Considering what happened along the way, she was lucky to be alive. Conrad said he hadn’t seen any tracks in the photo he took around the scene, but then the snow was falling pretty hard by then. She hadn’t mentioned the tiger until they were headed back to town, and by the time he’d returned to the scene, there was nothing. Not even a hint of tracks in the back of the truck.
The cop in him was on alert. If Ian was back in town, it could only mean trouble.
And he had Ainsley’s scent, a woman who closely resembled the sister Ian had lost to cancer. If she left town, Ian might follow her. It had happened before. Back then, his friend didn’t know what he was. It wasn’t until he’d almost killed two hikers after shifting that Luc and Doc found him and explained. He had a tough time learning control, especially after his sister’s death, which had set off all kinds of emotions in him. When he’d almost hurt a human who’d stopped to walk her dog, he’d been mortified. He left town before Luc or anyone else could help him.
“Why are you watching me?” The sultry voice did things to his lower regions. Damn her. It had been a long time since he’d wanted a woman as bad as he did Ainsley, but she was off limits. All women were off limits. One of the many reasons she needed to leave town as soon as Luc and Conrad knew she’d be safe.
“Can’t sleep,” he lied. No way could he tell her that he was soaking up every second he had around her.
Lame, even for you.
She sat up and the quilt fell to reveal her in his large white t-shirt. It swallowed her, but the way her breasts poked against the cotton made him think it had never looked better than when it was on her.
“Do you want to–” She yawned.
Fuck you? Yes. Make love to you until you scream my name a hundred times with that velvety voice of yours. Yes.
“Switch,” she said as she tried to hold her eyes open, “beds. I mean, I’m a lot smaller. That couch can’t be comfortable for you.”
He’d fallen asleep on the couch many a night holding his pacifier—a large bottle of JD. Ironic, now that he was sober he owned a bar. It’d been three years since his last drink.
“I’m fine, go back to sleep.”
“I’m kind of cold,” she said.
Impossible. He’d put the quilt with a couple of blankets on her.
“I’ll get you another blanket.”
“Is your heater out?” Her teeth chattered.
“No,” he grunted. It might make him miserable but she’d freeze to death if he didn’t turn it up a little. Shining his cell on the thermostat, he turned it up to forty-five degrees. That was about all he could handle this time of year. Any warmer and he’d never be able to wake up. The warmer he was, the sleepier he became.
“Thanks,” she whispered. “You could share the bed. We can put pillows down the middle or something. I trust you.”
She wouldn’t if she had any idea how much he wanted her.
Tempted, he almost said yes, but he knew that was a bad idea. That close to her, he wasn’t certain he’d be able to keep his hands off of her.
Who was he kidding? No way in hell he’d be able to.
“Not a good idea,” he said crossing his arms.
“I promise not to attack you if you change your mind, though I might snuggle because you keep this place the temperature of a refrigerator. It might be warmer if I go down and sleep in the walk-in cooler.
She sank back down into the blankets. “Not that I’m complaining. It’s better than the only other option I had tonight. Well, two.”
“You told me you didn’t have any where else to go.” The words came a little sharper than he meant.
“Don’t know why you always have to be so grumpy,” she mumbled. “I just meant this bed is a lot warmer and softer than my stupid truck. And the only other option was jail.”
Luc had a feeling they would both be a lot safer if she were behind bars.
Once her breathing slowed, Luc snuck out of the apartment. She’d need clothes. The clothes and shoes she’d worn weren’t appropriate for working in a bar, or his sanity. The way that skirt had hugged her hips…
Twenty minutes later he stood in the middle of the Chic Boutique, with Ronda Pippen staring him down. She was a long time friend of his family, but the scowl on her face didn’t make her look like it.
“You know, the store hours posted out front aren’t a guideline,” she said as she pulled the fuzzy dark green robe around her and tied it tighter. She and her husband, Dale, lived above the store in a loft space much like Luc’s. Only she had a thing for pink, which littered her store and home. And Dale was smart enough to let her do whatever she wanted.
“Sorry. I just wanted to make sure she had something to change into first thing in the morning. Can’t have her working in those shoes again. She’s an insurance risk.”
“Not sure that’s the risk you need to worry about,” Ronda mumbled. “Did you get her size?”
Luc handed her a piece of paper. “I checked all the labels. Had a hell of time seeing the number on the bottom of those red soles.”
Her head popped up. “She wears Louboutins? Holy hell. What’s she doing working in your bar, if she can afford shoes like that?”
“Everyone gets down on their luck now and then,” he said. “So do you have something in her size?”
Ronda rolled her eyes. “Lucky for her, I do. A lot of women in this town are bigger boned than most. You have her hip size, but did you get her waist?”
Luc held out his hands. “She’s about this big.”
Ronda snorted. “Does she have a favorite color?”
They hadn’t discussed those kinds of personal things. But she did seem to like things that were soft. Her lingerie had been silky.
“I don’t think she cares, as long as it’s good quality. And she likes nice fabrics.”
“Don’t we all? So if she’s working in the bar, she’ll need some jeans.” Ronda tossed a pair into Luc’s arms. “If these fit, you can come back and get some more. Here are a couple of t-shirts.” She handed back some cotton T’s. “She’ll also need a coat so go pick one out for her. I’ll see if I can find her bra and panty sizes, you go see if you can find her a pair of size nine tennis shoe. She’ll need something with a rubber sole if she’s going to work on that floor of yours. I hate to think what that filthy thing has done to her fancy shoes.”
Luc wanted to grumble that the floor was scrubbed clean every night but he didn’t want to piss off Ronda any more than he already had. On the left side of the store he found the women’s shoes. There were strappy things and work boots, but he knew exactly what to get as soon as he saw them.
Piling his purchases on the counter, he waited for Ronda to add the lingerie. He tried not to look at the flimsy silk she put on the top of the pile but he couldn’t help himself. After seeing Ainsley in her bra and underwear, he’d thought of little else. Imagined her in every color and without anything at all on.
“If any of this doesn’t fit, bring it back during normal store hours and I’ll exchange it for her. You wake me up before five in the morning again and I’ll be wearing your pelt at the Christmas party.”
A wolf, Ronda was all bark and no bite. She had the kindest of hearts, which was the only way he’d been able to convince her to get up so early. Dale had answered the door, chuckled and told Luc he had taken his life in his hands.
But Ronda had been there for him in the dark days, and he’d been there when her youngest was sick and the store wasn’t doing so great. He’d held a fundraiser and raised the money needed to cover the hospital expenses.
“You be careful with her, you big old bear. She’s a tender human.”
Ronda didn’t say the exact words but he knew what she meant.
No one knew better than he that with just one wrong move he could kill Ainsley.
Chapter Five
A vice lay across her stomach. Each time Ainsley tried to breathe it hurt like hell. It took her a few minutes to realize that the vice was Luc
’s arm, but his touch was gentle. It was her ribs that made her breathing painful. She smiled, despite the pain, at the large man next to her. After whining about the cold again, he’d wrapped her in the blankets and then pulled her close. Instantly, the chill had left her bones and she settled into a restful sleep. It had been a week since she’d had more than a few hours, and if it weren’t for her ribs, she would feel almost human.
“What hurts?” He said with his eyes still closed.
She started to ask how he knew since she hadn’t said a word, but he seemed to have some innate sense of knowing what she needed. At first, it had freaked her out a little, but now she didn’t mind. “My ribs.”
He grunted. “Doc said they might need to be wrapped. I’ll get the ace bandages he left. He wanted to do it last night, but we couldn’t get you to stay awake long enough.” Before she could stop him, he was out of the bed.
For such a grump, he was an incredibly thoughtful man. Giving up his bed, taking her in and making sure she ate a decent meal. No one had cared for her like that in a long time. Possibly ever, if she really thought about it. Her parents loved her but they left her care to nannies and nurses. When she was older, the butler, Gerard, took over making certain she did her homework and that she arrived at school on time. Other than that, from the time she was about thirteen, she was left to her own devices.
She’d become quite the little hellion. Rebelling against anyone who’d ever tried to make her into something she wasn’t. They wanted her to be some Westside debutante. But her free spirit couldn’t be tamed.
As soon as she was old enough, she moved to Los Angeles about as far away as she could get from her family and still stay in the United States. After a year of freedom, she’d received a call from her father. He’d offered to pay for business school since she’d mentioned that she wanted to go into business for herself. All she had to do was attend classes and make decent grades and he’d pay for her education no strings attached.
Rebellious as she might have been, she wasn’t an idiot. Living in L.A. was expensive. She worked at two different galleries just to make ends meet. Turning down an amazing education would do no one any good, least of all her.
She’d been accepted to Wharton and moved back to the East coast—and even began mending fences with her parents. They grew closer as the years passed, and then last year they’d been killed when her father’s corporate jet smashed into the side of a mountain. Everyone thought it was a weather-related accident. But Ainsley knew the truth. A truth, that could get her killed.
Her uncle was to blame for all of it. But she didn’t know about her brother. She had her suspicions about him being involved, but she couldn’t imagine him being complicit in killing their parents. He’d worshipped their father and had always doted on their mother. He was the good kid and had always been her rock.
Why would he turn on her?
“If you’re in pain, maybe you should take some of these,” Luc stood in front of her with a prescription bottle, a glass of water, and an ace bandage, bringing her back to the present.
“I don’t like taking anything that makes me foggy,” she said.
“Suit yourself,” he said as he sat the pills and glass down. “Sit up and turn around. I’ll get these ribs wrapped.”
“No, I—” her breath caught when she twisted. Damn it hurt.
“Just take off your shirt and let me do this so we can get some sleep. You’ll rest better if the ribs are held tight and can’t move as much.”
Glancing up at his face, she stilled the argument on her tongue. The look in his brown eyes told her that he would brook no silliness from her.
“Fine.” Battling her sore muscles, she lifted the shirt over her head she faced the wall, with Luc behind her. For a moment nothing happened. Then his hand trailed down her spine so delicately, she wondered if he actually touched her.
“There’s another large bruise above your kidney,” he said. “We’ll have to watch that. If the pain gets worse, you need to let me know.”
“Okay,” she promised.
His hands moved deftly below her breasts as he held the bandage there and wrapped it slowly around her ribs. Each time his fingers grazed her skin, she gasped a little. Small electric pulses burned where he touched her. It was all she could do, not to beg him to touch the rest of her, over and over again.
When he reached the bottom of her ribs, his hand splayed across her belly in an intimate gesture. Her heart beat triple time as she did her best to steel her nerves. He used a small clasp to keep the bandage in place and removed his hands.
The bereft sensation she felt as he turned away, annoyed her. This was the absolute last man in the world she should be interested in. He wasn’t interested in her. He only wanted her well enough to send her on her merry way.
“I appreciate it,” she said as he climbed onto the other side of the bed.
Turning on his side, he faced away.
She sighed but moved as close to him as she could without touching him.
Heat radiated off of him and soon his gentle snores relaxed her tired bones. The comfort she experienced being so close to a man she knew instinctively would protect her with his life wasn’t lost on her. For the first time, she felt as though she would survive. All she had to do was keep the big bear of a man off kilter until she figured out a way around her problems.
…
Full moon was two days away and the crowded bar was filled with fidgety men and women. Even with Ainsley’s help, they were all running around like crazy. Recognizing how sore she must still be from yesterday’s wreck, he had insisted she stay upstairs. She did, for about five minutes, but the next thing he knew she was taking orders and picking up empties from the tables.
More than once he’d ordered her to go back upstairs but she’d just smiled sweetly and told him she needed the tips. Man she had to be racking them up. The woman knew how to work a room. There wasn’t a single customer, male or female, she hadn’t charmed.
“Two darks, one light and table three says you need something from this century on the juke box,” she said as she put her tray on the bar for the Cress brothers to empty.
“Tell them they can go to another bar if they want to listen to that crap,” he said as he put the beers on her tray the boys had cleaned off.
She rolled her eyes, and he bit back a smile.
“You holding up okay?” he asked for the thirtieth time that night.
She shrugged, wincing slightly at the movement. “Yep. I’ll be fine.”
That meant she wasn’t fine just then.
Dammit. Why couldn’t the fool woman do what was good for her?
She delivered the beers and returned with another order.
“The ladies in the corner booth want your margarita special. They said you’d know what that meant.”
“Tell them to give me a few minutes and I’ll see if I have more limes. And the special is a pink umbrella,” he said as he reached for the package of decorative, paper umbrellas and handed it to her. “Gets pretty dark and cold around here. The ladies like to liven up their nights with something a little different.” After he finished mixing the pitchers of margaritas, she added the umbrellas.
“These don’t normally go together where I come from, but I have to admit, it’s festive.” She took off to deliver the drinks. He wondered if she would ever tell him about her troubles. If she didn’t sit down soon, he was going to make her. Working so hard could not be good for her injuries, but all she seemed to care about was making tip money so she could fix her truck.
Busy at the bar, his sensitive hearing picked up on an argument near the jukebox. In a crowd like this, the small altercation turned nasty fast.
“Stop it,” Ainsley shouted as she pushed her way over to the fight. “You’re being idiots.” There was contact with skin and she yelped.
That was it. He leapt over the bar and flew across the room, landing half-bear half-man in the middle of the crowd. Claws out, he prepa
red to attack. His mouth morphed, his grizzly teeth growling. Everyone backed away.
Ainsley’s eyes widened as she stared at his face and then his arms. The t-shirt he wore had split on the sides and he was part fur.
Hell.
Everything stopped for a few seconds.
“You boys behave,” she ordered her voice slightly shaky. Her eyes never left Luc’s face, which was morphing back to human as she spoke.
Of course she was freaked out, why wouldn’t she be? The man she’d shared a bed with the night before had turned into a bear.
“I need a glass of water and some aspirin,” she said. “You two better not go at it again or I’ll kick your asses for accidentally bumping my sore ribs.”
“Yes, ma’am,” the men said in unison. If Luc hadn’t been so worried about her reaction to his true self, he might have laughed. He didn’t doubt she’d do it, despite being in no shape to take anyone down.
The woman was a wonder. The fact that she didn’t run screaming from the room also said a lot about her. The place was silent as she backed up to the bar and disappeared into the kitchen.
“You two pull something like that again, and you’ll be banned.” He growled.
They nodded.
“And if you hurt her ribs, I’ll be the one kicking your ass. She’s in a lot of pain.”
“We’re sorry,” Jason said. “You know how it is close to the moon.”
“Don’t care about your excuses. Control your temper or you’ll find yourselves at the wrong end of mine.”
Luc followed her into the kitchen a few moments later, but she wasn’t there. Sniffing the air he frowned as he followed her scent to the broom closet.
Knocking gently on the door, he waited for an answer.
She might be in shock. Worse things had happened the first time a human saw a shifter.
Turning the knob, he said, “You’re safe. No one is going to hurt you.”
She mumbled something but even with his hearing, he didn’t understand her.
The door popped open and she stood there holding the tray of brownies he’d taken out of the oven twenty minutes ago. One by one, she stuffed them into her mouth. When she glanced up at him, her green eyes were wide.
Lions, Tigers, and Sexy Bears, Oh My! Page 4