Page 24 of Clubs

To his left, a little blonde girl sat. Blonde truly wasn’t the right descriptor. It was as white as the snow of the igloo above our heads. Her eyes, an icy shade of blue. She smiled at me, laughing, splashing hot water my way.

To my right sat another little girl. Her skin was darker than ours, a warm, golden brown. Her bouncy black curls were wound into a tight knot at the back of her head. She laughed and shoved my shoulder, and I shoved hers.

Then the memory was gone, and a hollowness stretched through my stomach.

It wasn’t a nostalgic type of hollowness, but a deep yearning. I missed them as deeply as I missed the mother who’d walked out on me in my current life. They weren’t just friends, but people I cared for with my whole being. Almost family.

And they were gone.

I wasn’t sure I wanted to see the part of the story that explained why or how that came to be.

Tugging off my boots, I shook my head at Drogo. “We found a spring like this when I was a girl. My friends and I, I mean. It was my favorite place in the world.”

He took my hand and helped me onto my ass, smiling when I hiked up my skirt to dip my legs inside. “And?”

“And what?”

“I think you owe me then.”

I got comfortable with my legs in the water and scoffed up at him. “And what am I supposed to owe you?”

Sitting beside me, he rolled up his pants and dipped his legs in as well. “An apology.”

Another scoff, this one paired with a smile. “Why would I be apologizing?”

“Not wanting to see my igloo. And then liking it anyway.”

Grabbing a fistful of his shirt, I yanked him into me and kissed him again. It was just as deep as that last one had been. So deep that he was panting by the time I pulled back.

I smirked. “That’s the closest you’re getting to an apology.”

Releasing a breathy laugh, face flushed, he brushed some hair behind my ear. “Suppose I’ll take it.”

“I suppose you don’t have much choice, do you?” Smiling, I pushed some hair behind his ear as well. Not pointed, just to clarify.

Smiling at me, the same boyish smile he gave me almost every day in the modern world, in my modern body, he leaned in. And he kissed me.

It was different than how he kissed me now. Not so hungry. Not so strong. Surely, he possessed the same strength as my Declan, if the memories where he transformed into a wolf and we ran together through the snow were any indication. But he was so tender with me in these memories. So much gentler.

I loved both. The tenderness of this moment as well as the ferocity of the ones Declan typically gave me.

As the kiss deepened, as his hand slid down my body, around my waist, drawing me closer to him, I found myself envying this girl. This old version of myself. The child I had been when we fell in love for the first time.

I wanted to be touched like this. So softly, so carefully. I wanted Declan to be this gentle with me. Why had he never been like this with me in the modern world? Of course, I never remembered asking him for gentleness. But I wasn’t asking for it now either, and he simply did it.

Gradually, that hand on my waist drifted between my thighs. He only coasted the tips of his fingers between them at first, slowly trailing them closer to my cunt.

And when he did, I tensed. Not with an awkward discomfort, but with…

“What’s the matter?” Lips still on mine, Drogo inched back. Our faces were so close that I could still feel his breath on my cheeks, his forehead against mine, but he lowered his hand. “Are you alright?”

Forcing a smile, I nodded. “I’m fine.”

The tremble of my voice betrayed me.

Ever so slightly, Drogo pulled back some more. He removed his hand from my thighs entirely. He still sat close, but made sure there was at least a hair of distance between us now. “No, you’re afraid.”

“That’s not it—”

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