by T. S. Joyce
Swallowing his grief, he closed his eyes and shook his head. “I was trying to help.”
“You’ve turned me into a freak, Dade! What kind of normal life can I lead now? Let me out. Let me out! Pull over, Mason.” Panic laced every word, and her eyes darted wildly. She was cornered and scared, and a trapped, injured she-grizzly was the most dangerous kind.
“Do it,” he murmured when Mason looked at him in the rearview with his dark eyebrows lifted high.
“Dade,” Mason warned, “we’ve got two news vans behind us.”
“Ooow,” Quinn groaned, grabbing her middle. When she dragged her frightened gaze to him, her eyes were blazing green-gold, the mark of the Keller bears.
“You want to deal with a newly Changed grizzly in your nice ride, Mason?”
“Oh, here we go,” Boone muttered. “I’ll take care of the news crews. Just get her far into the woods or Cody is going to string us up.”
“Well, he’ll have to take a freaking number.” The human lynch mob would be here shortly.
Dade pushed open the door as soon as Mason slammed on the brakes. Quinn was shaking and pale as a phantom. The light freckles across her nose were stark against the porcelain color of her skin, and when she released her breath, it trembled.
“I don’t feel well,” she whispered, her eyes rimming with moisture.
Shit, this woman slayed him. He wanted to kill everything. Every. Single. Thing. And for what? She wasn’t in danger from any outside source. She was in danger from the animal he’d put inside of her. Dade was grit—worse even.
Scooping her up, he swore, “Everything will be okay,” but even he could hear the uncertainty in his voice.
He hadn’t done this before, Changed someone. He hadn’t ever wanted to. This wasn’t something he wished on anyone, to spend the rest of their lives wrestling with a force of nature hidden away where people couldn’t see the struggle.
Dade strode up the hill through the pine forest, Quinn in his arms as a screech of brakes sounded behind him. He cast a glance over his shoulder just in time to see Boone Change into his bear. Well, that was one way to distract the crowd. With a little luck, he wouldn’t get shot this time.
A roar rattled the trees, and Quinn gasped and scrabbled out of his arms. “Is that Boone?” she asked, horror in her voice as she stared down the trail at his brother who was now scratching his back against a pine tree like he hadn’t a care in the world. He was about to bore the shit out of the news crews. Dade would’ve laughed if Quinn’s mouth wasn’t hanging open in terror.
He bent to pick her up again, but she swatted his hand. “I can walk myself.”
“But…your burns—”
“Don’t hurt like they should. And yeah, I should probably be thanking you for whatever bear-man healing super powers you gave me because I saw my legs bent the wrong way under that beam and know what they felt like when that hot metal burned through me to the bone. And this,” she said, waving her hands at the red, putty-like gashes across her legs, “is nothing compared to what I was supposed to deal with. I’m still angry, though, and I don’t want you carrying me around like I’m helpless.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “You think I’m weak, don’t you?”
With a growl, Dade scrubbed his face and sidled around her. He wasn’t having their first spat within filming distance of the crews behind them.
“You do. You think because I had a soft heart at the vet clinic and that you caught me on a bad day and saw me cry a couple of times that I’m some sniveling, pathetic weak…human!”
“No, you’re a bear shifter now.”
“Eaaah!” she screeched. “I didn’t ask for this, Dade.”
He shook his head, fuming as they crested a hill. The news crews disappeared behind them, and now all he could hear was the soft noise of their vans and the cars coming up the road.
“You’re walking too fast.”
“I thought you didn’t want me to coddle you.” His angry words whipped past his lips, but when he turned, she was even paler than when they’d left the car. “Dammit, I’m sorry,” he rushed out, gripping her under her elbows. He was emotional, and she threw him off-kilter every other minute, but the cold hard fact was she was still hurt and likely in shock from what she’d just learned.
“On the video, it seemed like you used me to come out to the public with what you are. Please tell me I’m not some springboard for your…people’s...agenda. Please tell me my life will be normal again.”
“My people are good, Quinn. They’re families and hard workers who are just trying to make it, like everyone else. You weren’t planned. I just couldn’t watch you suffer knowing I could make it easier.”
Her voice dipped to a ragged whisper as she leaned heavily on a tree. “This isn’t easier.”
“There wasn’t time to get the human onlookers out of the way before I bit you.” He held his hands out, pleading with her to try and understand. “I know I fucked up. Hell, I even knew it at the time, but I’d do it again. You were bad off. I didn’t know if your back was broken, and I thought surely you had internal bleeding, and your breathing was so shallow. I’ve been around death, Quinn. Lots of it. You were toeing the line, and I didn’t want to lose you before I even got to know you.”
She inhaled deeply and shook her head. “So Moira was right. You did save me.”
Dade shrugged. “Kind of.”
“No, there’s no kind of. You gave me the bear so I could live.”
“I ruined your life with the bear so you could live.”
Quinn looked defeated as she slunk down against the tree. She hissed as she brought her knees up to her chest.
Dade knelt in front of her and picked up a twig from the forest floor, snapped pine needles off it one by one. “I know I have no right to ask you now because you’re still figuring out the hell I shoved you into, but someday, when I’ve worked hard enough for it, I’m going to beg your forgiveness.”
“And someday,” she whispered through a tremulous smile, “I’m going to give it to you.”
“I won’t let anything happen to you, Quinn. I swear it. My body was made to keep yours safe. You don’t have to worry about any kind of danger, okay?”
She drew back, straightening her spine, as her delicate eyebrows arched. “No danger? Your neck, Dade. What happened to your neck?”
Dade bit back a curse as his mind revolted against the memories she scratched at. “One of the members of my Crew, Rory, was taken by a government agency that has been blackmailing me and my brothers into running missions for them. Tours and black ops shit. Stuff I’m not allowed to talk about. They put trackers in our necks, and we wore them for years thinking they were just monitoring our vitals, hormones, location, that kind of stuff. What we didn’t know is that the trackers were filled with acid and some agent that stopped the clotting of blood. It was a kill switch, and mine got pushed.”
“Dade,” she whispered. Her dove gray eyes were filled with horror when he dared to look at her.
“It doesn’t even hurt anymore.”
“Lie.” Quinn looked down at her legs wrapped in bandages from her knees to her upper thighs. “Look. Now we match.”
He shook his head to ward off the heartache in her words. “You should’ve never been involved in this. I knew you weren’t strong enough for my world, and I followed you to your house, anyway. I should’ve let you keep your normal life.”
“I knew it.” She leaned her head back on the tree trunk, looking utterly drained. “I knew you thought I was weak. Well, I’m not. I’m soft-hearted, but I’ve been through worse than this.”
He’d been in the middle of shifting his weight onto his other leg but froze. “What do you mean?”
Her smile was the saddest he’d ever seen. “I was married once.”
“But not anymore?” The thought of her with anyone else felt like a hand clenching his heart.
“Jay served our country, like you. Only he didn’t come back to me. I buried my new husband an
d mourned his life cut short beside his mother, and for years, I didn’t let anyone touch my heart because the danger of losing anyone else was too big. And I survived all of that, so you see, I’m much stronger than you’ve given me credit for.”
A surge of pride filled him as he shuffled closer and pulled her against his chest. She felt so good and warm in his arms. His heart was drumming against his sternum, and she could likely feel how affected he was against her cheek, but so what? She should see him. All of him. If she could share something so painful with him, she could have it all—if she wanted. His brave Quinn was strong, and he’d been a fool not to see it.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered against her hair. “I’m sorry he didn’t come back to you.”
A soft sob left her lips, and she clutched onto his shirt and buried her face against his chest. “It’s why I asked if you were still on active duty. I swore I’d learned my lesson, and now I’m choosing you. Army, black ops, secret missions, scars all over you that say you’ve paid for this life in blood, and I’m picking you despite it all. It’s not your fault I’m here, Dade. I saw the video. Saw how raw your face looked as you were telling that paramedic I was yours. I know you were trying to help me. I’d planned on living a quiet life and clinging to my past with Jay, and you came and shook everything up. I’ll be stronger.”
“You are strong,” he said thickly, heart in his throat. “I won’t coddle you if you don’t want. I have these stupid instincts to take care of you, and I will if you’ll let me. But I swear I’ll try to let you find your own way through this mess. You’ll have to be patient with me, though. I haven’t done this before.”
“Done what?” she asked, sniffling and easing back. Her soft eyes were innocent as she asked him what this was between them.
“Felt this way about a woman. You’ve been married, and I can tell you loved Jay very much. You’re my first, though, and I have all of these feelings and instincts keeping me off balance. I want to do every single thing for you and make you comfortable, but I can tell that is going to bother you. I’ll figure it out, but it’ll be easiest if you just tell me when I’m being a dumbass.”
She snorted a laugh. “I’m not the best with cursing. Do you want me to use those actual words?”
“Yes,” he said, relieved she could joke at a time like this. “Just say, Dade Leland Keller, you, sir, are being a dumbass.”
“Leland?”
“It’s a family name. All the Keller brothers’ middle names are Leland.”
“Oh,” she mused. “Okay. Dade Leland Keller, you were a super dumbass the other day when you threw gravel on me while I was walking home with a flat tire.”
“But not when I bit you?”
Quinn brushed her auburn waves behind her ears and studied him. “No. I understand why you did. I don’t like it, but I get why you made that choice. Saving me isn’t something I have to forgive you for. The rocks in my face though…”
A smile stretched Dade’s face. “I’m sorry I did that. And I really liked the bacon you made me. Bears love bacon.”
Quinn giggled a tinkling sound that filled his middle with warmth. It was the first time he’d heard her laugh, and it drew him back. He stroked a lock of her deep red hair that had fallen across her shoulder. “I like that.”
“What?”
“I like that you can laugh even when the shit is hitting the fan.”
“Well, I like that your muscles are big, and that you got all protective back there when those reporters got too rough.”
“Mmm,” he rumbled. “I like this game. Okay, I like the way your eyes have green in the middle of the gray, and I also like to think I’m the only one who’s noticed that before.”
“I like your scars. I think they make you look like a badass.”
“I like your scars because they make you a badass.”
Quinn was trying to hide a smile now, and her expression was so freaking cute he sat down and surrounded her with his long legs just to be closer to her.
“I like in the video when you took a bullet to guard my body when I was turning into…you know.”
“Say it.”
She pursed her lips and lifted her chin. “A bear.”
“I like that your bear has the same color fur as your hair.”
“Oooh, you like redheads, do you?”
“And freckles.”
“Oh, geez,” she said, blushing from her neck to her hairline. “Okay, I feel better now, and we should probably get back to the car. We can continue this game when there isn’t someone taking pictures from a few trees away.” She waved to the paparazzi.
He’d heard him approach, but they weren’t doing anything that would make Cody freak out if he saw it on the evening news tonight. Plus, he’d been having too much fun telling her the things he liked about her to care overly much. He had the distinct feeling this was going to be a part of life until the humans got used to the existence of shifters.
“Okay, I’m not supposed to coddle you, right?”
“Right.”
Standing, he dusted the seat of his jeans until he’d loosed all the dried pine needles. “Fine, I won’t even help you up.”
“Dade!”
“Just kidding. Here.”
She grinned, slid her palms against his, and warm tendrils reached up his arms where she touched him. He pulled gently, and then helped her back down the wooded hill toward the SUV.
Still pale and shaky, she followed slowly, but her determination to be strong and do it on her own only made him like her more.
Ten minutes alone with her, and he’d already learned so much. No more imagining what she was like. She was a bear shifter now, and even though she had no clue what it meant, she was his claim. Quinn didn’t know it yet, and he was determined to take this slow and give her time, but she was it for him.
No matter what came their way now, he was going to make sure she was safe, and that Quinn knew she was cared for.
Chapter Eight
Quinn couldn’t quit sneaking little glances at Dade as he drove them away from her house. Was she scared of what was happening? Heck yeah. But everything seemed less overwhelming when he was around.
The man spoke with such confidence and seemed to know exactly how to handle every situation that came their way. He could’ve told her to buck up in the car earlier and pipe down until they got somewhere far away from the news crews, but she had been on the verge of something big. Her insides had been burning, and her blood had hummed just under her skin with the need to do…something. And Dade had known just how to put her at ease.
He wasn’t the rude, confounding man she’d thought he was. Sure, he was a dangerous sort of creature. Nothing screamed that more than his scars, the inhuman, lithe grace in his gait, and the steely, humorless looks he could give in an instant. And she was pretty sure he would’ve made good on his oath and ripped someone’s limb off outside of the hospital earlier, but with her, he was gentle and accommodating.
He was a powerhouse, practically reeking of dominance, but he was aiming that bubble of protection he could provide right at her. It made it really hard to resent the feral side of her protector. She wanted to know everything about him. His dodging questions about his scars and missions only made her want to be closer to him. She had a natural curiosity and desire to dig deeper into what made Dade tick. And whatever that said about her, she didn’t care.
There was something base between them. Some chemical connection on a cellular level that made her want to touch him and be near him. Maybe it was science or some instinctive compatibility of their basic natures. Perhaps it was that he was part animal, and she understood him better than most people she’d met—she didn’t know. All she knew was when she was around him, he made her want to be braver and better. He made her stomach do curious flip-flops, and for the first time in a long time, the thought of a future with a man made her pulse race with excitement over the unknown.
“Are you sure you’re okay with me crashi
ng at your place?” she asked in a much smaller voice than she’d intended. Waves of random shyness did that to her. Apparently, the grizzly sleeping inside of her didn’t do much for bolstering her confidence around intimidating, sexpot shifters like Dade Leland Keller.
“Of course I’m sure. I don’t think I could handle you staying in town without the protection of the Breck Crew right now. I’d be there watching over your house from the uncomfortable seat in my truck and putting us both at risk by allowing us to be separated from our people.”
Our people. That was insane to think about. She had people, and she didn’t even know them yet. A sense of excitement and terror unfurled in her stomach, and she clenched her hands against the urge to panic, or squeal or both. “When will I meet the rest of the Breck Crew?”
“Tomorrow if you want. Ma has already sent me about thirty text messages asking about you. I think she’d given up on me ever finding a mate.”
“Mate,” she whispered, testing out the word on her tongue. Simultaneously, it sent a trill of intimidation and elation through her, leaving her breathless.
“Sorry. I know humans don’t talk like that. Sometimes I forget that you’re new to this because you seem to be handling it so well. We don’t have to talk about that stuff until you’re ready.”
She drew up straight at the realization she was kind of handling this like a champion. The animal lover in her was just as accepting of her new inner furry rider as it was scared for her future. She’d been on a roller coaster of emotions with all of this, but a small, quiet part of her felt right at home with her new animal side. “What does being your mate mean?”
Dade huffed a laugh and rubbed his hands over his platinum blond hair, spiking it up everywhere. It seemed to be a nervous habit of his, one that made this big tough guy even more endearing to her. “I don’t really know. I was planning on calling my half-brother about it tonight after you fell asleep.”