Flame

by Ophelia Sexton

He moved up her body until the blunt head of his cock was once again pressing against her entrance. Then he moved into her with one powerful thrust. She was so turned on that she welcomed the invasion, arching beneath him.

  He paused. "Everything okay?"

  After Baldwin, Cassie had never thought she would ever again enjoy the hard, heavy weight of a man's body on top of her.

  But this was Thor. Her mate. Hers.

  So she found herself clinging to him with desperate abandon, fingers digging into his back and shoulders, heels hooked behind his knees.

  "Yes," she gasped. "You feel great."

  Apparently encouraged by this, Thor took her fast and hard, his mouth covering hers, muffling her moans as he moved against her, angling his thrusts so that the shaft of his cock stroked her clit with every long, sliding movement.

  Cassie loved every second of Thor's hips moving in a merciless rhythm between her spread legs, driving her to another climax as he pounded into her.

  She felt a vast satisfaction as he shuddered and gasped against her.

  The remainder of the afternoon was filled with kisses and lovemaking by turns gentle and urgent. They dozed in each other's arms for brief periods, only to wake and begin the sensual dance anew.

  When hunger finally put a temporary stop to their lovemaking, they dragged themselves out of the thoroughly rumpled bed to wait for room service.

  Cassie found herself sitting across from Thor in the suite's living room, grinning at him like a fool.

  Both of them were wrapped in hotel bathrobes. Thor looked flushed and glowing with happiness. She felt that same glow, which was why she couldn't seem to stop smiling at him.

  She still couldn’t believe she had just committed herself to a virtual stranger…or that she felt happy, secure, and safe for the first time in a very long time.

  * * *

  In the end, they used up nearly all of the condoms Thor had brought.

  Near midnight, as Cassie drifted off to sleep in Thor's arms, feeling utterly relaxed and more than a little sore, she heard him ask softly, "We saved one for tomorrow morning, didn't we?"

  Chapter 14 – Return to Bearpaw Ridge

  "—in Denver?" Mom asked, her perfectly plucked brows raised in disbelief. "Very funny, young man!"

  "I'm not joking." Thor offered her the envelope containing the offer letter from the Denver Fire Department.

  Mom still looked skeptical as she pulled the letter free of the envelope and scanned it.

  Thor saw the moment when shock overtook disbelief as Mom realized that her second-youngest son was totally serious for once.

  She looked up from the letter, frowning. "But if you take this job, who's going to help your brother with the ranch? You were supposed to come back home and be the assistant manager as soon as you graduated—"

  "I never agreed to spend the rest of my life as Dane's second-in-command!" Thor retorted.

  "Thor," Mom said, trying for a placating tone through her clenched jaw. "If you want to be a firefighter, why can't you just volunteer for the Bearpaw Ridge FD like your brothers? You know the department needs all the help it can get."

  He took a deep breath. You're not a kid anymore. You don't need her permission, he reminded himself.

  "This isn't up for negotiation, Mom, not when I've got a paying gig as a real firefighter. Salary, benefits, the whole works…I've accepted the offer, and I start on January first."

  "But what about us? What about the ranch?" The letter crumpled as Mom clenched her fingers. "How can you be so selfish, Thor? We were counting on you to help Dane with the ranch! Instead, you're set on ruining Christmas for all of us!"

  "Yeah, well, no one asked me if being a ranch manager was what I wanted, did they?" Thor shook his head. "I couldn't wait to get out of this town after I graduated from high school."

  Mom's anger faded. Now she just looked sad. "Where did we go wrong, Thor? It's not as if you were ever bullied or anything. Everyone likes you!"

  Thor sighed. "It was never about that. It's just…everyone here spends their entire life worrying about what the neighbors are thinking and whether any of the Ordinaries in town are going to figure out that half of us are shifters. Going to college in Denver was really freeing. I can't move back here."

  "Why can't you just be happy here in Bearpaw Ridge?" Mom continued. "This is your home! Do you really want to spend the rest of your life in a big city where no one knows you? Away from nature?"

  Making a fresh start in a place where no one knew him had been the whole point of applying to college, he thought.

  "Going to university in Denver was the best thing that even happened to me." Thor knew that his attempt to explain was probably useless, but he had to try. "The world's a bigger place than just Lemhi County. And there are plenty of national parks just a short drive from Denver. I can let my bear out to play whenever I like."

  Mom's response was a frustrated sigh. "We Swansons are supposed to look out for each other, but you've only ever wanted to look out for yourself." Her tone was bitter. "Well, go then, if you want to escape from your family so badly."

  She thrust the letter back at him.

  This wasn't how he had wanted the conversation to go. Being hired as a Denver firefighter had been a long and difficult process, and he'd been ecstatic when the job offer had arrived just before he'd headed home for the holidays.

  Why couldn't Mom just be happy for him?

  Thor shook his head. "I'm sorry, Mom. I love you and the rest of the family, you know that. I don't need your permission to take this job…but I'd really like your blessing before I go."

  "I'll have to think about it," Mom snapped.

  Conversation over, she turned on her heel and headed for the kitchen, where the Christmas turkey was roasting, filling the house with mouthwatering scents.

  * * *

  Thor awoke in the darkened hotel room, his gut churning with frustration and anger left over from his vivid dream.

  Or had it been a memory? It had felt so real…

  There was someone in the bed with him…female, naked, and draped over his chest in a cloud of curly hair and abundance of soft curves.

  Cassie. Memories from the last three days came surging back as he inhaled her musky, feminine scent. His hand automatically traced a path down the dip of her waist and over her sweetly rounded ass.

  He decided that he already liked being mated if it meant waking up with a beautiful, sexy woman snuggled up to him.

  Mine. All mine. How'd I get so lucky?

  She stirred, and her fingers traced a lazy line down the center of his chest.

  "Everything okay?" she asked, sounding sleepy. "Your heart is racing."

  "Just a bad dream…or a bad memory."

  "Oh?" Cassie opened her eyes and studied him with a concerned expression. "You want to talk about it?"

  An instant denial bubbled up in his throat and dissipated under the gentle pressure of her hand, smoothing his chest hair.

  "Yeah," he said, a little surprised. "Yeah, I do. Get it out of my system, if nothing else."

  He described his disturbing dream and was a little surprised by the strength of the emotions it stirred up even upon retelling.

  "You know, that does sound like a memory," Cassie said, when he had finished speaking. "Or at least something based on a memory. Do you remember anything else? Like, did your mom ever give you her blessing? You've been working as a firefighter for a while now, haven't you?"

  Thor shook his head in frustration. Nothing. Just a big blank space when he tried to find the answer to his mate's questions.

  He concentrated on combing his fingers through Cassie's unruly mane of hair, trying to calm himself.

  "Ever since I spoke with my mom on the phone, I've been wondering if I'm some kind of asshole," he confessed. "I mean, talking to her, it's pretty clear that we had a bad fight about something."

  "Thor Swanson, you are not an asshole!" Cassie stated firmly. "Having your own plans for life
doesn't make you an asshole, no matter how much it upsets your family."

  He stared up at the ceiling, which was gray with shadows. He wanted to believe she was right. "Sounds like you know something about that."

  "Oh yeah." She huffed out something halfway between a frustrated sigh and a chuckle. "I grew up in a little town called Wildcat Springs, halfway between San Antonio and New Braunfels. It sounds a lot like Bearpaw Ridge—everyone knows everyone else or is kin to them, and the shifters spend a lot of effort trying to keep the Ordinaries in the dark about what's really going on. Kind of difficult, especially with challenge duels happening nearly every weekend."

  "Bears don’t have challenge duels," Thor commented. "We get angry with someone, we generally beat the shit out of them on an informal basis. But other than that, yeah, it does sound like we're both from the same kind of town."

  "So anyway, I think I've mentioned that I'm the worst sabertooth shifter ever?"

  She laid a finger across his lips when he tried to protest her harsh self-assessment, and continued, "I was counting down the days until I graduated from high school, and I applied to every university that I thought Daddy could afford."

  Memories crowded Thor's brain. "Yeah," he agreed. "I did that too. Lucky for me, my share of the vacation rentals of my house helped out a lot with tuition."

  "When I was accepted at UT in Austin, my Dad had a fit. He was proud of the fact I'd gotten an admissions letter, but then he started giving me the lecture about how I'd never climb any higher in the pride hierarchy if I didn't stay around to fight for my rightful place."

  Thor kissed her. "What did you say to him?

  "I said, 'I've never even come close to winning a fight, Daddy. What makes you think I'd be able to do it now?'" Cassie shook her head. "He didn't have answer to that, so I moved to Austin, and I loved it."

  "Nineteen thousand students on the University of Colorado Denver campus, and none of them knew me from Adam. No one bringing up for the hundredth time some dumb stunt I pulled while I was still a kid," Thor said, relishing a newly returned memory of a more pleasant kind. "It was paradise."

  "Yeah," breathed Cassie. "Nobody at UT, not even the other shifters, knew what a pathetic failure I was as a sabertooth shifter, and Ordinaries don't challenge each other to duels. They were all so nice to me!"

  Her voice still carried echoes of the wonder she must have felt.

  "So how on earth did you end up in an arranged mating?" Thor ventured.

  Cassie was silent for a long moment, but he felt her go tense against him.

  "It's okay," he said quickly, stroking her hip. "You can tell me I'm being too nosy."

  "No, it's okay. It's just…I've never talked about this to anyone. I didn't know how to explain it to Amanda, and I didn't really know any shifters who weren't pride members…anyhow, when I finished my bachelor's degree in biology, I applied to graduate school. Daddy just couldn't understand why I'd want to live surrounded by Ordinaries instead of my own kind. I think that's when he decided that the way to convince me to come home and settle down closer to home was to arrange a mating with the highest-ranking sabertooth shifter male that he could."

  "Edward Baldwin," Thor said.

  "Yup." Cassie hugged him, as if seeking comfort, and he returned the gesture as best he could with the cast on his arm.

  "Did your dad know what kind of person Baldwin was?" Thor asked, feeling a renewed surge of anger at the thought of what Baldwin had done to Cassie.

  She shrugged, which did delightful things to the generous breasts currently pressed against his side.

  "Nice guys don't end up as Pride First. Even if they start off nice, by the time they've clawed their way to the top—literally—they're not nice any longer. But I guess Dad was hoping that Baldwin would treat his mate respectfully. And that I'd be okay returning home and to the pride if I had the First to defend me."

  "From what I saw yesterday, you don't need anyone to defend you," Thor said and kissed her forehead. "But I want to do it anyway. It's part of being a bear shifter and a Swanson. We take care of our own."

  He moved lower and captured her mouth with his own. "And you're mine now."

  When the kiss ended, she gave him a smile that stole his breath. "I really like being yours."

  Desire sparked and flared between them, filling the air with the intoxicating scent of arousal.

  Thor kissed her again, this time with real hunger. She responded with enthusiasm, winding her arms around him and throwing her thigh across his hips in open invitation.

  He resisted the urge to pull her on top of him and take her fast and hard. They weren't in a hurry, and he wanted to ensure that sex between them was as good for her as possible.

  Thor made love to her slowly, sweetly, using his hands and mouth to explore her body with tender kisses and touches, rediscovering all of the places that made her pulse race with pleasure—her ears, her throat, her breasts, and the tender skin on the inside of her wrists, where the echo of her heartbeat caressed his lips.

  He learned that a fingertip drawn slowly down the length of her spine from the nape of her neck to the dimples at the base of her spine made her arch and squirm against him in an incredibly sexy way.

  In return, she reminded him of the magic she could work with her strong, supple hands and hot, wet mouth enveloping his cock.

  In the end, both of them shaking with need, he let her take control and was rewarded when she climbed on top of him and eagerly rode him to a mutual climax.

  It was sheer heaven to be inside her tight, slick entrance and stroke her breasts as she moved on him. He loved watching the flush of desire climb from her collarbones to her cheeks, and the surprised expression on her face when she came, her inner muscles squeezing and caressing him to his own powerful climax.

  When they were done, and spooned together in the blissfully relaxed aftermath, Thor wondered what time it was and decided he didn't care. He was happy to stay here in this bed with his new mate and enjoy his private slice of heaven…at least until his stomach began growling increasingly urgent demands for food.

  After a few minutes of this, when he realized that stoically ignoring his hunger pangs wasn’t going to make them go away, Cassie giggled and rolled away from him.

  "C'mon, big guy, let's go downstairs and get some breakfast before we hit the road."

  "Are you sure you wouldn't like to stay here one more day?" Thor asked, sitting up.

  He already missed the sensation of being curled around her, skin-to-skin, and surrounded by the scents of their lovemaking.

  "With your mom and the rest of your family waiting for you to arrive?" Cassie asked. "No offense, but I'd rather not make a bad first impression on my new Mama Bear-in-law."

  Thor chuckled at her description of his mom. "My mom has always been more growl than bite," he assured her. "And after all the complaining she's done about my older brothers' Ordinary mates, I think she'll be happy to have a shifter daughter-in-law at last."

  Cassie, who was now sitting on the edge of the bed, looked back over her shoulder at him. "Even a sabertooth shifter?"

  "Don't worry about that," Thor assured her. "My family is going to love you, Cassie."

  * * *

  After refueling at the hotel's generous breakfast buffet, which included waffles and omelets made to order as well as a dazzling array of fresh fruits, yogurt, gourmet pastries, hot and cold cereals, ham, sausage, and bacon, Cassie and Thor drove steadily north.

  As the hours passed, the landscape gradually became less arid. The rust-red and ochre-colored rock formations gave way to jagged mountains with snow-capped peaks and plains dotted with silver-gray sagebrush.

  As highway signs began to advise them that they were approaching Bearpaw Ridge, Cassie saw pronghorns, deer, and even a herd of elk grazing under the tall cottonwood trees that lined the banks of the Salmon River, which flowed briskly alongside the highway. The highway wound through pastures dotted with sheep and cattle, and in the dista
nce, Cassie saw the ridges of forested, snow-capped mountains that lined the valley on either side.

  "Anything look familiar?" she asked Thor.

  He was gazing out the passenger-side window with a pensive expression.

  "Yeah," he said softly. "This all feels very familiar." He pointed ahead, where a big wooden sign carved in the shape of a grizzly bear stood next to the highway. "Turn right there."

  As the car got closer to the sign, Cassie saw the words "Grizzly Creek Ranch, est. 1871" in big white letters. Underneath, in smaller letters, she read "Bed and Breakfast." Next to it was a smaller square sign that announced, "We proudly raise organic grass-fed beef."

  She turned off the highway at the sign and bumped along a narrow dirt-and-gravel road that wound through grass-and-sagebrush-covered hills for another mile or so, until they reached a cluster of six houses set on either side of the unpaved road.

  The biggest house was a grand Victorian, painted a cheery yellow, with gingerbread eaves and beautiful bay windows fronted by colorful flowerbeds and a big fruit tree in the middle of the flowers.

  The other houses were smaller and ranged in building style from Victorian to a modern log cabin with huge floor-to-ceiling picture windows and a wide deck.

  "I remember this," Thor said, looking around. He pointed at the windshield. "There! The third house on the left—that one's mine."

  Cassie saw a charming one-story 1940s cottage covered in freshly painted white clapboard, with pointed gables and a wraparound porch supported by square fieldstone pillars. She caught a glimpse of lace curtains in the windows and decided that those had probably been installed by Thor's Aunt Margaret when she converted the house into a vacation rental.

  "It's really cute," she said.

  "And that big ski cabin-looking monstrosity over there is Evan and Steffi's place, where we're going to be staying."

  "I don't know about the 'monstrosity' part. It looks pretty nice to me," Cassie said as they rolled towards the big yellow Victorian house.

  She saw a woman standing under the tree in front of the Victorian and recognized her from the Grizzly Creek Ranch's website.