Runaway Mate

by Cecilia Lane

  She could barely sort through the sounds invading her ears. Everything was too loud and too soft all at once. She thought she yelled for answers, but she couldn’t be sure. Maybe it was all in her head. Maybe she still curled in on herself as Bentley tore and ripped at her flesh.

  She could already be dead and her mind hadn’t caught up.

  “I can’t see where she’s bleeding.”

  “Doesn’t fucking matter, does it?”

  Meghan groaned as she was moved. Gray’s scent filled her nose. She wanted to bury her face against him, but something warm and hard kept her from getting closer.

  “Easy there, Hollywood,” he murmured in her ear. “We’ll get you fixed up. Drink some of this.”

  A warm and thick liquid hit her lips and tongue. The shock of it blasted through her system and her eyes snapped open again. Gray. Gray was there. Holding her. Keeping his wrist against her mouth.

  “That’s it. This will help you heal,” he murmured.

  Meghan groaned against his wrist. Blue eyes passed over her face, her temple, down her chest, then back to her eyes again. “You’re okay. You’re going to be okay.”

  “Where’s her car? She looks like she was in a wreck.” Cole, she recognized.

  She moved her head to the side. God, she felt as weak as a newborn kitten. But even that was better than before. “Bentley,” she said in a hoarse tone.

  Immediately, the sense around her changed from one of relief to defensive.

  “Let’s get you in the truck,” Gray said. The gentle tone he used didn’t hide the growl underneath. He craned his neck and addressed someone out of her line of sight. “He could still be around here.”

  “We’ll get her to the clinic first. I’ll call Callum and the others on the way, then we’ll hunt this bastard down,” Cole answered.

  It all sounded like a lovely plan to her. Her hearing was still all over the place and she wanted her head checked for lasting damage. She’d need stitches, too. She didn’t dare look at her arm, but the fact that she couldn’t feel any injuries probably wasn’t a good sign.

  Gray carefully cradled her between his arms and lifted off the ground. Cole strode ahead and pulled open the passenger’s door, then zipped around to take his spot as the driver. She’d been settled inside as gently as possible when she glanced out the windshield.

  “Bear.” Meghan pointed and glanced at the two men. “Bear.”

  Gray straightened and stared. The beast standing in the middle of the road didn’t move other than to raise his lips and snarl. Meghan prayed it was just a wild creature or someone with a dislike for her rescuers, but then the headlights caught his eyes. They glowed green like Bentley’s. She whined and pushed herself further into her seat.

  He couldn’t take her. She made it to safety. He couldn’t order her away from Gray.

  A silent conversation happened between Cole and Gray in a single glance.

  “Stay here,” Gray said. He planted a kiss on her temple, then reached a hand over his head and dragged his shirt off. “I’ll make sure he never hurts you again.”

  “What are you doing?” Meghan asked, but he only closed the door on her. She whipped around to Cole. “What is he doing?”

  The man’s face was grim as he stared ahead. “He’s doing what’s necessary to protect his mate.”

  That wasn’t any sort of answer until Gray threw his arms wide and yelled a wordless challenge at the bear. Then his own shift, far more fluid than any she’d seen from Bentley, dropped a large beast to all fours. He surged forward without delay.

  She imagined she felt when the two bears crashed into one another. Then they rose up on back legs and smacked each other hard. It was like watching a boxing match, only they drew blood with the long rakes of sharp claws.

  The fight was a flurry of motion. When they fell down on all fours, they snapped and charged one another, checking the other with their shoulders and sides. In the headlights of the truck, she could see blood matting the fur of both.

  But slowly, Gray edged out over Bentley. His blows landed a little more often. He dug in his teeth and bit more frequently. Bentley kept the weight off one leg where a well-placed crunch tore through fur and into bone.

  Meghan covered her mouth with her hands. “He’s going to kill him.”

  Cole slid his eyes to her, then back to the fight. “That’s the idea.”

  “He’ll be a murderer.”

  “Our laws are a little tougher than yours. He hurt someone’s mate. This is what he deserves.”

  It wasn’t. Not a man like Bentley. He didn’t deserve anything so quick.

  And the justification was wrong, too. She wasn’t Gray’s mate. Bentley had seen to that.

  As much as she hated the man and didn’t want anything to do with him, she couldn’t let Gray have that on his mind. He already hurt, he said. This wouldn’t help.

  She threw herself out of the truck and ran right for the fight. She expected pain or weakness, but there was none. Adrenaline pumped through her veins and held back her hurt, she figured. Good thing, too. Cole cursed behind her and tried to follow, but she had the edge of surprise.

  She ducked one massive paw and jerked back before a snapping jaw could catch her side. Her bear, her Gray, knocked Bentley to the ground. His paws landed on the side of the other bear’s head and only quick action on Bentley’s part kept his throat from being torn out.

  “Stop!” she yelled.

  Both bears pulled to a halt.

  “You can’t kill him.” Gray lifted his lips in a snarl and she spat her words out faster. “He doesn’t live by your laws. He wants to be human. He will suffer more if he loses his money and power than if he dies right here.”

  Gray didn’t quiet his growl, but he did take a step back from Bentley. The bear tried to scramble to his feet, but Gray whacked him back to the ground again.

  “You think this is for the best?” Cole asked beside her.

  She stared cold eyes at the beast that hurt her and the man somewhere deep inside. She wanted him to pay for everything he’d done. She turned her gaze up to Gray. His golden bear eyes were focused entirely on her. Even in his other form, there was so much of the man she loved in that look.

  She nodded.

  Gray lifted his lips in another snarl at Bentley, then his body shimmered. The snapping and breaking of bones drew back into the shape of a man. Without a care for his nakedness, he strode for her and pulled her into his chest.

  She didn’t care that he was covered in blood. She rested her cheek against him and sighed.

  Cole cleared his throat and when she parted from Gray, he had a gun and pointed it at Bentley’s head. “This what you want?” he asked.

  Meghan whipped her head around to the man he addressed. Her eyes went wide.

  Gray dipped his chin to his chest. Meghan struggled in his arms but he wouldn’t let her go.

  Cole fired a single round into Bentley.

  “No!” Meghan struggled. There wasn’t any honor in the action. It would have been better for Bentley to die in a fight, if he had to at all. “Why? Why would you do that?”

  Gray grabbed her arms and twisted her around to face the murderer and his victim. “Look.”

  Her eyes flicked from Cole to the ground. Bentley changed back from his bear to human in a much smoother transition than he’d likely ever experienced. His head lolled to the side with the ease of a ragdoll.

  “Tranquilizer,” Cole explained with a sour twist of his mouth. “Used to have a need for this regularly.”

  “Oh,” she said simply. A wave of fire flashed through her, followed by a sudden chill that made her teeth rattle. She might have been temporarily strong enough to interfere, but she was feeling the night all at once.

  Gray cupped her cheeks and drew her eyes back to his. Worry colored the dark blue with a ring of gold. “Hey, hey, it’s okay.” He glanced away from her for a brief second. “Cole, we need to go.”

  “On it,” the other man said
. He stuffed the tranquilizer gun into the back of his jeans, then slung Bentley over his shoulder.

  Gray was much gentler when he caught her under the knees and carried her toward the truck. “You take the front. You should be comfortable.”

  She shook her head against his chest. “No. I don’t want to be away from you.”

  The strong desire surprised her but she wasn’t about to fight it.

  “It might get bumpy,” he warned.

  “I just…,” she drew a shuddering breath as another wave of hot and cold passed through her. “I need to be near you after tonight.”

  He pulled tighter against his chest. “I won’t leave your side.”

  Chapter 27

  Meghan sprawled between Gray’s outstretched legs and he held her tightly around the middle. Bentley’s unconscious body bounced with every bump in the road as Cole drove them all back toward town.

  It was over. Again. Hopefully for the final time. She hoped with pictures of her injuries and statements of Bentley’s shifter nature, he’d spend a long time behind bars. Shifter prison, too. The sort he paid and lobbied to make uncomfortable for the inhabitants.

  Perhaps there was justice in the world after all.

  “What happened?”

  Gray’s voice interrupted thoughts of long court proceedings and appeals that no doubt Bentley would draw out. He drummed his fingers against the side of the truck. Agitation rolled off him in waves that stole the breath from her lungs.

  So she told him. She started with wanting to surprise him when he finished his shift at the firehouse. Her words stuttered with fear when she came upon Bentley blocking the road into town. It was uncomfortable to think about how long he’d been watching her and how he’d managed to get in position for his plan.

  Gray tightened his grip around her and buried his nose in her neck as she got to the part where his nature was revealed and he ordered her to run. The light growl vibrating through her back did as much to calm her as watching Bentley’s head loll from side to side.

  He couldn’t hurt her anymore. She wanted to extend that protection to everyone in the world.

  “He said I made a mistake leaving him and he’d make sure I never did it again by claiming me as his mate. Then he bit me,” she finished. “I thought I was dying, but I had to tell someone. I couldn’t let him blame you and get away with it.”

  “He bit you?” Gray stopped drumming his fingers and twisted so they could see one another. For the first time, she saw real fear in his eyes. “How?”

  “What do you mean how? With his teeth!” Meghan threw her hands into the air, then scooted until she sat next to him instead of on him. She held her arm up to show the bite.

  Huh. She expected more blood and gore to go with her deadened nerves. There was hardly a scratch.

  Gray’s eyes slid closed and he shook his head. “Oh, Meghan…” He slung his arm over her shoulder to draw her back to his chest. “I’m so, so sorry. I thought it was my blood that healed you. This isn’t what I wanted for you.”

  She pushed at him and searched his face. Worry lined every inch of his expression. “What do you mean?”

  Gray’s fingers wrapped around her arm and stroked softly to show silvery marks under the remains of her ordeal. “I mean he didn’t claim you. That’s done in human form. He bit you as his bear and now you’re going to be one, too.”

  She never expected her brief stopover in Bearden to end with her as a shifter. Though, to be fair, she didn’t expect to see photos of herself spread across the internet, lose her job, or discover her vengeful ex was a shifter himself. She had trouble processing the words and Gray took her stunned silence as needing more convincing.

  “Have you felt your senses coming and going? Your hearing is the most noticeable change and will get better and then slide back to your human range.”

  She heard Bentley hunt and the last breath of his prey enter the night. She imagined it. She must have. “That’s just because I hit my head when I fell,” she said slowly. “I probably have a concussion.”

  “If you did, it’s likely on its way to healed by now. That’s how the change begins.” He frowned.

  “What aren’t you telling me?”

  He passed a hand over his face. None of the fear dissipated from his eyes. “It can be dangerous under the best of circumstances. But this was done without your knowledge or consent. Those animals are always rougher to accept and control. Women have an easier time of it and survive more often, but…”

  “But I could still die?” How unfair to think she survived only to have the chance of life ripped out from under her again. She wished she’d dug and prodded for more information than what was readily available. The existence of the supernaturals and their enclaves were reported more heavily than the details and it seemed like every mouth simultaneously clamped shut when outsiders pressed for more. She was paying for that lack of knowledge with a sucker punch of information.

  “You might. You might not. Leah went through it. Her bear is a monster, but she made it out the other side.” Gray squeezed her shoulder and pounded a hand against the window behind his head. Cole flipped open the window with a muffled curse. “Skip the clinic. We need to get back to the cabins.”

  “You sure?” Cole asked.

  “Absolutely.” Gray was quiet when the window shut on them again. He stared into the dark trees zooming away, then made a noise somewhere between sigh and growl. “I meant when I said before. I’m not leaving your side.”

  “If it goes wrong…,” She felt odd discussing her mortality and was thankful that Cole gave them privacy. She didn’t want to cry in front of others. “I don’t want you to see that.”

  “You’re not pushing me away.” An unmistakable growl rattled in his throat. His voice was low and angry when he spoke again. “I refuse to believe fate would make my mate so perfect, only to die when she was given a bear.”

  Meghan pushed out from his arms. Besides the flattery that made her stomach flip, there was another nugget of information. Bentley wanted to claim her and failed. “What do you mean?”

  Gray grimaced and looked away. “This isn’t how I wanted to have this conversation.”

  “Too late for that.” She poked him in the chest. “Spill it, bear. I apparently don’t have time to waste.”

  He turned back to her and a tiny smile hitched up the side of his mouth. “You’re my mate, Hollywood. I knew it the first moment I laid eyes on you. I tried to stay away, to keep you safe, but it was easier to stop breathing. When I finally gave in, you changed something inside me. You tamed my bear and hold a piece of my heart.” He cleared his throat. “If I claimed you, properly, it would mean putting my fangs against your skin and marking you with a bite. We’d be bonded for life. You’d be stronger. Not as strong as a shifter, but more resilient than a human.”

  He raised his hand when she opened her mouth. Good thing, because she wasn’t sure what to say.

  “I don’t want your answer now. You have probably another two or three days to think about it. If I didn’t think this could help you, I wouldn’t have even brought it up.” His eyes brightened and swirled with gold. “This should be because you want me. This bond is stronger the marriage. We could separate, go our own ways, but it’s going to hurt. Whatever you did to heal me wouldn’t last.”

  She was saved from responding by Cole turning down the road that led to the Strathorn cabins. He pulled to a stop outside Gray’s home and her bear jumped over the side and to the ground.

  Cole rolled down his window. He eyed them both sharply. “I’ll ditch the baggage at the police station and call off the hounds.” He pointed to Gray’s jeans borrowed out of Cole’s toolbox then raised two fingers to his forehead in salute. “Wash those before you return them. Glad you’re safe, Meghan.”

  Meghan turned to Gray as Cole turned right back to the road. “What does he mean by call off the hounds?”

  Gray wrapped an arm around her waist and led her toward his door. “I wa
s worried when you didn’t come home. The clan is helping to find you.”

  “All of them?”

  “Leah is closing down the bar and she and Callum were going to check in the next towns over when she finished. Becca and Rylee took up phone duty to bully and convince other people to look. Hudson, Sawyer, and Jacob are running the territory. We would have searched every nook and cranny from here to California to find you.”

  She didn’t doubt it. That was the sort of devotion she expected from a man who wanted to bind them together stronger than marriage alone.

  The others surprised her, though. She liked them all even more knowing they were willing to sacrifice their time and sleep to locate her. Maybe she really did have a place among them.

  She and Gray stood awkwardly in the middle of his living room. Shoes she’d left behind when she packed for her trip still sat at the end of the couch where she kicked them off.

  She felt like she had come home.

  She wanted it to be home.

  Meghan glanced down at herself. Blood stained her clothes and flaked off her skin. That was just what she could see. A hesitant touch of her fingers felt stickiness in her hair from where she’d hit her head. “I should clean up,” she said.

  Gray pressed his lips together but didn’t push. “I’ll be right outside the door if you need me.”

  Meghan locked herself behind the bathroom door and turned the water on as hot as she could stand it. Her muscles protested when she stripped down. Bruises covered her nearly head to toe in the sickly yellow of old injuries. She peeled back her hair and pressed fingers to the bump. There was no cut there, or on her arm.

  She didn’t know how to handle the thought of death when she looked to be on her way to health. Her heart ached when she followed the thought to the worst conclusion. She didn’t want to lose Gray. The last few weeks with him had honestly been the best of her life.

  Meghan lumbered into the shower and let the water rain down over her. Her cheeks heated when she recalled her first time stepping into the tiled enclosure. Gray’s hands on her body, his mouth, his… everything. The night loosened a weight on her and set her free.