The Bear Shifter's Second Chance

by Jasmine Wylder

  "I needed to."

  Adela leaned against him. "Look, I’m not going to say that I don't love you for doing that, because I do. I love that you want the best for us. And you’re right. Your place is cheaper so I should move in with you rather than you moving in with me. Even though your bathtub is tiny. But selling your bike? You love it. And I love riding with you, and they make toddler car seats for motorcycles these days, too."

  "It was old and getting worn out anyway. Besides, we give it a couple years and these lawsuits will be over and we can get his and hers bikes."

  Adela straightened the collar on his shirt. “His and hers, huh? But I like riding behind you."

  "Maybe just a bike for me then," Marcus said. "And a convertible mustang for you."

  "My, my, we do have expensive tastes." Adela’s smile slipped away. "This isn't you competing for me, is it?"

  Marcus shook his head. "No. This is me wanting only the best for you. Forever."

  "I don't need the best. I just need you." She pressed herself to her toes and brushed her mouth on his.

  Before they could continue, though, Isaias and Becky came out of the mansion. The lovebirds broke apart. While their relationships had improved, he still felt like he was walking on eggshells around the billionaire and his mate. The two joined them with Isaias glancing appreciatively at the new vehicle. Becky gave Marcus the side eye as she approached.

  "New van, huh?" Becky walked around it. "Pretty nice. So, this is to prove that you’re determined to treat her better this time? Because you know I will rip you apart if you hurt her again. No third chances."

  "Becky!" Adela glared at her.

  Marcus kept his arm around her as he nodded seriously at Becky. "No, I get it. I am going to do everything I can for the rest of my life to prove that I deserve this chance."

  She nodded, apparently satisfied. Luci reached out to grab her sleeve and tugged her closer to the van and started to babble towards her. Becky inserted interested comments occasionally. Adela gave Marcus a significant look and joined them, leaving him alone with Isaias. The two men stood there not talking for a long moment. If he hadn't known better, he would have thought that the women had planned this on purpose. At least, that Adela had put it into action. Not that he blamed her. If it was him, he’d want his mate and brother to get along.

  The silence stretched on. Finally, Marcus shook his head and turned to Isaias. This was ridiculous. They were both grown men and if they couldn't at least try to be friends, then how did either of them deserve to have Adela in their lives? In all the months that they had ended up being under the same roof, it was time they started to put their differences aside.

  "Can we talk?" he said.

  Isaias actually looked relieved. He nodded and led the way into the house. "So, you sold your motorcycle and bought a van."

  "Yep."

  "Nice van."

  "Thanks."

  They lapsed into silence. Isaias shifted, looking like he was struggling with something. Probably trying to find an opening to have an actual conversation. Eventually he shrugged.

  "I gotta be honest here. I’m not happy that Adela took you back. However, that said, she gave me a good talking to and I am trying to put the past aside. From what I've seen, you've been treating her right since this whole Lexa thing blew up in your face." Here he gave him a look that clearly told Marcus that, whatever Adela had said, Isaias still blamed him for what happened with that. And he wasn't wrong. "So, I'm going to try. She's happy with you, which is more than I can say about when she's alone."

  Marcus nodded. He expected nothing more from Isaias, and to be truthful to have him try to be a buddy would have been just plain weird. "I know I was an idiot before. But if the past three years have taught me anything, it's that my life is less without her in it, and I am not going to mess up again. She is my mate and I'm not going to hurt her again."

  "Good. Because if you did hurt her, I'd have to take a contract out on your life."

  "Not do it yourself?"

  Isaias shook his head. "I have a mate to look out for. Can't risk jail time."

  Marcus snorted. "You know what? Between you and me, I pity any boys who try to date Luci when she's older."

  Isaias chuckled. "Yes. She's going to hate us when she's a teenager."

  Adela, Becky and Luci headed back toward the house. Marcus couldn't help but grin at the sight of his mate and his daughter. After everything that had happened, he was looking forward to having a nice, quiet, and uneventful life with them. The matriarch had brought the club back into the clan, and had hired him to organize events to install a sense of pride for being shifters. Even though he had sold his bike he was still part of the club, and after Lexa's defeat there had been talk about organizing more protective details in the neighborhoods that saw a lot of violence that the police didn't care about, under the matriarch's direction.

  Adela took his hand once the women reached them. "Becky and Isaias are going to watch Luci while we go for a ride in our new van."

  There was a familiar sparkle in her eyes and he eagerly let himself be pulled away. Once they were buckled in and driving away, he glanced at her. She pushed her chair back as far as she could and rested her bare feet on the dashboard. Her hair was loose and flowing around her face. He grinned.

  "So where do you want to go?"

  "Remember our place by the river with those weird looking cedars?"

  Boy, did he remember.

  "That's where Luci was conceived. I thought maybe we could start trying for number two."

  She didn't need to ask twice.

  *****

  THE END

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  Auctioned to the Dragon Warrior

  Description

  Brighid is a virgin at the College of Atlantica, destined to marry a priest she is repulsed by. One the day that she is meant to marry him, though, she is abducted by an alien species of man who can turn into dragons–the Viles. Have her fortunes gotten even worse?

  She soon finds out when she is purchased at auction by a dragon by the name of Eirrick. A warrior with more muscle than anybody she had seen before, he's more terrifying than she could possibly imagine… so why is it that she dreams of his touch?

  Eirrick has his choice of women. But he wants a wife, and that wife is Brighid. He'll convince her that he's the one for her, no matter what it takes. He wakens a fire of desire in her that she has never known. And he has sworn not to touch her until she wants him to… but how can she admit that she does when she has been taught all her life that desire is a man's prerogative, and shameful for a woman to have?

  And the priest that had laid claim to her at the College will not give her up so easily. When he declares war on the dragons, will Eirrick decide that one fragile human is worth fighting for? And can Brighid trust a man who can turn into a beast?

  Chapter One

  Brighid

  The bright sun was stifling, made all the worse by the thick, heavy dress that clung to Brighid’s neck. As a virgin in the College of the sea goddess Atlantica, she rarely stepped out into the sun, much less with her face uncovered.

  Though the heat made her want to vomit, her chest was cold, as if her heart had turned into a block of ice. Brigid sneaked a peek at the other girls standing in a line beside h
er. They all wore the same uniform as she did, thick black gowns that swept the ground and went to their chins and just past the wrist. Their hair was down freely, indicating they were ready to be taken as wives. All their eyes were ringed with kohl. It looked almost fearsome on the girls. In the morning many of them would have kohl streaking their faces.

  She would be one of them. All the girls were being picked by Atlantica’s priests to wife today, and she already knew who would pick her. Jyah. He was one of the high priests and never had a wife before, so he would be among the first to pick. There was a slim chance one of the others would pick her first but unlikely. Everybody knew Jyah wanted her and given his rising prowess on the battlefield, nobody would want to anger him by claiming what he already thought of his.

  Brighid's hands clenched. Perhaps it would have been better if she had thrown herself in the well where disgraced virgins were sent to be tried and drowned by Atlantica herself. It would be better than this fate. Perhaps in the morning she'd dive into it, or step from the high towers of the temple. Or perhaps Jyah would not be as terrible as she feared.

  A large transport ship, shaped like a bow with stylized propulsion systems like wings coming from the back, descended from the sky. Brighid shuddered. So they had arrived.

  The eunuchs and old maids of Atlantica, who guarded the girls’ virginity and punished those who broke their oaths, activated the energy barriers that would separate the virgins from the priests. They had all spent a decade of their lives out in space protecting the Lantian Realm from intruders, especially the great Beasts of Viles. Now that they were looking at the beautiful faces of human women once more they could hardly be expected to control themselves. It was a good thing they were being married, else they might become just as terrible as the Viles.

  The priests left their ship in a long line of swirling robes and armored bodies. They stood on transit disks and as they floated to the surface they formed a battalion rank.

  Brighid watched only long enough to see Jyah among the others. Even though priests spent their decade fighting, he was an exception. Four months ago he had been grievously wounded in battle and brought to the College for the virgins to tend to. That was when Brighid met him, while tending to his wounds.

  That was when he decided he wanted her.

  Her stomach churned as the High Priestess greeted the priests and thanked them for their service. She closes her eyes as the first warriors were called forward to choose their brides.

  Please, she begged the Ocean Mother, don't let me end in his bed.

  As if in answer to her prayer, a screech split the air. Brighid’s head snapped up. Jyah stood right in front of her. His face turned to the sky and his hand gripped the hilt of his long sword. Brighid followed his gaze. Her breath caught in her throat as plumes of fire burst in the sky.

  “Dragon!” someone shouted.

  The girls screamed. The priests drew their weapons. Brighid stared, fascinated, as the graceful shapes ducked and wove through the air. She knew in the back of her mind that she should be running. She should be utterly terrified.

  Half a dozen of the great beasts veered around and dove for the girls. They scattered. Brighid was frozen. From fear? It didn’t feel that way. Fascination? Not that, either. Just frozen.

  The dragon didn’t seem real until its claws were wrapped around her. Even then, there was no fear. The sharp edges of its scales cut into her dress and the talons were none too gentle but as it drew her against its hot belly and beat its wings at the priests that charged it, she didn’t feel how she ought to have. Full of terror. Pleading to be released.

  Through the crowd, she saw Jyah rushing towards them.

  With a final beat of its wings, the dragon took off again. More of its fellows were rising above the scurrying crowd, dodging this way and that as the priests threw spears at them. Girls writhed and screamed in their claws and Brighid wanted to laugh at them.

  Don’t you see that the priests would do the same as the beasts?

  She gazed at the ground as it got further and further away and wondered, if she prayed hard enough, Atlantica would make the dragon drop her so she would be dashed on the dirt. Her morbid thoughts shocked her from the daze that had taken hold of her. She struggled in the dragon’s grip. A rumbling vibrated its chest. A growl or laughter?

  The dragons wheeled about like a flock of birds. A cavernous mouth gaped open before them and Brighid screamed. But when they passed through the mouth it didn’t close. Instead, it turned into a giant, glittering cave. The dragons set down and pushed their catch into the center of their circle. Brighid clung to the other girls, her stomach churning.

  But that numbness that had taken her when she first saw the dragons crept back into her and she couldn’t make herself weep like the others.

  All around them, the dragons’ wings got smaller. Their bodies twisted and condensed until what looked like men surrounded them. All had hair that was coarse and blond, braided into chunks down their backs. Many had tattoos and all had scars. Viles, a species of alien that could transform from a humanoid appearance to the dragons that had taken them.

  “We’ve got a good bounty for the auction. And all Atlantica’s virgins.” One of them laughed. “Abelard was right, the risks were worth the rewards.”

  All around her, the other girls started wailing. And no wonder. The auction was well-known. The Viles gathered up stolen women and children and sold them as slaves. Brighid knew what sort of slave that they, as virgins, would become but she still couldn't work up the tears that had her fellow sisters gnashing their teeth. If anything, their dramatics were getting annoying.

  Her lack of tears caught the attention of one of the men. “You’re not wailing about like your sisters. Why not?”

  Brighid wondered for a moment if he was hoping that his cruel tone would make her tears come but shrugged. It was better than the leering that she got from Jyah. The way she would leave the baths and find him by the doors with a swelling in his pants and wonder if he had been watching her. How much worse could the auction be?

  “I suppose I don’t see any change in my fortunes.”

  The Viles’ hairy brows rose. He stepped closer to her and she was surprised that he didn’t smell of brimstone and rotting flesh, as she was so often told. His skin glistened and he smelled of animal fat, presumably rubbed over his body, but that was it.

  “No change in fortunes is it?” He grasped her wrist. “Why’s that?”

  She didn’t like him touching her but tried not to let her revulsion show. “I was sold to the college when I was a young girl. My mother was a harlot and she had no use for me. All my life I knew I was going to be claimed by a man whom I did not choose. A man I would not care for and a man I probably wouldn’t even like. I knew who was going to choose me today and I would rather be blinded by fire and live my life as a beggar than be forced into his bed.”

  The Viles laughed. “And so you will be sold to another man without complaint?”

  “He will probably be as dreadful but if I’m lucky, perhaps not.”

  His grip on her wrist tightened. “I could keep you. You’re a pretty one. Just bend over for me here and I’ll mark you as my own. No market. We’re allowed to keep a girl from each raid in our harem.”

  “Harem,” Brighid repeated. "Bend over?"

  Perhaps this man would be better than the one that she was going to be sold to but she pulled her hand away as a shiver ran down her spine.

  The Viles laughed once more. “Perhaps more frightened that you realize yourself. Cry when we sell you. With luck a soft-hearted fool will take pity on you.”

  “I don’t cry,” she replied.

  The Viles smirked. He strode away and others came to herd the girls down the cave. The lights faded away behind them until they were in pitch-black. It was only then that Brighid realized that the Viles had a transporter. It was the only way they could have appeared the way they had and escaped without pursuit. A transporter. No wonder the priests
could never catch them.

  Their captors stuck them in a cold, black room. Brighid clutched at the girls who clutched at her but only for warmth. Even if she had turned down that Viles offer, she didn’t feel frightened. She didn’t feel anything at all…

  Except she did.

  Here in the darkness without anybody being able to see her face, she allowed a smile blossom over it. If she had been alone she would have laughed. A change in her fortunes? Oh, yes, there had been a change. It didn’t matter who she went to now, because she knew who was never going to get his foul hands on her.

  Even if the priests came after these girls, none of them would ever be taken to wife. Not when they might have lost their virginity, willingly or not. It didn’t matter to the priests, they would only think of how the girls were no longer pure and that they didn’t want to raise a Viles baby. No, there would be no reclaiming. And that meant that she would never have to put her eyes on Jyah again.

  Brighid clasped a nearby girl to her as the girl started to cry but her own triumphant lips made no noise. Perhaps Atlantica was real after all, to give her this blessing.

  What if I get someone worse?

  She shook her head. It wasn’t possible. There was nobody worse than Jyah. It simply wasn’t possible.

  Chapter Two

  Eirrick

  The Auction. Eirrick breathed in deeply as he settled himself in a gold-plated chair. This was one of the most elaborate ceremonies that brought the various Viles clans together. And the only one that didn’t usually end in a little bloodshed. Each clan offered up a portion of their take from the year and were given coin to spend purchasing others’ wares. The more an individual gave, the more he got.

  Eirrick had given every catch he had gotten. The books, weapons, currency. He was against taking slaves but he was here to buy a woman. Not for a slave, though.

  A server brought him a bottle of wine and Eirrick waved her off. If there was a chance for bloodshed it was going to be here, at this auction. There was always a chance that someone would become too drunk and desirous and get angry when someone else could buy the person they were after. Better to keep his wits about him, in case he had to violently defend his choice.