Aislinn's was still frozen, her feet tucked under her. Her silver hair cascading down her back, the darkness throwing shadows across her features making them look even sharper as she stared at her mate laying against the headboard. She knew her time was almost up, yet he still had yet to move. She was confused. Confused and annoyed. What was he doing!? Anger shot through her, sudden and violent.

She was running out of time.

Shouldn't he be doing something she wondered to herself? She had been expecting some type of reaction and she didn't know how to react now that she wasn't getting one.

She knew what she wanted to do. But she couldn't. Could she?

Time. She was running out of time. What did she do?

Such a small space, just over a foot. She could feel the heat radiating from his body, the waves crashing against her. She thought it would hurt, expected it to. Really there was nothing else for her to expect, pain was the only thing her body understood anymore, it was the only feeling it still recognized, all that her skin, her bones, her mind remembered, the only thing it could, did, ever feel.

And yet it didn't feel like that. She felt something. She didn't like that, she was waiting for the pain to start and yet it didn't. Yet this otherness didn't stop.

She tried to pull her hand back, to undo what she had begun, but you can never really go back. Her hand stayed hovering in front of her.

Finally she was able to get her body to move again. Only to her horror she once again moved towards him. Her shock was almost as resounding as his.

Only an inch. One more inch towards his tanned warm skin. It felt like a mile. She saw him twitch, his muscles responding involuntarily to her movements. Again she stilled, freezing her body. Instantly ready to retreat. To escape.

Again it was unnecessary and again she found herself unsure, confused, out of control. She didn't like it. She liked it even less that she was so calm about it.

He was calming her. She did NOT like that. Not one bit. And yet her hand stayed still.

Kaiden tried to relax his muscles, he noticed how she had frozen when he had let himself twitch. His reaction to her unexpected movement sent a jolt of anger through his body directed solely at himself. He had sworn he wouldn't react, that he wouldn't scare her, and yet he had done just that. He just had never expected that she would have moved TOWARDS him again.

His heart had leaped into his throat, threatening to burst at just that tiny movement. He could nearly feel her uneasiness, her confusion, how he wished he could feel the actual mate bond that should have been alive between them. Still he was thankful for the small glimpses of her emotions even as dull and vague as they were.

He debated in his head, desperate to not let out a groan as he tried to pull his mind back from the stupidity of his sudden thought. What the literal actual hell was he thinking? He couldn't. Shouldn't. Hell she might actually kill him. This might be the stupidest thing he has ever done. And that was saying something.

Taking a deep inhale he let it out and opened his eyes. Moving them so he was once again staring straight into the blank grey orbs of his mate, the silvery tips of her eyelashes laying gently against her snowy skin. He tried to push as many comforting and calm emotions through his side of the mate bond as he could. It felt like he was pushing a huge boulder up the steepest hill towards a stone wall with his mind, but he kept at it trying to mentally will her to stay calm and trust him.

There was no f*cking way this was going to work. Oh god! He's so going to regret this.

Never letting his eyes waver he lifted his hand from where it rested against the bed at his side. He instantly saw her body respond even as her face stayed as blank as always, her muscles tensing. Nearly flinching away from him. A spike of hurt and pain laced through his heart at the gesture but he forced it back, refusing to let her see how he reacted focusing instead on continuing to push as many calm and nice thoughts towards her as he could.

He felt her pulling back as if she somehow slipping from the room even as her body sat in front of him.

He wouldn't lose her.

He moved his hand closer to her until only a hair separated her small frozen one from his large tanned one.

His heart stopped.

It felt like a lifetime, like the world stopped around them. He stayed perfectly still all of his energy and focus pulling on the bond, pushing, praying, willing, begging her to come back. To come to him. To open up just this tiny bit.

To trust him. Accept him.

The sparks that erupted when her skin brushed against his was resounding. So sudden and intense Aislinn had her hand pressed against her chest and was off of the bed before Kaiden could blink. He stared at her a goofy look of adoration and happiness taking over his face. Even his concern couldn't dampen his joy at his first touch of his wonderful little mate.

Aislinn however was not so overjoyed. Her mind and body was in complete chaos. She had no idea how to internalize what had just happened. Logically she did. She understood the mechanics of the mate bond, but trying to rationalize that with her instincts of fear and her ingrained lessons was agonizing. And then there was her body. She felt like she was being ripped in half; half of her wanted to get as far from all of them as possible, and the other half wanted to touch this man before her again. She was finally losing it, she had held on for thirteen long years, now just two days with this man and she was losing it.

Kaiden watched his mate closely as his initial giddiness began to ebb and concern replaced it. She didn't look any different. Externally she was perfectly still standing near the end of his bed, her face and eyes composed and void. The only evidence of their encounter being the hand still clutched closely to her chest, wrapped tightly in her other.

"It's okay little one. I will never hurt you. You don't have to touch me again, but if you want to you can. Maybe another day, you can try again and see that it won't hurt. Just the sparks, but that's it. I won't touch you, it'll always be up to you." Kaiden said as softly and gently as he could as he carefully watched her.

Realizing the time and not knowing what to do anyway Aislinn turned from the sight of her half-dressed, sleep-tousled, mate and climbed into the other bed after making sure her side was protected from the other she-wolf, she snugged deeper into the soft bedding. Letting the blackness take her away.

Aislinn never noticed Kaiden looking at the clock frowning at the time, 2:31.