by M. L. Briers
Except that other shifter – he really had problems – big ones!
I’m not a damn mate… no way – no how – no sir!
How the heck could I be a mate? I’m human, not a bear – not the last bloody time I looked anyway, and I think I’d have noticed.
“You’re just a little ray of sunshine in everyone’s day, aren’t you?” Curtis growled.
“Pot – kettle – bear!” she snapped back.
“Pot, yeah – you’d know all about that,” Curtis shot back and watched as she tossed up her hands in frustration.
“It’s not pot!” she snapped back. If she could have growled, then she would have.
“Says you,” Curtis grumbled.
“And look who’s talking,” she tossed up a hand in his direction, and he scowled back at her, narrowing his eyes. “Mr shifty shifter who’ll ship anything, legal or illegal!” She snapped back.
“I will not do anything illegal,” he grumbled.
“Noooo?” she craned her head towards him on her neck.
“No.”
“Who’s shipping pot?” she snapped back.
“It’s not pot!” he growled.
“There you go then!” she hissed out, and Justin cracked up, causing both of the mates to turn their attention towards him.
“Don’t stop – it’s hysterical. I haven’t had this much fun since…” He considered it. “Nope, never, and never is a long time for me. Ding-ding, round three, or four.” He waved away the fact that he’d lost count.
“We should continue this in private,” Curtis sneered at the vampire. “Come into my shop.”
“Said the spider to the fly,” June snorted her sheer contempt for that scenario.
“Said the mate to the mate,” Curtis growled.
“Prove it,” June snapped back.
“What?” Curtis was taken back by her demand.
Mine…
“Well, let’s hear it. I’m human, not a bear shifter – prove that I’m your damn mate!” she demanded.
Curtis felt the rush of the challenge. That challenge might have come from his mate, but it was no less potent.
Mine…
He dropped his chin down towards his chest, and his eyes turned jet black as he stalked the two steps needed to close the distance between them. Then his arm shot out, and he wrapped it around her waist.
A heartbeat later and he’d yanked her soft body against his hard one.
His lips came down on hers with punishing clarity.
“Game set and match,” Justin chuckled. “There’s me mixing my metaphors. What is the world coming too?”
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June felt something. Too much, and yet, it felt like not enough.
That made absolutely no damn sense to her whatsoever.
What she did know was that she was out on the street, being kissed by a man who proclaimed to be her mate – whatever that entailed – and, shamefully, or not, loving every damn second of it.
She was gobsmacked.
Things like that just didn’t happen in her world. In the real world. In real life.
She had to wonder if she was dreaming it. She had to wonder if it wasn’t her that was freaking nuts.
She really had to wonder why the hell she was letting it happen. It wasn’t as if she couldn’t regain control with a swift kick to his family jewels – his prized possessions – it was more a matter of if she wanted to regain control, and she wasn’t exactly wedded to the idea.
Control felt like the last thing that her mind or body needed. There were some mean ass tingles going on throughout the whole of her body, and her womb – well, that was doing a jig – more than grateful for the attention that it was getting from the jolts of excited that shot through her.
The man was… She had no idea what he was, apart from a bear shifter with a bad attitude. But none of that seemed to matter one bit while he was kissing her, and boy could he kiss!
Kissing had never felt so good.
Kissing had never felt so fine, so all encompassing, so engrossing, like a wakeup call to every inch of her body, mind, and even her soul.
How was that possible?
A mate?
Really?
CHAPTER NINE
~
There are more things in heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy – William Shakespeare, smart man.
Did he know about vampires, shifters, and other worldly supernatural beings? Truly know?
Did he know about mates?
I don’t know about mates.
Damn, I should spend less time in the greenhouse and more time on the bloody internet or reading books.
Books are good – being oblivious is bad.
A mate. A human mate. What the hell does that mean?
O, O, Ooooh, am I going to have to turn into a bear?
Kind of cool with the fur and the claws – but, no, being a bear would be, different.
I can’t say wrong, because I’ve never been a bear – how do I know if it’s good, or bad, or – just different?
But, if all bears kiss like that… wait – what?
He’s not a bear now – he’s a bear shifter, and very much a man.
I can feel all of his man bits – the muscles, the hard body, the hard – body parts that are pressed against my stomach.
Oh good Lord, stop!
Not him stop, he can keep going – no, wait – me stop – him stop – we stop.
June finally managed to find the willpower to wrestle herself backward, just a little and just her upper body, but it was enough to get her lips unglued from his – to hell with the rest of her body, she just needed to breathe.
“That’s all very – well, and good,” she was practically panting like a bear.
“Very, very good,” Curtis gave a hungry growl, and she was sure that his voice had gone from deep, to really bloody deep.
She liked the sound of it. A lot. Too much, maybe. It was reeling her back in.
“But, you can’t just attack a person in the street.”
“Goran is…”
“Me, not him.”
“When did I attack you?” Curtis growled, just a little, just enough for her ears to prick up and pay attention – now that she knew that she liked it, well, she really liked it.
“Now, with the kissing and the holding, can I possibly get my body back?” she demanded.
It wasn’t that she didn’t like the feel of his strong arms around her, she did. It was that he’d thought that he could do it, all of it, and get away with it that worried her.
June wasn’t easy by any sense of the word. She wasn’t about to start just because some sexy shifter thought he could take advantage of her.
No matter how good taking advantage felt.
Curtis knew one thing for sure; he didn’t want to let go of her. He liked the way she felt in his arms, pressed up against him like that – her softest parts against his hardest, making them the perfect jigsaw pieces.
But, he also knew that his mate thought he’d overstepped the mark. Even if it had been her that had challenged him to prove they were mates – he thought that he’d proved it just fine.
The man had a big old smirk on his lips as he willed his arms to come from about her. She didn’t appreciate that look much either.
“I think it’s just great that you two finally found something that you can do without squabbling about it,” Justin said, stirring the pot again, and making her aware that there were other people present.
Even if it was only the vampire.
“You’d think after living as long as you, presumably, have that you’d be more of a grown up,” June tossed his way, and Curtis snorted a grunt of amusement.
“I’ve been saying that for years,” Curtis grinned at the man.
“Says the woman cavorting in the street for the whole village to witness,” Justin berated her with a smirk that prodded her guilty conscience.
&
nbsp; “In the words of my so called mate – bite me,” she announced, and that got a real deep warning growl that came from Curtis and rumbled towards the vampire.
Curtis wasn’t sure if it was the fact that she’d invited the vampire to bite her that had both him and his bear rattled or the fact that she’d used the word mate in any context at all that applied to them together.
He hated the first option, but boy, was he gung-ho for the second one. All he had to do now was woo her, and he thought he might just have made a really good start.
“Dinner. Tonight.” He growled out and waited for her to turn her attention back towards him.
“I…” June tried to think of all the reasons that she couldn’t, but her brain was still in a state of flux, and she couldn’t quite put her finger on one real thing to spit out for her own salvation.
“Seven. I’ll pick you up,” Curtis announced, and she was even more at sixes and sevens as to how to get out of it.
Truth be told; she wasn’t entirely sure that she wanted to get out of it, and that led to a big old debate raging inside of her brain as to what to say or do.
Curtis nodded his head in sheer satisfaction. While he’d love to spend the rest of the day and every day that followed with her, he thought it was best to give her just a little time to stew on things.
He’d had a conversation once with a female bear shifter who’d lived next door to his family about why she was so flighty and nervous while she was getting ready for a date. She’d said it was just excitement at the thought, and wondering where the evening was going to go.
That was how he wanted his mate to be. Nervous and excited at the prospect of seeing him again. Her heart all fluttery in her chest, and constantly thinking about him for the rest of the day. Rather than on guard and apprehensive about him.
Although, he thought he’d managed to get through her guard rather nicely just then.
“I… o…k,” June wasn’t sure why she’d agreed to go out with him, but she did know that she had a burning urge within her to rush right home, flick on her computer, and scoured the internet for any mention of mates that she could find.
She put one foot in front of the other and started to her car. With a backward glance in his direction, just before she turned the corner, her heart slammed against her ribs and then did the dance of the butterflies inside of her chest at the way he was looking at her. The last time she’d looked, she was neither an ice cream or a stake, but, boy did he look hungry.
June practically headbutted the brick wall as she took the corner too close. His arms shot up and reached out to her – as if he could somehow snatch her back from making a total prized prawn of herself, before she jumped back from the wall, sidestepped in her shame, and continued on her journey as she twisted her face away to hide her burning red cheeks.
“Total bloody muppet,” she muttered to herself as she shot towards her car like the hounds of hell were on her heels.
“Watch the shop,” Curtis growled out over his shoulder towards Justin.
He fished out the keys to his pickup truck from his pocket and started towards the side turning.
“What? Me? Why?” Justin exclaimed on a rush of words and wide eyed surprise.
“Can’t let her out of my sight,” Curtis growled out as he stalked towards his ride with the vampire following hard on his heels.
“People are not going to come into the shop while there’s a vampire behind the counter. Think logically!” Justin snapped out.
“Then it’ll be nice and quiet for you,” Curtis grumbled, wrenching open the door a little too hard in his haste to be right on his mate’s heels. The hinges protested.
“Think this through man. Do you really want to trash your business for a mate?” Justin demanded and then rolled his eyes. “Stupid question.”
“Very,” Curtis agreed, forcing his large body into the small space behind the wheel, before he slammed the door shut, thrust the key into the ignition, and the engine roared to life.
His eyes took in the sight of the vampire, looking all dubious and forlorn. One stocky finger hit the down button on the window as his other hand shifted the gear stick into drive.
“Suck it up, man,” Curtis growled.
“Now, there’s an idea,” Justin brightened at the thought. “Lunch time could take on a whole new meaning.” He grinned.
“Do not snack on my customers,” Curtis growled as he started to roll the truck forward. “And send out her pot plants.”
CHAPTER TEN
~
June walked in through the front door, dumped her stuff on the small table in the hallway, made her way through the downstairs of the small cottage, and out of the kitchen door at the back of the house into the garden. She didn’t pay much attention to anything else as she walked along the brick pathway toward the giant greenhouse that stretched as far towards the woods as she’d been able to get it.
She was more than eager to get her morning chores done outside so that she could research all about bear shifters on the internet. And as she went about her work, she was more than aware that there was an irrational need to hurry up and to cut corners within her – just so that she could get to the damn computer.
June had never felt that way before about her work. She loved losing time inside her greenhouse, the potting sheds, and her outside gardens.
Even on the days that she was sick, she found that she always felt better and more at ease surrounded by nature. Right then, nature could go and take a running jump, because all she wanted to do was find out what the heck that bear man was talking about.
She was supposed to be re-potting her lilies that morning, but with a flash of guilt, she told herself that waiting another day wasn’t going to see the plants straining at the bit for freedom.
The man’s kiss was still on her lips. That was to say that they still tingled just a little when she touched the tip of her finger against them. She wasn’t entirely sure that she liked the thought of it.
Kissed by a bear shifter.
A mate to a bear shifter – and all that entailed.
Not that I know what that bloody well entails because I’m stuck in the greenhouse and not at the computer!
She rushed the re-potting of a Lucifer that in good conscience just couldn’t wait, and tossed the empty, used pot over her shoulder in her haste, and without thought to the sound of it hitting the glass panel and bouncing back off to play ping-pong with the neat rows of the other pots.
Oh, poop! What am I doing?
I’m like a damn schoolgirl with a crush on the new boy, who’s been pressed into doing her chores by the wicked stepmother.
God, give me strength.
I need to get a grip… around his bloody neck for kissing me.
Who does that?
Kisses someone on the street that they’ve only just met?
Oh, but wait… who bloody well lets them do that?
Me, that’s who!
I should have kneecapped him with my boot.
I should have nut-crunched him with my knee.
I should… not be trying to plant the damn Lucifer upside down in the new pot!
Pot! Ha! Cassava – muppet.
How could the man think that I was growing pot?
Me?
Miss straight laced and proper plain Jane.
The girls at my old school would be peeing their panties at the thought.
Almost as much as the thought of me being in any way shape or form with a shifter.
Not that we knew what shifters were back then.
Not that I bloody well know what a shifter is all about now.
She practically put all of her weight behind pressing the soil around the plant and chucked water at it.
“There, done!” she did feel a pang of guilt. “Now, off to the computer and a nice cup of… Scotch. I think I need a Scotch – too early for Scotch… vodka.” She started back out of the greenhouse and up the path. “Too early for vodka… tea… coffee… Iris
h coffee, it’s never too early to have coffee.” She gave a thoughtful nod of her head and rushed full steam ahead back towards the house.
She was determined to find out everything that she possibly could about shifters, mates, and bears before the man turned up to take her to dinner.
“Oh poop, dinner. Wash my hair, take a shower, search through my wardrobe for something suitable to wear…” she sighed inwardly. “Dating is just such a chore.”
Dating!
I’m not dating. I’m going to dinner with a man, and that doesn’t mean I’m dating said man.
Everyone needs to eat, right?
Right!
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“I have a strange mate,” Curtis muttered to himself as he peered out from the leaves that were all around him, offering cover, the perfect hiding place for him to see most of the back and side of the house.
His bear grumbled a growl within him. The beast didn’t want to be hiding like a wayward gnome in the woods; it would much rather be up front and center with their mate.
He watched as she potted around in the kitchen making coffee. His eyebrows lifted just slightly when she reached for a bottle of alcohol.
“Early drinker,” he muttered to himself.
He guessed that he could live with that. Although, his idea of a good morning would be to be wrapped in her body doing what mates did best.
He fidgeted as his cock strained against the fabric of his jeans at the thought of taking his mate down his hard length. He growled under the ache of need that image caused.
June was sugar and spice and all things nice, and he… was a bear shifter.
He frowned at the thought. He’d woo the woman – he had to woo her.
He just didn’t know how a woman like her was going to feel about spending the rest of her life – or even the time it took to have dinner – with a man like him.
His beast grumbled a sorrowful tune within him.
June was too good for him.
Now that he’d seen where she lived. Now that he’d seen her at home, and it was a nice home, way better than his damn cabin on the other side of the woods, he had to wonder if fate might have screwed up.