The Bear's EmbraceClanlessA Shifter Romance Series, Book 1

by Victoria Kane

  The only thing that hung heavy in his mind was their potential for a future together. She had talked about her life in New York while they had gotten to know each other. What could he offer her compared to that? All he had to give her was a beat up cabin in Wisconsin. That and his heart. She deserved more.

  But he had seen how she was while they walked through the forest. The easy smile on her face as she took in the sights and sounds. Her laughter as she skipped through the trees. The harder side of her personality had disappeared, and she had seemed happy. He could make her happy.

  So he clung to hope even as he wrestled with his thoughts, the only comfort coming from the soft sound of Laura’s breathing next to him.

  Laura woke up slowly, eyes opening to take in the trees flashing past but leaving her head leaning against the window. She spent a few minutes like this, just watching the world pass by.

  The sun was high in the sky now, shining a bright golden light across everything. Rick spoke before she moved. “Glad to finally have some company. This drive was getting boring all by my lonesome.”

  “Again you seem to know everything, Mr. Lumberjack,” said Laura, straightening and folding up the blanket covering her. She set it behind their seats, fighting back a yawn. “Do people smell different after they’ve woken up too?”

  “Not really,” he answered with a chuckle. “But your breathing changes. It goes from deep and slow to being a little shallower and faster. Animal senses include hearing, by the way.”

  “Of course it does,” she replied, a small smile breaking across her face. “How long have I been sleeping for this time?”

  “About five-ish hours or so. We passed Chicago a while back.”

  Laura’s insides tightened up. They were still only halfway through the drive, but each mile they covered brought her closer to knowing what had happened to Craig. She wanted to know one way or the other, but that didn’t change the fact that she was scared, maybe even terrified, to find out. She checked her phone again, more out of habit than anything else. She had the volume turned to max and would have heard if she’d gotten any messages or calls, but still felt compelled to look. Nothing.

  Rick looked over at her, eyes soft and bright. He didn’t say anything, appearing to understand that any reassurances he tried to give would fall flat. They were going as fast as they could, and would do everything they could do, but for now things were out of their hands.

  The next few hours passed slowly and quietly. They stopped once to eat, Rick again devouring a families worth of food. Laura tried to joke about it once more, but she knew her attempt sounded forced. Rick didn’t seem to mind, just laughing good naturedly.

  By the time they reached the outskirts of New York, the sun was just peeking over the horizon behind them. They took the tunnel to get into the city itself, Laura now directing Rick. He seemed slightly uncomfortable being in the tunnel. Laura hardly noticed, however, as anxiety was coursing through her at the prospect of finally learning what had happened to Craig.

  They emerged from the tunnel into Manhattan not far from where Laura lived. The traffic was horrible, and to be so close and yet moving so slowly made Laura want to scream in frustration.

  It felt strange to be in New York again. Her time in Wisconsin had been incredibly soothing, and to again be surrounded by concrete was slightly jarring. The cacophony of sounds and smells that she had once loved so much seemed almost foreign to her.

  After almost an hour of stop and go traffic they finally reached Laura’s apartment building. It was a modest sized brown stone building about ten floors high. She showed Rick where to turn into the underground parking, and he quickly found a spot just wide enough to squeeze his truck in.

  They climbed out of the truck, both doing that awkward dance where you open the door just enough to get out but not enough to hit the car next to you. While Rick was still squirming his way out, Laura went to the back and opened up her duffel bag. She took out the gun, hating the feel of it in her hands, and slipped it into the front pocket of the hoodie she was wearing. She kept her hands in the front pocket as she walked around the truck to meet Rick, hoping he wouldn’t notice it.

  “Do you think you’ll need the gun?” he asked immediately, eyes glancing down at the pocket.

  She flushed slightly. She should have known that she couldn’t slip it past him. “I don’t know, but I’m bringing it just in case.”

  To her surprise, he didn’t argue with her. “Okay, but don’t use it unless you absolutely have to. I can probably handle any trouble that we find.” Looking into her eyes, he noticed her surprise. “What, you thought I wouldn’t let you defend yourself? This could be dangerous.”

  She smiled, relieved that he didn’t see her as being useless. She knew she wasn’t some kind of warrior, but damned if she wouldn’t fight to defend him or Craig.

  “You ready?” he asked, hand taking one of hers in his own.

  “Yeah, let’s go.” Still holding his hand, she led him to the elevator. Laura studied Rick as they walked, noting how unusually tense he seemed. “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, I’m just a little uncomfortable in cities is all,” he answered, voice sounding a little embarrassed. “All of the sounds and smells layered on top of each other, all the concrete… It just makes the other side of me tense.”

  She nodded in understanding. “Thanks for being here. You can’t know how much it means to me.”

  “Of course I’m here. I’d do anything for you Laura.” He seemed to regret saying it as soon as the words left his lips, eyes breaking contact with hers and going to the floor.

  “I care about you too Rick. After we help Craig, we need to talk about what comes next.”

  His face brightened upon hearing this, eyes once again reaching for hers.

  The elevator let out a small ding just then, and the door opened slowly. They walked inside together, Laura pressing the button to take them to the eighth floor. Her entire body felt tense, like a guitar string stretched too tight. All the worrying she had been doing over the last two days was coming to a head now. Hopefully she would soon be laughing with Craig about how she could never relax.

  The elevator seemed to take forever, but it finally opened on her floor. She led Rick to the door of her apartment. He motioned her to stillness, ear cocked towards the door.

  “Rough breathing, and I smell blood. Someone in there is hurt,” he said. “There’s only one person though, we can go in.”

  Laura’s heart shot into her throat. She fumbled her keys out and unlocked the door, hands shaking slightly. Once it was unlocked she burst through the door, eyes trying to look everywhere at once.

  The apartment was destroyed. Pictures had been knocked off of walls, drawers strewn across the floor, and her couch looked like someone had taken a knife to it and pulled all of its insides out. And there, lying next to the couch, was Craig.

  “Craig!” she shouted, dashing across the room to him. Broken glass crunched under her feet as she went, the remnants of the family pictures that had adorned her walls. She knelt beside him and gasped in shock.

  Craig was lying motionless on the floor surrounded by a large pool of blood. His face, normally all smiles, was now a mass of red and purple bruises. His breathing was hoarse and shallow, and his clothes were in tatters.

  “Laura?” he croaked, voice low and raspy.

  “Yeah, it’s me,” she responded, tears in her eyes.

  “You shouldn’t be here,” he gasped out, one eye opening slightly. The other was such a mass of bruised flesh that it probably couldn’t open at all.

  Rick was there then, kneeling on the opposite side of Craig. His eyes took in Craig’s wounds. “There’s too much blood on the floor, he’s been stabbed somewhere.”

  “My side,” Craig said.

  Rick gently pulled his shirt up over his stomach. Despite the care he took, Craig hissed in pain as the shirt was pulled up. Underneath, a vicious gash in his side was exposed. Laura gasped on seeing
it. She had never seen a knife wound up close before, and it almost made her sick to look at.

  “I’m sorry Laura,” Craig said between sharp, fast breaths. His breathing seemed to be getting worse.

  Tears were pouring down Laura’s cheeks now, her voice raw with emotion. “No Craig, I should’ve been here to help you. I never should have left.”

  “No, you would have just gotten hurt too. I’m glad you’re okay,” he said, his voice seeming to get weaker as he spoke. “I messed up, I’m just glad nothing happened to you.”

  His one working eye closed then, and his breathing slowed down.

  “We need an ambulance,” Laura sobbed, pulling her phone out of her back pocket.

  Rick put his hand on her arm. “He’s gone Laura. His heart stopped.”

  “NO! Craig no!” she shouted. Her hands grabbed the front of his blood soaked shirt, as if angry at him for dying. Her mind raced, knowing there was something she could do. There had to be something she could do. “Make him a shifter!” she blurted out, desperate for any chance she could give her brother.

  “I can’t, Laura,” Rick said, his eyes carrying more sadness than she had ever seen in him. “When someone gets turned they’re sick for two or three days before they start getting our abilities. Even if we’d gotten here as soon as this was done to him, it still would have been too late. I’m sorry.”

  “He can’t die!” she shouted, the fury in her voice overpowering the despair. “He can’t!”

  Her hands hovered above his chest for a second, then she placed her hands one on top of the other above his heart and began to pump.

  Rick stood and walked around Craig’s body, kneeling behind Laura and putting his arms around her. “Stop Laura. He’s gone.”

  She shrugged off his arms furiously and continued pumping. Craig couldn’t leave her. He was the last direct family she had left.

  She had no idea how long she continued. It might have been a minute or half an hour in her mind. All she knew was that suddenly, the reality crystallized in her mind. Craig was dead.

  Her brother was dead.

  She bent further forward and pressed her face against his chest as sobs wracked her body. Her arms held his still form as she cried, her grief pouring out of her. “I’m sorry,” she said over and over again. “I’m so sorry.”

  She felt Rick’s big hand on her shoulder, felt it squeeze, trying to give what comfort it could. But there was no comfort or solace to be found. Her brother was gone, taken away by a group of criminals because he owed them money. And now she was alone.

  Her brother had been her last link to that golden time in her life before her parents had died. They’d grown up bonded by the tragedy of that fateful car accident that had destroyed their childhood. For the rest of their lives they had felt it was them against the world, barring Aunt Joyce and the few others who had taken care of them.

  She felt that part of herself crack, as if that childhood bond that had so defined her life had broken into a million pieces. In its place was a hole that radiated grief and sadness, pulling her in so deep that she couldn’t imagine ever getting out.

  Chapter 9

  She didn’t know how much time passed while she cried, but all at once it stopped. She felt raw, as if her emotions had been scraped down to the bone. Her gaze wandered back and forth, and she was vaguely aware of Rick’s hand still there on her shoulder, of his massive presence just behind and to the side of her.

  Her wandering eyes fell on a knife lying on the floor a few feet away. She picked it up, absently noting that blood covered most it. All she could think about was the night she’d received it, an impulse purchase from a website. The doorbell had rung, Craig answering the door to find a delivery guy standing there. He’d signed for the package and brought it inside, opening it on the coffee table in the living room. She had walked in just as he cracked open the outside box. His face had brightened into a huge smile on seeing the new, very high quality kitchen knives.

  “Did you get these for me?” he had asked, seeming like a kid on Christmas morning.

  “No, they’re mine. I’m going to start learning to cook,” she had replied. She hadn’t been able to help but smile at her brother’s enthusiasm.

  “You? Cook?” he asked, shooting her a look of faux puzzlement. “Well I hope you got fire insurance too, for when you burn this place down.”

  Craig had probably used them more than she had, as she’d never really followed through on her desire to cook more. And now here it was, sitting in her hand with Craig’s blood all over it. She turned it over in her hand, as if seeing it for the first time.

  Rick’s hand engulfed hers, gently taking the knife away and setting it on the floor. He took her by the shoulders from behind then and turned her until she was facing him, both of them on their knees. His hands pulled her into a crushing embrace against his chest, arms wrapped tightly around her, as if he would be able to hold in the splintered strands of her soul.

  After a moment, Rick whispered into her ear. “I’m sorry Laura. I wish we could have done more.”

  She just stayed there in his arms, hardly hearing anything he said.

  After a while, she felt Rick go tense against her. “Men coming,” he whispered, his lips close to her ear. “Same accent as the goons from last night. On the stairs, one floor down. They’ll be here soon.”

  They stood up together. If they really were one floor down there wouldn’t be time to get to the elevator before they got to Laura’s floor.

  Rick led her to the hallway across from the living room. His nose twitched. “At least one of them is carrying a gun.”

  Laura could hear voices now, still soft but growing louder. They sounded jovial, their speech regularly punctuated by laughter.

  Her expression tightened. They were laughing, and her brother was dead on the floor. She pulled the small pistol out of the front pocket of her hoodie, eyes glazing with anger.

  “Hey, killing someone isn’t going to bring him back,” Rick said quietly. “We need to get out of here and call the police.”

  “They don’t get to be happy,” she said, her voice heavy with fury. She knew she wasn’t being rational, but felt only half in control of her actions. Her grief had combined with her anger, creating a chaotic storm inside her.

  “They won’t be, but let me do the fighting. We surprise them, then get out. Anything else it too dangerous.”

  She didn’t say anything as Rick pushed her behind him and pressed himself against the wall, hiding just behind the corner where he wouldn’t be seen when they came in. Her hand still clutched the gun, holding it by her side in a tight grip.

  The voices were louder now, the men almost at her door. They waited breathlessly, Laura’s anger making fear impossible. The door opened, and the harsh Brooklyn accents washed across the apartment.

  “…only take a few hours tops, then we’re out at the bar.”

  “Yeah, I know. I still think we could’ve waited ‘til tomorrow though. This guy ain’t going anywhere.”

  Laura’s jaw tightened at hearing her brother’s death talked about so casually. As if sensing she was about to lose control, Rick pressed her back into the wall with one arm.

  The men walked into the living room, still talking amongst themselves, coming to within a few feet of the corner they were hiding behind. All at once Rick exploded forward. It was shocking how quickly he could move. The man closest to him barely had time to turn before Rick’s fist sent him crumpling bonelessly to the floor. The second man fared no better, a second swing from Rick’s arm knocking him clean off his feet to land on his back.

  Laura turned the corner then, seeing the last thug already pointing a large silver pistol at Rick. Time seemed to slow down as she raised her arm, the small gun in her hand feeling weightless. She brought it straight in front of her and pulled the trigger, knowing that it was already probably too late.

  Both guns seemed to fire at the same time, the sound shockingly loud in the enclosed spa
ce. Her sudden appearance had made the thug jerk slightly, however, and his bullet went wide, thudding into the wall.

  Her shot didn’t miss though. The man looked down at the blood spreading across his chest as if in disbelief. He looked back up at her, eyes pleading for help before he fell to his knees, then landed face down on the floor.

  Rick didn’t waste any time talking, grabbing her by the arm and rushing out the door. She followed him into the hallway, mind strangely focused on the look of surprise on the face of the man she had shot.

  They dashed down the hallway to the stairwell and started down. Laura wasn’t worried about calling the police anymore. Two gunshots in a crowded apartment building in New York would probably bring them faster than any phone call.

  Laura heard the door to the stairwell open above them just after they had passed the fifth floor. “…will kill us if we let them get away! They shot Frank!” She heard the sound of footsteps on the stairs above as the two men chased after them.

  They ran down the stairs as fast as they dared. Laura almost tripped over her own feet in her haste, and just barely caught herself before she tumbled down the stairs.

  Soon they reached the basement parking lot, the sound of the two men giving chase spurring them onward. Laura was out of breath, both from the mad dash down the stairs and the adrenaline flooding through her. Rick didn’t even look slightly out of breath.

  He opened the door leading to the parking lot and she followed him out. They ran to the Rick’s truck and jumped in. It roared to life as he turned the key, and he pulled it out quickly and started toward the ramp that led up to the street.

  Just as they hit the ramp the door to the stairwell opened and the two men spilled out. Looking through the back window of the truck, Laura saw the men pile into a black sedan.