by Zoe Chant
Derek touched her arm gently, and when she didn't pull away, he put an arm around her and guided her away from the desk. He sat on the foot of the nearest bed and drew her down beside him.
"Gaby, I haven't known you very long, but I can already tell you're one of the strongest, most determined people I've ever met." Derek touched her chin, turning her face up towards his. "They're going to be fine. You're going to be fine."
"I like it when you tell me that," she whispered, lips parting. "Say it again."
"You're really fine, Gaby," he whispered back, his lips inches from hers, and the corners of her mouth pulled back in a grin.
"You too," she murmured before his mouth closed on hers and rational thought fled.
He kissed with the same passionate intensity that he did everything else. Derek Ruger wasn't a man who lived life halfway, she could tell already, and after spending her whole life being safe, being sensible, she could feel those chains of caution loosening and falling away under his touch. She had never been kissed like this before. If she hadn't been sitting down already, her knees would have folded.
She surfaced from the kiss to find that his hand had worked its way under the bottom edge of her T-shirt. Both her hands were spread across the smooth muscle of his stomach, and before she could stop herself, she dipped her fingers under the waistband of his jeans. She could just touch the top of his underwear. Boxers or briefs? She had a feeling she was about to find out.
"Don't stop," she gasped, and recaptured his mouth with hers.
They kissed madly as they fumbled with each other's clothing. He unclasped her bra under her shirt; she gasped against his mouth as her breasts swung free. She was already wet as she climbed into his lap, legs spread so she could grind herself against him. Through his tight jeans she felt the massive stiffness of his erection.
They had to break the kiss to strip off their T-shirts. She straddled his lap as she pulled it over her head, and when her face emerged from the gray fabric, she found that he'd done the same in a single fast motion. Now she got an up-close look at that amazing, chiseled body she'd seen earlier. It was all working muscle, not the bulging body of a bulked-up gym rat.
She just wanted to touch him all over, feel him all over, bury her face in him.
Her whole life had been about self-control. It was about denying herself that candy bar so she could save the dollar to pay bus fare. It was about working her way through classes no matter how boring the subject matter, so she could get her business degree and earn a better living for her family. It was about working second shifts at the coffee shop so she could buy toys for her son's birthday and pay the copay on her mom's pain meds.
The only reckless thing she'd ever done in her whole life was her fling with her son's father, and she couldn't regret it because Sandy was the best thing that had ever happened to her. But she'd come out of that affair with the firm conviction that it was the last reckless thing she'd ever do in her life.
She had been wrong. So wrong.
It wasn't about keeping control all the time. It was about losing control with the right person.
She was losing control and it felt so good.
With her bra dangling from one arm by its strap, she pushed Derek down on the bed so she could straddle his hips properly. Making a husky groan deep in his throat, he let her, even though he was strong enough to fling her off without breaking a sweat.
He smelled wonderful. No hint of cologne or hair product, just a faint whiff of shaving foam and soap to accent the musky, spicy smell of male skin. She kissed his collarbones, his powerfully muscled shoulders, and ran her hands across the rough, ridged skin of the scars on his stomach and side.
On anyone else, those scars might have marred the perfection of his skin, but on Derek they did nothing except enhance the whole package. He was a dangerous man who made a living by fighting. She'd never been with anyone like that before.
And yet he was incredibly gentle as he stroked her skin, caressing her breasts, running a big thumb over her nipples. His eyes, when she pulled back to look into his face, were soft with a kind of warm wonder, like he was drinking in the sight of her.
At any other time she'd have soaked up that worshipful gaze like a flower seeking the sun, but right now all she wanted him to do was wrestle her down and fill her with the erect cock pressing through his jeans against her inner thigh. She undid her jeans and rose up to her knees to push them down over her hips, followed by her panties. Derek obviously got the picture; he was fumbling with the snap of his jeans already.
He was a briefs man, she discovered as his jeans went the way of her own.
And he was also huge. She'd never been with anyone that big. Right now, though, she had no concerns about whether he'd fit. She was soaking wet and about as ready as she'd ever been. At the sight of him, any last vestiges of control fled.
"Derek, I need you—now—"
Responding to her cry, he pushed into her, and she threw her head back in pure pleasure, digging her fingers into his chest. Each stroke pressed gloriously against her slippery inner walls, sliding in and out as she thrust back vigorously.
Derek rolled her over on the bed so he could get his mouth on hers, kissing her with a clashing of teeth as he thrust into her. Their bodies were tangled together, sweat-damp and burning with shared need. She could feel herself mounting toward orgasm and she didn't hold back. She was aware of his body shaking with the effort to control himself, to keep from reaching his own climax before she was ready.
She went over the edge with a powerful shock, her mind going numb in the throes of the best orgasm she'd ever had. Derek shuddered through his own shocks as he held her, and finally they collapsed on the bed, coming down from the high together.
Chapter Six: Derek
Sated and exhausted, all Derek wanted to do was lie beside his mate all afternoon.
But he couldn't. There were plans to make. Check-ins to perform.
His mate was in danger and he wasn't about to be less than fully vigilant.
Gaby made a tiny protesting noise as he pulled away from her and sat up. He swung his legs off the edge of the bed, and untangled his wadded-up jeans to get his phone out of the pocket.
"What are you doing?" Gaby asked, propping herself up on one elbow.
She looked amazing like this, her thick black hair hanging in a sex-tousled mass over her light brown shoulder. Derek smiled to allay the anxiety in her eyes. "Just checking with Keegan to see how the investigation's going. No point in worrying unduly if they've already caught the guy."
He sent off a quick text to Keegan, and another to the owner of the bar where he worked as a part-time bouncer to let them know that he wouldn't be coming in on his usual night this week.
Gaby sat up and stretched, raising her breasts gloriously before her arms dropped back down. "So what's it like, being a bodyguard? Lifestyles of the rich and famous? Do you jet-set around the world, guarding famous people?"
Derek couldn't help laughing. "Not exactly. More like babysitting the petty and drunk. I don't do much of this kind of work anymore, and when I do, it's mainly event security, short-term gigs as supplemental security for out-of-town celebrities' or politicians' families, and that kind of thing. Distinctly unglamorous. It's mostly a matter of escorting drunk college kids out of nightclubs."
"You don't normally work with the police?"
"Only when Keegan asks me to," Derek said. "He's an old friend. We go back a ways."
"School buddies?" she asked.
"Something like that." The last thing he wanted to do was tell her about the darker part of his past, which was inextricably tangled up with meeting Keegan in South America. Tales of gun battles had no place in this quiet hotel room; he had no business telling those stories to this soft, trusting woman with her gentle brown eyes and gentler hands.
There was a wildcat side to her, though. As he reached for his T-shirt, he looked down with a grin at the scratches on his chest.
Wh
ich made Gaby notice it, too. She gasped in dismay. "Oh, my gosh. Did I do that?"
"Sure did." He traced one of the faint pink lines with his fingertip, and then raised the finger to touch her lips. "Hey, if I wanted you to stop, I'd have said."
"I guess I got a little carried away."
"No, you got exactly the right amount of carried away," Derek corrected her. With a grin, he leaned over to kiss her. She hesitated before settling into the kiss.
His mate. Warm and pliant and lovely, with the smell of sex on her skin.
He would do anything to keep her safe. Even from his own past.
***
They ordered a late lunch from room service, which Gaby was adorably delighted with, even though all she ordered was a burger and fries.
"Look, I'm used to staying in the sort of hotel where you pass your credit card to the clerk through a security grille," Gaby said defensively. "I feel like I'm in a movie."
If this was a movie, hopefully it was a meet-cute chick flick and not the sort of movie Derek's life tended to resemble, which were more of the helicopters-and-explosions, Schwarzenegger and Van Damme type. Derek decided to keep his doubts to himself.
Gaby dipped a french fry in her ketchup. "Are we going to bring Mama and Sandy here?"
"It would be easier if you were all in the same place," Derek said. He felt his bear stir beneath his skin, itching to be able to protect his mate's family personally. "However, if the Ghost does come after you, it might be better if you weren't together. They're safe enough where they are, for now."
Gaby's mouth rounded in an "O" of shock. "I didn't even think ... just being with them might put them in danger, wouldn't it? I don't want to do that!"
This was all so new to her, and Derek pushed down a surge of fury at the Ghost for knocking away the foundations of her safe, secure world, forcing her into the hunters-and-prey mode of thinking for the first time in her life. The whole reason why people like him existed was so that people like her didn't have to think about those things.
But she seemed to be holding up well so far.
"You can see your family this evening, but we should probably spend the night at the hotel, just to be safe."
Gaby nodded and scooted a little closer to him. "So tell me about this guy who's after me. What did you call him? Ghost? What is he? I know he's, uh ... a guy who turns into a bear. Was he bitten by a radioactive bear, or what?"
"No, shifters are born that way." Derek hesitated briefly. "I was born that way."
Gaby gave a little nod. He still couldn't tell if she believed him about turning into a bear. She'd seen the Ghost do it, but that was one thing. The Ghost was a scary apparition, the bad guy who had chased her and tried to kill her. Knowing the guy she'd been talking to, the guy she'd just had sex with, spent part of his life as a grizzly bear was a lot to take in.
"The Ghost is muscle for hire. I don't even know his real name. When I fought with him—when he gave me these ..." He touched the scars through the fabric of his T-shirt. "He was working for a drug cartel. I assume he's doing something like that here, too, working for a local mobster or drug dealer."
"So, if the cops can find his boss, they can find him too, right? And stop him?"
"Yep," Derek said, although he was thinking that if the police closed in on the Ghost, he'd probably disappear just like his namesake. He had a habit of doing that, vanishing from one part of the world only to pop up somewhere else, months or years later.
His phone vibrated and he reached for it. There was a new text. "Hey, speak of the devil. Keegan says they haven't found the Ghost yet, but sources say he's working as mob muscle for a local crime family. They're running down those leads right now." He gave her a quick smile. "You might be back to your old life before you know it."
For some reason, this made her look slightly downcast before she smiled back. "That's good news."
Before Derek could probe the mystery of why she didn't look delighted, another text came in. "Also, Keegan says your family's security detail is about to change shifts. He wants to know if I can take it for a few hours this evening; then he can put another team of his guys on it for the night shift."
Now she did brighten. "Oh yes, let's do that! I can't wait 'til you meet my mom and Sandy."
... shit. He hoped his dismay didn't show, let alone his panic.
He was going to have to meet his mate's family.
The family she was completely devoted to.
Including a mother who was probably going to be less than thrilled when her daughter showed up with a big, scarred bruiser in tow.
A shifter family would understand, of course. Your mate wasn't someone you chose; the mate bond chose you. It was like a lightning strike. Your mate couldn't be unsuitable, no matter their outward appearance. Your souls knew each other at first sight.
But humans did things differently.
"Derek?" Gaby asked, hesitating.
"Yeah, that'll be great," he said, to himself as much as to her. "I'll just text Keegan and let him know."
Chapter Seven: Derek
Gaby gave Derek directions to her apartment building. He pulled up behind the unmarked police car, which he recognized by guesswork: it was the only car, in the long row of street-parked vehicles, with anyone in it, a man and a woman who had their heads bent together in a sort of halfhearted necking posture.
Derek knocked on the window and the two of them broke apart. When the window rolled halfway down, he recognized the woman inside. He'd met her at the police barbecues that Keegan had a habit of inviting him to.
She recognized him, too. "You're the lieutenant's bodyguard buddy, right? I guess this means we stand relieved, JJ," she said to her partner.
"Thank God," the man beside her said with fervor. "If I have to pretend to kiss you one more time, my wife's gonna kill me when I get home."
The female cop rolled her eyes. "Like it's such a treat getting your beard burn on my face."
"No sign of anything hinky, right?" Derek asked.
"Nah, just the usual pedestrian traffic. We saw the old lady and the little boy leave the building awhile back, then come back with some shopping bags."
"I hope she was using her walker," Gaby said anxiously, pushing up next to Derek. "Mama hates using the walker in public, but she's not supposed to walk all the way to the store without it, let alone try to carry anything."
The female cop glanced at her partner, who shrugged and said, "She was pushing some kind of little cart-type thing."
"Yes, that's her walker. It's got a basket on it, for putting things in," Gaby explained to Derek.
The security situation got worse and worse. An infirm, elderly lady and a little kid ... and just thinking about it, he could feel his bear flexing its claws and showing its teeth, ready to defend his mate's family.
"Anyway, we're headed back to the station." The female cop raised a hand and their car pulled away from the curb.
"Oh, I forgot to ask them if Mama was actually using the walker or just wheeling it along," Gaby fretted. "She does that too. She had hip surgery just recently, and she's supposed to be taking it easy, but with me working all day, she has to do most of the shopping—"
"Gaby, your mom's fine." He squeezed her hand and forced his nervousness off his face. "Come on, let's go meet them. Which floor are you on?"
"The third." She unlocked the door and let him in. "At least it's a secure building."
"Just the one entrance?"
"There's a utility door in the back."
"Do people use it?"
"None of the residents have keys, but the door opens from the inside, so sometimes people go out that way as a shortcut through the alley."
Which meant the Ghost could get in that way. He wouldn't even have to wait for someone to leave, come to think of it. With his powerful polar bear body, he could probably force either door; they were designed to stand up to human burglars, not a half ton of apex predator.
And that meant having a gua
rd on the front of the building wasn't going to be enough, especially under the cover of darkness. The Ghost could come and go from the back at will. Moving Gaby's family to the hotel was probably the best option.
"Is something wrong?" Gaby asked anxiously, moving closer to him.
"No, just thinking about security details. It's my job; I can't help it." As his mate, she was already picking up on his emotional state more easily. It wasn't precisely telepathy so much as a strong sense of being in tune with each other; they were more aware of the subtle tells of each other's faces and bodies and, in his case, scents. And at least some of the nervousness she sensed in him was because of meeting her family, so he tried to crush it down so as not to alarm her unduly.
"Third floor, right?" he said, and she nodded.
She let him check the stairwell before they stepped inside. By now it was becoming second nature for both of them; she automatically fell back as they approached a door, stepping behind him without needing to be told and resting her hand against his back, the softest of touches as if a butterfly had alighted there.
He'd known her for half a day and already he could work more smoothly with her than with teammates he'd worked with for months in the past.
But that was what having a mate meant. She was a true partner, joined to him body and soul.
On the third floor, she took the lead, stopping in front of a scarred wooden door. Derek made a move to stop her as she got out her keys, but aborted in mid-movement, realizing he could hear the happy babble of a playing child from behind the door, with occasional interjections from a woman's voice. If anything had happened in their absence, and in particular, if the Ghost was waiting for them inside, he didn't think a small child could be induced to sound that naturally happy.
Gaby unlocked the door.
"Mama!" came a joyful squeal, and a little boy with a riot of brown curls bounded up off the floor, where he'd been sitting surrounded by blocks and snap-together toys, and flung himself at her knees. "You're home early!"