by Becca Van
“This is the cake that had you raving?” Celeste picked up the cake in her pale, thin, delicate fingers.
Tammy nodded, wiped the residual coconut from her lips with a napkin and took a sip of coffee.
Celeste chuckled.
Tarik sat on the seat next to her, breathing in her sweet feminine aroma, and savoring the heat of her body so close to his. His sabear purred and rubbed against his side when her slim arm brushed against his sending shivers of need through his blood. His cock rapidly filled with blood and he had to shift on his stool to relieve the pressure from his constricting jeans.
“Where’s ours?” Hodge asked.
“I didn’t think you liked it,” Hopper said.
“I lied.”
“Uh huh.” Hopper went in the back for more cake and coffee.
“Why did you laugh?” Tarik asked.
Celeste breathed in and then started choking. She coughed so hard he was worried she was about to cough up a lung. Tarik patted her on the back, wishing his hand was touching bare skin, but at least he was getting the opportunity to touch her again. She’d shrugged off any attempt at touching her since the day he and Hodge had massaged her tight, sore muscles.
He’d hoped that she would come to trust them more but that hadn’t happened. In fact, she tried to spend as little time as possible with him and Hodge. It wasn’t because she wasn’t attracted to them, because he could smell her desire whenever she was around them. Maybe this stalker guy had made her wary of any member of the opposite sex.
Tarik squeezed his eyes closed with despondent resignation. She’d also seen Tammy’s and Hopper’s eyes glowing. Celeste was probably going to want to leave after his sister had explained what they were. Pain sliced into his chest making his gasp. He wanted to lift his head to the ceiling and roar out his fury. He sucked in a breath and tried to get his tumultuous emotions back under control.
He glanced down into Celeste’s stunning blue-eyed gaze when she nudged his arm. “Are you okay?”
Hope that she cared for him even if it was only a little warmed his heart, pushing the despondency aside. “Fine,” he rasped, his hand still stroking up and down her back.
“So, are you going to answer me?” Tarik asked.
She frowned as if trying to remember the question and he knew she had when her expression cleared. “This isn’t the first time I’ve eaten a lamington.”
“Lamington?” Tarik frowned before glancing at Hopper. When he saw his friend’s sheepish expression, he knew they’d been had.
“The cake.”
Tammy turned her gaze to Celeste’s. “You’ve had this before?”
“Yes.”
“Where?” Tammy scowled at Hopper.
“This is an Australian dessert.”
“Is it?”
“Uh, have I said something wrong?” Celeste asked.
Tammy shook her head, stood and pointed at Hopper. “You told me you made this recipe up especially for me.”
“I did.”
“You lied to me.”
“I would never lie to you, Tams. I did make this up especially for you.”
“I thought you’d concocted the whole recipe.”
“I never said that.”
“So, you lied.”
“No, just…bended the truth a little.”
“What does it matter?” Celeste grinned. “Who wouldn’t like two pieces of sponge cake dipped in chocolate and coconut with jelly sandwiched in the middle?” She took a bite and hummed in appreciation.
Hodge moaned softly, drawing Tarik’s gaze. His friend was watching their mate in the small mirror hanging on the wall behind the counter. He turned back just as Celeste glanced up and gazed right in the mirror. The mug of coffee dropped from her hand as she gasped and jumped from the stool. His and Hodge’s eyes were glowing.
When she shoved the stool aside and looked as if she was about to run, Tarik gently yet firmly clasped her wrist in his hand. “Calm down, baby. You don’t need to be scared of us.”
“W–what the f–uck is going on?” Celeste trembled but then she seemed to realize she was showing her fear.
Pride surged through Tarik when she shoved her shoulders back and scowled at him, but he could still see trepidation in her eyes.
“Sit down and we’ll explain.” Hodge pushed her stool closer and patted the padded seat.
Celeste swallowed audibly and after a tentative glance about the room, sat down.
Tammy slapped at Phelan’s hand when he reached for her and rushed around the other side of the counter. She glanced at Hopper from the corner of her eye but then locked gazes with Celeste.
“You are the sister of my heart, girlfriend. We would never do anything to hurt you.”
Tarik hadn’t noticed he was still grasping Celeste’s wrist in his until she tugged away from him. He wished he could feel her soft warm skin beneath his fingers and palm again. No, better yet would be to have her naked under him while he and his sabear claimed her. He shifted on his seat trying to relieve the restricting pressure of his jeans on his hard dick and hoped that Celeste wouldn’t freak out when they told her what they were. He had a serious case of blue balls and knew the ache was only going to get worse. He’d been harder than stone ever since he carried her out of the plane wreck, and though he knew it was going to be difficult to give her the time she needed to come to terms with who she was to him and Hodge, he would give her all the time she needed.
“Our family has always been a little different from the normal human being,” Tammy began.
“Ya think.” Celeste frowned.
Tammy giggled but then she scowled as Hopper moved until he was behind her and wrapped an arm around her waist. “Back off big guy.”
Hopper, who towered over his shorter sister, leaned down so Tammy could meet his gaze. Tarik had to bit his lip to hold in a smile when Hopper winked at Tammy and then shook his head. He wasn’t the least bit surprised when Phelan walked around the counter until he was standing next to Tammy. He slung an arm around her shoulders and pulled her up against the side of his body. The ensuing struggle between the trio would have been amusing if he hadn’t caught Celeste tensing beside him as if preparing to come to Tammy’s rescue.
“Enough!” Tarik growled in an authoritative voice.
Tammy smirked at Phelan and Hopper before shoving them aside and taking a few steps away from them.
“Most of the males who live on this island are shifters.”
The silence after Tammy’s statement was fraught with tension. Celeste blew out a noisy breath and looked at his sister as if she was a more than one brick short of a load.
“Um. O-okay.”
“You don’t believe me, do you?” Tammy asked.
“We’ll it’s a bit hard to accept a declaration like that when I’ve only ever read and heard about such things in fiction and mythology.”
“Understandable,” Tammy said. “Let me tell you the whole story. We’ve traced our ancestry back to the Haida—correct phonetic pronunciation and sometimes spelled Hyda—people, indigenous to the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America. They apparently resided in British Columbia, but a few of them wandered far and wide.”
Tarik was glad to see the entranced expression on his mate’s face. He glanced at Hodge and saw his usually stoic friend smiling. He couldn’t remember the last time he saw him smile. Celeste glanced his way, meeting his gaze briefly before turning back to Tammy and nodding for her to continue.
“Some of the indigenous tribes wound up on this island and settled here. There was a time when the vegetation on this island flourished and the women of the tribe would go out every day to gather berries and other food.” Tammy paused to inhale.
“The legends say that there was a large colony of polar bears living here as well, and while the women worked they sang to the bears so they wouldn’t upset the Bear Mother spirit. A spirit from the indigenous people’s cultural beliefs. Every single woman, young and old sang but ther
e was one exception. She was more interested in chatting about her own concerns. The bears thought the woman disrespectful and as the women began heading back to their village, the selfish woman’s basket tipped spilling all the berries.
“Two men dressed in white bearskin robes offered to help her if she agreed to go with them. She agreed. The chief of the bearskin people took her as wife and she bore him twin sons who were half human, half bear. One day her brothers came looking for her and they murdered her husband. However, the father had taught his sons all the bear songs and after their mother died the brothers broke all connections with humanity and embraced their animal side, once more living with the bear people.”
“But that’s just myth and legend, right?” Celeste asked.
“Couldn’t myth and legend be based on fact?” Tammy countered Celeste’s question with her own.
Celeste didn’t reply.
“There’s more.”
“Um—”
Tammy started speaking, interrupting whatever Celeste had been about to say. “Apparently when the saber-toothed tiger was still roaming the earth one of the males was able to mate with a female polar bear. A mixed species called sabears was created and exist to this day.”
“How is that even possible?” Celeste frowned. “Two different species that mate can’t reproduce, can they?”
“Apparently, they can,” Tammy replied. “Maybe it was the will of the creator, Bear Mother, God, or whatever other deity is out there. It isn’t our place to question such things.”
Tarik’s heart filled with love and pride for his sister. She’d explained everything succinctly without causing his mate any fear. He, on the other hand, wasn’t sure he’d have been able to relay their origins so calmly. Especially since his sabear hadn’t stopped slamming his head into his guts trying to get out. Now his beast was raking him with his claws and snarling savagely.
Keeping his animal at bay was going to be the most difficult thing he ever had to do. No, maybe the hardest thing to do would be keeping his hands to himself until Celeste agreed to be his and Hodge’s mate. Mentally weighing those two things didn’t give him an outcome.
It was neck and neck, a tie.
Chapter Seven
Celeste felt as if she’d fallen down the rabbit hole and landed in the Twilight Zone.
Everything that Tammy had told her rang with sincerity and though she wasn’t scared per se, she was very trepidatious. How the hell was she supposed to accept something so off the wall? She shook her head. It was too far-fetched, too unbelievable to digest.
When she realized her bestie was looking at her expectantly, she knew Tammy was awaiting a reply. “Uh, if you say so.”
Tammy met each gaze of the four men sitting or standing silently around her. “Someone needs to prove it to her.”
Hodge cleared his throat. “I will.”
Tarik stood before clasping her waist in his big hands and lifted her from the stool to her feet. Celeste shivered as heated desire began to course through her blood, warming up her insides. She actually felt her breasts swell and become heavier. Her nipples hardened and her pussy softened and moistened. Her clit began to throb along with each beat of her heart and her breathing escalated. She inhaled through her nose trying to circumvent the response of her wayward body, but that was a huge mistake. Tarik and Hodge were close—too close—and their combined scents sent her body into desirous overdrive. Her cunt clenched, causing cream to weep from her pussy and dampen her panties.
When she heard two audible sniffs, she glanced at both men from beneath her lowered lashes and nearly groaned when she saw them staring at her with hungry glowing eyes. Heat suffused her cheeks and she quickly lowered her head hoping to hide her embarrassment. They could smell her arousal. Shit!
“We need to go outside, love.” Hodge offered her his hand.
Celeste eyed that appendage warily. It wasn’t that she was scared that either man would hurt her, but that she was already reacting to their proximity. If she relented to touch them she suspected her hunger was going to shoot off the charts, and she wasn’t sure she wouldn’t want more.
She lowered her gaze from Hodge’s hand and hurried toward the door. Guilt assailed her when she heard a loud sigh and though she hated that she might have hurt Hodge’s and Tarik’s feelings, she was too confused right now. She needed time and distance to get her head together. She wasn’t sure how she was going to react if these people could prove their outlandish claims to being shifters. She gasped air into her oxygen-depleted lungs and almost giggled when her breath clouded out in front of her as she exhaled. Celeste was feeling so off-kilter she wasn’t sure what to think, or what to believe. She was panting and though the air was near freezing she was sweating. Her body, mind, and heart were at war with each other and even she wasn’t sure which part of her was going to win.
She walked to the end of the wooden porch as far from all the tall, huge men as she could get and wrapped her arms around the veranda post. Tammy came up behind her, clasped her shoulder through the thick padded coat she was wearing and squeezed.
“Everything is going to be all right, Celeste. You’ll see.”
Celeste nodded and then her mouth gaped open. Her friend’s grip had been so much stronger than she’d ever used on her before. She turned to meet Tammy’s gaze. “Are you sure you aren’t a—” She couldn’t believe she was about to ask this question but couldn’t seem to stop herself from continuing. “Shifter?”
Tammy blew out a frustrated breath and Celeste wished she’d kept her mouth shut when she saw sadness lurking in her friend’s brown eyes. “No. I can’t shift. I am stronger and faster than the average human. I have an enhanced sense of smell, hearing, and eyesight, though.”
“You do?”
Tammy leaned forward to whisper in Celeste’s ear. “I can smell your arousal.”
“Oh god.” She leaned her forehead on the post and wished the ground would split open under her and swallow her whole. “That means they can, too?”
“‘Fraid so.”
“No.” She moaned with mortification.
“Celeste?” Tarik’s loud voice was the reprieve she was looking for.
“What?” she asked as she met his gaze.
“You need to watch Hodge, baby.”
“My name is Celeste,” she yelled a little hysterically.
“We know what your name is, love.” Hodge smirked.
“Damn stubborn, stupid men,” she muttered under her breath.
Tarik roared with laughter. When she glanced at Hodge, the breath caught in her throat. He was smiling. They were so good-looking and manly, but when they smiled their whole demeanor and visage seemed to change. It was like they were glowing on the inside and she could virtually see their auras of kindness highlighting their hearts and souls.
Her mouth dropped open and she stared stupefied as Hodge began to remove his clothes. She’d always thought these people were a little whacked in the head since none of them wore winter gear or seemed bothered by the below-freezing temperatures. She was rugged up like an Eskimo and still felt cold to her bones. Celeste had shrugged that off and chalked it up to them being acclimated to the weather since they’d grown up on the island, but now she didn’t know what to think.
Her brain was too busy to latch onto any one thing and the tumultuous thoughts were too implausible to voice. At least, she thought they were at first. She’d thought they were all crazy. Now she was beginning to wonder if she should call the men in the white coats.
Celeste’s breath sawed in and out of her lungs faster and faster with each piece of clothing Hodge shucked and discarded onto the ground. And though she tried not to stare at his bronzed skin and bare muscles as they flexed and bulged with his movements, she couldn’t make herself look away. His shoulders, chest, and arms were thick with muscles and each time her gaze wandered over his nakedness, her body grew hotter, her pussy wetter and the lustful ache inside of her intensified.
When his
fingers tugged open the button to his jeans and then began to lower the zipper, her heart stopped beating altogether. She didn’t take another breath until he’d kicked his boots off and shoved his jeans and formfitting boxers over his hips, down his thighs before he kicked them aside. Air exploded from her lungs as her face heated so fast she was sure, she had no doubt, she looked as if she had a very bad sunburn. Her gaze wandered over his brawny physique and while she tried to avoid gazing at his groin, she couldn’t stop herself. A soft moan escaped from between her parted lips when her gaze snagged on his fully erect cock. She was vaguely aware of Tammy muttering, “That’s way more than I needed to see. Thank fuck my brother didn’t decide to be the one to prove a point.”
Celeste heard booted feet coming up to her and Tammy from behind but she was so entranced by Hodge’s nakedness—a whole herd of elephants could have been stampeding toward her and she wouldn’t have been able to move.
“Cover your eyes, Tams,” Hopper ordered.
“You’re not my damn father,” Tammy snapped. “You can’t tell me what to do.”
“You think not,” Phelan snarled.
“I know so.” Hopper clasped her shoulder.
“That’s what you…put me down you overgrown baboon.”
Smack.
“Owe, that hurt. You better sleep with one eye open from now on, Hopper Sawyer. Paybacks are a bitch.” Tammy scowled.
“We look forward to anything you can dish out, sweet thing,” Phelan said.
“Bastard,” Tammy growled. “Uncover my eyes.”
“No,” Hopper replied.
Celeste lifted her gaze from Hodge’s long, thick, hard cock when he shifted on his feet, her eyes taking in every delineated striated bulge until their gazes locked. His brown eyes were glowing and had turned to a light amber hue, but it was the blazing hunger in his gaze that had her shifting uncomfortably. Then all thought fled her mind when the lines of his body shimmered. A bright blinding light flashed, making dark spots dance across her retinas causing her to blink. Once her spotty vision cleared she was flabbergasted to see a huge white polar on all fours where Hodge had just been. There were the lightest gray-tinged stripes on either side of the bear’s torso running from the edge of its back and stopping just before its belly. But what had her swallowing nervously was the nearly half-foot-long white gleaming canine teeth protruding from either side of the animal’s mouth. Those teeth had sharp pointed ends and had to be close to five inches long.