Page 17

U gh, this stubborn man. He gets me all excited for a surprise. Then he tells me it's going to take about three hours to get here, but after multiple stops, it was much closer to four hours. Now I'm stuck in the car until he's finished loading things into the tiny bed of the side-by-side.

He finally makes his way back to my door, popping it open and holding out his hand for me to take, pulling me out of my seat and into his arms, and setting me on my feet, my feet crunching in the light layer of snow.

The SUV's tinted windows were definitely muting the gorgeous sky. It looks like someone used cotton candy to watercolor the clouds, and I've never seen a more beautiful sunset. The trees of the forest, dusted with the fresh glittery snow, all framing the sky, it’s…it's like something out of a movie, and I still can't believe this is real life. Ever since I met this man, so much of my life has felt like a fever-dream. The good and bad kind, but today is about the good.

When he's let me have my fill of the view, he pulls my mother's camera from behind his back and hands it to me. “I figured you'd want to snap some shots while we're here. I remember how much you loved it.” He smiles down at me, and I always worry that one of the times he makes my heart stop dead in its tracks, it won't be able to restart.

My eyes crinkle with what probably looks like a borderline psychotic smile, but I can't contain how happy I am that he thinks of these things. It tells me that he really sees me. Not just the mate bond. Not the fact that I'm the reincarnation of someone else. He sees Leera. Just Leera.

I choke out a small, “Thank you,” and gently accept my mother's camera from his outstretched hand, immediately rushing to capture the perfect colors of the sunset before they continue to darken and fade altogether. When I've taken a bajillion pictures, I secure the strap around my neck, still cradling the camera with one hand. I find Roman leaning against a tree, and it takes serious conscious effort not to drool at the sight of him. He's dangerously handsome every day, but the way he's leaning against that tree right now looks downright sinful.

He has on black shoes that look like a pair of tennis shoes and a pair of hiking boots had a baby. His pants trailing up his thick, muscular legs are tighter than usual denim and almost look to have a gray hue to them, with a few worn areas and small rips struggling to contain his quads. Under his lightly fur-lined gray suede jacket is a tight white Henley t-shirt with the button undone. He styled his hair, gently pushing it out of his face but in that simply stunning kind of tousled way men do. He has one leg on the ground and one on the tree he's leaning on. While he's distracted by whatever he's thinking, I allow myself a moment to capture a few shots of him.

I suddenly want to climb him…like the poor unsuspecting tree he's leaning against. He finally catches me gawking at him, but before he can say anything, I crook my finger at my hunky hockey playing werewolf.

A smile full of mischief and love lights up his entire face. “You beckoned, Your Majesty,” he purrs, and my body shouldn't enjoy the way he says that.

When he's within reach, using my free hand, I latch onto his shirt and pull him into me so that I can kiss him. Cutting the kiss short so we don't get swept away, I rest my forehead against his and whisper a breathy, “I love you.”

He growls and holds my face in his hands, raising his chin to kiss me on the forehead where it was touching his. “I love you, too.”

“Thank you for such a sweet surprise,” I sigh as I melt into him, and he laughs so hard it shakes my whole body. “What, pray tell, is so funny about me thanking you?” I huff.

His smile somehow widens even further as he leads me to the side-by-side. “That wasn't even part of your surprise. We're headed there now,” he finishes as he lifts me into my seat and fastens my safety belt.

I wrack my brain for what he could possibly have planned but come up blank as he plops into the seat beside mine, foregoing his own safety belt, I notice. He starts the motor, and the rumbling below me does not help the already slowly rising burn in my core.

We've been lightly bouncing through the woods for a few minutes now, and I'm just about to ask him where we're going when I see unnatural lights up ahead. As we get closer, I see twinkle lights, just like the ones from the rooftop, strewn between and around the trees. When he parks the side-by-side, he smiles over at me before dashing out of the vehicle to unbuckle me and show me what he's put together.

As we approach the sight before us, I gasp, and tears immediately fill my eyes. They are…just wow…it’s not just some random twinkle lights strung along the trees; he has wrapped trees and spread the lights between them, in two lines, creating a twinkle-light-lit path through the forest. But wait, there's more, folks. “R-Roman, what is that?” I ask, staring at the forest floor of the path.

“Ice,” he beams at me in the glow of the tiny lights.

“I know it snowed a little, but why is there a trail of ice on the forest floor surrounded by twinkle lights?”

“Well.” He kicks at the snow by his feet, looking suddenly unsure of himself. “I thought it would be fun to take you ice skating, but I wanted it to be more magical…like you.” He shrugs like it's no big deal, and there's a light blush on his cheeks that I wouldn't be able to see without my wolf's vision upgrade I received.

Another gasp escapes me, ending in a choked sobbing sound as the tears that were welling in my eyes begin to fall. “This is the sweetest thing anyone has ever done for me,” I praise him, flinging myself into his arms. “It's perfect,” I breathe into his chest as his strong arms hold me in place.

When I've listened to our hearts nearly beating in sync for a few moments, I pull back, wiping away any running makeup below my eyes and laughing up at him. “I'm going to have to stick to waterproof makeup with you, aren't I?”

“Only as long as they're happy tears,” he answers all too seriously.

Flipping the cap off the lens and bringing the camera to my face, I focus the dial and take an ungodly number of pictures of this beautiful surprise. I want to make sure I never forget a single detail. When I lower the camera, Roman takes that as his cue to bring me a brand-new pair of ice skates. They're not the big and bulky ones the hockey players wear. They're the petite and beautiful skates that figure skaters wear. Where those are usually white or black, these are the lightest, softest pink.

This man.

“Will you help me put them on and lace them up? Well, and teach me, I've never ice skated before.”

“Of course.”

He lowers me onto the log that I'm sure he thought to set here just for this reason, then kneels before me and removes my tennis shoes. He sets my shoes to the side and pulls the first skate onto my foot, lifting the leg warmers out of the way as he tightly laces it. He explained how it's important to lace them all the way to the top, securing them completely as they support your ankles on the thin blades, then repeated the motions on my other foot. He then pulls his skates out of thin air and turns to sit on the log beside me, performing the same steps much quicker as he's obviously used to handling his own skates.

He pops onto his feet and skate-walks our shoes over to the side-by-side adding them to a small pile of stuff in the little bed. That must have been where he had the skates on the way in. I wonder what else he has back there. When he returns to me, his hand extends to me, but there's…almost worry…in his features when he asks, “Do you trust me?”

Undoubtedly, I think, but “Yes” is all that I can get out on a breath with him looking at me like that. I lift my hand into his, and he pulls me to my feet. I begin to wobble on the thin blades of the skates, but his arm winds around my waist and steadies me completely.

“Just take your steps nice and slow,” he instructs when he begins to lead me the only half-a-dozen steps to the icy forest-floor path.

“Okay, I made it, now what?” I smile up at him, the lights brightening the forest around us.

“When you move on the ice, you don't step the way you do regularly. As you set your foot down on the ice, you'll extend that step, gliding yourself into the next step. Does that make sense?” he asks with a kindness and patience you wouldn't expect from a werewolf in the stories of our childhood.

I nod and try to mentally picture the way the men all move on the ice, but in slower motions. Imagining the instruction he gave me in my mind so I can tell my body to do that and hope that I don't land on my ass. A small giggle escapes. “Okay, Big Guy, I'm ready…Don't let me fall.”

“Never,” he instantly responds, all serious again as he prepares for me to step on the ice.

Here goes nothing.