by Desiree Holt
“Do you want to ride with Grant?”
“No.” Her voice sounded shrill even to her own ears. But a small voice in the back of her consciousness, or maybe it was her soul, screamed yes. Yes, she wanted to be with him no matter what shape he was in. “Grant turned into a bear.”
Hans helped her into her seat. He positioned her, even clicked her seat belt on, as if she were a small child. He didn’t say anything about her statement, and perhaps there wasn’t anything to actually say. He pulled out, following the large SUV with a bumper sticker reading I Brake for Bears. “Funny bumper sticker.”
“Shauna has quite the sense of humor.”
“She’s your wife, I think you said?”
“Mate. My kind doesn’t do wives. We have mates.”
“So you are a…”
“Shifter, bear shifter to be specific, just like Grant.”
They could have been talking about how many miles to the gallon he got for as calmly as they conversed, but they weren’t; they were talking about things of myth. Shape shifters, skin changers, morphs…none of those were real. She shook her head to clear it. “So are all bears shifters?”
“No, just as not all bison are. Otherwise, that one wouldn’t have charged you.”
“He charged Grant.”
“Not likely. I would bet when Grant wakes we will discover he put himself between you and the bull.” Hans reached over and squeezed her hand. “But this isn’t your fault. No man would have let their mate be hurt. He did what he needed to.”
“But I am not his mate.”
“Perhaps not here.” He tapped her head then pointed to her heart. “But, in there, I think you know better. Every time I slow down and there is a little space between the two cars, you hold your breath. You became edgy when a car pulled between us and blocked your view. Can you deny it?”
Could she? Had she even known she had done those things? But, as if to prove his point, he slowed way down. The radio in the car beeped then a voice came over. “Knock it off, Hans.”
He chuckled and lifted the receiver. “Don’t know what you are talking about.”
“Dammit. Every time you put distance between us, Grant becomes aggressive. Shauna says you don’t want to answer to the beta if her mate is marked by anyone but her.”
The car before them shook a little as if someone was climbing around inside.
“Hans, do it again and I’ll kick your ass from one side of Yellowstone to the other.” The commanding voice she assumed was that of their leader.
Hans sobered. “Sorry, Alpha.”
They waited for something else to be said. When it wasn’t, Hans replaced the receiver onto its hook. “You can deny it, but Grant knows it.”
They rode in silence for the rest of the trip, and she didn’t even question when she found three ATVs waiting for them when they exited the Jeep. The largest had a trailer attached to it. Grant was moved, motionless, to the metal flatbed. The one they kept calling Alpha approached.
“Morgan, let me introduce myself. I’m Brutus.”
“We…bumped into one another the other night in front of the hotel.”
His eyes seemed to see her soul. “So we did. Please understand my concern at the moment is for my scout. Though he is stable, his injury is serious.”
“What can I do?”
“Would you please sit near him? It’s harder to follow closely in the woods, and he is calmed by your presence.” When she hesitated, Brutus continued, “He won’t hurt you. Ever. He would take his own life before he would lay a paw on you.”
Something in the way Brutus spoke made her believe him. “Okay.”
He helped her onto the seat facing the trailer and Grant. The other woman threw her silvery dreadlocks over her shoulder as she climbed in next to her. “Hello. I am Shauna.”
“Hans’s mate.”
“Yes.” She smiled before turning to the driver. “Ready. The quicker the better.”
As the ATV jolted forward, Morgan gripped the bar beside her and focused on keeping her butt on the seat and not flying through the air into a tree as they gained speed. Shauna sat beside her not even holding on, but every now and then reaching out to grab a leaf and examine it before either throwing it to the ground or placing it in her bag. Either way, she was unfazed by the bumpy, racing ride through the woods.
Shauna reached out and braced Morgan as they came to an abrupt stop. They weren’t where she’d imagined they would end up. She’d had only a vague idea, but the middle of the woods without a single building had not been it. “Come on, let’s get you inside while everyone is focused on Grant. You can deal with the others at a later date.”
“What about Grant?”
“Oh, as soon as you are out of reach and he starts to grumble, they will get him in as fast as possible. A great motivation to get a bunch of lazy bears moving.”
She turned as Shauna pulled her along. The men circling the trailer, eyeing the unconscious bear, were muscular and overwhelming, appearing alert and anything but lazy. A sudden, piercing pain shot through the center of her chest. “Wait. I can’t.”
“You can’t?”
She tried to take another step, but it hurt. Her chest ached. “I need a second.”
“Push through it. The mating takes its shape a bit differently for us all.”
She allowed the other woman to pull her along. They eventually came to a dark cave opening. Before she could protest, she found herself through the dark cave and into a bright hallway. “This is the back entrance but closest to Grant’s rooms. Don’t worry about getting lost. Someone is always around to lead you.”
“But please don’t go out alone. Not yet, anyway.” The woman Brutus had been with the other evening embraced her. “Welcome, Morgan. This isn’t the way Grant had envisioned us meeting you.”
“This is Quinn, our beta,” Shauna said, the admiration for the smaller woman clear in her voice.
“Beta?”
“Queen.”
“I’m not your queen, for Pete’s sake, Shauna.” Quinn blew out a frustrated breath. This obviously wasn’t their first go-around with this subject. “Come along. Let’s clear the hallway. The men are almost here.”
She would have questioned it, but the pressure on her chest had eased and she, too, knew they were close. “Does this get easier?”
“This? You will have to be more specific. There are so many ‘this’ involved in our situation.”
“You’re…um…like me.” When the other woman didn’t answer immediately, she stumbled. “Right?”
“If you mean am I human, then, yes.” The gentle smile eased something within her, nervousness about being in a place where she knew no one and everyone stood ten feet above her. It was more like a foot and a half, maybe two. “Come on. Let’s go into Grant’s living room while they get him situated in his bedroom. Shauna, will you call us when you need her?”
“Of course.”
As if in a trance, Morgan followed Quinn into a small, rather bland, room. The furniture appeared to be straight from the 80s, from one of those stores in the mall that sold utilitarian platform beds, sofas, and chairs. The hunter-green cushions had seen better days. Quinn humphed. “I’ve never been in here. If I had known this was what awaited you, I would have done something about it this afternoon.”
“It’s fine.”
“No, it’s not, but you’ll have plenty of time to fix it up later.” Quinn sat on the sofa. “Now, you must have a thousand questions.”
“Maybe even a thousand and one.”
“Let’s start with the thousand, first, shall we? I’ll try and answer what I can.”
A growl erupted from the other room. Morgan jumped, but Quinn eased her down beside her, placing a comforting hand on her knee.
“Enough,” Brutus bellowed, silencing the others, but Morgan leapt back to her feet.
“He’ll be okay, won’t he?”
“What is your heart telling you?” Quinn asked.
“
That he is fine.”
“Then he will be fine.” She patted the sofa cushion next to her. “Please sit down. I spend so much of my time straining my neck. Please don’t make me do it with you, too.”
“I do have a question. I mean, something strange happened.”
Quinn cocked an eyebrow. “Stranger than watching your boyfriend shift?”
Oh, thank god she didn’t say mate. “Yes, believe it or not, stranger than that. Though that’s hard to believe, isn’t it?”
“Nothing shocks me anymore. Go on, ask me your question.”
“Have you—that is, I…”
“Did you grow fangs?”
“Yes.” Relief washed over her as she sank into the sofa. Quinn really did understand.
“No need to worry. It’s normal.”
“Normal?”
Quinn furrowed her brow then giggled. “As normal as any of this is.”
In the confusion of everything, in a world that had shifted on its axis, Morgan found a friend and laughed. Laughed until her sides hurt and tears flowed down her cheeks. Shauna found them giggling like two schoolgirls together on the sofa.
“We have him bandaged up, and he is asking for you.”
“He’s awake?” Sobered and thrown by the fact that, for a single moment, she had forgotten Grant in the other room, she stood but didn’t wait for an answer. Her feet moved of their own accord. When she entered, she expected to see a bear, so to find him a man, propped up on pillows, naked except for a blanket over his lap was a shock. Her focus moved to the white bandage wrapped around his waist, a slight tinge of pink oozing through. “You’re still bleeding.”
“Please come closer.” His voice held an alarming rasp. When she didn’t move, he dropped his extended hand to his side. “I’m sorry. I must have terrified you. I can’t even imagine what my shifting like that must have been like.”
“I was more concerned about what the bison had done to you.” This time, she did move. She needed to touch him, needed to feel his warmth under her fingertips. “Are you okay?”
“In a few days, I’ll be like new.” He brought her palm to his lips, kissing it ever so gently. “Perhaps with one more scar and a tale to tell.”
“You were bleeding really badly.”
“My kind heal fast, you’ll see. I’ll be up and about tomorrow morning, and by the weekend I should be back to scouting.” He flinched. For a second, a glimmer surrounded him. She stepped back, fearing he would shift again. “It’s okay, my bear wants me to heal. To do so I have to shift, but I needed to make sure you were okay.”
“I’m fine! You, however, are bleeding through that bandage. Let me get Shauna.”
He grabbed her wrist holding her beside him. “I don’t have the right to ask, but please don’t leave. If you still want to leave, once I’m healed, I’ll let you go, no argument.”
She let her heart lead her. “They said you can’t hurt me.”
“It’s the truth. The fates decreed you are my one true mate. I can’t change that no matter what I do. But you aren’t one of us, so you have free will. You have all the power in this relationship.”
She would have pulled a chair over to his bed, but it stood so high, she would have faced the side of the mattress. Instead, she pulled the chair over and used it to climb up next to him. She allowed him to draw her into his arms and laid her head on his chest, careful to avoid his injury. Being in his arms calmed her, quelling any urge to argue, and she hoped her nearness would help him heal. “You will have to shift, won’t you?”
“I will, but, at the moment, my bear is enjoying this.”
“You speak as if your bear is a different being.”
“No, we are one and the same. Sort of like saying my soul yearns for you.”
“Does it?” She arched her neck to see him better. “Does your soul yearn for me?”
He brushed a stray hair from her face. “You really are beautiful.”
This time she believed him, convinced by the way his gaze followed the lines of her face. “Don’t change the subject.”
“My bear is my soul.” He kissed the top of her head. “And the only thing on this planet I yearn for is you.”
She wanted to say something. Her heart went against what her head debated. They’d known each other for only a couple of days. And yet she’d talked to him and opened up more today as she worked getting her research than she had with anyone before.
She summoned her courage. “I want to give us a try.”
Grant grunted and the glow enveloped him. The thick hair covered his body. Awesome and terrifying, he changed from a human to a bear. His large paw locked her to his side. Seventy-two hours before, she would have been terrified. Now, the transformation fascinated her. She closed her eyes. Perhaps she would wake up and find out she had eaten some strange mushroom and suffered hallucinations.
Chapter 4
The fog of deep, healing sleep faded. In the distance, Quinn yelled at him to let go. What was she doing in his room? She never entered his bedchamber. Why was his alpha chuckling? Then he remembered his mate and the bison.
Something small and determined fought against his paw.
Morgan.
“Brutus, help me,” Quinn declared.
“He isn’t going to attack you. He may, however swipe, at me. And I will not get between a sleeping grizzly and his mate. You, of all people, should understand that.” Humor laced Brutus’s voice.
Grant opened one eye, feeling like he had come out of hibernation too soon, his dry mouth and even dryer eyes could have been used as sandpaper. Fog blocked his brain from full function. Over the head of his mate, who was lying in his furry arms and pushing at his large paw, he could see his beta pulling on his arm. But he couldn’t figure out why.
“Ladies, he’s awake. Perhaps you can simply ask him now.”
His first instinct was to pull Morgan deeper into his protective embrace, but if the females were working together, he needed to find out why. Quinn bopped his shoulder. “Let her go, now.”
“He isn’t a dog. Grant, release your mate, please.” Brutus’s words, although phrased as a request, brooked no argument.
Lifting his paw, he watched Morgan shimmy out of bed.
“Thank god. I have to pee.” She raced from the room.
“You”—Quinn pointed at Grant—“need to take care of the needs of your mate. Starting with getting her a set of stairs for this bed. It’s not dignified for her to have to climb up on a chair. I should know.”
Still not sure what was going on, he stretched and shifted into his human form. The ache in his side took him by surprise for a second, but he reached for the bandage. The wound closed. “Why is everyone in my room?”
Quinn humphed, handing him a large glass of water. “Drink.”
He did, because he wasn’t going to argue with his beta and he was parched. “How long was I out?”
“Sixteen hours. Your poor mate has had to pee for four.”
He paused mid-sip. “She was with me the whole time?”
“Yes. We tried to move your paw, but you are as stubborn as a mule.”
“I was unconscious.”
“I don’t think that’ll float with Quinn. Grant, when I said I was worried about my mate being lonely over the winter, I didn’t think you would bring her a human playmate.” Brutus feigned pain as Morgan slapped his arm before heading to the hallway.
Quinn towed Brutus with her out the door. “Grant is fine.” Her voice carried back to him. “Someone bring some food for him and Morgan, please, and the rest of you get back to your regular day.”
One of the last places their alpha had wanted to be was in one of the bedrooms of his scouts. He had only been there to ensure his beta was safe.
A few minutes later, a young woman deposited a tray of food on the chest of drawers and slipped back out. Morgan ducked through the door, running her fingers through her messy, gorgeous hair.
“Sorry,” Grant said before she could say
anything. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“I wasn’t frightened, but I was starting to get desperate.” Her cheeks pinked. “I mean…”
“I apologize for that, too,” he hastened to reassure.
“Do you usually sleep in bear form?”
“Depends if you mean bear or in the bare.”
She stared him down the way Quinn did Brutus and the way he was sure women the world over glared at men when they weren’t amused. “Try to be serious.”
“I only take bear form when I’m working, protecting what is mine, healing, or hibernating.”
“Woo, can we go through that list again, slowly and more in depth?”
“Bring the food tray and join me up here for a picnic and I will. Although I am feeling better I am not even at 75 percent yet. I really don’t want to feel the wrath of Shauna for overdoing it.”
She lifted the tray, placed it on the bed then used the chair to climb up. His first honey-do-list item would consist of that step Quinn mentioned. Once she was settled and they each had taken a few bites of the berry salad, he continued. “First, sometimes it’s easier for me to work in the park as a bear. I can get to areas accessible only to wildlife.”
She wiped her mouth with a napkin, though he’d have proffered to lick the berry juice himself. “That makes sense. So, do animals know you are what you are?”
“Yes, they are very aware we are different. They keep a wide berth, but, if they are injured, they will allow us close enough to help. Mundane grizzlies will protect you because you wear my scent and won’t attack under normal situations. But never get between a sow and her cubs. She won’t care who you are.”
“So, basically, still keep my distance with the wildlife. Not a problem.”
“I think protecting what is mine is pretty clear.”
She made an humph sound, taking another bite of salad.
“You doubt me.”
“No. No not at all. None of this is self-explanatory. You say I’m your mate but didn’t shift to protect me when the bison attacked.” She rubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands. “I would have thought you would have changed immediately.”