by Anne Douglas
“I don’t intend to stop any time soon. In fact, I intend to be doing this for quite a long time to come.” What in God’s name did he just say? Did he just make a declaration of intent to mate with a woman he’d met just a little over an hour before? His beast made its presence known with a growl, telling him he indeed had. The bear had been waiting for this woman, whether the man knew it or not. Hours, days, years ‑‑ it wouldn’t have mattered to the bear. Ever since the first waft of scent had crossed its muzzle, the beast had been trying to break free of the man to claim its mate.
The man, at least, showed a small measure of sense and recognized that once this moment of claiming was over there would be hell to pay. With an equivalent form of a chuckle, the bear agreed and didn’t envy him the inevitable wrath of his mate, especially as she was in heat.
While Rex had been internally debating with himself, he had moved slowly down, licking a path to heaven. His nose and tongue found the source of the sweet scent that had taunted him in his surgery, and even more so in his truck. With a rumble deep in his chest, his fingers opened the petals of her sex wide, gently stroking them as he nuzzled into the slippery slit that beckoned him to taste.
He circled his tongue around Pearl’s clit, making her moan louder, and the sting of her fingers pulling at his hair as she dragged his head ever closer to the source of her pleasure made his beast howl with satisfaction.
This woman was his for the taking.
Why was she letting this happen?
Because he is sexing you up just like in those books you keep hidden in your wardrobe, and though you might be prudish, you’re not dumb! Ah yes, that was the reason why.
There was a big, brawny man using his big, strong hands and extremely talented tongue in certain important little places, determined to drive her entirely insane.
That same man had changed into a bear in front of her. A bear, for God’s sake! Then he’d ambled over to her and shoved his snout in her crotch ‑‑ just like the dogs that had followed her around all day. Then in an instant, he was human again.
Buck naked, and oh-so-stunningly erect ‑‑ and of all things, totally hot for her ‑‑ because biologically he can’t help himself. Crap!
Pearl couldn’t stop the roll of her hips as she pressed closer to Rex’s mouth. Biological imperative or not, this handsome ‑‑ if a tad uncouth ‑‑ stranger was driving her toward something no man ever had: an earth-shattering climax.
Pearl’s fingers clenched in his hair and tugged; her brain told her to pull him away, yet her body screamed at her to lie back and let him do as he willed. Her own biology fought with her intellect and ingrained need for propriety, and started to win.
Rex growled as she moved him slightly away from her mons, the growl fading to a needy whimper as he pressed back. Surely the tug on his scalp smarted? His tongue pressed harder against her, moving faster the more she tugged against the dark curls.
He liked her being rough! Pearl hadn’t had enough sex of any sort to be experienced with rough play, but that he enjoyed the sting of her demands gave her quite a heady sense of power.
Rex’s chest-deep rumble was all the warning she got that her perceived control was pure fiction. He pulled up, scooping her legs into his arms, and tugged her to him. Pearl felt her blouse and skirt ride up even more as he towed her along the floor.
She should have been yelling and screaming at him to stop, that this had gone all too far, but when he thrust his hips forward and plunged deep into her, she screamed for an entirely different reason. Pure pleasure.
“Yes! So tight, so perfect…mine.” Rex growled out the words, surprising Pearl with their possessiveness. She arched as Rex moved her legs down and around his hips. His hands tunneled under her waist and raised her until she sat in his lap, impaled on his cock as it thrust deeply into her core. Her nipples hardened more as Rex pressed her close, abraded against the triangle of curls on his chest; he nipped at her exposed neck as he left a moist trail of kisses on his way to her ear. He bit down on the lobe, making her shudder. “Mine, do you hear me.” The rasped declaration made her shake.
His declaration, his lovemaking felt so perfect, like the final piece of a puzzle clicking into place, as if she had been searching for him all her life.
This can’t be happening. I’ve only known this guy for what? An hour? Now I’m letting him fuck me senseless, and he’s claiming ownership?
Her body swept away her logical thoughts as Rex spread his knees and took her ass in his palms. For the first time, she felt her ass was the perfect size ‑‑ his large hands held her easily, lifting her up, tilting her pelvis so she was forced to wrap her arms around his neck, drawing them even closer. She felt the clench of his thighs beneath her as he thrust upward, dropping her the last inch to meet him, slamming their bodies together on a groan.
“Baby, you’re so hot…so tight, you fit me so well…” He changed his grip slightly, and his fingertips crept into her pussy from behind. One finger gathered up moisture where he thrust into her, then pressed against the rosebud of her ass.
The thickness of Rex’s cock, the rasp of her nipples against his chest, the rub of his pelvis against her clit, and now the gentle penetration of his fingertip in her ass proved too much.
Pearl’s body tensed, her eyes closed, and she threw back her head and screamed as her orgasm rolled through her body. Rex’s howl joined her cry, and he thrust against her, burrowing as deeply as he could as he came, the warm rush of his seed coating her channel. Her skin tingled as if an electric current ran under her skin. Pearl shivered against Rex as she struggled for control of her body, making him whimper and pull her tightly against him.
“Don’t move, Pearl. I can’t take anymore; I’m on overload.” Rex wound his arms around her. One slipped under her arm and up along her spine, his palm pressing her head into his shoulder. The other held her pelvis pressed to his, keeping him buried in her depths, her legs around his waist.
Pearl opened her eyes and saw a blue haze sparking from their skins. Darker royal blue hovered around Rex, and when she raised her hand in front of her face, crystal-like sparks of a cool ice blue jumped from her fingertips. As she looked down, a mark she didn’t recognize flared on her belly, then faded away as if it hadn’t existed.
“My God, what did we just do?” she whispered as she rubbed her fingers together. The blue sparks felt fluid, like they were a layer over her skin.
Rex only pulled her tighter and sighed.
“I’m glowing! What…what have you done to me? There are little blue sparks coming out of my fingers. What the hell is happening to me?”
Frantic was usually not an option for a Gordon; you were supposed to button down your emotions and show the perfect face to the world. This time her mother’s training let Pearl down, and she started to shake for all the wrong reasons.
“We are mated.” Rex’s words were solid, final, but a little despairing at the same time. “You’re now my mate; no other shall have you.”
The woo-woo weird crap proved too much, and like the good, well-mannered lady she had been brought up to be, Pearl swooned.
As Pearl slumped in a faint, Rex grabbed her tightly, and gathering his breath, he moved to his feet. He was almost glad that Pearl had fainted ‑‑ he didn’t need her to see the way his legs wobbled as he stood. It was a telling gesture of how much she had affected him, and it didn’t rest well with his ego, since he was used to being the biggest and the strongest.
At the same time he was in awe. This one woman had shaken his world and pulled the foundation out from under his feet. She’d left him gasping and teetering on an unknown precipice ‑‑ he, the confirmed bachelor, was now mated. It shocked him. Angered him. Scared him.
No longer was he the lone bear; he had a mate, and eventually, possibly, cubs to protect and provide for. But first he had to survive the fallout from what had just happened.
He also needed to figure out what the fuck all that magic crap was at the end. W
hy had there been the rush of magic rippling under his skin?
Reluctantly, he freed himself from the snug fit of Pearl’s body and laid her down on the bed in the small room off the main living area. The irony wasn’t lost on him as he gently covered her in the old wedding ring quilt his grandmother had made when she’d formally mated with his grandfather.
The usually invisible magic runes on the quilt flared to life for an instant as he leaned down to softly kiss Pearl’s forehead. “You and I might not have expected this, Pearl Gordon, but it seems my ancestors approve.” The runes faded again as he moved away, no longer physically touching the quilt.
Rex turned back toward the living room and his clothing, quietly pulling the door nearly closed behind him, leaving it cracked so he could hear if Pearl needed him. He reached for his pants, jerking his cell phone from the pocket. He pressed the numbers with one hand while awkwardly pulling his jeans on with the other.
He needed to get some information from the Elders; they had some explaining to do.
Chapter Five
“I did what?” Disbelief tinged Rex’s voice as he gulped back an epithet. You didn’t swear around the Grande Dame if you could help it; she might be heading toward her seventies, but she could kick any Alpha’s ass like he was an overeager cub if he had the stupidity to misbehave in her presence. “I made her Ursus? Her beast is going to be a bear?”
The Grande Dame hadn’t been surprised by his call. Straight off the bat, she’d asked what he had done that had such powerful magic in the wind. When he explained he’d been trying to do the responsible thing for the Pack but ended up mated instead, she’d laughed ‑‑ cackled, in fact. Then she told him he was well overdue for giving up his free and easy bachelor life.
But even she had been surprised when he asked about the magic he had seen and sensed when they’d climaxed. Once he explained more about Pearl’s situation ‑‑ some young Weres were about to get a Grande Dame ass-kicking once she got off the phone ‑‑ she had distractedly muttered to herself about old ways, deep magic, pregnancy rune marks, and preserving a species.
“I said, since she had not yet released her beast, at the time of conception she became Ursus. You made her into your perfect mate. All your cubs will be Ursus, not a hit-and-miss chance amongst your children of not being magic carriers.” The Grande Dame sounded rather pleased. “I also think that since the magic has taken it upon itself to create your perfect mate, there must be more Ursus out there to be found. After all, why give you the perfect mate to carry on your line, and take it away in the next generation when they, too, can’t find a mate?”
“I made her beast a bear, and I made her pregnant?” Desperation and disbelief made his words louder than he’d intended. “And somewhere there’s another family of Ursus for my kids to mate into…Christ, she’s going to kill me.” Rex slumped back into the chair with a gulp. “I was going to have a hard enough job explaining the I’ve-just-met-you-let’s-shag sex, but now I have to explain she’s a Were-bear and she’s knocked up?” The Grande Dame only laughed in his ear as he growled out his frustration from deep in his chest.
“You did what?”
Rex bit his tongue as a voice sounded from the bedroom doorway. He’d been so preoccupied with what the Grande Dame had been telling him, he hadn’t heard Pearl awaken, or open the door. So much for being the big, bad protector. Rex gave himself a little leeway. It wasn’t every day you found out you were mated, essentially married, and going to be a daddy ‑‑ all at the same time.
The back of his neck prickled as he felt Pearl’s animosity pounding at him from across the room. “Grande Dame, I have to go…she’s awake.” And angry as all hell, though he wasn’t about to say that out loud. He could almost see the Grande Dame rubbing her hands together with glee while she cackled at his downfall.
“I want to meet your mate as soon as possible. I want to see just who the magic decided was the best woman to carry on the Ursus line.” With no preamble, the Grande Dame closed the connection, leaving Rex holding the phone ‑‑ quite literally.
When he turned, he came nose to nose ‑‑ or was that muzzle to muzzle ‑‑ with his mate. His very sexy, very naked, and very angry mate, who dragged his grandmother’s quilt along behind her, barely covering her front with one of the corners.
“Rex, what have you done? Did I hear you right? You turned me into a Were-bear and you got me pregnant?”
Rex had never felt as uncomfortable in his skin as he did right at this moment. “Umm…yeah. I think so.” He had no chance; he didn’t even see that great right hook come out of nowhere until it connected with his nose.
Since they were standing this go around, Pearl didn’t connect as well as she had when he’d been in bear form. Her fist glanced off his cheek then into his nose, making it smart and his eyes water, but it didn’t start bleeding again.
“Owww!” Quickly, he took a step back. Pearl followed, collapsing into his arms as she unbalanced from throwing her punch. She stood on the edge of the quilt, dragging it down so she stood plastered along his front, naked as a jaybird.
“Oomph!”
As she clung to him, Rex felt time stand still as his body recognized the woman who was his perfect mate. The beast quickly mewled, confused, as it lost the joy of the embrace when its mate started to cry, her emotions doing a three-hundred-and-eighty-degree flip from her anger.
“What have you done? What have I done?” Pearl’s shoulders hunched, her hands covering her face as she quietly sobbed, and it just about broke his heart. Women crying and the big, limpid eyes of an animal in pain sucker punched him every time.
“Pearl, baby, it’s not that bad.” Rex did his best not to let her go, and reached for a corner of the quilt, wrapping it around her shoulders and swinging her into his arms. Her head burrowed back into his chest as he sat down on the sofa, cradling her on his lap, his arms pulling her in close as he rocked, trying to calm her. “Would it help if I told you something about our history, about what happened to you?”
Pearl tried hard to stifle herself with a sniff, and Rex felt bad for enjoying how her breasts heaved against his arm.
“Let’s start by saying magic exists, and that’s a lot of what being a Were-kind is about ‑‑ magic. Not that we, in the majority, practice it, but it’s what makes us what we are. In every long-established Pack, there are a few people who’ve learned some skill in manipulating magic. But for the rest of us, really, it manipulates us.” Rex paused and brushed a fall of hair back from Pearl’s face. “That’s what happened today…the magic made some big changes to our lives.”
“Really? Do you think?” Rex smiled and gently kissed the top of Pearl’s bent head. Some of the sassy woman he had seen before was shining through.
“Let me finish before you start beating me up again.” He tilted her chin, lifting her lips toward his for a soft kiss before pulling away. “Okay?”
Pearl nodded and tucked her head under his chin again.
“No one really knows how Were-kind came to be. It’s all rather mysterious, really. The one thing for certain is that all Were-kind are predators ‑‑ bears like me, wolves, jungle cats and other felines, and the like. And despite modern literature, we all actually get along…most of the time. There are fights for Pack leader, but not usually to the death; Pack Alphas have a harder job controlling themselves around other Alphas, but not overly so. Many mate for life ‑‑ it’s something to do with the magic ‑‑ but it’s not unknown for couples to go their separate ways, just unusual.”
Rex felt happy as he gently petted her hair, running it through his fingers. He knew Pearl’s vulnerability wouldn’t last, but he wanted to make the most of her little breakdown for his own selfish pleasures.
“Packs can be made up of all one type of shifter, but here in Rockville the Pack is cross species. And that leads us to you. There’s a lot more to tell you about Were culture and history, but you deserve to know exactly what’s happened to you.”
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��Damn right I do, mister.” Had she been a cat, Pearl’s hair would’ve bristled. So much for the wounded waif he had been comforting. “We can start right at the beginning, then you can skip very quickly to the ‘you made me a bear and knocked me up’ portion of the explanation.”
“Look, Pearl, I truly didn’t know that was going to happen. I’m the Pack doctor, so I’ve heard of lots of different things, but magic has a way of rearing its head and taking us all by surprise at times.” Rex pushed her away a little so he could look her in the eye; he wanted Pearl to see he genuinely was apologetic. “I know it’s worse for you. What with becoming Were, and now” ‑‑ his eyes dropped to her stomach ‑‑ “other things. But this has changed my life, too. I’m your mate and the father of your baby ‑‑ a pretty big change, considering everyone thinks I’m the ultimate bachelor.”
“And just why do they think that?” There was a wealth of sarcasm in that sentence alone before he saw, or in his case felt, the body language. Obviously, his actions that afternoon and his remarks were enabling her to tar him with a brush he didn’t much like the feel of.
“That’s not very nice of you, Pearl. There’s a good reason for it, and if you let me finish explaining, you’ll see that your sarcasm is unjustified.” It stung to think his new mate thought so little of him, yet she had cause. “Well, in the most part,” he muttered.
“Like I said earlier, last night a young Were bit you. He broke your skin and let the virus, or magic ‑‑ there are two schools of thought on this ‑‑ into your system. As you’re in the middle of your cycle, you had just, or were just about to ovulate. This, combined with the Were bite, put you instantly into heat.” In a corner of Rex’s brain, the doctor was trying to work out the odds of this happening; there was literally a window of minutes, hence the reason why this phenomenon happened with so few bitten women.
“All right, I understand that ‑‑ it was the wrong night to go out with the girls and blow off steam. Where does the turning into a bear come in?”