by Celia Kyle
Ty released her clit and placed a soft kiss to the blissfully abused nub. Those talented fingers slipped free of her and she finally stirred enough to release her hold on his hair. Pushing to her elbows once again she found him licking his lips, the bear’s eyes practically glowing in pleasure.
“Delicious.”
Chapter Nine
Ty lapped at her slit once more, enjoying the musky flavors of her cream as they danced across his tongue. His cock ached and throbbed within the confines of his jeans, but he held himself in check. Barely. Mia still had too many doubts, too many questions, and he wouldn’t push her until she was truly ready to be his. No matter how much his dick complained. Come to think of it, his bear complained a hell of a lot, too.
He placed one, last lingering kiss to her flushed pussy and then rolled back to his knees. He’d never seen anything more beautiful than a debauched and thoroughly satisfied Mia. Her dark hair formed a midnight halo around her head, her face glowed with satisfaction and her clothes barely clung to her.
He held out a hand to her. “Come on, Itana. Let’s eat.”
Mia giggled. “You did already.”
He rolled his eyes and wiggled his fingers. “Uh-huh. Time for you to eat. Gigi will kick my ass if I bring all of this food back. Plus there are a few more things I want to show you.”
“Naked things?” She waggled her eyebrows.
“Wench.” When she finally placed her palm on his, he grasped her and tugged, pulling her upright. “No more today.”
She harrumphed and he found that gorgeous as well.
In two seconds they resumed their positions only this time, Ty remembered the forks. He gathered a bite of potato salad and held it out for her. His bear continued its growling commentary, but was slightly appeased by the idea of feeding her.
She opened her mouth to accept the morsel, but the echoing roar that rolled over them had him halting immediately. The second, more urgent than the last, had him tossing the food to the ground.
“Shit.” Ty rolled to his feet and snatched up Mia’s shoes. “Put those on. We need to go.”
“Ty?”
“Now, Itana,” he snapped out the words and cursed himself for his tone, but Van wouldn’t have called for him if it hadn’t been urgent. He’d threatened to kill anyone who interrupted his picnic with Mia.
With his brusque order, she scrambled into action, as if sensing his need to leave quickly. The moment her sandals were in place, he hauled her to her feet and took off toward the path.
“What about the food?”
He shook his head. “We need to get back.”
Another round of roars came.
“Oh, God, is it Parker?” Her footsteps faltered.
He turned back to her and noted that every feeling inside him was visible on her features. “I don’t know. Can you run?”
Her nod was all the agreement he needed. He released her and broke into a jog, glancing over his shoulder to make sure his Itana kept pace. Gradually, he increased his speed. Later, he’d be smug about the fact that his human mate kept up with him. They burst past the tree line and raced toward the house, the rapid pounding of their feet against the hardened earth never lessening.
Van spotted them first, his brother lowered his head from its raised position while the last roar he released still lingered on his lips. “Itan.”
Ty slowed when he got to the small gathering of his brothers, all three of them standing together and at least fifty feet from the clan den. He opened his mouth to question the men, but Mia got to them first.
“What’s wrong? What happened? Is it Parker?” She fired the questions at Van, Keen and Isaac, one after another, and turned toward the house.
“Itana, wait.” Isaac, held out a hand to stop her.
Ty’s beast reacted instantly, snarling at the idea of any other touching her. He was still surrounded by her scent, the musk of her cream sticking to his skin, and that drove his possessive and protective instincts even higher. He grabbed his brother’s wrist and tightened the hold until Isaac winced.
“Damn it, Ty,” Isaac muttered the words.
“Ty? Seriously? You’re playing with your brothers when there’s something wrong with Parker?” She scolded him and Ty noticed that his brother’s eyes widened.
“It’s not Parker, Itana.” Van, her harshest opponent, had finally adopted the title. It seemed that after three days, his brother had gotten the hint. “It’s… something else.”
“Oh.”
Ty still hadn’t released his grip on Isaac. His bear was having too much fun watching the different shades of red fill his brother’s face.
A small, delicate hand punched him in the shoulder followed by a whining “ow.”
From the corner of his eye, he saw Mia shake her hand. “Your body is like concrete. Now, stop hurting Isaac so they can tell us what happened and then we can hurt all three of them.” Mia’s glare encompassed is brothers. “Do you have any idea what you interrupted?”
Based on the flaring of their nostrils and the grins that suddenly decorated each of their faces, he figured they did.
“Focus,” Ty snapped. He wanted this done and then he’d sneak Mia away…
Keen gulped, and stepped forward. “Richard was running late this morning and someone finally found him.”
Ty sighed and released Isaac. He pinched the bridge of his nose and waited for Mia’s rapid-fire questions to pick up again. He’d wanted to save her the stress, wanted to keep her happy and free of worry while they got to know each other over the past few days. Telling her that Richard—one of the men responsible for trailing Griss—had been missing for a day wasn’t exactly something that gave off a worry-free vibe.
That decision was about to bite him in the ass.
“Found Richard? He was missing? I thought he was watching Griss.” A single, slim finger poked his arm. “You said he was watching Griss while Van did bear research.”
He couldn’t cater to her right that second. He needed to be the clan’s Itan. Straightening his spine, he turned to Van. “What happened?”
“Ty?” She gripped his bicep, tugging on him.
“Just listen, Itana. I’ll explain later.” The furious expression on her face assured him he’d probably have a quite a few things to explain later. Probably something about keeping secrets. And, based on the murder in her eyes, he wasn’t going to enjoy the discussion.
Not much could be done about it now.
Van ran a hand down his face and this was the first time Ty noticed the fatigue dragging at his brothers. All three of them wore haggard expressions, dark circles lingered under their eyes, and their clothes were wrinkled.
“What happened?”
Keen spoke up first. “You know I didn’t discover anything crime related about Richard and Sarah in the government database, but I went ahead and tagged their financials.” His brother stared at the ground a moment and then refocused on Ty. “There was a twenty grand withdrawal from Sarah’s account this morning.”
“And an officer found Richard in a dumpster behind the diner this afternoon. He was last seen having breakfast there yesterday and then never showed up for his shift. So between then and two this afternoon, he was beat to hell and left for dead.” Van’s voice was quiet, solemn.
“It was Martin’s turn to watch Griss. What did he have to say about the asshole’s whereabouts?” This shouldn’t have happened, they already knew the man had probably killed Parker’s parents, his brother and sister-in-law. Hell, maybe even his own parents in an effort to get a shot at the position of Itan. The Sheriff’s office in Cutler had forwarded a box of evidence to see if they could discover anything new, but that wasn’t arriving until later in the day.
Damn it, his people were supposed to keep an eye on the male.
“Martin’s missing.” Van’s lips formed a solid, white slash across his features. “Griss is out there on his own.”
“Fuck.” There was no better word in the English langu
age. Mia’s shaking hand embraced his, squeezed until a throbbing ache assaulted him. Scenarios pinged through his mind but there was only a single conclusion that could be reached. “Find Sarah.” Keen whipped out his cell phone and punched the screen. His brother felt it was okay to play damned games? “Keen?”
“Two seconds.” Another few pokes and prods.
“Keen…” he growled. He would have his brother’s full attention.
Keen finally looked at him. “Her phone is at the corner of Main and Seventh. Car is on Sycamore near Pine.”
“What?”
His youngest brother shrugged. “You wanted everything on them, I gave you everything. The cell was easy to hack and her car is hooked up to one of those services where if you’re in an accident, they call you. I got into both systems.”
Yet another surprise from Keen.
He’d missed way too much. As soon as this crisis was over, he’d remedy that. For now, he needed his inner-circle, not a band of brothers wandering around.
“Good. Van, you’re acting as enforcer. Go find her and bring her to me. Battered is fine, dead is not. Put her in the cell in the basement. I have no doubt she’s helping Griss somehow. Keen, keep him up to date on her location.”
Van’s eyes darkened to black as his brother accepted the responsibility of his position.
Keen held his hand out to the clan’s enforcer. “Give me your phone. I have an app that’ll track her.”
He dismissed his two brothers and focused on Isaac. “I need you to go through everything inside that box coming from Cutler and find me a reason to end Griss. Undisputable proof would be best, but I’ll take something I can use to reason with the Southeast Itan if it comes to that.”
Ty knew the man had been behind the deaths of his own parents and his brother and the male’s wife. He needed proof before he could finish it all.
“Yes, Itan.”
By the time he was done, Van and Keen had refocused on him. “I want more men near the den and in the forest. He’s not coming near the Itana nor Parker.”
They spoke as one. “Yes, Itan.”
With that, they strode away, three werebears intent on their orders. Which left him with a wide-eyed, shaking Mia. She still clutched him, fingers digging into his skin, but he barely noticed the sting. He was more worried about the wildness in her eyes.
“Mia?”
“What else haven’t you told me? Why is he doing this?” Her eyes cleared for a moment. “You can’t keep secrets from me. Not if…”
Ty clenched his jaw, fighting against the lie that ached to spring to his lips. He wanted to tell her there was nothing left to reveal. There was nothing more going on other than a missing Griss and Sarah the heartless bitch. It was obvious the two of them somehow found one another and were working together.
“Mia,” he forced himself to be calm and collected while he shoved his bear back into its cage. The animal raged at him—raged—for upsetting their Itana.
She released him and stepped back, holding up her hand to forestall him when he would have followed. “No. That man,” she spat the word as if it were poison, “nearly killed Parker. The male who was supposed to be watching him did die, another is missing, and Sarah is involved in it all. Parker hates that woman and has tried to take a chunk out of her twice. Have you looked into that? Because something about her stinks.” She took a deep breath and another step back. “You need to clean up your clan, Itan.”
With that order—and it was an order—she spun on her heel and stomped toward the house. At her approach, the back door burst open and a smiling, tumbling Parker stumbled down the steps. Mia didn’t halt, merely scooped up with cub with a laugh, raised him above her head and blew a raspberry on the boy’s stomach.
You need to clean up your clan, Itan.
Wasn’t that the truth.
*
With every step, a little more pain crept into Mia’s veins. He’d kept secrets. Not about tiny, insignificant things, but ones that affected her and Parker’s safety. She knew about Richard’s initial screw up. The man hadn’t been appraised of Griss’s crimes and had been lured by his mate into shirking his duties. A brief dose of clan discipline had corrected the man’s behavior. Locating Griss again had taken a little time, but from that moment, he and the other guards had been intent on keeping the evil male under constant watch. Mia realized Sarah’s distraction had probably been intentional. The woman was definitely working hand-in-hand with that piece of cow poop.
Parker giggled and tried to tickle her and she laughed as he expected, even if bits and pieces of her were dying.
“You little tease.” She laughed and tickled him in return while stomping up the stairs into the home. The moment they crossed the threshold, she placed him on his feet. The scent of warm cookies stroked her and she smiled down at the cub. “Why don’t you go see Gigi and beg for a cookie? Tell her I said you could have one.”
“Two?” Parker held up two fingers.
“Okay, two.” She was such a pushover for a smiling face.
“Three?” Another finger joined the first two.
Mia rolled her eyes and laughed. “Be happy with two, mister.” She nudged him toward the kitchen. “Off you go. I need to find Keen.”
The boy giggled and raced off, feet sliding over the polished wood and he nearly wiped out as he raced around a corner. Shaking her head, she did as she’d told Parker, she hunted Keen Abrams.
Ever since Ty discovered his youngest brother’s magic with computers and anything tech related, Keen could always be found in his new office. Mia slipped off her muddied sandals and then padded through the den, navigating the halls with ease now that she’d been in residence a few days. She rounded the next corner and smiled in relief to see the door open. More than one clan member had earned Keen’s echoing roar by going in when it was firmly shut. Some hacking attempts needed quite a bit of concentration.
Mia poked her head in. “Keen? Got a minute?”
“Always for you, Itana.”
She internally winced at the title. The Abrams brother’s acceptance had been a sort of domino effect. First Isaac, then Keen and finally Van. From there it was slowly filtering down through the clan.
Mia moved deeper into the room and slid onto a heavily cushioned chair. “I want to know everything.”
“Everything, Itana?” His eyebrows rose to his hairline and a sweet look of innocence graced his features. If it wasn’t for her experiences with Parker, she would have believed him.
“Everything, Keen. I know there’s more than what you four discussed in the yard. There has to be. So, I want to hear it.”
“Itana…” He squirmed in obvious discomfort.
“Glad you agree.”
“Oh, but I didn’t—”
“Well, you called me your Itana and the clan’s Itana rules beside the Itan. She shares his knowledge and his burdens. I believe I’ve been neglecting my duties in that area, so let’s fix that, shall we?” Mia gave him her best aren’t I sweetness and light smile.
When he frowned and squirmed, then sighed, she knew she’d won.
“It all goes back to Cutler, Itana…”
Fifteen minutes later, Mia had the short version of Griss’s history and a timeline of events. Starting with the Cutler Itan, Thomas, and his dead son. Then on to the Itan’s dead brother and family which left only Parker between Griss and control of the Cutler clan. Added with what happened in Grayslake, and she was sick.
“You need to go into Sarah’s past, Keen.” She pressed a hand to her roiling stomach.
“I’ve already—”
Mia glared at him, he didn’t deserve the brunt of her anger, but she didn’t exactly have Ty hanging around. “You missed something. Did Parker’s parents hang around Richard and Sarah much?”
Keen shook his head. “No, they stuck with other families with cubs. Clans aren’t about being buddy-buddy. We get together once a month for a run, but most of the time, there are smaller individual gr
oups—cliques—that socialize more than we do as a larger group.”
“So Parker—who has probably seen Sarah from afar, but didn’t know her—suddenly decides to take a chunk out of her leg? His behavior is probably new for him. He wants to harm a near stranger while he’s been sweeter than anything to everyone else, including me.” She kept her gaze steady. “How is it I’m the only one seeing something there?”
“His parents just died—”
Mia raised a single brow and waited.
Keen’s shoulders slumped. “Yes, Itana.”
She gave the man a jerky nod, and rose from the chair. In a handful of steps, she was in the hallway and hadn’t even bothered to say goodbye to Keen. She had too many thoughts writhing in her mind. She bounced between decisions, shifting from confronting Ty or simply stealing Parker away while no one was looking.
One thought clung to her, one part of Keen’s explanation that refused to be ignored.
The Cutler Itan, at one time, had a son.
A son that was killed at sixteen by his best friend.
Chapter Ten
Ty entered Mia’s room, their room, with trepidation dogging his every step. He waited for her to yell and scream at him, to demand that he leave her space and never return, but the order didn’t come. Instead, she ignored him, ignored him standing just inside the doorway as she padded past him and into the bathroom.
He quietly eased the door closed, wincing when the click of the latch sliced through the silence. He stepped deeper into the room, moving toward the bed, and he paused just beside the piece of furniture. The quiet stretched, occasionally interrupted by the splash of water and low thump of the various bottles of creams and treatments she slathered on each night. Usually, he joked and poked fun at her routine, assuring her that nothing in a bottle could make her more beautiful to him. Tonight, however…
Ty cleared his throat. “Mia?”
“Just a minute.”
She disappeared from view for a moment, the half-closed door blocking his line of sight, but then it swung wide. She was revealed to him in all of her shorts and T-shirt clad glory. He glanced at his watch and noted it was nearing nine. Technically, it was early for a lot of the bears in the clan, but with tucking Parker in, they usually headed to bed before everyone else.