Aiden's Mate Read online

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Epilogue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Aiden’s Mate

  Sexy Shapeshifter Romance

  Kathryn Kelly

  Copyright © 2018 by Kathryn Kelly

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Pretend You’ll Stay Excerpt

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Also by Kathryn Kelly

  Also by Kathryn Kelly

  Also by Kathryn Kelly

  Prologue

  Emma Miller flipped through her conference program. It was only the second day of the National Wildlife Society’s annual conference, and she was already itching to get away from the throngs of people.

  Her best friend and colleague, Henry, however, was having the time of his life. Since Emma was only here for the continuing education credits, she let Henry pick out all the lectures. He pushed up his glasses and leaned forward as the speaker approached. She smiled to herself. Anyone looking at Henry would see a quintessential nerd, but once he put on his park ranger uniform, he immediately transformed into a font of information about wildlife.

  She tuned out the speaker’s introduction, and instead, focused on a scholarly paper about bears and hibernation.

  Some of the speaker’s words, however, began to catch her attention. Bears. Interesting that he was talking about the same species she was reading about.

  Shapeshifters.

  What kind of talk had Henry dragged her to? She really needed to pay more attention to his choices.

  There has been recent evidence supporting the rumors of a shapeshifting community in Colorado.

  She leaned over to whisper in Henry’s ear. “Is he talking about some kind of cult?”

  Henry shook his head. “Listen.”

  Emma looked up at the speaker. He was a middle-aged man wearing a suit and tie. He looked, well, normal. He didn’t look like a man who would be talking about shapeshifters.

  Emma had studied shapeshifters, of course, in college, but the instructor had assured the class that there was no evidence to support the rumors. Emma had even spent a couple of hours in the library reading a few speculative articles, but again, the authors, respected in the field, had concluded that hard evidence did not exist. Emma had subsequently dismissed the idea as folklore.

  But Henry seemed to be intrigued with the idea.

  The speaker put a picture of an attractive young lady on the screen. He clicked his remote and added a wolf, showing the girl and the wolf side by side. The girl and wolf may very well be one and the same.

  Someone raised their hand and asked where these photos had been taken. Good question.

  “Germany,” the speaker answered. “In the mountains. Shapeshifters have an affinity for the rural mountainous areas.”

  Of course. It would be rather conspicuous to be a bear walking around in a city. Unimpressed, Emma went back to reading her article.

  After the lecture ended, Henry announced. “I’m going to talk to him.”

  “Go ahead. I’m gonna sit out by the pool and finish some reading.”

  Henry shrugged. “Okay. I’ll find you later.”

  Emma laughed to herself. Henry was easily obsessed with the oddest things.

  Chapter One

  Aiden Hunter needed a break. He’d been working nonstop for the past three weeks, renovating a cabin so it could be opened up for guests. The lodge and the few cabins they had were always booked. They needed more space.

  But it was a beautiful October Saturday morning, and he was taking a walk up to Silver Creek Falls. Besides, there wasn’t much he could do with his banged-up thumb. He’d slammed the hammer into it, leaving it swollen to almost twice its normal size.

  He maintained it wasn’t his fault, no matter what his sister Skylar said. If his golden retriever, Beau, hadn’t chosen that exact moment to race past his legs, he would have hit the nail squarely on its head.

  He whistled, and Beau ran next to him as he started up the trail. The local weathergirl predicted snow. Significant snow. She didn’t always get it right, but she was a lot more interesting – and better to look at - than the Weather Channel, so he had a tendency to tune in to her station.

  Snow or no snow, he needed to get out. Not only did he need to stretch his legs, his inner bear was itching to take a romp up the mountain. It was probably one of the last times he’d go up the mountain as a bear until next spring. With the cold, he slowed down and could go into hibernation as a bear.

  Aiden always carried a bag over his shoulder where he could stash his clothes. He’d done that ever since that unfortunate incident involving a group of tourists fifteen years ago when he was sixteen years old. Even after all this time, just remembering it still brought heat to his cheeks. The downside was that if anyone saw a bear carrying a bag, well… no telling what havoc that could create.

  It was just one of many reasons to keep his eyes open and avoid humans when he was in bear form. So far, that hadn’t been a problem. He had a keen sense of smell and knew when he was coming close to a human. Unfortunately, he didn’t have that skill set as a man.

  He waved to a couple of tourists setting off on a hike. He let them get ahead, so he could have solitude. As the son of the lodge’s owner, he’d been trained on appropriate tourist interactions since before he could walk. As a result, he always felt like he had to be on guard, except when he was alone in the mountains, whether as a bear or a human. He could wander for miles. If he got lost, all he had to do was shift into a bear, and he’d find his way home.

 
Chapter Two

  Emma walked along the trail, red and gold leaves crunching under her feet. Fall break and a well-timed couple of vacation days gave her a whole week of much-needed time off from her teaching job at the university in Pittsburgh. She’d rented a cabin at the Silver Creek Lodge near Rocky Mountain National Park and was looking forward to long walks in the mountains and even doing a little writing on her computer in the cabin. She had a dissertation to write. She kept reminding herself that it wasn’t going to write itself.

  Solitude. The thing she craved the most. She didn’t have to see anyone all week if she didn’t want to.

  She usually brought Henry along on these kinds of trips, but he was in a relationship now and was more interested in spending his time off doing things with his new friend than traipsing around in the woods with Emma.

  She stopped to admire the view of the lodge below with its cabins scattered about. It was early on a Saturday morning, so not too many people were up and about. The long-distance hikers were already out, and the sightseers usually went to the lodge for breakfast.

  She took a bottle of water from her backpack and drank. It had been last spring since she’d been hiking. Too long.

  She put her water back in her backpack and continued up the hill. As the path wound around, she decided to go off the trail and take a more direct path up the mountain. There was nothing like the clean smell of the blue spruce trees.

  She heard a group of tourists on horses traveling along the path below her and was glad she’d gotten off the trail. She came to a level spot and sat down to rest. The elevation took some getting used to, and she was a little short of breath.

  Lost in her thoughts, she didn’t notice the black bear cubs at first. Two of them were playing rough and tumble just a few yards away. Uh oh! She looked around for the momma bear. The last thing she wanted to do was to get between the momma and her cubs.

  There was a large boulder a few feet away. Keeping low to the ground, she slowly inched her way to the boulder and climbed to the top. It wasn’t hard to do since it had a gradual incline to the top. She lay on her stomach and watched from the top of the boulder as the momma bear came from the other direction and lay down next her babies to join the play. Emma breathed a sigh of relief.

  When her heart rate went back to normal, she used her phone’s camera to video the momma bear rolling on her back and the babies climbing all over her. This was going to be great to show her students.

  The bears played for about thirty minutes before the momma bear nudged them up and along. She videoed them walking away, the momma bear with her cubs bouncing around her.

  Sitting up, she took some water and trail mix from her backpack. Just in the few minutes she’d been watching the bears, it had become cloudy, and there was a definite chill in the air. As she ate her trail mix, she contemplated whether she wanted to continue her hike or head back.

  When the first snowflakes fell, she decided to head back.

  Slipping her backpack over her shoulder, she started to stand up, but froze as she looked toward the trees.

  Chapter Three

  Aiden stopped in his tracks when he saw the most beautiful young woman he’d ever seen. She was sitting atop a boulder only a few yards in front of him. He wanted to call out to her. To warn her not to fall off. The first snowflakes would make the rock slippery. But he was a bear, and he couldn’t speak. He could growl, but that would only frighten her.

  Instead, he dropped to the ground and lay still. Hopefully, she wouldn’t see him if he lay quietly. Beau, however, had other ideas. He wagged his tail and barked.

  The girl, who’d been about to stand up, slowly sat back down and, after spotting Beau, saw him. He should have known that he couldn’t possibly hide as a bear. He was just too big. He tried putting his head down on the ground, thinking maybe she wouldn’t feel threatened.

  It didn’t work. Sometimes, being a big black bear had its disadvantages. He rarely saw anyone up here, and usually, he smelled them long before he saw them. For some reason, he hadn’t smelled her.

  Beau darted toward her, and Aiden reflexively jumped up to stop him. She gasped and moved backwards. No. Don’t do that.

  He’d been right. The rock was slippery. When her foot slid, she overcorrected and… fell off the back. He leaped up and dashed up the rock to look over the ledge.

  It was quite a fall – several feet. She groaned and moved. That was a good sign.

  He turned and darted toward the trees. He needed to shift. And fast.

  He shifted into his human form and pulled on his clothes.

  Running back toward the boulder, he slowed and called out to Beau. Aiden waited until Beau barked before he went around to where the girl sat on the ground.

  “Are you okay?” He hoped he did a good enough job of pretending this was the first time he’d seen her. But when she looked up at him with wide, green eyes beneath thick, dark lashes, he couldn’t look away.

  “I don’t know.” She clutched her ankle.

  “Do you want me to take a look?”

  She hesitated. “Sure.”

  Her ankle wasn’t broken, but it was most likely sprained. “We make a good pair, huh?” He held up his thumb.

  “Are you like a Ted Bundy?” She attempted a smile.

  “No.” That was something not to kid about up here in the rural mountains. “My name is Aiden Hunter.”

  “Hunter as in the ‘lodge’ Hunters?”

  He nodded. “I’m the oldest son, but please don’t hold that against me.”

  She held out her hand. “I’m Emma Miller.”

  He took her hand, and a little bolt of electricity shot between them. Her eyes widened. He jerked his hand back. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay. It must be the… static electricity.”

  “I’m sure it is.” Aiden had lived here his whole life and had never known anyone to complain of static electricity while sitting on the ground in the snow. “Emma Miller, what are you doing up here so far off the path?”

  A guilty expression crossed her features. “I’m a wildlife biologist. I was looking for wildlife, but I think I found more than I bargained for.”

  “How so?”

  “I saw…” She looked at Beau. Blinked. And rubbed an eye with her palm. “A bear.”

  “A bear?”

  She glanced around. “Did you see it?”

  “Where?”

  She pointed. “Back there where you came from.”

  He shook his head.

  “I saw your dog…” She was obviously confused and rightly so. She’d seen a bear and a dog standing companionably. Not something people usually saw.

  “Never mind.” She looked down at her ankle. “I should be able to walk on it.”

  “Let’s find out.” He stood up and held out his hand. She put her hand on his arm. No spark this time. He put a hand under her other elbow and helped her stand up.

  She grimaced. “I think it’s worse than it looks.”

  “I don’t think you should put any weight on it.”

  “I think you’re right. But getting down this hill is going to be a little difficult.”

  He smiled at her calling the mountain a hill. “I’ll carry you.”

  She laughed. “That’s probably not a good idea.”

  “Okay. Just lean on me.”

  She hobbled a couple of steps. “This might take a while.” She glanced around. “I saw a momma bear and two cubs earlier over there.” She nodded to her right.

  “Really?” How had he not seen the mother bear and her cubs? Or at least smelled them. His senses were definitely off.

  “I hope we don’t run into them.”

  “Me too.” He would hate to have to shift into a bear in front of her in order to protect her from an angry female bear. It was high unlikely that they would encounter any other bears though.

  Unfortunately, they had another problem. The snowflakes were falling steadily now. He looked up at the banking clouds. Fo
r once, his weathergirl seemed to have gotten it right.

  Figures. Any other time, she would have predicted snow, and they would have gotten sunshine.

  Emma appeared to be in pain if her expression was any indication. “Maybe you could let me at least try to carry you.”

  “Maybe after we get on a more level surface.”

  Walking in silence, they slowly made their way down the steep side of the mountain. Her fingers dug into his arm, and he had a firm grip on her. If one of them slipped, they would both go down.

  They were getting close to the trail though, because he heard the tourists on horses coming back in the distance. He was surprised Brayden took them out with the snow coming in. But then Brayden rarely watched local weather.

  “Let’s rest a minute.” He didn’t want to run into his brother and a handful of tourists. His brother would put her on his horse, and he’d probably never see her again. I’m being selfish.

  As long as she was standing still, she wasn’t wincing. He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t let her walk in pain when he had an easy solution. “I can call and get someone to bring a horse up.”

  She turned and looked into his eyes. “I apologize for being such a bother.”

  “No need to apologize. It’s my fault you fell.”

  She looked at him sideways. “How is it your fault?”

  Oops. “It was my dog who scared you.”

  “It wasn’t your dog. It was your dog’s friend the bear.”