With a jolt, I realized that what I’d just asked for would never be enough for me but it would sound hypocritical to backtrack now. Besides, as much as I craved all six of them, I also knew without a doubt that I needed to learn how to manage this crazy magic without them before I could surrender myself to them at all. The dragons had given me enough of a taste of what that surrender would look and feel like. It was far from an undesirable experience, but I’d lose myself so easily if I wasn’t careful. The fact that Eddie and the other two ursa had their own strict limitations was a good excuse to take a step back.
“If that’s what you really want,” he said, pinning me again with his blue-eyed stare. My heart pounded harder as he studied me, daring me to come clean as if he knew my secrets without me telling. Steam rose up of his wet body, and the plain white T-shirt he wore was soaked through to the skin, leaving nothing to the imagination. He lifted a hand and brushed a damp curl from my cheek. My pulse quickened to the point I could barely breathe.
“Eddie …”
His fingertips grazed my jaw and my resolve snapped. With a soft curse I reached for him, leaning up to press my mouth to his. He had his arms around me before I could think twice about what I was doing, but god, did he feel good. His lush lips were at odds with the solid bulk of his muscular body, and his beard was twice as soft as I’d imagined.
I moaned into his mouth, gripping the wet fabric of his shirt and twisting it in my fists, not sure whether I wanted to pull him closer or push him away. When the twinge of magical need pulsed almost painfully in my core, I forced myself to pull back.
“Shit.” I pressed my forehead to his chest, breathing hard.
“Sorry,” he gruffed.
I laughed. “Dude. Not your fault. But to answer your question, no, it’s decidedly not what I want. But it’s what I need for right now, okay? I need to manage this magic myself before I can let go with all six of you. I need to know I have control. Does that make sense?”
He took a slow, deep breath and tightened his arms around me, tucking me in against him, heedless of the fact that his wet clothes were seeping into mine. I didn’t really care though, because his arms around me felt amazing.
“Makes perfect sense. We’ll be ready when you are.”
“Thanks,” I said, tilting my head back to smile up at him. I reluctantly pushed away, but it didn’t take more than a moment for the thrill of the project to replace that need with a different desire.
I turned toward the furnaces and took a deep breath. The warmth and scent of the studio gave me such a rush of pure joy it felt like coming home, even though I hadn’t had a real home since Dad and I moved away from the estate. When the rest of the guys joined us one by one a little later, the feeling intensified to the point my lower abdomen spasmed with another pang of need so acute I gasped out loud. I’d been in the middle of shaping a gather of glass at the end of the pipe and faltered, causing the glass to sag a little.
Gray was there, his comforting hand on my shoulder. “Breathe and focus. Picture your piece in your mind’s eye as if it’s a seed you’re nurturing to grow, and push some of that energy into it.”
I took a deep breath and did as he said. Murdoc moved into position at the end of the pipe, crouching down to blow when I needed. Then the world seemed to fall away as my attention fixated on the piece. Nothing existed but me and the glass and the six men who surrounded me.
“Blow,” I said, preparing to shape the glass as Murdoc pushed air through the pipe into the growing bubble. As he did, my magic flowed into the glass with a sensation so similar to exhaling, I felt like the two of us were connected.
When the pressure inside me eased, I shot a victorious look at Murdoc, who grinned back.
“You’ve got it. Nice work!”
Gray and Stuart took over another bench, and I sensed them in my periphery, their actions nearly symmetrical to mine and Murdoc’s. Across the studio, the racket of blacksmith hammers echoed as Eddie got to work with Tate and Chayton.
All six men exuded creative energy, but it was a challenge to focus on the work when the heat and exertion compelled them to strip to the waist. I may have indulged one too many times in covert glances across the studio.
Tate wielded a hammer that he swung at a metal rod to shape it against the anvil. Each time he moved, all his muscles flexed and glistened, the sight warming my insides and tugging at my core of power. Chayton’s longer hair flew wild around his head when it was his turn, sweat glistening across the dark hair that peppered his broad chest and the whorls of tribal tattoos covering his biceps and shoulders. Eddie turned into a gilded god, evoking an image akin to Thor that made it easy to imagine thunderbolts flying from his hammer on each swing.
“I thought we were on a schedule,” Gray said, nudging me gently with an elbow. Murdoc and Stuart stepped into my field of vision, and I had to tilt my head to keep a clear view of Eddie at work.
“What?” I asked.
The dragons all laughed, which caught Eddie’s attention, and I could’ve sworn he flexed a little harder now that he knew I was watching.
“Hm, never mind,” Gray said. “I’m just fine watching them work if that’s what we’re doing. But if you need more than eye candy, you know you can ask.”
Focus, I told myself, letting out a huff of indignation and glaring at Gray, who only laughed louder.
“We’re not going there. I want to figure out how to control this power. Then I’ll entertain other outlets.”
“Fair enough, but for the record, you really don’t know what you’re missing.”
I definitely didn’t miss the loss of control over my body, and over the next few days of working side by side with them, I learned to tell the difference between the estrous surges and my own libido. One was easier to ignore than the other, but channeling that excess energy through my work became easier each day.
Tamping down my natural libido grew more difficult, though it wasn’t just sex I craved after more than a week of working on the project. The frame of the tree was mostly finished after the first week, and with each new section completed, I felt closer to the guys than ever.
Aside from the occasional bickering between the three ursa when they got tired, we were all completely in sync, and the bickering even became somewhat endearing. They always settled down the second I entered the fray. I learned that Eddie was the trigger point of the trio’s collective temper, and when I sensed their moods shifting, all I had to do was slip in close to him and distract him with a question or suggestion. Getting him to focus on me cooled the irritation, but I had a feeling if I wanted to rile them up in other ways, he’d be the man to start with.
We spent all our waking hours together, either working, cooking, eating, or lounging in the library around the fireplace. The house didn’t have a TV, but I didn’t miss it with all the stories the guys had to tell.
Gray wove tales of dragons that sounded like they were plucked from the pages of a fantasy novel, but he assured me they were all real. Their six immortal leaders had been viewed as gods once upon a time and spent their time away from the human world locked inside a magical realm called the Glade that was made almost entirely of endless sky, with floating islands and cliffs where they could land.
Chayton told stories of the ursa’s home, the Sanctuary, where the spirits of each of the four seasons inhabited the bodies of four ursa women, who took turns ruling over and protecting the ursa race.