by Bianca James
Jack laughed. “You’re going to love her. She’s another city girl who knows how to shoot and look after herself and . . .”
Cassie gestured for him to continue.
“Promise you won’t get mad?” Jack winced at the thought of that.
Cassie planted her hands firmly on her curvy hips and fixed him with a harsh you better get on with it stare.
“She saved my life,” Jack said it quickly, as if that might lessen the impact.
It didn’t.
“You were in that much danger and you wouldn’t let me help? But it’s alright for her to save your ass?” Cassie pointed right at Erin, her eyes blazing with fury.
Jack recognized that look. Nothing good ever came after that. He was about to man up and come to Erin’s defense when Erin squeezed Spider’s fingers briefly then broke away toward Cassie.
“Hi, I’m Erin.” She offered her hand to Cassie who had little choice but to shake it. “I’ve heard so much about you, Jack hasn’t stopped talking about you the whole way back.”
Jack had no clue what she was talking about. He’d hardly said a word the entire walk back to the town.
“I’ve been dying to meet you,” Erin added as she threw her arms around Cassie, giving her a solid hug and a peck on the cheek.
Jack stared in amazement. The fire in Cassie’s eyes dulled and she returned Erin’s peck.
“So what’s this I hear about you saving my man’s life?”
“Oh, that . . . he does exaggerate, doesn’t he? You should be proud of him. All of them,” she looked around at her new friends, “they did an awesome job saving Elle and running those pricks off the mountain for good.”
“That’ll cost you a quarter in the swear jar,” Rosie called out from the steps of the diner. “This is no place for that kind of language, young lady.”
Erin looked to Spider for guidance. She had no idea who this woman was or if she was serious.
“She’s with me, Rosie. Don’t be giving her a hard time.”
“Maybe that’s why I’m giving her a hard time.” Rosie winked at Erin. The old lady’s eyes gleamed with mischief, despite her age and stooped stature.
“Ya’ll look like you could use some good cooking and coffee. Maybe something a little stronger, too.” She held the door open for them and waved them through.
Hot coffee cups warmed the cold hands that cradled them. Eggs and bacon were piled onto plates to feed the famished army. Tales of bravado and war stories threw back and forth across the table as they interrupted, adding their own version of events to each other’s stories. They were just like any other family. But they weren’t any family. They were a crew of bear shifters and their fated mates and they weren’t related by blood.
But they may as well have been. They had chosen to be together and stand together when one of their own was threatened. Their friendship had been forged in battle and there is no closer relationship than that.
Even Erin felt it. She felt at home with her new friends and when Spider nudged her under the table with his knee, she noticed that he left it pressed against hers long enough for the meaning to be clear. He felt it, too.
Suddenly Minion Kevin and her sneering co-workers seemed a world away. So far, in fact, that she felt no affinity with them whatsoever. This was her home, now. She’d found her family.
If they’d have her.
Chapter 24
Spider took his hands away from Erin’s eyes. “Okay, you can look now.”
“What is this place?” she asked. She was in awe looking in every direction trying to take it all in.
“This is my special place,” Spider confided with her. “Where I can shift when I want to be alone and enjoy my own piece of forest. Here I can run wild and free.”
“It’s . . . beautiful.” Erin was almost lost for words.
“Rosie brought me here when I was first discharged from the Navy. All I’d ever known was flying and navy life. I was totally lost, like the structure of my entire existence had been pulled out from under me.”
Erin let the silence hang a beat before placing her hand on his elbow, motioning him to continue his story.
“I drifted. Did odd jobs along the way to pay for food and board, but I never stayed anywhere long enough to put down roots. Then I came here.
“I don’t know how, but I think Rosie knew what I was, but she didn’t seem to care. I boarded with her above the diner for a time, then next thing I knew, she’d loaned me a cabin in the mountains. Winked at me and told me she knew I needed my own space. But she never mentioned it again.
“Next thing I knew, the rescue service decided we needed a rescue helicopter up here and they asked me to fly it. I’m pretty sure Rosie had something to do with that, too. She’s got some political muscle or something going on. Not sure I even want to know.” He smiled when he recalled how he felt being offered the opportunity to fly rescue missions in this pristine mountain wilderness. Like a dream that had finally come true.
But that wasn’t Spider’s only dream.
He wanted a mate. Just like Jarrad and Jack had found their fated mates here on the mountain. He wanted a family of his own and someone to come home to every day. Until now, that had eluded him, although he’d always been happy for Jack and Jarrad. There had been no envy, but a sense of longing when he saw what they had.
“What do Jarrad and Jack mean when they talk about their mates? Is that like their wife or girlfriend or something?”
Spider paused before answering. It was as if she had read his thoughts.
“Mates are nearly always fated. For every bear shifter, there’s a special mate, just for him and fate brings them together. They can usually tell their fated mate as first glance or first scent. They just know, even if the bear’s human doesn’t.”
“Men can be stupid sometimes,” Erin agreed.
Spider nodded, and then he started taking great interest in his shoes as he kicked at some rocks on the ground.
“Is it coincidence that both Elle and Cassie are . . . well . . . rather . . .”
“Robust?” Spider helped her out.
Erin nodded thankfully. “Yeah, like me.”
“It’s no coincidence. Even in human form, bear shifters, when they mate, can be very, how can I say it delicately . . .”
Erin returned the favor. “Rough?”
“I was going for something like enthusiastic, but rough works, too. Anyway, we can only mate with women who can handle us. Shifters aren’t attracted to the skinny catwalk models and their lettuce leaf and tofu diets. We like our women strong on the inside and just as strong physically.” He looked at her sideways worried how she’d react to his revelation.
He needn’t have bothered. Before he knew what was happening, she’d jostled in front of him and reached up on her toes to crush her lips to his, hoping to carry on from where they’d left off previously.
“Show me,” she breathed in his ear before probing it cheekily with her tongue. “Show me how enthusiastic you can be.”
Spider effortlessly scooped Erin up in his arms, forcing a nervous squeak from her as she settled into his cradling arms. She was surprised at both his strength and his immediate response to her wanton proposal. He wasn’t the kind of man who needed to be told what to do twice.
Chapter 25
Trailing kisses from her ankles to the soft, sensitive skin behind her knees, Spider hoisted her skirt as he worked his way up. Her skin was soft to his lips and her scent was pleasing his bear, which growled openly as he showered her with kisses and nibbles. There were no secrets. Not any more.
“What if someone sees us?” she giggled. She was ticklish behind the knees.
“They won’t. Bears are territorial. Nobody will come here. This is my ‘alone time’ space.” His words were muffled as he spoke with his lips parted against her thigh.
“Like a man cave, but without the actual cave . . . Oh, yeah. Right there,” she keened as he took a mouthful of her butt cheek and gently b
it it.
His thumbs hooked inside her panty elastic and with deliberate, leisurely pace, he began to work them down her hips and over her thighs until that were a tangle mess at her ankles. She kicked them away, no longer caring if anyone should see them or not.
The scent of her arousal, freed from her panties, inflamed Spiders desire to take her. Right then and there. Out in the open, like a wild animal.
But he wanted his first time with her to be special. Memorable, for all the right reasons. If his bear was right and if she was his fated mate, then he wanted everything to be perfect. For both of them.
“Why are you stopping?” She was worried she’d done something wrong.
“Are you sure you want this?”
Her eyes met his. There was a heady dose of desire and primal hunger burning in his bottomless hazel eyes. Desires that mirrored her own, she suspected. The raw lust she felt at this moment was like nothing else she’d ever felt and she had never been more sure of anything. She felt drawn to him physically and emotionally. But right now, it was all about the physical pull she felt toward him.
She nodded firmly. Hell yeah.
He was teasing her and he knew it. She’d make him pay for this. But not right now. Definitely not right now. Not until after he’d satisfied her with his dexterous tongue. Maybe not even then. He kept teasing her with light flickers, brushing the tip of it across her swollen nub. Even when she arched her back, he withdrew slightly, leaving her aching for more and just a little frustrated. More than a little, it seemed.
Reaching down, she clamped her hands around the back of his head and pulled him into her. Hard. She arched her back at the same time, crushing her desperate and needy clit against his lips and tongue. She’d had enough of his play. He’d stoked her fires and now it was time for him to make good on that promise.
With a rhythmic thrust of her hips, she set the pace and he obeyed.
Good boy.
He began to work his mouth over her pink bud to the same rhythm and her moans were a sure sign he had got it right. No more teasing. He wanted to pleasure her now and show her what a true mate could do for his fated ‘one’.
“Yes! Please! Yes!” she keened and moaned to his rhythm. Steadily, she increased the pace of her thrusts, matched by his increasingly frantic licking and sucking of her juicy morsel.
“Oh my . . .” The words refused to come, like they were no longer needed. Her body had taken over and she willingly surrendered to the pleasure that welled deep within her belly, sending liquid fire to the mound of her sex.
With a final push of her hips, she held Spider’s head still and let the waves burst from within her, pulses of orgasmic relief surging through every muscle fiber and nerve ending in her body. Her eye lids fluttered and she bit her bottom lip in an effort not to scream obscenities.
“Fuck me! That feels fucking amazing! Oh, fuck!”
It didn’t work.
She no longer cared what she said. The words came from her mouth, but they weren’t hers. It was as if some inner beast, some shameless, brazen minx had been unleashed within her.
She collapsed and started to breathe again. She hadn’t even realized that she’d stopped. Her breathing was ragged and shallow, like she’d just run a marathon.
“So that was alright then?” Spider asked with a cocky grin across his gorgeous cupid’s bow lips.
Chapter 26
By the time Erin had regained her composure and her heart rate had returned to something approaching normal, she became aware of the hardness that threatened to burst from Spider’s pants. It pressed against her leg and it was with some difficulty that she actually managed to move her legs once more as she sat up.
“I haven’t forgotten about you.” She squeezed his hardened shaft in acknowledgment, taking a moment to admire and enjoy the length and girth he appeared to have tucked away down there.
Wow!
She could see the outline of his enormous crown through his pants and she could only imagine at what it might look like totally unrestrained. Not wanting to wonder any longer, she unbuttoned his pants and unzipped them before plunging her hand inside and caressing his responsive member through his satin boxers. It twitched and flexed at her touch. That was a promising start.
“You want me to get him out?”
Spider swallowed and bobbed his head vigorously. He didn’t dare speak for fear his voice would crackle like a horny teenager.
Sitting on her haunches, Erin reached under her dress and removed her bra, casting it to where her panties had ended up previously. Then, she started to pull the sundress she’d worn for their stroll in the forest over her head. Slowly. Partly because she was anxious about Spider seeing her soft curves and partly to tease him before the big reveal.
As soon as the dress was over her head, her magnificent breasts bounced free. Spider looked at them wide eyed and lustful. He immediately took them in his strong hands and began to knead them, enjoying how they felt and how her nipples responded to being grazed by his calloused palms.
“You’re . . . you’re stunning. Absolutely gorgeous.” Was all he could manage to whisper. It sounded inadequate, but those were the only words he could find.
“Let me look at your sexy, hard body again. God I’ve missed seeing it,” she growled. The unabashed voice sounded like hers, but she dared believe the words could be coming from her lips.
She grabbed his shirt tails and pulled them free of his pants and began to unbutton his shirt, spreading it wide as she went. Her mouth fell wide open as her eyes drank in the expanse of tanned, muscled flesh that sat on offer before her. As he breathed, his massive chest heaved making his powerful pecs even more pronounced. And the term ‘washboard abs’ didn’t do him justice. She was going to think up a new term to describe his abs which looked like they’d been chiseled from a slab of granite by a renaissance master.
With her fingertips she traced the lines of definition between his abdominal muscles, marveling at how hard they were. She imagined him taking her from behind like a wild beast and feeling that hardness against her ass while the hardness of his cock plunged her depths.
But that was for another time. Now she wanted to look at him and see his face while he took her. She wanted to enjoy his deep, soulful eyes looking at her like she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen at the same time as she felt his cock buried deep inside her as he unleashed his primal need to fuck her like there was no tomorrow.
Using all her strength, she flipped herself over onto her back, taking him with her, so that he ended up on top. Frantically, she clawed at his pants and boxers with her feet and toes until they pooled at his feet and he could kick them off. Now they were flesh on flesh with no barrier to their intimacy. She loved how he felt against her. His hard muscled body seemed to complement her soft curves and they fitted together like they were meant to be.
“You want this?” he asked as he brushed the tip of his crown between her wet folds.
Erin nodded and bucked her hips, taking the head of his cock as far as her tight entrance. She wanted him to do the rest while she enjoyed being stretched to accommodate the swollen head. As much as she wanted to feel him inside her, she feared she might not be the able to handle him. He’d made her anxious with his talk of some girls not being able to mate with bear shifters.
As if to allay her fears, he gently but firmly embedded himself inside her. All the way. Burying his generously proportioned cock to the hilt.
The sensation was too much for her. There was no pain, just an overwhelming feeling of being stretched to the limit and on the delicate cusp between pain and pleasure.
“Just breathe. Deep and slow. You’ll get used to it in a minute. The more you relax, the more you’ll enjoy it. Trust me.”
She did and he was right. As soon as she started to relax, her body felt as if something that had been missing all her life had found its way into her. As he started to withdraw, ready to plunge into her again, a sense of loss and longing welle
d between her legs. Then he pounded it into her again, grunting like a . . . well . . . like a wild bear as he did.
“Grrrrr,” she mocked and bit his neck as she wrapped her legs around his, her ankles locked inside his knees. That gave her enough leverage to meet his thrusts with her hips each time he pounded her.
Clawing at the muscles in his back which undulated beneath his skin her needs escalated, meeting his. It was as if he was making love to her with every muscle in his magnificent body. Every thrust brought his granite abs in contact with her belly, stirring her passion with vision of how they must look, coupling in the forest like a pair of sweaty wild animals.
Erin looked into Spider’s eyes. They shone with a blend of deep desire and something else she couldn’t put a name to. Love? She felt the same for him but hadn’t been brave enough to say the word. Perhaps she didn’t need to right now. Maybe this look that passed between them was enough. For now.
And with that, she arched her back, clawed his tight butt with her nails and screamed as she came again. Her vision narrowed and all she could see was her man’s eyes as he, too, allowed himself to join her, his hot seed filling her deep. As her tunnel clamped down on his shaft, it began to convulse in time with her orgasmic waves, clenching his cock and milking it of every last drop. She didn’t want it to end, like she’d waited her entire life to feel like this.
Then they both collapsed in a sweaty heap, unable to communicate other than to hold hands reassuringly as they gazed into each other’s eyes.
Epilogue
Rosie cleaned up the last of the plates from the tables vacated by the latest assortment of climbers and hikers who’d been attracted to the mountain by some recent magazine articles published by the leading outdoor and adventure magazines.
“That girl of yours had better stop writing them articles or I’m gonna have to hire some help to keep up,” Rosie said to Spider as he nursed his coffee in his hands.