DuBois, Edith - Rugged Salvation [Rugged Savage Valley, Colorado 3] (Siren Publishing M?nage Everlasting)

by Edith DuBois

  Jeremiah met his eyes. “And if we come across her while shifted?”

  James frowned. It was what had started this whole mess, and Marina would be devastated if another one of them accidentally mated her. But hell, they couldn’t leave her out there when a fucking bear was nearby. “We’ll deal with those consequences if they arise. Right now we need to focus on bringing Marina back to safety.”

  His brothers didn’t hesitate. They strode toward the front door and began removing their clothes. As soon as they were outside, they burst out of their human skin. Their bear paws fell already running upon the snow. James snatched the keys hanging next to the front door and sprinted for the Jeep. On his way down the road, he’d call the rest of the shifters on the emergency number. Each of the bears had a phone that they kept nearby for emergency situations.

  “Damn it, Marina,” he whispered when he revved up the Jeep. If he found her, he was going to spank her ass until it was as red as a goddamn fire hydrant. He didn’t let himself think of what would happen if he didn’t find her.

  Or worse, if he found her too late.

  * * * *

  Marina fought off another shiver. She was only wearing a sweater, a jacket, and a scarf, not even a pair of warm gloves. Not for the first time since abandoning the Escalade, she cursed her inconsiderate haste in leaving behind all those warm clothes. The first twenty minutes or so had been cake. She’d been so riled up that she didn’t even notice the swiftly dropping temperatures. Now though, the cold had begun to reach her flesh. It crawled along her skin and sunk through, swimming with sharp claws through her blood. She gritted her teeth and forced herself to ignore it.

  Someone would come along soon.

  She couldn’t go back. She wouldn’t give up. She had to get out of Savage Valley.

  Her feet faltered as she heard a familiar sound behind her.

  “Thank god,” she whispered as a pair of headlights beamed across the road from behind her.

  Turning around, she jumped up and down and screamed, begging the vehicle to stop. Under normal circumstances, she would never, ever consider hitchhiking. But tonight, she had too much at stake. A vintage RV approached, and its hulking silver-gray shape in the twilight was such a welcome sight that Marina found herself laughing in relief as it slowed down.

  When it came to a full stop in front of her, the woman in the passenger seat slid the window open with a loud crack. Her light-brown hair was frizzy and pulled back in a bun. She eyed Marina for a long moment.

  “Hi,” Marina said, not sure of the proper hitchhiking protocol. “Umm…can I hitch a ride?”

  The man driving leaned over and eyed her. Suddenly the air around her felt colder. One of his eyes squinted, and he rolled his tongue around the front of his teeth. “You that country singer?” he asked in a scratchy voice.

  “Yes, sir,” she answered with a bright smile, hoping to make them feel a little more comfortable. Or maybe it was to make herself more comfortable. “Marina Andrews. It’s nice to meet you.” She held out her hand to the woman, but the woman only stared.

  Then she said, “What do we get if we give you a ride?”

  “Umm…” In all the movies she’d ever seen where the free-spirited young woman went hitchhiking, everyone was super cool and nice, and there were couches and soft cushions on the inside. And everyone was always singing. “I can put your names in the acknowledgments of my next album?” she offered.

  “That’s it?” the man asked, and the woman kept her beady eyes trained on Marina’s face.

  “I can give you some money once we get into Denver. As much as you want. I just have to get out of here. Please,” she begged. “I can’t stay here.”

  The man whispered something, and then the woman slid the window closed with another loud crack. Marina bounced from foot to foot for warmth as the two discussed something inside the RV. Something told her to just turn around and start walking back toward the Escalade, but she couldn’t give up. She’d come this far. She had to get out of Savage Valley.

  The woman whipped her head back around and fixed a hard stare on Marina. Marina stopped bouncing as the woman got out of her seat and headed for the back.

  “Thank you,” Marina said, jogging to the door, waiting for the woman to open it up for her. A cold wind swept past, and she fought back a violent shiver. The wind kept coming, though. It tore through the fabric of her clothing and whipped across her skin. It reached for her bones and held her in its frozen grip.

  The door to the RV flew open, and before Marina could move, something cold and smelling of overripe tomatoes splashed against her face and then dripped through her hair, down her shoulders, and onto her chest and back.

  Marina gasped, tasting spaghetti sauce on her tongue. When she wiped the sauce off her face, she could only stare up at the angry face of the woman who held an empty pot in her hands.

  “You’ve got the devil in you,” the woman said, her voice angry and shaking. “You and your devil music pollute the minds of decent young girls. You make them think that salvation can be found in sex and alcohol and money. You are a sinner. You are going to hell. Do you hear me, Marina Andrews? You are going to hell!” The woman slammed the door, and the RV accelerated, moving away from her with finality.

  Marina gasped, unable to catch her breath as exhaust fumes washed across her face. She felt a sob bubbling in her throat. “No, no, no, no,” she said, watching the RV move further and further away. “Come back,” she whispered.

  She was in shock. Her muscles were stiff and ineffectual. Nothing like this had ever happened to her. She’d received her fair share of hate mail, but not once had she been faced with naked aggression like this. It shook her. She didn’t know those people. She’d never done a thing to those two travelers except ask them for help.

  Her whole body was shaking, but she couldn’t stop. If she stopped, she would fall down, and she would freeze. Her mind was in shock mode. All she could do was keep walking. So she put one foot in front of the other, and she marched.

  A part of her knew she should give up, should turn around and head back into town. But the woman’s words clamored through her mind. “You’ve got the devil in you.” All the self-doubt she’d been struggling with came boiling to the surface. She did have demons. They were too powerful. They would always be there to destroy anything she tried to build between herself and the Greenwoods.

  All she could do was keep walking away.

  The spaghetti sauce was cold, and it smelled. The odor was so strong. The sauce had to be at least a week old if not more.

  “Goddamn it!” she shouted, trying to wipe off as much of the goopy red stuff as she could, trying not to lose the last vestige of her sanity, but it was a useless endeavor. It was in her hair and embedded in the fabric of her jacket and scarf. Her fingers trembled as she ran them through her clumping strands.

  Turn around. Marina nearly jumped at the voice in her head. “Shut up,” she whispered to herself. A few minutes went by. The sun was no longer visible, only a few straggling rays scraped against the sky from behind the mountains. Give up. Turn around.

  “Stop it, Marina,” she shouted, forcing her feet to keep moving. She absolutely could not give up. If she did, if she gave in, that meant that the fucking Shoshone curse had won. It meant that she was bonded to Johnny and that she would never escape Savage Valley. Everything she knew about herself, about her life, it would all be over.

  She would be trapped, but more importantly, the Greenwoods would be trapped. With her and with all her destructive tendencies. She didn’t want to see them grow to hate her. She couldn’t live through that.

  You know you want to.

  “No, I fucking don’t,” she said, growling and marching. “I can’t go back. I won’t give up. I am getting out of Savage Valley. Do you hear me, you goddamn Shoshone bullshit curse? I am getting out of Savage Valley.” She had stopped and was screaming at the forest around her. “You can’t win. I�
��m getting away from you. You can’t keep me here!”

  She gasped, clenching her eyes tight and sucking in a deep breath, forcing the panic back down her throat. She couldn’t surrender to the despair. If she did, everything was lost. She had to stay focused. After a few long moments of deep breathing, she thought she had her thoughts back under control. This would be the absolute worst time to lose her mind. Brushing a hand over her forehead to sweep her tomato-infused bangs out of her face, she opened her eyes.

  A crunching noise came from the forest up ahead, and she took a few steps toward it, wondering if it was some sort of forest critter but hoping it was, by some miracle, a person. She hoped it wasn’t anything aggressive. She’d already dealt with her fair share of crap for the day. In fact, in her humble opinion, she thought she was just about set for life in the “crap I shouldn’t have to deal with” category.

  The crunching grew louder, and she paused. A couple low grunts came from the trees, and then out stepped a bear. Marina jerked. It was so damn big. She could see its breath blowing out of its nostrils in hot clouds of steam.

  “Johnny,” she whispered, hoping and praying. “Is that you?”

  The bear sniffed the air and then turned its head toward her.

  “Johnny?” she said a little louder, taking a few steps backward. The bear let out what sounded like an annoyed huff. “Jeremiah? James? If it’s either of you, please stop. Shift back or whatever.”

  The bear’s lips curled up, and it let out a decidedly aggressive snarl.

  “Please,” she whispered. “I can’t handle anything else. Just please shift back.”

  The bear stood up on its hind legs and let out a roar, swiping its huge paws at her.

  “Are you a real bear?” Marina looked at the creature with new eyes, new terror racing through her veins, colder than anything she’d felt that night. The bear’s lips curled and twitched as it released another long, angry roar.

  She screamed as the noise reached inside her ears and clenched steel fingers around her heart. Then everything—all the fear, all the sorrow, all the anger that she’d ever felt toward herself and her life—rushed to the surface.

  “Fuck you!” Marina shouted. She could endure no more. She was finished. Her eyes darted across the ground. If she was going to die, she might as well put up some small fight. There were a few sizable rocks nearby. She picked some up and then began chunking them at the bear, screaming at it. “How perfectly fucking ironic, right?” she screamed, throwing a rock. “I run away from bears only to be eaten by one.” She threw her head back and laughed and then hurled another rock at it. “Well, come on then, you coward.” Tears clouded her vision. “Just do me a favor, okay? Make it quick.” The bear huffed and grunted at her tantrum. “Come on!” she screamed. She didn’t even know where the bear was anymore, her tears were so thick. Maybe that would be better. Maybe it would make everything easier.

  “Get on with it,” she sobbed. “Just fucking eat me.”

  With a wild sob, full of desperation and everything her life would not be, she threw her last rock.

  Then her hands fell to her side. She gave up.

  Chapter Twelve

  “Damn it, Marina. Damn it! Damn it!” James had found the Escalade abandoned about a mile back. He could smell Marina’s scent all over it, then her scent threaded away like a long line of waving silk. It drifted along the side of the road, leading further in the direction he’d already been heading. He’d left his car behind and began running along the road, following her scent.

  Soon after, he’d come across the strangest thing. Marina’s scent changed. Suddenly her smell was drowned in tomato. He could still catch hints of her, but the smell of tomatoes was overpowering. He was surprised every critter on earth hadn’t come to investigate where that delectable smell was coming from.

  He’d thought about shifting into bear form. His senses were sharper. He was faster. Stronger. He could find her in half the time. But he resisted. He didn’t want to risk alienating her even further by accidentally mating her. Goddamn it, if she’d have just stayed put, they could have talked. They could have figured something out.

  A new scent caught his nose. It flew up into his brain and then stabbed his heart with fear. He suddenly knew why no other critters had come. The bear was nearby.

  The road curved in front of him, and he began removing his jacket and his sweater. Then he undid his belt buckle while continuing to sprint down the road. Marina screamed, and then he could hear her sobbing. The bear released an angry roar.

  James’s muscles began to shake and quiver. His bear was ripping to the surface. There was no time to resist, no moment of second thought. He exploded outward with a mighty bear roar. His great bear-paws beat onto the earth-ground. Nothing—no bear, no man—would ever touch his stormy-eyed-Marina.

  He flew past her. His bear-jaws flew open. He launched his body toward his fearsome opponent. He snarled and he snapped. He would tear soft, yielding flesh between his sharp bear-teeth. He knocked the great wild bear backward. They rolled across the frozen earth-ground.

  Then something slammed into James. It flooded his nose. It was sweet and powerful. It ripped him away from his great bear-self. In the heat of his initial attack, he’d been able to ignore it, but now her scent could be denied no longer.

  “Marina,” he whispered as his bear receded and he became a man again. He rolled away from the wild bear.

  “James!” Marina screamed.

  “Don’t come near me!” He roared the words. He didn’t know if it was fear or lust that caused the words to barrel out of his chest. His heart beat with a wild frustration. He needed release, but already, the bear had regained its footing and was heading back toward him. He crouched in the snow, naked and breathing hard.

  It was difficult to call his bear up again after having it so forcefully stripped out of him. “Come on,” he shouted. He concentrated, pulling up every shard of wildness in his blood. His bear was sleeping. His bear and the Shoshone magic that coursed through his blood knew his human side needed to root itself in Marina, but he couldn’t. The wild bear shook its head, regaining its equilibrium.

  If James wanted to shift back into bear form, he had to go deeper into his wildness than ever before. He had to lie with the beast, had to become the beast. He had to welcome its ferocity.

  The wild bear ran at him, shaking and roaring.

  James could feel the fire of his bear’s blood begin to trickle through his veins. He stood up and faced the oncoming bear. He roared. He let wildness consume him. It flooded everything he was. Everything human slipped away. He was bear.

  The wild bear lunged for him as his body transformed. Hot fire-pain ripped across his shoulder. The bear’s claws sank into his hard-muscled back. He roared, but he would not be conquered. He growled. He stretched his fierce bear-snout out and snapped. He wanted the taste of flesh. He needed the hot-gushing blood of this animal. He would kill it. He would destroy it.

  He rose up on his powerful hind legs. He leapt at the wild, loathsome creature. The creature who wanted what was his.

  His bear-claws sank into hot flesh. He roared in heady triumph. He would taste death tonight. The fire-energy of desire clashed through his mighty bear-blood. He wanted victory. He wanted to kill for it. His roar rang through the frozen-still air. He was on top of his wild foe. He ripped. He gnashed. His enemy rolled with a wild-desperate snap. James opened his bear-jaws wide.

  But his vicious rival twisted. He escaped his death-bite. A claw swiped up. It caught James on his bear-jowl. A roar exploded out of his great bear-heart. Hot blood dripped through his bear-fur. He stalked his mighty opponent. He could not let him win.

  He did not wait. He did not hesitate. He lunged forward again. His aim was true. He could feel it deep in his bear-bones. His powerful bear-teeth sank into the wild bear’s throat. Sharp claws dug into his back. They scratch-clawed at his soft underbelly. He did not let go. He did not relinq
uish. He slashed his head back and forth with violent power. The wild bear’s blood gurgled into his mouth. He tasted its hot power deep in his belly. He did not release the throat from his mighty bear-mouth.

  The bear struggled. It fought against him. He was a mighty, ferocious opponent. But James would win. James would destroy. The wild bear moaned. James felt it twitch. And then its life was gone. The bear was no more. James ripped his bear-mouth away.

  His great bear-body trembled. He was weak. He felt it in his bear-blood and in his bear-muscles. But he did not think of rest. He did not think of the warm comfort found in a leaf-bed close by.

  One thought filled his vast bear-mind. One image burned against his vision.

  It was her.

  Her woman-scent flooded his mind again. The fire-energy snapped through him. It roiled through his bear-blood. It was primal. It was barbarian. It was animal. His human form throttled itself at the surface, and his bear receded. When he stood as a man before her, he could feel the grime of battle on his face. He could feel the cold ground and the snow beneath his bare feet. He did not think about these things.

  She had her back to a tree. He could see where the tears had streaked a trail down her face. She had tomato sauce on her, but he didn’t care. He needed to be in her. He needed to possess her. He had to join their bodies. He would disintegrate if he did not. He would cease to exist.

  He strode toward her.

  “James,” she whispered. “Please, I can’t…”