by M. L. Briers
Curtis wanted more. He wanted it all, but he knew that there was one thing that he needed to hold back – his beast.
When she finally begged him for mercy, he climbed up and over her body on his hands and knees. His jet black eyes held her spellbound, and his hungry growl didn’t scare her one little bit.
He saw the flame of passion burning in her eyes, and he was ready to turn it into an inferno.
The sight of his thick, hard cock gave her a moment’s pause for thought as it hung low, pointing the way to where he needed to be.
“I’ll try to be gentle,” he teased. His dark eyes alight with passion.
“Just be you,” June assured him, reaching for those broad, muscled shoulders, and curling her fingers over the top. She squeezed, and those muscles didn’t give an inch.
“Not this time. It’ll be too wild, too…”
“Do you think I can’t handle wild?”
“Can you?” He didn’t move. He wanted to be inside of her, buried deep, and loving her the way a man should love his mate, with everything that he had to give, but he needed an answer.
“Let’s find out, mate.”
Curtis bear rose within him. He’d talked the beast down, kept him at bay, but now the beast wanted to mark her as theirs.
“If I let go of myself, I’m going to mark you as…”
“Yes, mark me.”
Curtis bit down on his need, but he couldn’t keep his desires at bay.
“Let’s start here and see where it takes us,” his deep tones were underpinned with the hungry growl that rumbled in his chest and caught in his throat.
He lowered his body down, fit his hips between her inner thighs, and groaned as he pressed his cock into her tight channel. Her fingers tightened over the muscles of his shoulders as she revelled in the feel of her silken walls sheathing his cock so damn tightly that he growled with every inch.
She felt like heaven, and he was in hell because he just wanted to thrust to the hilt and revel in their joined bodies. He wanted to be wild with her, wanted to let his beastly side out.
He moved his hips towards hers, took her down his long, thick length until they the fitted together as one. He felt her legs wrap around his, felt her ankles lock him there, and he loved it.
He loved her. His mate. His. Forever.
Curtis had resisted the urge to move for as long as he could. Then he dragged his cock back through her silken walls and buried it to the hilt once more.
He watched her eyes flare, heard the sound that caught in her throat, and moved again.
Each long stroke took her deep. Every time he hit home she squeezed her inner muscles around his cock, not wanting to let him go, and each time he could feel the wildness for her within him growing stronger, clawing at him to be set free.
Mine…
He was in control. Barely.
As long as he didn’t turn her, didn’t look upon the place on her shoulder where he desperately wanted to place his mark, then he’d be fine.
He felt the pressure of her fingernails against the skin of his back, and before he could do anything to stop her, she clawed down his flesh, and his mind and body went wild. He reached around and snagged her wrists within his hand, trapping them against the mattress on either side of her head.
Her eyes flared. She liked it.
“You’re holding back, Curtis.”
With a grunt he moved fast, pulling back from her. His large hands released her wrists and clamped down around her waist, lifting and turning her onto her hands and knees on the bed.
At the sight of the curve of her back, he growled hard. His beast pushed forward until he could feel the prickle of the bear fur just beneath his skin.
His hands clamped down against her hips, and he thrust his cock back inside of her, taking her to the hilt. He blew his breath down his nose with every deep thrust, a grunt of pleasure every time her tight walls sheathed him so completely, and his powerful hips moved faster.
Skin slapped against skin. The scent of sex was all around him, and he breathed it in, reveling in the combined smell, and all that meant.
Joined.
He could feel her inner muscles tightening around his cock. He could see her fingers clawing at the sheets of the bed as she fisted them in her hands. He knew that she was close to coming undone around his cock and he wanted that feeling more than life itself.
With one large arm wrapped around her waist, Curtis yanked her back towards him, locked her against the hard muscles of his chest, safe in the cage of his body. He dipped his head and took her scent at the source.
Mine…
He traced his tongue down her neck, over her shoulder to the spot where his fangs would cut deeply, mark her skin, and his beast roared within him – demanding that it be done.
His fangs pushed down and locked into place.
Mine…
June’s whole body was tightening in his arms with anticipation. The friction of his thick cock inside the tightened walls of her channel was spellbinding. He grunted with every deep thrust.
Her fingernails were biting into the flesh of Curtis’ arm, and he loved that feeling. It made him work harder for what she needed, what he needed, and then she tipped her head back and to the side, opening her neck and shoulder for him in what felt like an act of submission to his beast, and his bear roared once more.
Curtis heard her catch her breath and hold it, felt her whole body tense hard a moment before the orgasm tore through every inch of her. He sank his fangs into her flesh and drew them down through her skin, and the taste of her blood was on his tongue.
His bear roared within him. The beast finally sated by the act of marking her, bonding with her, but Curtis was anything but sated.
He licked against her wound, cleaning and sealing it into her skin, and his body fired like a fever had taken his blood. It sent him wild with desire for his release.
Curtis took her forward on the bed. One strong arm still locked around her waist as he curled his body over the top of hers.
Caged.
His hips were still pounding against her backside, but now he was like a wildling. With every deep thrust, he grunted hard, searching – searching – needing to find his release – needing to place his seed deep within her womb and complete their bond.
Curtis heard the curse words that were bitten out from her sweet lips, and he loved the sound of them. Loved it when she begged for more. Was empowered by the feeling of her channel tightening around his cock again, making him work harder.
Every muscle strained to find release. Every sinew was burning with the fever that powered him on.
Curtis craned his head back on his neck and his face twisted as if in pain, but all he felt was pleasure, so much pleasure, the like of which he’d never known before. Then he felt her fingernails against his thigh, and the skin gave way beneath the pressure – pain, and pleasure – his wild side devoured it all.
The instant that he felt her channel clamp down around his cock he was in heaven and hell. June cried out with the intensity of the orgasm that tore through her body, wave after hard wave claiming her to her very soul.
The hard clench and release of her inner muscles around his cock sucked the seed from his balls, and a hard growl started within his chest, and caught in his throat the instant that the first wave of the orgasm hit him.
Then he thrust deep inside of her and roared as his seed exploded against her womb.
Over and over, wave after wave, the pleasure felt unending, and he rode with it to completion. He was sated, for now, but he knew that he would never get enough of her.
Curtis’ muscles were quivering. His legs could barely hold him up, let alone their combined weight as he turned her within his arms and used every last bit of strength that he possessed to turn them in the bed and bring her down within the protective safety of his arms.
He’d never let her go. Never let anyone hurt her again.
June was his mate to love, to honor, and
to protect.
Forever.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
~
“Of course we can, Mrs. Muir. We ship, almost, anything, and our prices are bear-ly legal,” June said with a cheeky grin towards Curtis.
Her mate stood on the other side of the long counter top, with his thick, muscled arms folded across his broad, hard chest. With a stupid grin on his lips that had been there for the last ten months since they’d bonded.
“See, now that’s how you deliver the line,” Justin muttered from his chair in the corner of the shop, and Curtis ignored him.
June took the payment that the woman offered her and turned to ring up the sale. Business was booming since she’d started behind the counter, and a lot of the locals popped in for a chat as they were passing.
Curtis had become the man who can. He’d really opened up towards the community and was only too happy to help the more senior residents with any little problems that they had around their homes.
“You’re fit to burst,” Mrs. Muir exclaimed at the size of her stomach, swollen with the cub that Curtis was just itching to hold. “You shouldn’t still be on your feet.” Mrs. Muir turned a scathing look at her mate, and Curtis swallowed hard.
“She said she was fine,” Curtis rushed out in his defense.
He’d been telling his mate for weeks to take it easy, put her feet up, but the woman had a hard head and a soft heart. She never listened to him. she was too damn headstrong.
“She’s pregnant with your baby, and there you are, slave driver, making her work all hours…” Mrs. Muir teased the man.
She knew what a fusspot he was and had seen the way that he hovered around his mate, but, much like the vampire that she always eyed with suspicion, she liked to stir the pot.
“It’s positively disgraceful,” Justin bit in out in mock disgust as he eyed the page of the magazine that he did not intend reading.
“Should be ashamed,” Mrs. Muir added, and she caught the flick of the vampire’s eyes, and they offered each other a conspiratorial smirk.
Curtis was already on his way around the counter. His dark brow drew down in a scowl, and he wasn’t happy. June could hear it in the way that he growled.
“Now you’ve gone and done it,” she rolled her eyes to the ceiling and counted to three, that was as far as she got before Curtis moved in on her.
“Sit down,” he growled.
“Right here?” June asked, turning her eyes towards her mate and raising her eyebrows high on her forehead.
“Yes, now…” Curtis growled. “Wait, no, not there.” He shook his head.
“He has a slight decision-making disorder,” June offered towards the older woman and noted the smirk on her lips.
“I do not have a decision-making disorder, and I will not have my mate sitting on the floor, especially in your condition.”
“I have a condition?” June played innocent.
“Pregnant,” Curtis looked at her as if she’d just thrown up on his shoes.
“That’s a condition?” June shot back.
“Well, it’s not normal,” Curtis offered and watched his mate twisted her head on her neck and glared at him.
“It’s perfectly normal, and I’m perfectly fine,” June offered back with a small frown.
“I will not allow you…” Curtis growled out, but he got no further, the spark of fire in her eyes made him want to swallow his tongue.
“A-l-l-o-w…” she breathed out like a dragon.
“Huh?” Curtis played dumb.
“You will not allow me?” June pressed her point, and when her hands went to her shapely hips, Curtis did swallow down hard, but the lump was still in his damn throat.
“I didn’t…” he started but got no further.
“He said it, I heard him,” Justin folded the magazine and placed it on his lap to watch the fireworks. Curtis grumbled a growl.
“I heard him too,” Mrs. Muir piped up.
“Ooh, Curtis,” June groaned out with a shake of her head and a scowl on her brow.
“Now, what I meant…” Curtis needed to backpedal and fast, but it was three to one, and he didn’t think he was that damn speedy.
“Barefoot and pregnant,” June announced, tossing a hand up in the air and letting it fall again, and the man snapped his body to attention.
“Huh?”
“That’s what you’d have me be,” June said and tossed up her hand again for good measure.
“That’s not…” Curtis shook his head faster.
“Barefoot, pregnant, and chained to the kitchen sink,” June bit back.
“Shame of a man that he is,” Mrs. Muir said as she shook her head in mock disbelief. Curtis snapped his eyes towards the older woman and then back to his mate.
“I never…” he tried again but didn’t get very far.
“You just did,” June said, scowling a death glare at him, before she raised her chin in the air, and offered him a huff. She tried to fold her arms across her chest, but her belly and her breasts were just so big that it felt silly.
“Did not!” Curtis growled.
“Did so bloody well too!” June snapped back.
“Did!” Justin said.
“I heard him,” Mrs. Muir put in.
“I just want to protect you from yourself,” Curtis growled.
“Myself?” June pulled her head back on her neck and twisted her face in disbelief. “Am I not able to take care of myself?”
“No!” Curtis snapped, and when her eyes went wide, he backpedaled. “Yes, but it’s my job too…”
“Be a big pain in the backside as you can be? I know, babe,” June teased, and a spark of mischief played in her eyes. Curtis caught that look, and he knew – knew that she was playing with him again.
Between her and the vampire, he wasn’t sure which way was up sometimes.
June saw his mood change. From helplessly trying to dig himself out of a hole, to suspicious, and then he fixed on understanding – knowing.
“I get it,” Curtis growled.
“Looks like you got it, judging by the bulge of her stomach,” Mrs. Muir bit out, and the vampire chuckled.
“Someone’s feeling playful,” Curtis took one big step towards his mate.
“Fat, bloated, and hungry twenty-four hours a day, but playful?” June rolled her eyes.
Curtis took one more step and dipped at the waist, he swept her up off her feet and started around the counter with her in his arms, right towards Justin.
“What are you…?” June chuckled.
“Up,” Curtis growled at the vampire, and Justin frowned.
“Excuse me?”
“Up, out, now,” Curtis growled.
“No please?” Justin tossed back.
“No please, just some claws and fangs if you don’t move this instant,” Curtis growled back. “My mate needs a chair.”
“There is another one, you know?” Justin shrugged.
“She needs the big chair,” Curtis growled.
“I what?” June demanded. “Thanks!” she grumbled.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Curtis said. “I like the new curvier you.”
“Curvier? I look like a beached whale,” June grumbled.
“But, you’re my beached whale,” Curtis grinned. “With my cub inside you.”
“Fine,” Justin groaned and pushed up from the chair.
“Go finish off Mrs. Muir,” Curtis growled to the vampire.
“You might want to rephrase that,” the older woman grumbled back, and Justin chuckled.
“I was gonna say that,” the vampire grinned.
“Hmm, just so long as you don’t try it,” Mrs. Muir said with something of a playful glare for him.
“Perish the thought,” Justin chuckled. “I’m not that kind of a monster.”
“Monster, Pah! The teddy bear and his trusty side kick,” she snorted a chuckle.
“Why does everyone call me the sidekick?” Justin grumbled in disbelief.
“I’m four hundred and forty years young, give or take, and he’s just a cub.”
“Maybe it’s because you follow him around like a puppy that’s been kicked,” Mrs. Muir offered with a smirk.
“There are no words,” Justin offered back.
“Look at that, lost for words, and you – a four hundred and forty year old,” she shot back with another snort, but it was June’s chuckles that warmed him the most. The woman had become like a sister to him in such a short amount of time.
“I get booted out of my chair, insulted – twice, and made to do manual labor behind the counter,” Justin played to the crowd.
“What you need is a woman of your own,” Mrs. Muir shrugged.
“Offering?” Justin gave her a beaming smile, and she snorted again.
“Not if my life depended on it,” she hit back. Then she turned her head at the sound of someone clicking their heels against the pavement outside the shop. “Try this one,” she offered, eyeing the twenty-something, pretty brunette that was coming their way. “Not too young for you?” She chuckled as she watched the vampire’s interest pique.
“There are only so many four hundred-year-old women to go around,” Justin tossed back. “You sit,” he motioned to Curtis and June, then he turned his attention towards Mrs. Muir. “You can be my wingman.”
“That’ll go well,” Mrs. Muir offered back with a sparkle of mischief in her eyes.
Justin grinned. He liked the old woman; she was his kind of people.
The End.