small town of Hearth, and it’s all I can do not to drag her ass back to our cabin and tie her to my bed. I don’t care what happens to me if we get caught, but Aurelia being taken away from us…I’ll die before I let that happen.

Khalil crooks his finger since his ride is the only one equipped for two passengers, and Aurelia walks over to stand next to him.

“Do you know how to drive one of these?”

“No.” She chews on her bottom lip while we wait for her to confess whatever she obviously doesn’t want us to know. “I don’t know how to drive anything. I don’t even have my license.”

Khalil is the only one of us who grew up in a stable, loving home, so his brows shoot up in surprise. “Your uncle never taught you how to drive?”

“That would be a no.”

Clenching my teeth to keep my thoughts to myself, I silently watch Khalil give her a quick tutorial. “Throttle. Brake. Never press them both at the same time. When turning, shift your body in the direction you want the bike to go. Keep your feet on the running boards at all times. In the event you fall off, this clip will disable the ignition,” he says as he fastens the cord and clip attached to the key to her belt loop.

As I’ve been doing regularly since she dressed in a pair of my Ski Bibs for the trip to town, my gaze travels to Aurelia’s plump ass while her back is turned to me, and I feel most of my anger melting away as I imagine making her ride me in reverse later.

“That’s it?” she asks.

“Pretty much. Hop on.” Khalil slides a yellow helmet over her head since she isn’t wearing the mask right now before sliding a red one over his own. He then scoots back into the second seat, and Aurelia takes the driver’s seat. I watch her gloved hands nervously curl around the handles, and then our eyes meet through the open visor of her helmet.

“Stay behind and don’t stray.”

Once she nods, I look to my right at Seth, who is already straddling his Ski-Doo and wearing his green helmet. Our gazes meet, and he jerks his chin, silently acknowledging my unspoken order.

Only then do I slide my blue helmet on with a heavy exhale.

This isn’t just a huge mistake. It’s a necessary one on all counts. We get to show Aurelia that we’re willing to trust her. And she gets to prove to us that we can.

I turn the key in the ignition and take off without warning. If I don’t now, I never will. I’ve realized it’s much easier to keep Aurelia prisoner and deal with her hate than make her want to stay and hope we’ll be enough.

One makes me a coward, and the other…

I’m not sure what the other makes me, but I’m not so selfish that I can completely disregard a possible future in which Aurelia is happy, too.

One glance over my shoulder shows her keeping up. Seth is hot on her tail, and while I can’t see Aurelia’s face, instinctively, I know she’s smiling.

We’re halfway through the valley when I decide she’s got the hang of it, so I pick up a little speed. Moments later, I hear her voice through the speakers.

“Whooooo! This is amazing!”

“That’s okay,” Seth deadpans. I can hear the smile in his voice. “I didn’t need eardrums.”

“Oh, shit!” Aurelia screeches even louder, making the three of us groan. “You can hear me?”

“Bluetooth, baby. We can all hear you,” Khalil answers.

“Thorin, go faster!” Aurelia immediately demands.

“You sure you’re ready for that?” Instead of an answer, I hear her engine accelerate. Aurelia breaks formation and speeds past me with Khalil holding on for dear life and Seth cheering her on. “You don’t even know where you’re going!” I shout when I recover from my shock.

“Then you better keep up!”

I feel a grin split my face at the same time I hit the throttle. The four of us race across the frozen valley. Aurelia’s got all of that deadweight—aka Khalil—slowing her down, so I barely have to max out my speed to catch up to her. Seth is not far behind, but I can tell he’s not really trying for some reason.

I don’t give it much thought as I continue to gain on Aurelia. I’m still inching closer when Khalil suddenly twists in the rear seat and throws something. Whatever it is, I barely have time to duck the missile before it can hit me between the eyes. Instead, the orange sails over my shoulder and bounces off my snowmobile’s reflector, cracks it , and then hits the ground.

“Why the fuck are you throwing shit at me?” I bark.

“Mario Kart, asshole!” Khalil throws another fucking orange.

It finds its mark this time, hitting my right shoulder so hard that I lose my grip on the accelerator and some of my speed. Growling, I press on the gas to catch up again, dodging all the over-ripened oranges that Khalil just happened to bring with him.

I’m starting to suspect this race was their plan all along—Aurelia’s, Khalil’s, and maybe Seth’s, too. They probably plotted to fuck with me, knowing I have a competitive nature.

Khalil finally runs out of oranges about five hundred feet away from the forest line that marks the end of the valley, so I decide to make my move, shifting to the left side of Aurelia’s Ski-Doo and increasing my speed. Despite Khalil’s frustrated encouragement, Aurelia is still too nervous to max out her speed, so I’m confident I have the easy win in the bag.

My front bumper is inching closer to Aurelia’s rear when something slams into me from the right side. I swear viciously, feeling like my brain is bouncing around in my skull as I veer off track and lose speed as quickly as I’d gained it. Aurelia bursts forward, but I’m too busy reaching for the gun on my hip to worry about the race. When I aim in the direction of the impact, I expect to find a hungry bear staring down my sights—nothing else could have hit me with that much force—but all I see is a maniac.

I can’t see his face, but I know he’s proud of himself.

“Seth, what the hell?” I bark.

“Team Sunshine, bitch!” To Aurelia, he shouts, “Go, baby, go!”

Fucking pussy-whipped purse-holding traitors.

Aurelia hits the throttle and soars across the finish line while Seth flips me off and follows her. Khalil is cheering the loudest as the three of them stop near the gap in the tree line to celebrate with their cheating asses. I hear Aurelia giggling through the Bluetooth as Khalil and Seth hi-five each other over their stolen win.

I’m purposely quiet as I take my time catching up.

They can’t see the grin I’m wearing or feel the way my heart is aching at the picture laid out before me. I can’t recall the last time I saw my brothers this carefree and alive. And Aurelia…she’s in rare form today too—open, unresistant, and laughing—and I wonder if we’re being gifted a glimpse of what could be or taunted with a fool’s dream.

One perfect girl for three very different men.

Aurelia, Seth, and Khalil don’t have a clue what I’m feeling, so the three of them are quiet and guarded by the time I cruise across the finish line to join them. And I don’t feel the least bit bad about it. Pretending to ruin the mood is my petty revenge for being teamed up on.

Cutting the engine, I school my expression before removing my helmet, and Aurelia does the same. She’s still beaming and beautifully flushed from the thrill of the race, but when she notices me watching, her smile dims a little, and she lifts her chin in a clear challenge. “Well?”

I just barely hold back my grin. “Well, what?”

“Are you going to be a sore loser, Thorin Thayer?”

Leaning forward to rest my forearms on the handlebars, I hear Khalil and Seth snickering and give them unimpressed looks before meeting Aurelia’s gaze once more. “Of course not, my wolf. Congratulations on your victory.”

Aurelia looks gut punched before she looks away. We both know I’m not talking about the race.

Aurelia’s got us wrapped around her finger, and not one of us is interested in untangling ourselves. It’s only Aurelia who seems to shut down whenever we bring up the fact that she obviously feels something more than just reluctant lust for us.

She agreed to stay and give us everything, including her heart, yet…she’s not.

Not yet, at least.

I tell myself I can be patient. We haven’t had the best start after all. We haven’t earned her trust yet. But even after all my Marine training, patience has never been a virtue of mine. I want to possess every inch of this woman—her darkest desires, voluptuous body, rare smiles, teeth and wit, and soul…however it comes.

She stares toward the trail leading to Hearth when she asks, “So, are we hiking the rest of the way?”

“Fuck no,” Khalil grumbles after popping off his helmet. “We wouldn’t reach town until well after nightfall, and then we’ll be too tired to show you around.”

I cut Khalil a sharp look, which he pointedly ignores.

Aurelia keeps her expression perfectly sedate, leaving us to wonder if she’s calculating the distance between the valley and Hearth. There’s an odometer on the snowmobile, so if she pays attention, she’ll know exactly how close the town is soon enough.

Suddenly, the hidden cloth I’d brought—the one I hoped I wouldn’t need—is burning a hole in my pocket.

We’re pretty remote out here, but not so much that we’re completely cut off from civilization. The townspeople of Hearth are just all too happy to ignore our presence since they’re used to these mountains being uninhabited anyway. Sheriff Kelly visits occasionally, but even he knows we want to be left alone, so he keeps his visits to a minimum. It was hard dodging his many questions when he first discovered us hiding out here, and for a while, we were subjected to his overbearing scrutiny. But then we proved useful when we helped him find some missing honeymooners a few years ago. The sheriff’s been our only link to the main world ever since.

“We’ll ride the Ski-Doos down to the main road where our truck is waiting,” Seth informs her.

“Oh. Okay.”

“Aurelia,” I call as I swing my leg over the snowmobile and stand. The hard snow crunches under my boots as I walk the short distance over to her.

“Yes?” Her head swings my way, and she frowns when I remove her green and brown gingham headband from my pocket. At night, she uses it to tie her hair up, so it was easy to find on my nightstand.

“I’ll need to blindfold you, baby.”

Her entire body tenses. “Why?”

“You know why.” Aurelia’s pouty mouth opens to argue, but I beat her to it. “Your chance to prove we can trust you will come once we reach town. Until then, we’re not taking any chances.”

Her lips snap closed, and she glowers at me. I can tell she has an attitude but doesn’t fight me as I step forward to cover her pretty, brown eyes. Once the headband is tied behind her head, I lean down to brush her lips with mine to soften her a little, but she doesn’t kiss me back. She turns away from my touch while her chest heaves from her heavy breaths, and I imagine if she were a dragon, smoke would be expelled from her flaring nostrils. She might even turn me into a pile of ash if she could, and I don’t blame her.

I shake off the sting of her rejection as I help her stand from the snowmobile so that Khalil can take her place in the driver’s seat, but I’m still thinking about it the entire way down to the main road.