by Holley Trent
“If you promise to behave yourself, I’ll actually open the door for you when you ring the bell,” she said.
He turned. “Define behave.”
Sarah counted off on her fingers. “No staring, no lewd jokes, no forcing your way into conversations she’s in, and last, give the woman some space.”
“How much space?”
Sarah made a waffling gesture with her hand before climbing into her truck. “Ten feet ought to suffice.”
“Surely, you jest.”
“Take the deal or leave it.”
He swore under his breath in Romanian and threw up his hands. “Fine.”
The deal didn’t matter. Soren would figure out a way to get close. He didn’t do so well in his business by following the letter of the law. Sarah was probably going to ban him from her household, but as long as he got under Marcella’s skin even a little bit, he’d consider the punishment worth the frustration.
___
Marcella speared the last bit of chorizo from her bowl only to drop her fork and slap a raptor-sized mosquito off her forearm. “Mean little wretches. Can’t ever seem to get away from them, no matter where I go.”
Astrid, who sat across from Marcella with her feet propped up on the fire pit’s bricks, canted her head toward the nearby fence corner. “Sarah and Felipe didn’t have any neighbors until recently. That was farmland six months ago.”
“And they built up a subdivision right next door?”
“Yup. The whole thing sprouted up in like, a year. There wasn’t a mosquito problem at all on this part of the property until those folks”—Astrid gestured toward the corner again—“installed a koi pond.”
“In that tiny little thumbnail of a backyard?”
“Yup. Aren’t even any fish inside. Neighborhood stray cats kept slapping them out. Felipe went over there and asked them to consider draining the pond since they don’t even have a pump installed, and they told him to fuck off. So, now you know the score.”
“Really? He’s going to leave it at that?” Growling, Marcella snatched a bloodsucker out of the air and crushed the bug inside her fist.
“Felipe? Nah. Not his style to let things slide. He and Fabian are a lot alike in some regards, and what Fabian would do is wait until I’m out of town and do his dirt when I’m not around to witness him.”
“Ah.” Marcella moved a little closer to the fire pit. She’d felt silly asking Felipe to light the damned thing, but the fire was the only reason the bugs hadn’t completely eaten her alive. Part of the reason the bugs were so aggressive was because of her ridiculous magic. Her affinity to water was a real detriment at times. “When the cat’s away, the mouse will play, I suppose.”
“We keep telling them they don’t need to pretend they don’t get angry on occasion. I think Fabian and Felipe believe if we actually see them exhibit emotions on that end of the mood spectrum now and then, we’d be less enamored of them.”
“Well?”
Astrid snorted and locked her gaze across the yard to the cluster of men standing around the cedar picnic table, and certainly at one male in particular. The Castillo twins had become much easier to tell apart in recent weeks. Being indiscernible had once been necessary when they’d worked in a circus and needed to confuse audiences, but now that they were out in the real world, they’d started to differentiate. Astrid’s husband, Fabian, had recently shorn his long blond hair down to the scalp over the ears. They were still hard to tell apart when he wore his hair down, but at the moment, he had his locks pulled up in a knot making them easy to distinguish.
As if Fabian sensed her watching, he started walking toward them in the corner.
Astrid waved him off. “No need to visit,” she shouted. “Can’t I look at you without you revving your engine?”
He shrugged and rejoined the cabal.
“Does he always do that?” Marcella asked.
“Yep. He dotes. I figured he’d get exhausted by my moods eventually, but there doesn’t seem to be any evidence of him losing endurance. The Castillos are good men.”
“Or maybe you’re a good wife.”
Astrid twined her fingers together atop her pregnant belly and had the temerity to blush.
“He adores you. Even I can tell, and I’m not usually so tuned into the sweet stuff. Why do you think you don’t deserve that?”
“You’ve gotta understand that the last guy I seriously dated was the one who enrolled me in the SHREW Study. I wasn’t good enough for him. He wanted to change me. He wanted to make me nicer, or whatever, to fit into his perfect mold of the sweet, submissive, Southern girlfriend. After him, I was justifiably wary, I think.”
“Same happened with Maria, right?”
Astrid nodded.
Marcella caught the occasional bout of girl talk with Maria, but in the past few weeks, Maria had been on the go a lot, and most of their conversations had been of the basic “getting to know you” variety. They shared tidbits about their close family and their routines. Their love lives hadn’t factored much into the mix, but Marcella had caught wind that Maria’s ex had been a dirty dog. He’d be fortunate if Marcella never encountered him. There were few things she couldn’t abide more than men who couldn’t handle independent women.
And apparently, just because she was thinking of men, a particular one leaning against the table sipping beer wouldn’t stop staring at her.
Marcella groaned and slouched low in her seat. “Who invited him?” she asked in a mutter.
“No one. That’s Soren for you. He tends to invite himself to things. And don’t look now, but he’s heading over.”
“For fuck’s sake.”
“Don’t panic. He doesn’t have his usual mercenary glint in his eyes, so maybe he’s just curious if we want drinks or something.”
“Is Sarah coming back to this seat?” Soren pointed to the chair Sarah had abandoned when she’d left to change Gabrielle’s diaper.
“If she does, I’m sure she’ll have no problem telling you to move,” Astrid said.
He grunted and sat, his gaze fixed on Marcella.
If she’d been a betting woman, she would have wagered that his eyes had been browner before. The light from the fire, perhaps, made them gleam moss green.
She averted her gaze and twiddled her thumbs. She was practicing being less rude, so she committed to waiting three minutes before getting up and leaving. There was no way in hell she could sit there with him looking at her in that interested way and have her be comfortable. Things always escalated, and she couldn’t have that. She couldn’t lead him on.
“Forget an important step while dressing?” Astrid asked, narrowing her eyes at Soren.
He looked down at the splayed plackets of his short-sleeved button-up patterned shirt, and ostensibly at the bare chest between them.
If Marcella would admit to looking at all, she’d also confess that his was a very nice chest. The man was built like a brick shithouse, and all that tattooed, muscled flesh begged touch, if only so she could make out what picture the ink made. She couldn’t tell from the amount the shirt hung open.
The fact that she realized that she couldn’t tell hinted that perhaps she’d already been staring for too long.
She closed her eyes.
“Spilled paella broth on the front. Rinsed the stain out of that and my undershirt, but the undershirt is still in the dryer. And before you tell me I eat like an animal…”
When he didn’t finish his statement, Marcella opened her eyes to see why.
She shouldn’t have.
He was staring at her and smirking. “I am one.”
“Yes, you are,” she muttered.
She stood, knocked a few wrinkles out of her shirt, and started toward the patio.
He followed.
Damn it.
“Have a hotter party to get to?” he asked.
“I’m going home to bed, not that it’s any of your concern.”
“We’ll have to agree to disagree on tha
t matter. I’m quite interested in whether or not you’re in bed, and who’s in bed with you.”
“Huh,” she mused as she slid the screen door open. A man as large as him would probably take up every inch of the bed in her temporary studio apartment. She’d have to sleep on top of him, if she wanted to be in bed at all.
That should seem like a worse idea.
The fact it didn’t was only because she’d been depriving herself of a certain kind of male attention for going on a year. She’d been too busy, and too wary to let another lover close so soon after nearly exposing what she was to the last one. That mistake could have ended in disaster.
She leaned around him and waved goodbye to her hosts.
He smelled like spice and earth, and she bet he tasted like sin.
“Need less sin in my life,” she muttered.
He followed her through the kitchen, past the living room, and out the front door. She’d left her borrowed car parked in the driveway, and fortunately, no one had blocked her in.
“Are you implying that sleeping is a sin or that I am?” he asked.
She stopped. Growled. Turned. “You don’t know how to hold your tongue, even a little bit, do you?”
“Hold it?” There was a troublesome twinkle in his eyes just before he stuck his long, broad tongue out and waggled it at her. “Where would you like me to hold it?”
“Where… Hold… What?” She scoffed and couldn’t help making the sound. Her body had a few reflexive responses cued up for whenever he was in her proximity. Scoffing. Snorting. Laughing. Eye-rolling. Automated visceral reactions that had usually warned most sane men off.
Soren wasn’t exactly a “man,” in the technical sense of the word. He was a beast, and she refused to be convinced otherwise. She wasn’t so sure about the “sane” part.
“I wouldn’t tell anyone,” he said.
“T-tell anyone what?”
“That we fucked.”
Lord, help me.
“Who said we were going to?” she asked breathily.
Pull yourself together, woman.
He gave his head a patronizing shake. “You may not believe me, but I would have been more tolerable during the mating season.”
“Right. The sex-starved Were-bear thinks he could ever be tolerable. That’s rich.”
He grunted and folded his arms over his chest. “I would have talked less then. Used fewer words. Now you get to hear me make all sorts of vulgar suggestions.”
“I don’t have to hear you at all,” she said, happy that her resistance subroutine had finally reactivated. “Get the hell away from me.”
He gestured toward her car. “You could walk away. You stopped.”
She looked at her feet.
Yes. Stopped.
She cleared her throat and nervously lifted the thick dreadlock bundle off her sweaty neck. “If I walk away now, you’ll say I’m fleeing.”
He shrugged. “Doesn’t matter what I say. We both know the truth.”
“Soren!” Sarah shouted out the front door. “What did I tell you?”
He kept his gaze on Marcella, who really should have started walking again, but instead, rocked back on her heels. “I forget. What did you say?”
“You should be half a backyard away from her.”
Marcella pushed up an eyebrow.
He blinked and grinned shamelessly, eyes sparkling with mischief. His irises were like dabs of highly pigmented paint overlapping on a palette and subtly striated with green and amber.
Hypnotizing, almost. She couldn’t stop staring.
Catching his grin in her periphery, she scoffed. Again, she couldn’t help it.
“Soren!” Sarah called again.
He took a single step back, but not before drawing in a long inhalation through his nose. “You smell delicious.”
She folded her arms over her chest and rocked on her heels again. In her experience, saying “Thank you,” would only lead to more compliments, and likely of an unwanted nature.
“Soren, if I have to cross this yard…”
He took one more step back. “You smell like you’d taste like honey.” That crooked smile adorned his face yet again. “Bears like honey.”
Thinking of that broad tongue of his, Marcella scoffed.
“Do I need to call Tamara?” Sarah shouted.
He looked over his shoulder and stared at the Shrew for a long moment. “No need.”
“So get moving. Or maybe I’ll turn the hose on you.”
“Why waste the water? Won’t change anything. It’s been in the sun all day. The water will come out hot at first, and you’d have a wet Bear in need of dry clothing. I thought you wanted me to keep my clothes on?”
“Spare me the peep show. I don’t fancy nudism like you shifters.”
“But I don’t mind being looked at.” He turned back to Marcella, still grinning. “Want to look at me?”
Yes.
She wanted to look at all of him, in fact, so she could prove that a guy with an ego as big as his had a laughably tiny cock. Unbidden, her gaze shifted downward.
“Want to know what I’m working with? I’ll be happy to show you. Examine me all you like.”
That invitation got her moving again. She took off at a quick clip toward her car and said, “You are a seriously brazen motherfucker, aren’t you?”
“Is that a yes? I won’t ask you to reciprocate. At least, not immediately. I do have some manners.”
“If you think I’m going to bare myself for your inspection, you better not hold your breath waiting.” She folded herself into the car and tugged the seatbelt across her body. He leaned against the front passenger door and looked in. She’d stupidly left the damned window down.
“I’d like that,” he said. “I like to look and touch. I like putting my fingers into things.”
She clamped her lips on the tiny yelp that had escaped from her lungs and would have crossed her legs at the knees if the steering wheel hadn’t been in the way. The dull throb settling at the junction of her thighs reminded her that she was an animal as much as he was, and he was an attractive animal who put off alpha vibes and could make her wet merely by pulling one corner of his lips up. Maybe pheromones were to blame, but the cavewoman part of her brain was reading him as a healthy, virile, potentially fertile mate. The modern human-enough part of her cautioned resistance.
She had to resist, or they’d both get hurt.
“Go away,” she said, nobly hiding the strain she felt.
“Shall I call you later?”
“What the hell for?”
“Soren!” Sarah shouted.
Grinning, he put his hands up and backed away. “I will try harder to resist you, draga mea.”
Marcella didn’t buy that for one minute.
She was a little glad he didn’t mean it. She didn’t want to be wanted, but at the same time, she would have been angrier if she’d been attracted to a man who didn’t want her back.
There was no denying that she was attracted to that animal.
She gave a few of her dreadlocks a hard tug of frustration.
“Damn him.”
CHAPTER THREE
When Soren strode into the office of Shrew & Company the following morning, carrying his usual bribes of premium donuts and name-brand coffee, the receptionist stopped him at the hall. Putting up her hand in a halting gesture, Drea shook her head.
“Come on, don’t be like that.” He held up the coffee box. “I brought you stuff.”
“They’re in a meeting, Soren.”
“But they usually don’t mind me popping in.”
She raised her shoulders coyly. “Rules change all the time.”
“But you should make an exception for me.” He was, after all, her brother-in-law. Soon enough, they would be related twice over. Her brother, Bryan, was married to Tam, and Drea was Peter’s mate. He’d been at their apartment less than twelve hours prior. “You’re cock-blocking. That’s not nice. We’re family.”
“Gimme a donut.”
“No. Not until you play nicely.”
“Shush.” She snatched the box from him and set it on her desk. “I missed breakfast and didn’t have time to grab anything on the way in.”
“You didn’t have a problem getting into work in plenty of time before Peter moved in with you.” Not that Soren was bitter at all. He was happy that his brother had found a Bear who’d put up with his pathetic ass.
“Well, I had fewer distractions then.” She set a éclair onto a napkin. “Besides, they’ll be out in a couple of minutes, anyway. They’re rehashing what Sarah and Marcella learned from Gene last night. I’m waiting on them to give me something to work with, so I can start searching the usual places for info.”
“Ah. I see.” Soren didn’t bother digging because he’d already gotten the skinny on Gene. The Shrew grapevine was extraordinarily robust, seeing as how Ridges and Ursus used it heavily. Soren got access to supposedly confidential information with no fuss. Sarah had told the Shrews about the meeting, then Drea had told Peter, and Peter had told Soren. He admired the restraint Marcella had demonstrated during the interrogation. That was what he’d gone to the office to tell her.
As a start, anyway.
He had plenty of other things to tell her, some of which were almost certain to get him slapped. He didn’t mind being slapped when he was in a particular mood, but he knew better to say that out loud in mixed company.
The conference room door opened with a squeak, as always, and Bryan stepped out and into the hall. His eyes went wide, briefly, at the sight of Soren, and then he narrowed them. “Better not let Tam see that you’re here.”
“So what if she does?” Soren performed a dismissive shrug. “So fucking ridiculous. I’m not afraid of her. I’ve blown things that were larger than her into tissues.”
“Your life. Waste it if you like.” Bryan grabbed a couple of donuts and leaned his butt against the edge of his sister’s desk. “The ladies are mobilizing. Trying to figure out whom to send out in the field. Most of the time, their problem is understaffing, but right now, they’re actually okay.”
“Mmm.” Drea relieved Soren of the coffee box and rooted her BEARly Awake mug out of the lower right drawer of her desk. “Plenty of staff now that Gene’s not around raising hell, but we’ve got training gaps, or skill sets aren’t quite right for certain jobs.”