by T. S. Joyce
“You cried when you saw Kane.”
Anger pounded through her that he dared to point out her weakness. “I hated Kane, and I missed him terribly. Then I hated him, missed him, on and on and on. That was a hard moment you saw. I said I wasn’t pitiful, not emotionless. I had a decent life after Apex. Did Kane’s file have that? I got adopted three months after my lioness was taken, and by humans who were kind and who understood that I was going through hell. That I was missing a vital piece of me, a vital connection to my mom. They were always tender.”
“I was raised by a gorilla shifter,” he blurted out. A long hiss sounded from him, and he took a long steadying inhale that stopped it. “Sorry. I’m not good at talking, and you smell angry now, or…disappointed?”
He’d shocked her so hard she’d dropped her stick. “Are you part gorilla?” That would explain his size and his ability to hold a pride for so long.
“No. My parents were both lions. Good at being lions, shit at being parents. But I got lucky. Got taken in by an old silverback who didn’t have a family.”
“What was his name?”
Beast’s mouth curved up in a breathtaking smile, and his eyes softened as he chuckled. “Beast.”
“Beast? Did he name you after him?”
Another deep, sexy laugh. “His real name is Callum Dalton, but he’d spent some of his youth in a facility where they studied the breeding of shifters and humans. He was…hurt there. It’s why I get angry at Apex for you. For Kane. Callum had scars on his insides that never got better until I was almost old enough to take a pride. He wanted me to fit in with my people. He didn’t have that with the gorillas, so he trained me to think like a lion, but brawl like a silverback. I had a darkness inside of me, always wanted to fight, couldn’t control the animal unless I had a steady flow of good battles. He saw that, saw it would be hard for me to transition into pride life, and when I turned eighteen, he cut me loose. Put me on a small pride, two females, the male was older and had more fighting experience, but Callum didn’t think I should wait until I was older. He said the darkness would get bigger without lionesses under me to keep me steady. He said that’s what happened to him. He was silverback of a family group when he was taken into the facility, and after he was broken, he couldn’t fit back in. He couldn’t breed the females without flashbacks of what they did to him in that place, so he stayed alone, and he got worse. He didn’t want that for me. He wanted me to be okay, but at eighteen, I was a hellion.” Beast smiled and let off this tiny laughing sound. Now only six feet separated them. He flashed her a wicked grin. “It was good I was raised by a giant silverback who could keep me in line. The lions would’ve stood no chance. Before my first fight for females, Callum said he felt good about the man I turned into, and he felt better on the inside because of it. He said, ‘You’ll be Beast now. Someday you won’t need the name anymore, and you’ll call me and give it back.’ I never knew what he meant by that, but I think about it a lot. I will always be Beast. My given name is unfamiliar to me. Callum found a female gorilla shifter a couple years ago. A mate. It’s not supposed to work like that for the silverbacks, a single mate, but for some it does. For Callum it did. Soren didn’t fit anywhere either, and now they’re happy. She doesn’t call him Beast. She calls him Callum.”
Kiera’s heart was so full by the end. She didn’t know Callum, but he was probably the reason Beast turned out okay. Even though she’d never met the gorilla, a piece of her adored him for what he survived and for giving a troubled shifter a home and a future. For finding his own happiness. “What is your given name?” she asked softly.
Beast shook his head. “Doesn’t matter.”
It stung a little he wouldn’t share that part with her, but it was unfair of her heart to demand so much so soon. He’d already shared more than she ever thought a man like him would be able to.
“I like the name Beast. It suits you. And I don’t mind your scars like you think I do. If I stare, it’s because I think your face is interesting.”
Now only four feet separated them. Beast avoided her gaze, but he stooped and picked up another stick, handed it to her, but didn’t let go of his end. They walked along like that, holding the branch between them. It was the most intimate moment she’d ever shared with another person.
“I think your face is interesting, too. And your purple hair and your nose ring and your lips—” A growl blasted from him, and he dropped his end of the stick. He placed his hands behind his back again. He tried to put another couple of feet between them but she chased him and kept their distance the same.
He cast her a quick sideways smile. It looked shy. Shy? Were his cheeks red, too? Now her cheeks felt hot. This man was something else.
Suddenly, he drew to a stop in front of her, halting her in her tracks. The grin had fallen from his lips, and he searched her face. “I didn’t kill them.” He ran his hand over his short hair and looked off with a confused expression. “Or maybe I did, I don’t know, because I didn’t do enough to save them. They were mine to protect, and I failed them instead.”
Kiera’s eyes stung with tears at the bone-deep loss Beast had endured. His pride had been killed, and he carried the guilt. “Is that why you let the rumors go? Is that why you never told anyone differently?”
When he looked back at her, his face was a fearsome mask, but his eyes were so clear, so blue, so full of pain. He nodded once. His nose twitched in a pissed-off lion expression. “I deserve the rumors.”
Before she could change her mind, Kiera threw her arms around his waist and held on as tight as she could. Ignoring the long snarl that vibrated through his body, she rested her head on his chest and stared off into the woods until, little by little, the tension left his body, and the snarl turned to a soft, almost inaudible content sound.
He cupped the back of her head gently, as if he thought she would turn to dust and float away on the breeze. His other hand pressed softly onto her lower back, and he rested his cheek on the top of her head. “Don’t cry, Kiera. I’m not pitiful either.”
Was she crying? She sniffed and took stock of her body. Her cheeks stung where her tears had chilled in the cold wind, and her shoulders were shaking. Oh, she knew what he was saying. She’d told him she was strong instead of weak earlier, and he’d just done the same with her.
Something gray blurred by, snatched the stick out of her hand, and bolted away. Startled, Kiera lurched back, then laughed at the retreating dog with the giant stick hanging out of his mouth.
Beast took a quick step toward the dog, but Kiera grabbed his hand. “Let him have it, Beast. It’s just a stick.”
“Just a stick,” he murmured with a frown in his voice.
Beast stood still like a hunting predator, his lightening eyes trained on the dog as it disappeared into the woods.
“Whose dog is that?”
“That little fucker belongs to no one. He’s supposed to be Kane’s, but he runs wild up here. Name’s Gray Dog. Smells like a sewer rat.”
Kiera snorted, and when Beast cast her a confused look, she cracked up. “That was funny.”
Beast looked down between them, where their hands were still clasped. “I’m not a toucher.”
“Right.” She snatched her hand away and hid her disappointment by looking back toward Kane’s house. “Sorry, it was just a reaction. I’m not a toucher either.”
Beast’s blond eyebrows drew down slightly. “Truth.” His voice sounded surprised. “I thought since you were human, you would be needy, like Emma.”
“Emma’s a wolf,” Kiera argued, turning them to the incline that led to Kane’s house.
“Only recently. She needs petting all the time. Winter, too. So do Dustin and Logan and Kane and Rowan. Everybody’s lost their goddamned minds up here. PDA everywhere. Can’t escape it ever.”
“You just hugged me back,” Kiera said cheerfully, walking backward in front of him. “Did you hate that?”
Beast cracked a smile. “Yes. It was gross.”
“Oh, super-gross,” Kiera played along. “Bleh, hugs and affection, who wants that?”
“Not me,” Beast said, but he was chuckling now. “Truthfully, I never did, though. You haven’t lived in a pride, so you don’t know what it’s like.”
“For alpha males?”
Beast nodded thoughtfully, his gaze on the woods as he followed her along slowly. “Females don’t need the affection. Don’t want it. They want to be taken care of during their heat cycles, and then it’s back to being friends.”
Nope, she didn’t like the sound of him fucking his females through their heat cycles. She’d had a couple of estrus cycles before she’d been cleansed, and she’d been a hormonal little heathen, wanting to be touched three times a day until it was through. The vision of Beast screwing other girls made her hands claw up, but then she thought about what he’d really admitted. “So you’re saying you’ve never made love to a woman?”
“No such thing.”
“Oooooh Beast, if only you knew.”
He narrowed his eyes to blue slits. “Have you?”
“I’ve had human boyfriends. Some of them do believe in making love.”
“I don’t like talking about this.” Indeed, he was snarling pretty fiercely. The pretty blue had disappeared from his eyes and had morphed to an angry gold. Suddenly, he scented the air and asked, “What’s wrong with you?”
Kiera offered him an offended sound and turned around, giving him her back. “What do you mean?”
“You smell sick.”
Kiera resisted the urge to rest her hands on her belly for comfort. “It’s personal.”
“Are you dying?”
She cast him a glance over her shoulder to make sure he was being serious. “No.”
“Good,” he rumbled, gaze on the gravel.
Maybe Logan was right, and the shifters up here really hadn’t been around a pregnant woman. But…that didn’t make sense for Beast. He’d been alpha of a pride for ten years. Surely, he’d been around pregnant females before. This scent should’ve been the most familiar one to him. Male lions obsessed over the smell of pregnancy hormones. It meant they’d been successful. She couldn’t come right out and ask him, or she risked giving away the pregnancy, and she wasn’t sure she was ready for that yet. This still felt like her secret to keep, at least for a little while longer until she made a decision either way.
Beast walked her all the way to Kane’s door, then locked one arm against the frame and looked like he wanted to say more. He got caught up staring at her lips, though, and a part of Kiera wished he would kiss her.
He was the most handsome, intriguing man she’d ever met. He’d been through hell, like she had, and he’d come out of it. Perhaps not whole, but he was still here fighting. Also like her. She never thought she would feel this way about a closed-off, damaged man like Beast, but he seemed like a kindred spirit.
He was all dominance, gruffness, and infinite rough edges, but he’d also just shown her a glimpse of his beautiful soul.
She stepped closer and gripped his sweater in her fists. He searched her eyes for a few moments more before he leaned down, pressed his forehead against hers, and rolled his eyes closed. A few heart pounding moments more and he eased away, then drifted down the porch steps. She’d never felt so thoroughly kissed in all her life, and he hadn’t even touched his lips to hers.
“You’re terrifying,” he said.
Kiera smiled at him as he walked away. “Good.”
Beast turned and came to a stop in the middle of Kane’s yard, then linked his hands behind his head, lifting his sweater just enough to show a sexy strip of his lower abs. He canted his head and dragged his gaze up and down her body, hesitating on her curves. Her breath stuttered in her chest. With just a look, he had caressed the length of her.
“Tomorrow is Saturday.” He shrugged and rolled his eyes heavenward. “We call it D-Team Sucks Saturday, and we grill out at the trailer park. If you want to come, you have the invite.”
Kiera bit her bottom lip to hide how much pleasure his invitation gave her. She leaned her elbows onto the porch railing and admitted, “I had full plans to chase you out of these mountains.”
Beast didn’t look startled like she’d expected. Instead, his wicked smile deepened. “Same.”
Kiera giggled. Fucking sexy, scar-faced lion, making her heart race with his honesty and that devilish glint in his eye. “Now you’re the terrifying one.”
Beast turned and strode away, his gait graceful like the massive predator that dwelled inside of him. A single word echoed through the clearing as he disappeared down the road. “Good.”
Chapter Six
Kiera practically floated into the open doorway of Kane’s cabin. The dark dragon had his brown eyes narrowed on her as if she’d lost her mind, but screw everyone’s opinion right now. She really, really liked Beast.
And his almost kiss? Such a delicious tease that made her want to chase him. Oh, that big brawling man knew exactly what he was doing. He was stealing her heartstrings one by one.
“You okay there?” Kane asked.
“Hmm?” Kiera asked. “Oh, yes. I’m great.”
“Really? Because the other day when I saw you for the first time, you were pretty emotionally charged.”
“Right.” Kiera frowned and cleared her throat, strove for seriousness. If only the damn grin on her lips would quit perking up.
His blond-haired mate, Rowan, was sitting at the kitchen table with a knowing smile stretching her mouth. “We watched you on the video camera,” she blurted out excitedly.
“Wait, what?”
“Roe,” Kane reprimanded her.
“I’m not sorry,” Rowan said with her eyes round as the moon. “I’ve never seen Beast be nice like that. He almost kissed you!”
“He almost kissed me!” Kiera exclaimed, excitement bubbling up in her throat as Rowan clapped and stomped her feet on the wooden floors as though she couldn’t contain her giddiness.
Kiera wiggled her butt in a victory dance that now matched Rowan’s as they both cracked up, and Kane’s black eyebrows arched up and he looked from Kiera to Rowan, and back to Kiera. “Everyone in here has lost their damn mind but me. Reminder, Beast is half-crazed and should be managed with care.”
Rowan barked a single, bellowing laugh. “Kane, you should know better than anyone that man won’t be managed. Besides, I think Kiera can handle him. She’s ex-lioness, current-badass. She looked like she was managing him just fine out there to me.”
Usually, it made Kiera really defensive when someone brought up her lioness, but Rowan hadn’t said it to hurt her. And really, it was kind of nice having that secret out in the open here. She wasn’t pretending to be human, or lion. She was just her—Kiera the Cleansed, so okay. She wasn’t going to get her feelings hurt when people mentioned it. It is what it is, and all.
Kane locked his arms against the table and sighed, his eyes on Kiera. “I have a question to ask you. And I know it’s soon. Too soon maybe, but it feels right, and I’m gonna do it.”
Kiera sat down gingerly in the chair next to Rowan. “Okay. Ask.”
“I’ve contacted an RV rental company, and I can have one out here for you as soon as tomorrow. I can set it up in the trailer park.”
“Why? I’m fine in the motel.” Kiera’s hackles were up. She was a roamer, and Kane was trying to get her to grow roots like a stagnant tree.
“How much money do you have left?”
“None of your business.”
“Do you plan on getting a job here?”
“No.”
“And when you run out of money, what will you do?”
She shrugged stubbornly. “Whatever the fuck I want to.”
“Will you let me pay for an extended stay at the motel?”
Kiera huffed a breath and looked at Rowan to see if Kane was really serious.
Rowan smiled apologetically. “We really want you to stay.”
Kane sat in
the chair across the table from her. “At least until I have my dragon or instincts…or whatever convinced that you’re okay.”
“I’m fine.”
“Then why did you come here, Kiera?” Kane asked. His eyes lightened to green, and his pupils elongated. Hello dragon. “Why did you come find me? Why did you tell me you were in trouble? Why do you smell sick? Look, I’m not asking you to stay permanently. I’m asking you to stop running for long enough to take a breather. Spend some time here, shoot the shit with people who don’t care about your past, drink, eat, be fucking merry because I know you’ve gone through hell. Everyone could use a break sometimes, Kiera. Just…stay for a while.”
Kiera crossed her arms over her chest and stared out the window at the churning gray storm clouds outside. She didn’t like being pressured. She liked traveling light, little baggage, little reason to stay in a place too long. It was easiest that way. But maybe she should stay here and see what kind of life her cub would have. To see—God, she was so pathetic—to see what kind of life she could’ve had if she hadn’t gotten so jaded getting here.
“Kiera,” Kane said sternly. The dragon wasn’t going to let her ignore her way out of this.
“Can I think about it?”
“Of course,” Rowan said. “Whatever you need.”
Kane’s mouth stayed in a disapproving, thin grimace, as though he wanted an answer now, but Kiera stood before he could push the matter. She rushed to escape, but as she reached the door, Rowan called, “See you tomorrow, Kiera. Prep the liver. We drink on D-Team Sucks Saturdays.”
Kiera hesitated at the door, and without turning around, nodded once. Then she stepped out into the cold wind, shutting the door behind her, her heartbeat hammering against her sternum.
She turned and stared at the closed door. Her fingers tingled, and the baby was going crazy, rolling and kicking. Was this a sign? Kane had just offered her the world. He didn’t realize it, but he had. If only she could settle… But it wouldn’t work. A few more weeks here, and she would have the urge to roam again, like her frozen inner animal demanded it. Rogues did that. They migrated constantly. Lucky her, she was a human with the instincts of a lonely lioness.