She shook against me. “I thought I was setting myself up for a huge crash and burn. I was afraid you’d find your mate and I’d be alone and abandoned, but I had a hard time letting go. I wanted to find someone to help me forget you.”
Growling, I sat up straight. “And you let someone else touch you?”
“It just happened. As soon as he did, I got out of there.” She shook her head. “I didn’t know why I was feeling this way about you, Gray. I thought I was all screwed up. You should’ve told me! You should’ve let me know.”
I fought to restrain my fury at the idea of someone else touching her. “Tell me again how you feel about me.”
“Tell me again why you kept this a secret from me.”
“I don’t really know. But I know I would do anything to keep from losing you. I’m not ready to ever smell another man on you, ever again. I love you, little wolf.”
She crossed her arms over her chest and leaned back. “Tell me again.”
“I love you.”
“Again.”
“I love you.”
“Spank me again and I’ll castrate you.”
I sighed. “You’d better get this dress off, then. Every time I catch a whiff of that asshole, I feel like doing it all over again.”
“Tell me one more time.”
“I fucking love you, Laila. You’re my mate. I’m going to love you for eternity and then some. That’s a promise, sweetheart.”
Sinking against my chest, she smiled. “Okay, thanks.”
“Thanks?” I growled.
“Yep. Thanks.”
Pulling her over my knee, I slapped her ass, laughing as she shouted at me. “Tell me, little wolf.”
“I hate you!”
“What did you say? Smack my ass again?”
She laughed then, her voice lighter than I’d ever heard it. “I love you, Gray Lowe.”
24
Laila
“Shift, Laila. Run with me.” Gray pulled me back up against his chest and kissed me hard. His mouth tasted even sweeter, now that I knew he was my mate.
I bit my lip and nodded. I rolled out of bed, stood and grinned down at him. “I’m getting faster. You won’t catch me this time.”
His eyes flashed yellow and he growled low and menacing. “Better run, little wolf.”
I ran to the back door, threw it open, and leaped, shifting in mid-air before taking off down the stairs and down the beach. My heart pounding, my body lighter than I ever remembered feeling, I ran for all I was worth. I felt different. Everything felt different now that Gray was mine. There would be no other woman coming between us.
I really should have known, though. Who else could my mate be but the man that who would stand beside me through thick and thin, fight for me and hold me up when I couldn’t stand on my own?
It wasn’t long before I heard Gray gaining on me. He was larger, stronger, and faster than I was, but I liked running from him, anyway. I was getting faster and, who knew, I might just outrun him one day. I didn’t really want to outrun him tonight, though. I was hoping to be caught.
Just as I felt his breath on my tail, I cut sideways and then back toward his house. Gray’s teeth nipped my tail playfully, nearly toppling me. He yelped at me and raced toward me even harder. I’d just gotten to his steps, my little home base, when he tackled me. At the bottom of his stairs, he shifted back and rested under me, his eyes intense.
“Listen here, little wolf.” He stared into my wolf’s eyes, into my soul, and stroked my coat. “You will always be safe with me. I am yours and you are mine. I’ll never let anything happen to you. I would kill an army of men to make sure you never get a single scratch. I would cut off my own arm to make you smile, if that’s what it took. Do you hear me?”
My wolf tilted her head back and let out a long howl. She dipped her head and nuzzled Gray’s chest before retreating—seamlessly—and I found myself naked on top of an also naked Gray.
There together under the moonlight, I felt everything inside of me come together into alignment. He was the man I was supposed to spend the rest of my life with, and I’d found him.
“Let me claim you, Laila. Say yes.”
I braced my hands in the sand on either side of his head and looked into his eyes, the intense love he had for me was so evident. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t recognized it before. “Yes.”
He kissed me then, taking his time, making love to my mouth. His tongue stroked mine, his hands roamed my body until I was liquid against him. “I have to mark you. I have to.”
I moaned and forced myself to roll off him. Moving toward the stairs, I only got two steps up when Gray was against me. Hands roaming up to my bare breasts, he growled into my neck. I fought the urge to let him take me right there. “Inside.”
Lifting me and carrying me up the steps, I gasped when he slammed the door shut behind us and had me bent over the couch in seconds. I was still getting my breath when he entered me from behind.
Filling and stretching me, his cock was hot and rock hard. His thighs against mine were sandy, his hands on my back rough. He wrapped one arm around my waist and his other hand gripped my shoulder, holding me against him as he pulled out and thrust back into me hard.
I clawed at his arm, already lost in the wildness that was Gray. Rough and rugged around the edges, he made me forget everything I’d ever thought I knew about myself. Insecurities were forgotten when he took me with such hunger.
Thrusting into me again, harder, Gray swore and pulled me up so he hit a deeper spot, a spot that instantly sent an orgasm ripping through me. My body trembled and shook, but he continued to fuck me through it. Holding me tightly he ran his teeth over my neck and shoulder.
“Mine. You’re mine, Laila. Mine, little white wolf. Every part of you. All of you.” His voice was rough, his wolf right there at the surface. “We’re going to grow old together. I’m going to spend the rest of my life right here. Buried in you, loving you, making love to you, pleasuring you, making you scream my name, and holding you in my arms as I watch you fall asleep. Say yes.”
I dropped my head back onto his chest and moaned louder. I was barely holding on to lucidity, already riding the edge of another orgasm. “Say yes? What’s the question?”
“Marry me.”
I jerked in surprise just as Gray sank his teeth into my neck. Wild, ripping, mind-altering pleasure shot through my body at the speed of a bullet. I screamed for him, begged him for more, and throbbed around him as he emptied himself in me. I was there one moment and then I was floating in another dimension.
I lost track of when my orgasm finally calmed into something more on the earthly plane. The aftershocks were bigger than any orgasm I’d ever experienced before I met Gray. When they finally ended, Gray carried me into the bathroom and sank with me into his too-small tub, hot water running around us. I curled up and melted against him. My body had gone to mush after what he’d just done to it.
Gray was stroking a bar of soap over my arms and neck when the ability to speak came back to me. I mumbled a few words before stopping and starting over. “That wasn’t a question.”
Hands stilling, Gray grunted. “Say yes anyway.”
I smiled to myself and lifted my arm in a silent suggestion that he wash the rest of me. “You’re super bossy.”
He grunted again but kept washing me.
“And you spanked me.” I sighed as his hands cleaned my breasts. “You’re demanding. And you haven’t told me anything about your past. For all I know, I won’t be your first wife.”
“Laila.” The way he growled my name showed his impatience, but also his nervousness.
I glanced up at him and grinned. “Yes.”
He grabbed my chin and kissed me hard enough to bruise my lips. “Say yes.”
“Yes. I’ll marry you.” I laughed at the way his eyes lit up. “As long as I’m not the third or fourth, wife.”
“Only you, little wolf.” He ran his tongue over the spot where he�
��d sunk his teeth and left a claiming mark. He groaned when I shivered. “Only you.”
Later that night, as I laid on Gray’s chest and he stroked my hair, I smiled as I thought of the day he and I met.
“What are you thinking?”
“I was thinking of how if it wasn’t for Cybermates, you and I might not be here together right now. Which means technically, we’re Parker’s first mate matchup. We owe her, like, a gift basket or something, at least.”
“I’m going to send Parker the biggest carrot I can find.” Gray shifted under me and brushed a strand of hair from my cheek.
I laughed. “You’re so gonna piss her off with that idea.”
“Don’t care. That bunny deserves a carrot.”
I tucked my head under his chin and sighed happily. “She deserves more than a carrot. We should name our first born child after her.”
I paused. “There’s something else, Gray.”
He stroked my back and kissed the top of my head. “Tell me, little wolf.”
“Say yes.”
He laughed. “Yes. Now you mind telling me what I just answered yes to?”
“It’s my turn to claim you.”
With a moan, Gray wrapped his arms around me and held on tighter. “In that case, hell yes!”
Laughing, I kissed his neck and started another round of lovemaking that lasted through the night and well into the morning.
THE END
NEXT BOOK IN THIS SERIES
When Laila Bissett keeps her promise to drop off Gray Lowe’s application for Cybermates, the new shifter mate matching service, she has no idea Sunkissed Key’s most eligible bachelor is about to trigger her painful repressed memories and send her into full blown crisis mode. There’s no going back. Either Laila faces horrifying truths, or they destroy her.
Gray Lowe is not signing up for a silly mate matching service. His mate just walked though the door. How is it that she doesn’t even know he’s her mate? What happened to bury Laila’s wolf so deep inside her psyche that, until recently, she didn’t even know her animal existed?
To help Laila, Gray must coax a terrified wolf, hidden away for years, to overcome her traumatic past.
Get Charmed Mate HERE
Werebear’s Mail Order Mate
Jackson Valley Shifters
Tanner Holt is a bear shifter who neither wants nor needs a wife. For the wealthy rancher, his daughter Chloe, foreman Josiah, and ranch hands are all the family he needs.
Chloe Holt loves her dad, but she needs a mom. So, armed with her dad’s credit card, the ten-year-old finds them the perfect wife and mother.
She prays that the pretty lady with the kind eyes will give them a chance… and that her dad doesn’t ground her for life when he finds out!
Heather Ayer is down on her luck and has just done the craziest thing. She applied to a mail order bride agency. Marrying a man she’s never met is crazy. Then again, maybe it’s the fresh start she needs.
1
The building was a brownstone affair; it looked perfectly innocuous from the outside, sitting within the tree-lined street, amidst rows of other replica houses. Heather double-checked the GPS on her mobile, not daring to walk up the stairs to the entrance just yet. The destination was confirmed to be correct, and eyeing the building again she spotted a small silver plaque by the buzzer, indicating that the building wasn’t residential.
Heather couldn’t quite believe that she was actually here. Lately, she’d felt like she was having an out-of-body experience and that surely she was living someone else’s life and not her own. Up until a month ago, she had been engaged to her boyfriend of three years, living in a beautiful apartment on the Upper East Side, hosting dinner parties, and attending charity functions. She’d never stopped to think that her existence as it was might be transient, that the life she had planned for herself could at any moment veer wildly off-course.
Despite the beautiful New York spring day, Heather felt like she was walking around beneath her own black cloud. The stairs up to the brownstone would lead her into the offices of a mail order bride service—the last place on earth Heather would of have imagined herself being just a short month ago.
Taking a deep breath and summoning what little courage she had left, she slowly made her way up to the entrance, ready to meet her future.
Sitting in the well-lit office of an immaculately dressed Mrs. Atkinson, Heather cowered beneath the woman’s searching inspection. She was no doubt taking in Heather’s expensive attire, but also her haphazard appearance and the dark shadows that rested beneath her eyes.
“And you are how old, Ms. Ayer?” She asked, pen and clipboard out as she filled Heather’s details into a thick form.
“Call me Heather, please. I’m twenty-nine.” Heather smiled at the woman and tried to look accommodating and warm. Mrs. Atkinson returned the smile, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes.
“And what is it that you do, Heather?” The woman looked up from her clipboard expectantly. A silence filled the room. Heather hadn’t been gainfully employed for years. Since becoming Bertram’s girlfriend, she had dedicated her waking hours to accommodate his business, his weekend schedules, and his country club meetings and events. She had cooked, cleaned, and ferried clothes back and forth to the dry cleaners. Under the scrutiny of Atkinson’s glare, she felt embarrassed, but at the time she’d found her role fulfilling—happy in the knowledge that she was making his life easier and contributing in the small way that she could to his success.
“Well,” Heather hesitated, drawing out the silence, “I am starting my own baking company. It’s in the initial stages, still ironing out the business plan… but Bergdorf Goodman and Bloomingdale’s have shown great interest. We’re just finalizing the details.”
Mrs. Atkinson finally looked impressed, but Heather wanted the ground to swallow her whole. It had all been a complete fabrication. Worse, a dream. A dream that she had floated past Bertram, who had subsequently told her, in no uncertain terms, that no fiancée of his would work as a baker.
“Well, that sounds lovely. We do like the women on our books to have passions and joy de vivre. What is it exactly that you’re looking for?”
The question elicited another long pause. What did she want? She really just wanted someone to love her as she was without constantly belittling her or prodding her to change, to become someone else—a sleeker, more finessed version of Heather. It was doubtful that she would find her perfect match through a mail order bride service, but she would happily settle for companionship, she decided. If she wanted passion and romance, she’d read a book.
“I’d really just like a kind man. I don’t care what he does for a living or where he lives. I also…” she paused and took another breath. This was important. “Well, the truth is, I can’t bear children.” Trying to speak the words without breaking down was still hard. But it was a fact, and one that Heather had lived with for a while now. The crashing waves of grief that had hit her when she first found out were slowly being reduced to small, daily sorrows that were now a part of her.
“So,” Heather continued, “it would be nice if the man in question had a child—it doesn’t matter how old, or how many. I love children, and it would be nice to be around them.”
Mrs. Atkinson scribbled rapidly on the notepad as she shot Heather a faux smile of sympathy. Heather tried to return it, but she knew from experience that women who had children, or didn’t want children, never understood the pain of being barren. There were suggestions about IVF treatments and stories about friends and relatives who did this or that to successfully conceive. Eventually, they would run out of things to say, and Heather would end up feeling like a social pariah. Some women that she’d used to circulate with, part of Bertram’s social set, had treated her like she was contagious, as though infertility could be caught.
“Well, many of the men on our books are divorcées or widows, so that is a possibility.” Mrs. Atkinson paused and sighed. “But, Heather, I mus
t say, we’re unlikely to find you the caliber of man you may have been used to.” She pointedly eyed Heather’s Hermès bag. “Those type of men,” she cleared her throat and shuffled some pages on her desk, “Well, they tend to prefer women who are… let’s say, less curvy. Less, full, perhaps? Do you understand what I’m saying?”
Heather’s cheeks flushed bright crimson. She looked at Mrs. Atkinson’s emaciated figure across the desk, and then looked down at her own full-to-bursting cleavage. She knew exactly what Mrs. Atkinson was trying to say. Despite Heather’s breeding and attractive appearance, the men who ruled Manhattan liked their women looking like polished supermodels. Women who only ate lettuce leaves, had the regulation honey-blonde highlights, and vampish manicures. It was a world that Heather had tried to fit into, ever since she was a young girl. Yo-yo dieting had been a constant companion throughout high school. It was made worse when she met Bertram who’d insisted on buying her a gym membership and a bathroom scale. She had even once tried to dye her deep chestnut brown hair platinum, but her hairdresser had point-blank refused and stormed out in a fury at her request.
“I understand,” Heather’s tone was cooler this time, “I’m not looking for a Manhattan businessman—just a good, kind man, as I said. That’s all.”
Back on the street, Heather felt shame wash over her. She berated herself for thinking that it was a good idea in the first place. It had been horrible. It made her feel incredibly small and embarrassed that she’d think a mail order bride service was a valid option for starting a new life. It was the two glasses of Merlot she’d had last night, at one in the morning, that had convinced her that this was an exciting, revolutionary plan to turn her life around. Instead, not surprisingly, it had destroyed what little confidence she had left. Never listen to the Merlot.
Shifter Starter Set Page 56