He blinked down at her without moving his arm.
“Gotta admit, that’s not the question I thought you would be asking.”
“Oh, it’s not the only one,” she promised him.
It would have been a nice lead-in to an actual question, but staring up into his eyes, there was nothing in her that wanted to question this at all. Instead of questioning, all Ros felt was a deep and soothing peace, something so sure and so solid that she could build a house on it, live a life, stake her world.
“Ros?”
“Do you want me?”
“Completely. Utterly.”
The tension between them cracked like whip, and the skin that Teagan touched felt suddenly electric, compelling and hot and simplynot enough.Nothing changed. He didn’t hold her tighter, he didn’t lean any closer than he already was, but she suddenly knew that a singleyesfrom her lips would start something that she couldn’t imagine stopping. He looked like he was a single yes away from giving them what they both wanted and pouncing on her, and that was the image that drew her back, that got her pulled out of his arms and put a few feet between them.
Ros’s body immediately protested, because as far as it was concerned, things had finally begun to go right, but she shook her head hard, pressing her hands against her eyes.
“Ros! Are you all right?”
Her eyes still covered, Ros nodded.
“Yes. I’m fine. It’s just... Well.”
“I turned from an eagle to a man in front of your eyes?”
“Yes. There are many questions about that. However, there’s also the fact that whenever we touch, my entire body saysyes, that,and everything else goes out the window. On one hand, it’s amazing. On the other hand, this is no way for me to get the answers that I need, dammit!”
Teagan laughed, and seriously, it wasn’t fair. The man had a laugh like whisky and honey, and she could feel him leaning in to press his lips against the crown of her head. It wasn’t a kiss, not really, but there was something so very gentle about it, so tender and so sweet, that she melted.
“Okay, well, I’ll keep my hands to myself, and how about we sit down?”
That sounded like a great idea, and Ros was even smart enough to go sit down at the kitchen table rather than on the couch.
“Okay,” she said when she was finally settled at the table. “What the heck?”
Teagan’s lips quirked at her words, a hint of mischief in his extraordinary eyes.
“That’s not a question.”
She jabbed a finger at him accusingly.
“There’s so much here that any question I can come up with would be woefully inadequate to get me up to speed.You start.”
“Fair enough. All right. I got up this morning, and I realized there were three birds missing from the flock. They don’t usually separate that much. They hunt together and sleep together, so I got worried that maybe they were hurt or something. I figured I could sneak out to see what was up, and the best way for me to do that was in my eagle form.
“I’m a shifter. My whole family is. More or less from birth, we have the ability to turn into eagles, more specifically, this extinct species called the Kolman’s eagle.”
“Is the moon involved?”
“No, we’re not werewolves. I know some wolf shifters, and they don’t really use the word werewolf either. Says it gives people the wrong idea.”
Ros laughed, cutting it off abruptly when she heard the slightly shrill sound and saw Teagan’s concerned expression.
“No, I’m sorry. That’s totally legit, people get to be called what they want to be called. So you’re a shifter, you turn into an extinct eagle like your whole family does, and wolf shifters also exist. Can you just do this whenever you want?”
“Yes.” A pause. “Do you want to see?”
“Absolutely. But, it doesn’t hurt you, does it? I mean, it’s not like there’s a limited number of times that you can change?’