Bear My Love: BBW BWWM Paranormal Shapeshifter Werebear Mail-Order Bride Romance (Shifter Grove Brides Book 4)

by Anya Nowlan

  Both of Battle’s hands rested against the tailgate now, his head propped up by her shoulder and Keesha’s arms trembling as she held them both up.

  “You’re amazing,” Battle whispered into her ear, sliding his hands over her soft stomach and pulling her against him.

  Now, he held both of them up and she relaxed against him, his still-rigid cock still in her. She rested her head against his chest, looking up at him with her head thrown back. He didn’t hesitate to use the moment to steal a kiss from her – just the lightest of pecks on her lips.

  “Okay, so maybe there’s something to this working outside thing after all,” she murmured.

  Keesha could get used to that. As long as her every little work-related victory was met with furious fucking with a sexy as hell mountain of a bear.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Battle

  He was tense again and he was sure Keesha could feel it. She was sitting next to him in the truck as they bounced their way down the dirt roads towards Shifter Grove for the first time. He’d managed to hide her away at his place for several days, but his lack of planning had caught up with him. There wasn’t enough food and he only had one towel at the house, and Keesha was itching to see Shifter Grove.

  He wasn’t completely sure why he was so rigidly opposed to going out in public with her. It certainly wasn’t because he was afraid to show her off to the townsfolk. He was sure that she’d strike a positive chord with them as she did with him, and he was proud to be walking next to a curvy beauty like Keesha Bailey.

  His curvy beauty.

  At the back of his mind, he had a guess as to what made his mood droop. He’d been loose and cheerful when it was just him and Keesha, tucked away in the woods, fucking and talking. But as soon as she’d offered a trip to Shifter Grove, he’d grown worried. He could see the first buildings start to crop up behind the trees and it made a muscle twitch in his neck.

  “Everything okay?” Keesha asked, quirking a brow at him.

  He nodded mutely, gripping the wheel harder. Battle hadn’t liked being around people much for years now. Ever since… well, ever since he’d stopped liking being around others. He kept waiting for his past to catch up with him, and that had always kept him moving, always running. Now, in Shifter Grove, he had thought that maybe it could end. Maybe he could settle down and build a life again that didn’t include fleeing a new place every few days, always sleeping in his truck and being wary of strangers and acquaintances alike.

  But now with Keesha by his side, it wasn’t just his own safety he had to worry about, it was hers as well. So all the old worries came back. What if someone recognized him? What if someone knew what he’d done? What if someone wanted vengeance? What if they were better than he was and he couldn’t protect Keesha? His stomach tied into knots and he thought they would soon twist around his lungs and cut off his breath completely. Battle exhaled sharply.

  Shifter Grove was a place for new beginnings. As much as this meant that people could hide from their pasts, it also meant that others with the same goal could find them there. And Battle had plenty of people he didn’t want to find him.

  They rolled into town and Battle parked his truck in front of Pearl’s General Goods. He hopped out and, this time, he made it over to Keesha’s door before she could scramble out on her own. Like it was the most natural thing in the world, he took her hand in his and led her into the store, making a beeline for the door and not taking any time to stop or look around.

  “Are we in a hurry?” Keesha asked, a smirk on her lips.

  “Always. I just want to keep you for myself, so the sooner we get out of here, the better,” Battle said jokingly, but he didn’t feel any of the humor.

  He waved to Dalton, the gangly looking teenager that helped Pearl out at the store, and picked up a basket.

  “Grab whatever you need,” Battle said, making his way to the meat section.

  It took up about a third of the store. Most of the shifters in Shifter Grove were carnivores and Pearl, the storeowner, had spared no expense in stocking for even the most demanding of tastes. It was wise, too – Shifter Grove wasn’t ready for a famished lion to go take down a deer, after all.

  Battle piled various cuts of meat into the basket while keeping one eye on Keesha. She was wandering around in the store, picking up a can of something here and there. When she came to the small selection of clothes and found a pair of sweatpants, holding them up for Battle to see, he couldn’t help but chuckle – dammit.

  It’s not proper to fuck her in the middle of the store, right?

  He shook his head, smirking. Somehow, he’d managed to keep his hands mostly off of her on the drive over. Each night, the conversations would drag him in and keep him there until it was so early in the morning that she could barely keep her eyes open. He’d carry her to the bed when she’d drift off. Every time he’d try to sneak under the covers without disturbing her, she’d wake up and make everything worth his while. He couldn’t get enough of her and, fortunately, she couldn’t keep her hands off of him either.

  His bear had been right, she was his mate. There was no doubt about it in his mind.

  Now he’d just have to keep her safe until he figured out what to do about it.

  The basket was already groaning under the weight of the food Battle had picked up, but he didn’t stop there. He peeled himself away from the meat freezers, losing sight of Keesha for a moment as she was tossing through the bins of clothes, looking for her size. When he saw her again, Battle’s heart stopped for a moment.

  A tall man, far slimmer than Battle but still obviously a shifter, was standing ten feet from Keesha, staring at her. He was in the same aisle as she was and, after a second that felt like an eternity, the man looked up and rested his cold gaze on Battle. There was something familiar about him, like a face you kept seeing around, but never really noticing. He grinned, showing his sharp teeth, and Battle dropped the basket, rushing over the Keesha.

  He put his hand around her as soon as he got to her and almost yanked her off her feet, tugging her back towards where he left the basket.

  “Hey! I was looking at those,” Keesha protested, a frown marring her pretty features.

  He’d apologize later. Looking over his shoulder, the thinner, pale-eyed and blond-haired man was still standing there, his hands shoved into the pockets of his worn jeans. Yeah, Battle had definitely seen him before. Something about him struck Battle hard. The man had given Battle no reason to think he was a danger, but the way he looked at Keesha and then at him had the hairs on the back of Battle’s neck standing up.

  Battle memorized the way he looked, his narrow frame, sunken eyes and high cheekbones. Battle whiffed at the air, his lungs filling with the plethora of smells in the store, but one note stuck over all of them – malice. The man had to be a wolf. Battle gritted his teeth, grabbing the basket on his way out and ushering Keesha to the checkout without a word.

  “Hey, Battle,” Dalton greeted him cheerfully, accepting his basket and the pile of goods in Keesha’s arms. “Who’s your pretty friend?” he asked with a wink, drawing a smile out of Keesha.

  “I’m Keesha. You must be Dalton. Pleased to meet you.”

  “Likewise, miss,” Dalton said, putting on his smoothest voice and failing just a little as it cracked in the end.

  When Battle gave him a look, Dalton shut up and just moved his hands quicker, depositing the groceries and other things in bags. Battle paid and took both bags, his other hand clasping around Keesha’s palm. He didn’t need to check again to know that the wolf was watching him. They walked out and Battle threw the bags in the bed of the truck and quickly opened the door for Keesha.

  “I thought we were going to see the town,” Keesha protested, putting her hands on her hips.

  “Another time,” Battle said shortly, his eyes searching around for any other signs of trouble.

  He knew there had to be more of them. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the wolf paying for
something at the checkout, exchanging a few words with Dalton. Fuck – Dalton knew Battle was living around Shifter Grove, but thankfully not where. He’d made a deal with Warren to keep that between the two of them for the time being, but Battle didn’t need to sit around and think to realize that if someone was looking for him, just obscuring his address wasn’t going to get him very far.

  “Hey, Battle. We’ve been getting along great but I won’t take none of this macho shit. We agreed to see the town. So let’s do it.”

  He could feel the irritation flowing off of her and dammit if it didn’t just make him like her more. A woman who said what she wanted and how she wanted it – perfect. But now was not the time nor the place. The wolf didn’t seem to be in any hurry to follow them and for a second Battle wondered if he was overreacting. Then, the wolf looked up through the wide window and winked at Battle and he knew, he just knew he had to get Keesha out of there.

  “Keesh, get in or I will put you in there myself,” he growled, his eyes flashing the deep brown of the bear hidden deep within him.

  Keesha’s eyes went wide and when Battle nodded towards the door again, she scrambled in. She looked surprised and hurt and Battle knew he’d just lost a lot of ground with her. But having her be pissed at him was still far better than putting her in danger. He slammed the door shut behind her and ran around the truck, getting in as well. When he peeled out from the parking spot, dust and pebbles flying behind him, he could see the wolf walk out of the store in the rearview mirror. His pale blue gaze followed the truck until Battle rounded a corner.

  “You wanna tell me what the hell that was about?” Keesha hissed.

  He could almost see steam rising from the top of her head. He knew that the last thing he should do was try to boss her around like those bastards that had come and gone in her life before. Did it make things better that he had a good excuse?

  “No. But I think I have to.”

  Sorry, baby, but you were possibly about to get mangled by a wolf for payback. Did I tell you that I’m a convicted murderer? That’s gonna go over well.

  Battle’s day had gone from great to fucking abysmal in about five minutes flat.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Keesha

  Her arms had been crossed over her chest the entire drive back. She was livid, just out of her mind angry.

  What did you expect, coming to see some lumberjack bear in the middle of the fucking forest? Of course he’s an ass. It comes with the vast fucking territory.

  Keesha wasn’t completely sure whether she was furious at Battle or herself or both of them, but she was pissed. This was Jules, Veron and Blake all over again – teeming with rage, sitting in the bathroom, plotting doom upon the prickish men who ran her life. Except that now she was stuck in a beat-up truck with a man she’d fuck just as easily as she’d slap him. Maybe both at the same time?

  She’d thought she’d got away from all of that, but lo and behold, she’d found another guy just like the others, willing to run her life and not take her opinion on it for anything. She could barely keep from baring her teeth, feeling more like the wild animal here than the werebear next to her.

  “Well?” she pressed through gritted teeth.

  He’d said he’d have to explain, but so far it hadn’t led to a single additional word being uttered. They’d been driving away from Shifter Grove for a good ten minutes now, taking an even more obscure route than they had before. It almost felt like Battle was running from something. But what? And why did she have to be stuck with him for the show?

  “I’d like to get you to sa… I’d like to get you home, first,” Battle said, his expression growing even grimmer – if that was even possible.

  “Were you about to say that you’d like to get me to safety? What the hell, Battle. I think you better start talking before there’s permanent damage here.”

  Keesha’s voice broke a little and she mentally cursed herself for it. This big lug of a bear had already crawled under her skin and she wasn’t keen on extracting him. The way he’d acted at the store had come as a cold shower. He’d been so kind and open with her when it was just the two of them and then so massively controlling in Shifter Grove. She might have liked that in bed, but not when they were out! Keesha didn’t really get it and it seemed out of character for him.

  What do you know about his character, she thought glumly.

  With a resounding sigh, Battle pulled into a narrow forest road and hit the gas even harder. The truck wobbled and shook as he made it plow across the makeshift road, leaving Keesha to hang on for dear life. He took another turn and reached a wide clearing in the woods, recently felled trees still stacked neatly in piles. Battle hit the breaks and Keesha lurched forward even with her seatbelt fastened, but Battle quickly grabbed her by the shoulder and broke her forward momentum.

  He undid both of their seatbelts, Keesha looking on with confusion, but he didn’t get out of the truck. The huge, usually deathly calm man looked like he was dealing with war inside of him and wasn’t yet sure which side was going to win. When he looked at Keesha, his gray eyes were flooded with an emotion she couldn’t decipher. Pain? Guilt? Remorse? It chilled her and made a little tremble shudder through her.

  Those gray eyes had flashed brown back in town, showing her the power of the bear she’d so far only seen as a cuddly way to get fish. It had been a swift and merciless reminder that she wasn’t dealing with just the man, but the beast as well. For a moment, it had cooled her rage and made her comply with Battle’s request to get the hell out of there, but she wasn’t swayed as easily anymore.

  “What’s wrong, Battle?” she asked again, her voice getting smaller and more worried.

  “It’s a long story.”

  “It’s not like I’m going anywhere,” she said, smiling at her own pained joke.

  Battle chuckled. “No, I guess you ain’t.”

  He let his head fall back on the headrest with a thud, looking through the windshield at the empty plain around them. Tree stumps and yellowing grass were the only things keeping them company. They were all alone in the middle of nowhere and a rational voice in Keesha’s head reminded her again that she should be worried. But just like when she’d met him for the first time at the airport, she couldn’t muster any worry within her. This was Battle, after all, not some crazed psycho killer.

  “My real name isn’t Battle. It’s Branson Hunt. I’m originally from Montana. And I’m a convicted murderer.”

  Shit.

  Well, there went the cuddly bear theory. Keesha’s stomach twisted and she felt bile crawl up her throat, but she pressed it down and just nodded blandly. Battle, or Branson, had the right idea – she turned to look outside as well, sparing herself from making eye contact with him. Against better judgment, her hand reached out for his and squeezed his big paw of a palm encouragingly. Might as well see this through.

  “What happened?”

  “It was ten years ago. I was twenty. I thought I was in love.”

  “With Adriana?”

  “Yes, with Adriana,” Battle said dully, closing his eyes.

  A mask of pain contorted his features for a moment but then passed and was just as soon forgotten. His fingers traced the outline of the tattoo on his chest.

  “She was a wolf. She was gorgeous and manipulative and my hormones kept washing over me, telling me that she was the one. Others warned me about her, but I wouldn’t listen. I kept it a secret that we were seeing each other. My bear knew she wasn’t the one, but that didn’t matter to me then. Her pack, the Longbrook wolves, lived close to my clan and there had always been bad blood between the two. Wolves and grizzlies don’t mix well, especially when confined to small spaces like Bitterroot.

  But I was young and in love and thought that nothing mattered but her and I. So we snuck around and professed that we’d be together forever and all that good stuff. She had two brothers around my age, and a few younger ones as well, and her family was next in line to head the pack. I was the cous
in of my clan’s Alpha. Not a power position, but I was going to make a decent Lieutenant one day. I should have seen it coming before I did, but I didn’t…”

  A strangled silence fell between them for a few seconds, until Keesha squeezed his hand again. Those knots that had so easily formed in the pit of her stomach were undoing themselves, letting her breathe a little again. These weren’t the words of a maniac. He could barely spit the sentences out without choking on them. Whatever had happened, Keesha had a feeling it wasn’t all on him.

  “Seen what coming?”

  “She didn’t want me. She wanted my Alpha – dead. One night, when we’d been together for a while, she convinced me to sneak her into our clan lands. My house was just next to Ryder’s, my Alpha’s. I didn’t know it then, but her brothers followed us, taking the secret path that would get us past most of the lookouts and that only I knew. There hadn’t been any serious trouble between us and the wolves for years, but wolves in packs are treacherous creatures and we didn’t trust them. At least, the smarter ones didn’t.”

  There was that bitterness again, that self-blame in his voice that made Keesha’s heart break for him.

  “Anyway, I was just taking her into my house – I was living alone – when her brothers came up behind me and knocked me out with something. When I came to a few minutes later, I heard a struggle in the other house. I didn’t see anything but red. I understood what was going on and by the time I was back on my feet, I was seething with rage. Any sort of calm and rational thinking I might have once possessed floated away, replaced by this bleeding red fog. There she was, Adriana, my girlfriend, the love of my then-life, hanging onto my Alpha’s throat while her two brothers were trying to tear his stomach open.

  I shifted so fast I don’t think I’ve ever moved quite as quickly. I remember grabbing her by the scruff of her traitorous little neck and slamming her into the wall. Ryder almost snapped the neck of one of the brothers, Argo. I grabbed the other one, Adam. I don’t think I realized I was squeezing down so hard until I heard his skull crack and saw the life go out of him.”