by Edith DuBois
Joseph had been posting burn ban signs around town and writing more citations for people flicking cigarettes out their car windows.
Elena hadn’t seen much of Joseph, either, if she was going to be honest with herself. But at least she knew he was still alive. At least he talked to her. There was always something behind his words that said he wanted her. His eyes followed her any time they were near each other. He’d kissed her a few times since that night after her mountain lion sighting, and there had definitely been a sense of restraint, as if he wanted to give her more, wanted to take more, but something held him back.
Elena couldn’t figure out what the bloody hell was going on with the Kinman brothers, and it was starting to get under her skin.
Jeremiah Greenwood had taken over Caleb’s tour guide duties, and he was very sweet and knowledgeable, but he wasn’t Caleb. He refrained from saying too much about anything they saw together. He didn’t ask to see her photos. He waited until Elena asked him something before speaking. He was very respectful.
But she missed the companionship, the thrilling sense of discovery she’d shared with Caleb when they were out together.
She’d been photographing the mama elk and her calf every day, watching the baby grow—take its first steps, begin to wean itself off its mother’s milk, play in the river with the rest of the calves—all these things she’d witnessed through her lens, and she wanted to share it with Caleb. It felt like he was missing so much.
A few days after witnessing the elk birth, Mayor Cash had asked for permission to display her pictures in the Town Hall. Soon after The Savage Herald, Savage Valley’s weekly newspaper, asked to run some of the photos in their upcoming issue. She hoped that, even if for some unfathomable reason Caleb had decided to avoid her, he at least could see a few photos of their little elk family.
People that she didn’t even know, mostly residents of Savage Valley, had approached her to ask her questions or share similar stories or simply tell her “well done.” Elena was starting to enjoy the small, friendly waves at Savage Convenience or the few minutes of idle chatter while eating dinner at Savage Hunger. She almost felt herself a part of the town.
If only the Kinman brothers would stop ignoring her.
She’d awoken that morning needing a hike, a long hike that would take her deep into the forest. She’d brought her camera in case she came across anything interesting, and she felt the knife that Joseph had given her thumping in a reassuring way against her thigh, but photography wasn’t her main goal. Her goal that morning was to let off some steam, and she’d already been on the trail for over two hours, already gone further than she ever had with either Caleb or Jeremiah.
A few minutes later she came to the edge of a large clearing. She’d almost gone marching across it, not noticing at first the brown bodies hidden in the waist-high grasses. But an odd movement caught her eye, causing her to stop for a moment and really look.
Then she saw the movement again and realized it was the head and antlers of a buck rising up from the grass. It tossed its head back several times, and its shoulder muscles rippled beneath its fur in the sunlight as it pawed the earth with pent-up aggression. Elena quickly scanned the clearing, knowing another buck was probably nearby involved in a similar male dance.
She stepped back into the shadow while she readied her camera and then returned to the edge of the clearing. Several other deer were nearby, but the two bucks had eyes only for each other. In a flash of angry movement, their antlers locked together with a loud scraping, cracking noise.
The bucks struggled against each other for close to five minutes. Elena snapped hundreds of photos, their grueling battle providing her with just the sort of gritty edge she needed. She crept closer and closer, completely engrossed in the display of male aggression before her.
Finally, one of the bucks ducked away, catching a nick on the shoulder from his opponent as he retreated. The winner chased after his shamed opponent, but a few minutes later, Elena saw him striding back toward the group, his chest heaving but his head and antlers held high and proud. A few of the females pranced in front of him, flicking their tails and sending saucy looks over their shoulders. Elena smiled as she photographed the deer. This was exactly what she needed to take her mind off two very tempting sets of black eyes.
Suddenly, across the field, one of the deer on the opposite side of the herd from Elena popped its head up. It began making a snorting sound and pawing the ground. A few deer surrounding it brought their heads up, and together they began running. The whole herd became alarmed and soon all of them were running.
Right for Elena.
With a squeak of alarm, she turned and fled, cursing as she realized she had ventured farther from the edge of the clearing than she thought. Hearing their hooves closing in on her, she dug in, only needing to make it to the safety of the trees.
A few does passed her as she reached out a hand for a tree and, using her momentum, spun herself around to the other side, ripping the skin of her palm as she did so.
The herd flew past her like thunder, and the sound of their hooves pummeling the earth matched that of her heart beating wildly in her chest. When the last deer shot past her, her shoulders slumped slightly forward with relief.
Slowly, she peeked around the tree to see what had spooked the deer.
Her body froze.
Standing in the middle of the field, staring right at her, were two black bears.
Elena thought quickly. From all her lessons in wildlife survival and from what she’d read on the Internet, she wasn’t supposed to run. She was supposed to speak to them in a firm, scolding voice. Joseph had told her to let an animal bite her arm and then stab it in the throat if she was attacked. They hadn’t discussed what to do in the face of two wild animals.
One of the bears rose up on its hind legs and roared.
Yeah, her knife felt pretty useless at the moment.
The second bear ran a few steps in her direction, growling and slamming its paws to the ground in a threatening manner.
“Nope,” she said, turning and taking off into the forest. As she ran, she didn’t know if it was the sound of her heart pounding or the crash of heavy paws hitting the earth that thundered through her ears.
* * * *
Joseph pulled the cruiser up next to Savage Convenience, spitting a big ol’ glob of spit onto the dirt as he did. He wasn’t usually a spitter, but when he pulled in to fill up, he noticed the car on the other side of the pump. Wilmer and Wally, two disgusting and slovenly goons employed by Ulysses C. Norman of NormCorp in Denver, were filling up their black convertible Volkswagen Beetle.
Along with Joseph’s brother, the Greenwoods, the Ashleys—in fact, all the bear-shifter and lion-shifter families and practically everyone in town—he loved to poke fun of the NormCorp goons and their decidedly not masculine mode of transportation. He thought spitting at their feet an appropriate jibe.
The fact that the bug’s Colorado vanity plate read KILLA didn’t help their case, either.
Hooking his thumbs in his belt loops, he leaned a hip against the cruiser as it gulped down its mid-afternoon snack. Wilmer, a short, tubby man, eyed the spit glob but decided to ignore it.
Jim Bob Pritchett called from his rocking chair on the porch. “Afternoon, Sheriff.”
“Afternoon, Jim Bob. Where’re your comrades-in-arms?”
“Pickin’ us up some lunch.”
Joseph smiled and nodded then looked at the goons. Wally, a large, brutish man who rarely spoke in anything other than grunts and mumbles, jiggled the pump as he finished up. When he pulled it out and swung it around, though, a late spurt of gas from the old pump spewed out and splattered right across the chest of Wilmer. The short, red-faced man sputtered and shoved Wally in the chest.
“You idiot! This suit cost over a thousand dollars. Just wait ’til Mr. Norman sees this. God, do you have a peanut for a brain?”
Joseph couldn’t help it. As sheriff of Savage Valley,
he knew he should uphold some modicum of decorum, but those two assholes got under his skin, and he couldn’t hold back a derisive chuckle.
Wilmer whipped his head around at the sound of Joseph’s laughter, and he narrowed his beady eyes. “Something funny over there, Sheriff?”
“I think a better question would be what are you two doing all the way up here in Savage Valley? Does Mr. Normie Pooh have you up to no good?”
Joseph barely contained his chuckle at the mottled red hue that quickly spread across Wilmer’s face at Joseph’s nickname for Ulysses C. Norman.
The tubby little man charged forward, finger pointing and wagging at Joseph in an accusatory manner. “Now you listen here.” He shot through the center of the two rusty gas pumps, but the effect was ruined when his chubby form got stuck for a moment.
Joseph bit the inside of his cheek, trying to fight back the laughs, but when Wally tried pushing Wilmer from behind, a long snort broke free.
Wilmer started flailing. “Stop! Just stop. I. Can. Get. It.” With each word he scooched further and further through the two pumps, his plumpness jiggling, and broke free on the last one. He straightened his suit jacket, trying to restore his dignity.
Joseph shook his head and chortled at the thought of the tub-shaped man and dignity belonging together. Wilmer narrowed his eyes and resumed his attack, poking a finger at Joseph.
“I’d be careful if I was you, Sheriff. Mr. Norman has plans so far beyond this Podunk, festering hole of a town. None of you small-minded townsfolk can even comprehend what he has in store.”
Joseph looked at Wally. With a menacing scowl on his homely features, the tall man ran a thumb across his throat in a blatantly threatening gesture.
Joseph could refrain no longer. He threw his head back and let loose a long string of laughter. He laughed so hard that he had to double over and support himself with a hand on Wilmer’s shoulder. “It’s too much. Oh god, it’s too much.”
Joseph heard his cell phone ring from inside his car. The ring tone signified that it was one of the other bear-shifter families calling from their emergency number. Without betraying the urgency of the situation, Joseph straightened and clapped Wilmer on the back. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, gentlemen. I’ve gotta take this call. Don’t come back soon, ya hear.” He infused the last sentence with as much cheesiness as he could muster.
Waving up at Jim Bob on the porch, he slipped back into his cruiser and shut the door in the face of a flustered and sputtering Wilmer. Looking at the caller ID, he answered the phone as he pulled out of Savage Convenience.
“Sheriff Kinman speaking.”
“Joseph. It’s Sebastian.”
“Hey, Seb. What’s up?” Sebastian Carson and his twin brother, William, were co-owners of Savage Valley Bank. Their family had founded the bank soon after each of the five bear-shifter families had returned to Savage Valley from the wilderness. They’d set up the bank in the old fur-trading outpost right in the center of town on Main Street almost one hundred and fifty years ago.
“It’s that photographer, Elena Ward.”
Immediately, Joseph stiffened. His senses became alert, and he could feel the bear side of himself awakening. “What about her?”
“She’s special to you?”
Joseph growled low in reply.
“My brother and I were out hunting. We were deep in the forest, Joseph. And we came across her.”
Joseph released a mighty roar. “What the fuck? How could you be so careless? You obviously weren’t deep enough if a tiny woman like her could walk long enough to reach you.” He continued yelling into the receiver, trying to ignore the wide, swarming despair that threatened to obliterate all of his sense and reason. He couldn’t lose Elena, not after that delectable taste he’d stolen from her that night in his office. She was his. She was Caleb’s. He was trying to give her space. She’d been so skittish around him and his brother.
The Carson brothers had smelled her scent. That’s why Seb had called.
It was over. He had lost her.
Joseph wanted to run into the forest.
He wanted to disappear into the dark wild.
He could not stand this misery.
“Joseph! Joseph, listen to me!” Seb’s voice barely cut through the deep, swelling agony that swept through him. He could barely breathe, much less pay attention to anything Seb had to say.
He hit the end button on the phone call and whipped the car around, moaning, letting his despair wash through him. His muscles trembled. He needed to shift. He needed to escape his human restraints. This type of misery could only be endured if he was in bear form.
Oh god, his Elena. His Elena was no longer his.
He sped to the edge of town, not knowing how long he could hold on to his human form. His bear was rampant, threatening to break free at any second. The cruiser skidded to a halt at the edge of the forest near Old Deer Trail. He didn’t even bother turning it off or closing the door. He did have the presence of mind to take his clothes off, though, before letting his bear explode from beneath his skin.
When he finally released a deep, guttural teeth-rattling roar, it was as if more anguish sprang up to take place of the pain the roar had released. Running, he thrashed his great head back and forth. He tore at tall trees as he ran by, needing the feel of the weak, shredding bark as his sharp bear-claws tore through it.
But then he needed only to run.
He tucked his mighty head down, and he let his bear-muscles have free rein over his heaving bear-body. Shoving all visions away, he ran and he ran and he ran. He focused on each step, on each slide and pull and dig of his strong bear-muscles. Each step became labor. And he welcomed the pain.
It took his man-mind away from her, away from what he’d lost.
A whole life, a future he’d been dreaming of for the past month.
Gone.
Now that the brothers Carson had both smelled his tawny-headed-Elena, she belonged to them. It was bear-law. It was natural. It was writ. Brother Caleb’s claim on her would be weakened. He hadn’t sniffed tawny-headed-Elena in person, merely the remnants of her scent. But even that was enough to have driven him to avoid her for weeks lest he should inadvertently take her, claim her, possess her. The brothers Carson had been close enough to smell her in person. He knew what had happened.
The images that followed those misery-causing thoughts biz-buzzed angrily inside his head and caused another bone-shaking roar to come clawing out of his throat. He dug in. He forced his bear-muscles onward.
So wrapped up in his misery, he almost ran over her before he even recognized her presence.
Tawny-headed-Elena was on the trail before him.
She was alone. She was hiking. She had on all of her gear.
His mighty claws gripped the earth. His already tired bear-muscles trembled with the effort of bringing his six hundred pounds of bear flesh to a halt.
He stopped just inches before her and sucked in a deep nose-and-heart-filling breath.
Her scent—her skin, her blood, her heart, her flesh, her bones—all of it filled him and all of it belonged to him. She was unclaimed. She was clean and fresh. She called to him. Somehow, by some miracle, the Carson brothers hadn’t taken her. Her scent was stronger than anything Joseph had ever experienced. Suddenly, his bear retreated. His human side became the dominant side, and he felt his smooth, sweaty flesh come bursting out of his fur.
Then he stood before her. Naked. And she knew him. She knew all of him. He was hers.
He took another deep breath, and oh, she was his.
“Joseph?” Her voice trembled. Her wide brown eyes stared at him with shock.
His hard, insistent cock twitched at the sound of her voice.
He strode toward her and grasped her chin in his big hand. “Elena,” he said, not attempting to hide the strain and the need in his voice. “Now you know me.”
She swallowed and glanced down at his large cock, only centimeters from touching her body. He
needed to hear one word from her. One little yes.
Her whole body trembled. He could feel it in the palm of his hand. “Remember what you promised me, Elena. Do you remember?”
She nodded.
“What did you promise me?”
“I promised that…” She took a deep breath and met his eyes. “…that I would never be afraid of you.”
“That’s right.” He leaned down and placed a soft kiss on her lips. It was so difficult. All he wanted to do was rip every scrap of clothing away from her body and plant his cock deep within her sweet, hot cunt. But he had to hear it from her. She had to want him, too. He realized his muscles trembled just as much as hers. He couldn’t tell where hers ended and his began. “Will you have me, Elena? Now that you’ve seen me and you know me, will you have me?”
Her brows creased together, and Joseph noticed the delicate little lines that popped up across her forehead. She looked so tender and fragile, yet her next words had the potential to break him, to completely destroy him.
Her soft hand came up to cover Joseph’s that still gripped her chin, and she nodded.
“Say it. You have to say it.”
“Yes, Joseph,” she said before he could finish. “Yes.”
* * * *
As soon as she uttered the words, Joseph’s lips crashed against hers. His big arms circled around her body, pulled her close, and held her. His cock nudged against her inner thighs, lighting up her insides with irresistible lust. When he set her back on the ground, he began removing her gear and her clothing. He watched her face the whole time, and she could look away from his black eyes no more than a coil of ivy could pull away from the tree it embraces.