“Could be.” Her fire was adequately built, but she hadn’t left enough room for the air to flow around the bigger pieces of wood—probably because she was used to campfires, and within the stove’s iron firebox, there was less room and a lot less oxygen than in an open-air fire. Baz used one of the sticks to poke the pieces of wood farther apart, then added some birch bark and smaller bits of kindling, and blew on it.
Moments later, the fire was crackling merrily. He closed the stove’s front door and fastened the iron latch that held it shut. Through the open grate in the door, flames danced cheerily and cast their golden flicker across the room.
“My hero,” Arden declared.
Baz fanned the front door a few times to try to get more of the smoke out before closing it. “Do you have an opening window?”
Arden shook her head. “That would be nice. This is pretty rudimentary.”
No fire escape window, Baz noted; this cabin was built before fire safety standards. And the bunk was at the back. “You shouldn’t sleep in here with a fire in the stove, not if you don’t have a way to get out. It isn’t safe.”
“I hadn’t thought about that. This is the first time I’ve made a fire in the stove.” Arden held her hands out to it.
Other than the stove snafu, his fears of Arden huddling in a soggy sleeping bag surrounded by drips like an inhabitant of a cartoon hovel turned out to be unfounded. The cabin seemed very snug and tight. It wasn’t even leaking as much as his place. In fact, he saw no drips anywhere.
Since he had last seen it, Arden had made the cabin into more of a home. She’d placed some colorful pieces of pottery on the windowsill, with a bouquet in one of them, and she had set a chair beside the bunk to serve as a sort of bedside table, holding a couple of books and personal items like a toothbrush cup. A bra was hanging from the chair back. Baz hastily averted his eyes.
“Sorry,” Arden said, blushing a little. She of course had noticed the quick dodge, and she hastily took down the bra and stuffed it into the top of her pack. “I wasn’t expecting company.”
“It’s not your fault I dropped by unannounced.”
“Well, your timing couldn’t be better. Thank you for the help.” Holding out her hands to the stove again, she took in Baz’sbedraggled condition for the first time. He had no idea what he looked like, but he could feel water dripping into his eyes from the ends of his hair. “Uh .... Baz, do you want to use my towel?”
“I’d love a towel. Sure.”
She took down a towel that had been draped to dry over the top pole of her bunk, and it was only as Baz put it over his head that he was suddenly hit with two things.
Thing one: Arden’s strong female scent.
Thing two: the realization that she probably only had one towel, and no opportunity to launder it.
This towel, which was currently draped over his head, flooding his senses with warm female pheromones, had been rubbed all over her body in the not too distant past.
Over her breasts. Between her legs.
“Are you okay?” Arden’s voice asked, and Baz became aware that he had frozen in place with a towel over his head.
It was likely that humans couldn’t smell each other like this. Particularly humans who weren’t their mates. The towel also smelled like sunshine and grass. She had probably rinsed it in the creek and dried it outside and thought that it was clean enough.
It definitely was not. He didn’t mind. He also didn’t think he could move any part of his body below his waist without revealing a raging erection.
“Um .... fine,” Baz said, the speech centers of his brain lagging considerably behind the conversation. He scrubbed his hair, his senses still filled with the scent of Arden, clean and fresh, mixed with the smell of sun-dried towel.
Her legs. Her thighs. Her neck. Her ...
He froze again at the realization that every other shifter in his clan was going to be able to smell her on him.
“You’ve been under that towel for an awfully long time,” Arden said dubiously.
Baz jolted himself into motion, finished drying his hair, and let the towel slip down over his shoulders. “Uh, thanks. That was ...”
Horrendously, unexpectedly arousing. Will make the rest of this visit excruciating.
“—really a big help,” he said with a desperate grin.
“Um ... okay.” Arden held out a hand, and he returned her towel with a mix of relief and regret. With it went the smell of her sun-kissed skin, her hair, her thighs.
While she draped the towel over the chair back to dry, he took off his damp jacket with the intent of tying it around his waist to try to hide the evidence that had every chance of making her think he was a total perv.
