ROMANCE: BIKER ROMANCE: Werewolf Rider (MC Shifter Pregnancy Romance) (New Adult Paranormal Romance Short Stories) (15 page)

After undoing the helmet, Azalea accepted his hand in getting off. Her feet didn’t quite reach the ground and she was not too keen on how graceful she may have been attempting to dismount on her own. As it was, Luke had to reach in to almost lift her off the seat. She may have gotten really well acquainted with the ground otherwise.

“Follow me,” Luke set off towards one of the trails that ran along the edge of the canyon.

Azalea had been to Butte Creek Canyon a few times before as a child, but her memories paled in comparison to how beautiful the landscape looked in person. Trees, several stories tall, blanketed the countryside, shades of green and yellow decorated the countryside. The open air allowed for the breeze to circulate, allowing for a little relief from the summer heat.

Azalea and Luke walked along the trail in silence for a few minutes, just enjoying the landscape and fresh air until Luke seized Azalea’s hand and veered off the path into the forest.

“Is this where the serial killer part happens?” she teased, only half joking. Her stomach knotted up with anticipation and butterflies. Instinctively she knew she was fine, the alarm bells weren’t going off and she was so hyped up being out in nature for the first time in ages, she just wanted to enjoy it.

“Ha ha, funny girl. This is a shortcut to what I wanted to do today,” he turned back and flashed a heart-stopping smile at her, distracting her long enough to stumble over a tree root, “Whoa!” She had pulled Luke down to the ground with her.

Mud caked the knees of her jeans and she cradled her right arm, the one she was being led by; she had wrenched her shoulder on the way down. Luke landed on his ass, completely uninjured, and was quickly back on his feet, “You okay?” he knelt down beside Azalea.

The slightest movement brought tears to Azalea’s eyes and made her wince, “I think I may have dislocated my shoulder,” she gently probed the affected area to discover that indeed the shoulder was out of joint, “It happens sometimes if I’m not careful… The remnants of an old volleyball injury,” she shrugged her good shoulder. It had been months since the last time this happened. She recovered quickly, but it didn’t make the feeling suck any less.

“Stay still. I’m going to put your joint back in place, okay?” gently Luke laid his hands on Azalea’s arm and shoulder to feel for where the socket was, “This is not going to feel good. You want my belt to bite down on?”

“Nope. I’m an old pro, just get it over with,” she squeezed her eyes shut and turned her head.

Luke adjusted her arm into position, “On the count of three. Ready? One… two… three,” he popped her arm back into place.

Azalea screamed through her teeth. The initial wedging of the joint back in to socket hurt like hell, but the pain quickly subsided and she could breathe again.

“Thank you.”

“Maybe we should go back. You really need to rest that arm.”

“No. Let’s keep going. I’ll be fine. This arm has given me nothing but problems since the tenth grade anyway, I’m not gonna let it slow me down. I just need to wear a sling for an hour or so, so it doesn’t dislocate again.”

Luke peeled his shirt off over his head and fashioned a make shift sling around her neck.

Azalea’s breath hitched as he touched the sensitive skin around her neck. Luke looked like he didn’t have an ounce of fat on him. Her eyes explored over the planes of his chest. Luke was not overly hairy, but he did have fair amount of light brown hair covering his chest and arms. In a moment of what she deemed as lapsed sanity, she stroked her hand over his forearm, indulging in the contrast of the soft hair and the solid muscle.

Luke went totally still, like a deer in a hunter’s sight, and just watched. Her touch was feather light, almost as if she was wary about making contact.  What was surprising was how Luke felt his stomach flip. He chose her, but something in the back of his mind made him think maybe there was some type of design he wasn’t aware of in making that choice.

“C’mon, kid,” he kissed her cheek. Just a chaste expression of comfort, nothing more, “We’re about half a mile from our destination. Stick close,” he helped Azalea to her feet and guided her to his left side to protect her injured shoulder.

His senses were on high alert. Her falling normally would have been no big deal, but Luke wasn’t exactly the most well liked of individuals and having someone injured with him may prove a liability. There were so many people from his community gathered in the paradise area that had expressed ill feelings toward him in the past that it was likely some of them had made their way over to the canyon for a run. Most of them wait for the cover of darkness to make their mischief, but it never hurt to be wary anyway.

“So tell me about yourself. We still have time to kill,” Azalea was gazing up at him patiently waiting for a response.

“There isn’t much to tell,” Luke shrugged, “I have lived my entire life in Chico and the surrounding areas. I went to San Francisco for a couple of years in my early twenties with my band and when that didn’t pan out, I came back and became a welder.”

“What kind of music did you play?”

“Really bad heavy metal. We wanted so badly to be Judas Priest, but none of us had any actual talent,” he laughed, “A heckler heaved a beer bottle full of piss at my head and screamed that I couldn’t sing. Five stitches and a bender later, I finally believed him.”

“Gross. So you were the singer then?”

“Sing is really too strong a word for what I did. I would politely describe it as a midnight tomcat serenade.”

Azalea giggled. Her laugh was so sweet, Luke thought he would do anything to keep hearing it, “What about you? Outside of volleyball what is there to know about Azalea Armstrong?”

“Well, I don’t play volleyball anymore. Apparently you really need grace and coordination to play the sport and those are two skills I seem to have in short supply as you can see,” she pointed to her shoulder.

“I’m only here for the summer. I grew up in Paradise, but I go to college at Arizona State. I’m finishing up my Bachelor’s in Animal Sciences. I’m getting ready to apply for med school to become a vet. I want to work with big cats,”

How appropriate.
Luke thought, “Ambitious. I like it. It’s a good field to get into.”

Azalea appreciated that he didn’t say he was impressed or looked at her surprised when she explained her chosen career path. Too many people in Paradise and even in Arizona always look shocked when she would tell them she wanted to be a doctor and not a dental assistant or a teacher. His tone conveyed respect as opposed to skepticism, which was refreshing.

“Why big cats?”

“Excuse me?” she was still lost in thought.

“Why big cats? You’ve chosen such a specialized field, I was curious as to why.”

“I find them fascinating. Every summer we would road trip down to Lancaster to visit my grandparents. I would drive them crazy when we would get there to go to the sanctuary in Rosamond at least once a week.

I would spend hours talking to the handlers and vets about the animals – mind you I was ten at the time – and I wanted to know everything I could. That summer they had gotten in a rescue named Teddy, a cougar, and he became my favorite. He was sleek and powerful, everything about him came off as being Mr. Cool. I was so sad when he died a few years ago.”

Luke was giddy inside. He couldn’t believe his luck. He stared at this woman he just thought was intensely beautiful with her bright green eyes and breathtaking curves. Fate, heavenly design, whatever you want to call it, put him in the path of this woman. There was no way he was letting his perfect mate go.

“We’re here,” Luke announced. The falls stretched out before them, the river it fed snaked through the landscape, parting the trees, demanding its space to run before turning a corner and disappearing.

“Come with me,” Luke guided Azalea to the grotto under the falls, “Mind the rocks,” the ground was slippery with algae beneath her flip-flops.

Luke sat on a boulder and removed his boots and socks. As he stood to undo his jeans Azalea stopped him, “Are we going swimming? Is that even allowed here?” Luke was dangerously close to being naked, a thought that both enticed and freaked Azalea out. She had to stall.

“Technically, no we aren’t supposed to go swimming, but does that matter? No one else is here. It’s just you and me. You
can
swim, right?”

The two of us alone, that’s what’s freaking me out!
“Yes, but I don’t have my bathing suit,” suddenly gripped by modesty, she became concerned by what he would think if he saw her without any clothes on. All of her goddamn summer camp and gym class insecurities came back and flooded her system. She hadn’t ever had sex with the lights on and now her date for the afternoon was all gung ho about skinny-dipping.

“Neither do I,” Luke’s eyes twinkled with mischief and mirth. He turned his back to Azalea and dropped his clothes.

Azalea choked and became more than a little turned on at the sight of his bare body. His naked torso was simply the sneak preview; she just got an eyeful of the entire fucking feature presentation.

“Last one in is a ‘fraidy cat” Luke teased and dove in. His broke the surface of the water a moment later with a whoop and a shake of his head, “That’s cold, whoa,” he wiped his face and blinked the water from his eyes, “Get in!”

Azalea hesitated, but the sight of Luke naked in the clear spring was too tempting to pass on. She kicked off her flip-flops, tossed her makeshift sling to the side, and quickly shed her clothes down to her white cotton bra and underwear. She crossed her arms over her stomach, to cover herself and dipped a toe in.

The shock of the chill shot up her leg through the rest of her body, “You’re nuts! The water is freezing!”

Luke disappeared under the surface again for a moment and quickly materialized in front of her, “What did I tell you about hiding in front of me?” The water near her feet was the shallowest, maybe three feet deep, allowing Luke to get close and grab Azalea around the waist, playfully tossed her in the water.

Azalea squealed as she soared through the air and landed a few feet away ass first into the water.

The chill momentarily stunned her, taking her breath away. Her head came out of the water, “You shit!” she scanned the area and found Luke treading water a few yards away, laughing his head off. She dipped beneath the water and kick paddled her way over to him. Not quite trusting her arm, she relied on her legs to do the work.

Coming up in front of him she splashed water in his face with her good arm, “You jerk!” she said playfully before laying on her back and kicking up a powerful spray of water in his face before taking off.

Luke chased after her and the two spent the afternoon swimming and playing in the creek, just enjoying each other’s company and the warmth of the Northern California summer.

The sun had sunk low, casting the sky in shades of pink and orange. Rays of light bounced off of the water’s surface around Azalea causing it to sparkle and twinkle, drawing Luke’s attention to the warm coloring of her skin. His eyes traced along the wet tendrils of Azalea’s hair. She reminded him of the water nymphs of Greek legend, enamoring and mysterious, she drew him in to her by just existing.

“What?” Azalea asked, “Do I have something on my face? Is there a bug?” she stopped talking, Luke’s staring unsettled her, “What?”

Luke allowed impulse to take over as he closed the space between them and bent down to kiss her.

Azalea stiffened in surprise and then allowed her body to respond. The kiss started gentle, testing the connection between them, but the softness of his lips and the scratch of his stubble brought her body to attention. She had felt something pass in the air between them last night and for sure this afternoon. It was dangerous, yes, but in the way that her vow to swear off men had been put in jeopardy, and maybe her heart as well.

Luke buried his hands in the hair at the nape of her neck, drawing her in and deepening the kiss. The gentle exploration was fading and was being replaced by lust and possession.

Pressing closer, Azalea allowed that possession to happen. Luke was not her type at all, maybe that was a good thing since her type hadn’t worked out so far, but her response to him was stronger than to any other man she had been with.

The softness of her body pressed against him quickly stirred Luke’s arousal. His tongue brushed over hers, stroking and teasing a response from her mouth.

She sighed and wrapped her arms around his waist, running her hands over the damp hills and valleys of his back. Feeling bolder, she drew her nails gently down his skin, “Jesus, that feels good,” he purred.

Luke’s hands drifted down her neck and over her chest to cup her breasts. Her nipples strained against the soaking white fabric, begging for his touch. He ran his thumbs over the sensitive flesh. Azalea moaned and dropped her head back allowing Luke to taste her neck. The kisses and nibbles drove her crazy, almost to the point of losing her control.

“Excuse me! There are children in the park. Take your shenanigans elsewhere!” a tourist and his family had stumbled on the scene in the water. A woman – presumably the mother – was covering the eyes of two children and a very angry bald man stood on the bank with his arms crossed over his polo-clad chest.

“Sorry, sir!” Azalea called out. She and Luke swam back to the grotto to dress. Being caught had knocked all of the excitement out of their almost rendezvous. She felt a little bit ashamed of herself for letting things go as far as they had.