by Frankie Love
I pull back. “Truly?”
He releases me and rests his head in his hand. “Fuck, Grace. I was in a motorcycle gang, I had to get out, that’s why I ran. Shit was bad, and sure, I didn’t shoot anyone, but I had no problem holding a gun.”
“Did you kill people?” I ask, my heart tight. I don’t want to lose him, not when I’ve just found someone who might be as broken as me. Someone who might understand the jagged edges of my heart.
“No. But I stood by, knowing what was happening. I didn’t speak up. Instead, I played the part of backup; the bodyguard. I beat people up, knew all about the black market the leader was running.”
“But you left,” I say, reaching for his hand. “For a better life, right?”
“I left because my sister put a bullet in the leader’s chest. I left because she wasn’t safe. Not because I was brave, but because I was scared.”
I listen closely, trying to understand Bear, piece together his story.
“I shouldn’t have told you all this. You’re probably disgusted by me. I’m disgusted by myself, Grace. That’s why I left you the first day we met. I’m not good enough for you, you deserve the world. Not the dregs of the earth.”
“Stop it, Bear,” I say, taking his chin and turning his face to mine. Tears glisten in both our eyes. How a man I hardly know has captured my heart so fast is beyond me, but it’s the truth, and I need him to know it. “You’re not nothing, Bear.”
“Then what am I, Grace?”
“You’re mine.”
12
Bear
I kiss her like we have forever. And maybe we do.
Soft and slow, our hands held, fingers laced. I want to make time stop, to make her mine, now and forever.
“Oh, yes,” she whispers, her heart beating hard against my chest. I run my hands over her bare arms. The tea has gone cold, but our bodies are hot with need.
“Oh, God,” I growl in her ear, pulling her on top of me as I lie down on the couch. She straddles me, then leans down so our mouths collide. But it’s no crash, it’s a slow and steady rhythm, our bodies melting as we become one.
A stillness settles over the cottage. The babies stay asleep and I pull up her dress, groaning as I run my hands over her bare pussy. So slick with want.
“No panties?” I grunt, my fingers slipping inside her warm entrance.
“I was hoping...” She pants as I rub her swollen clit, lifting my hips as she pushes my pants my pants past my thighs.
“You’re hoping I’d finish what we started this morning?” I ask. Her hand finds my cock, and damn, it’s throbbing like a motherfucker. Hard only for her.
I pull her the neck of her dress down, wanting to kiss her tits as she strokes my cock. Her nipples are hard and my tongue rolls over them, but I’m not nearly satisfied. I need all of her.
I grab her hips and force her body up, so she is sitting on my face. I want to lick her pretty cunt, want to taste her sweet release.
She loves it, resting her hands on the arm of the couch as I run my tongue up and down her pussy. She so damn wet and ready, and my tongue slips inside her, loving the way her thighs clench as I take her as my own.
She rolls her hips as my beard grinds against her and she laughs as it tickles her most sensitive place. God, this is the life. Right here, right now. Taking the woman I want forever, in a cottage in the woods, with sleeping babies in the bedroom-- is there anything more than this, right here?
“Ohh, Bear, ohhhh,” she moans, as an orgasm floods her body. Then she begins to laugh softly. “Do not make me wake the babies,” she jokes, lifting her dripping pussy from my mouth, lowering herself back to my cock, kissing me firmly on the lips.
“God, Grace, how did I get here?” I say, guiding my tip into her warm cunt, my hands moving to her face, needing to look into her eyes as I fill her up.
Our noses touch, our hearts beating hard, my body and her body joined as one.
“I think you took a few wrong turns and somehow found your way.”
“To you.”
She nods. “To me.”
Tears fall down her cheeks as she lifts herself up, swirling her perfect hips around my throbbing cock. Tears fall from my eyes as we make love. As I try to forget, and she somehow finds a way to forgive. Forgive me, for my past, for my misdeeds, and mistakes.
“Oh, Bear,” she whimpers, both of us coming so close to the edge.
It’s scary as fuck, giving myself over like this... and maybe I’m a weak man now, knowing how much power Grace has over me, but I don’t care. If loving her makes me less alpha in the eyes of the world, so be it. In my heart, I know it makes me stronger than I’ve ever been before.
I want to say it, tell her how I feel, but before I can, someone is at the door, knocking hard.
My eyes meet hers.
“Who?” I ask.
She stills herself, her hands on my chest. “I don’t know.”
“Grace, you there?” a woman’s voice calls, the knocking continues.
“Just a sec,” she shouts. “It’s Stella,” she tells me as she pulls herself from my still hard cock. She pulls up the top of her dress, pulls it down too.
“Stella?” I stand, zipping my jeans.
“Yeah, my friend from up the mountain.”
“Right.”
“Grace, what are you doing?” another voice asks, pulling at the doorknob. “The door is locked.”
“That’s Cherish,” she whispers. “Just a sec!” she hollers toward the door.
“Okay, should I…?” I look around, my boots are by the door.
“Um.” Gracie laughs. “It’s fine. Just act natural. Say hello and then, you, know...”
“Get out?” I grin, grateful she isn’t freaking out or something.
“Yeah, I haven’t told them about the babies or you.”
“I get it, you don’t have to explain.”
She leans in and I kiss her, my chest expanding. She isn’t pushing me away because of what I shared with her.
A baby begins to cry, and I go to her room, picking up Abel. She reaches for Laura, then walks to the front door, patting the infant’s back. She looks so beautiful with a baby in her arms.
She pulls open the door, and I try not to stare as I stand in her bedroom doorway.
Besides the two women, there are also two burly ass mountain men here.
“Oh, hey, James, Wilder,” Grace says, biting her bottom lip.
Her friends come in with looks of shock on their faces. Understandably.
“What in the world?” one of them asks, pointing to the baby.
“I know,” Grace says. “I should have called you back.”
“We’ve been worried,” one of the women says. “You’ve ignored us for two days. We got people to watch the kids, so we could come check on you, Grace. Heck, we even brought our husbands, we were so nervous about you.”
“Uh, yeah, what is going on?” the other woman asks, her eyes landing on my work boots. “Who do those belong to, Grace?”
“Right, uh, those are Bear’s boots.”
I step into the living room, trying my best to smile as Abel fusses in my arms. It’s the first time I’ve held him and it’s impossible not to feel attached to this sweet boy. Finding him on the road like I did, feels like serendipity. Like for the first time in my life, I had a purpose. A place. Like I belonged to the babies and they belonged to me.
“Hey,” I say, stepping toward them. “I’m Bear. I live up in the cabin behind Grace’s property.”
“I’m Cherish, and this is my husband James. And um… Are these your babies, then?”
“No, it’s a long story.”
“Well, tell it,” James says, his brows furrowed.
“Don’t be intense, James,” Grace says. “Bear is my friend.”
“Visiting late at night?” he asks.
“God, I’m not in a cult anymore,” she scoffs. “I can do what I like with whomever I want.”
“Hey, let�
�s just calm down,” the other man says. “I’m Wilder,” he says, offering his hand. I shake it. “This is my wife, Stella.”
“Good to meet you both.”
“What’s happening here?” Stella asks. “I’m so confused.”
“Actually,” I say, looking over at Grace who is flustered. I’ve never seen her like this. “I was just headed out. I’ll let Grace fill you in.”
“You don’t want to stay?” Stella asks with a smirk. “Looks like you were pretty cozy here. Are we interrupting?”
“No, it’s fine,” Grace says, her eyes on mine. I can tell she wants to smooth things over without having to look me in the eye; the man who just fucked her in this very room. “Bear was just going.”
“Would you mind?” I ask Cherish, pointing to Abel.
She nods and takes him from my arms. Then I pull on my boots, feeling the eyes of all the people in the room on me.
“Just give me a sec,” Grace says, handing Laura to Stella.
She pulls me to the front porch, closing the door behind her. “They are gonna have a million questions, you realize that, right?”
“Want me to stay?”
She shakes her head. “No, I want to talk to them myself. For some reason, I’ve pushed them away since the babies came and I need to apologize.”
“You always push away people who want to help you?”
“It’s hard to trust other people, to let them in, especially people who are good to you. I know it’s stupid, but...”
“But sometimes when we’ve been hurt, we do dumb things to try and protect ourselves.”
“Right,” she says. “You know about that, then?”
I smile. “A little.”
She tucks a loose strand of hair behind her ear, dipping her face. “And what should I tell them... about us?”
I lift her chin, looking into her eyes. “You should tell them what they wanna know.” I press my thumb to her still swollen lips. “Don’t doubt this. Not now. This is real, Grace.”
“You’ll come back?”
I rest my forehead against hers. “As long as you’ll have me.”
13
Grace
After Bear steals away into the night, I close the door, knowing Cherish and Stella are going to have a thousand questions for me. And that Wilder and James aren’t gonna leave without the full story.
“Tea, anyone?” I ask, moving past them and reaching for the mugs on the coffee table. I don’t dare meet their eyes as I deposit the cups in the sink and then reach for the kettle.
“Um, whose baby am I holding, exactly?” Stella asks. All four of them are following me, standing a few feet away. Basically, I’m cornered.
Sucking in a deep breath I set the kettle on the stove, turning the burner on. “That’s a good question.”
I turn to face them, their worried faces crushing me. I should have kept them in the loop and been a better friend.
“You better start at the beginning, Gracie,” Cherish says.
“It’s all so insane, I doubt you’ll believe it.”
My friends all chuckle, and I take Laura back from Cherish’s arms.
“Sweetie,” she says. “We escaped a cult together, remember the time I was pregnant with my second set of triplets? I had never left the compound in my life before and yet managed to find James. Here, on this mountain.”
“And I was reunited with Wilder on the set of a reality television show after getting secretly pregnant with his twins. We can’t really be shocked at this point.”
I pat Laura’s back. “No judgment, though?” I ask, looking between my friends and their husbands.
“You never judged us,” Stella says.
“But I have been jealous,” I admit as the kettle whistles.
Cherish moves to make the tea, telling us to all go sit down. She says she thinks it’s gonna be quite a story.
“I’m sorry I didn’t call you back. That was really rude.”
“Everyone will forgive you,” Wilder says, “if you tell us why there are twins in your house.”
I start at the beginning, glossing over the details of my first time with Bear in the woods. Then I explain the babies coming, the social worker, the police. Everything but the part about Bear’s past. That doesn’t seem fair. Not when he is doing his best to start over.
“Oh, my God,” Stella says, cradling Abel in her arms. “These poor babies.”
“I know,” I whisper. “They’ve been angels, really. And I have a doctor’s appointment tomorrow. I don’t even know how old they are.”
Cherish twists her lips. “I’m guessing maybe three and a half months?”
James nods. “That sounds about right. But God, I want to find those parents and --”
I cut him off. “We don’t know their story, James.”
“I know, but I can’t imagine...” He shakes his head, swallowing his emotions.
“I know. It’s so sad. But the babies are safe, and... I mean, I don’t want to say I’m grateful to be taking care of someone else’s children... but I am happy I had my foster care license, so they could stay with me.”
“And Bear, is he staying with you too?” Wilder asks.
I twist my lips. “It’s only been two days.”
Wilder laughs. “A lot can happen in two days on this mountain, Gracie.”
“Fair enough,” I say, shaking my head as heat rises to my cheeks. “I don’t know if you can fall in love with a stranger, but I think I did.”
“Oh, sweetie,” Cherish says, clutching my hand. “We need to have a barbecue, invite everyone over.”
I roll my eyes, laughing. “What is it about this place and BBQs?”
“Any excuse to spend time with the people you care most about, right?” James says, looking over at Wilder. “Look, if he’s a good guy, clean, and just likes living in the middle of nowhere, we have no problem with him.”
“We’d only have a problem with the guy if he’s hiding something,” Wilder says.
I swallow. “He’s not hiding anything,” I say, wondering if I should say more. But I feel a loyalty to Bear that overwhelms my decision-making process.
“Good, then you need to go take a late-night nap and let us feed and change these babies,” James says.
Balking, I try to say no, but they won’t have it.
“Grace, if there is one thing I’ve learned from becoming a mother,” Cherish says, “it’s that when someone offers to let you get some rest, take them up on it.”
I hand her Laura, knowing she’s right. “Your little ones going to be okay without you?” I ask.
“Yes, I promise,” she says, then kisses Laura’s head. “Now let us take care of your little ones for just a little while.”
I slip away, into my bedroom, and crawl under my blankets, suddenly exhausted. Cherish’s words linger in my mind ... your little ones.
How long have I wished for such a thing? For as long as I can remember.
The next morning the sun is out and I’m getting the babies in their car seats when Bear stops by.
“Hey,” I say, offering him a smile. “Can you carry Abel to the car?”
He nods, and lifts Abel’s infant carrier to the car, buckling the car seat into my little SUV, next to Laura.
“I’m headed to the pediatrician’s and then the social worker’s office,” I tell him as I adjust the buckle on Laura’s seat. We’re looking at one another over the babies, both right there in the backseat.
“I hope it goes well. Do you need me to do anything around here while you’re gone?”
“It’s fine, Bear. I’m sure you have things to do yourself.”
He lifts his eyebrows. “Yeah, I need to go look for work. I need to get some shit in line before I...” He stops mid-sentence and shrugs. “Just gotta take care of a few things.”
“Right,” I say, pressing my fingers to my lips. Before what? “Well, I’ll see you later?”
“Yeah, you certainly will, Gracie.” He closes the bac
k door, and I do the same with mine, then he walks around the car and gives me a hug and kiss. “Drive safely.”
I exhale, looking at the babies through the window. “I’m a little nervous, driving alone with the babies.”
“Do you want me to come with you?” he asks.
“Would you?”
He nods. “I’d love to.”
14
Bear
The doctor’s appointment goes quickly, and I help Gracie carry the babies into the office, before heading to the waiting room. I’m not a foster parent, and their personal information isn’t mine to have.
An hour later, we’re back in the car, and Gracie tells me that they both seem happy and healthy, and I can see the weight falling from Gracie’s shoulders as she tells me.
“See, they’re gonna be okay,” I assure her, watching as she drives toward Eagle Crest, her eyes fixed on the road.
“I hope so.” She looks over at me, and I rest my hand on hers. “They are just so vulnerable.”
“Did you always picture yourself with babies in the backseat?” I ask her.
She grins. “I grew up in a crazy cult, women were barefoot and pregnant at seventeen. How I’ve avoided it all my life is a mystery. Still, I’ve always wanted to be a mother.”
Looking her over, I’m amazed at how resilient she is. “How old are you?”
“Twenty-two.” She glances over at me. “How old are you?”
“Twenty-six.” I run a hand over my beard. “You seem older than twenty-two. You have a business and place to live. You have your act together. I feel like a mess next to you.”
“What do you want to do?”
“I have a good amount of money saved.”
“That’s not what I asked,” she laughs. “I mean, that’s great, but I mean, like, do you have any dreams, Bear?”
I look over my shoulder at the babies. Gracie catches my eyes.
“You want kids?”
I nod. “I’ve never had a healthy family. The idea of having one feels like a pretty good way to spend a life. Beyond that? I don’t know. I’m good with my hands, never turned down work. Thing is, I’m not so worried about what I do from now on. I just care about why I’m doing it. The motorcycle club, Badlands, had no integrity. Whatever I do next for a paycheck is going to be a clean job.”