“So you and Maverick, huh? I guess it was some weird kind of fate that brought the three of you out to the McAllister ranch,” he said curiously while he popped open the bottle and poured a shot for her and a double for himself.
“Don’t you have a ranch to run?” Harmony poked, eyeing the liquor.
“It’s getting pretty slow this time of year, and the ranch almost runs itself these days,” he said, tipping the small glass and downing it in one gulp. “Plus, it takes a whole lot more than a couple shots to get me drunk. Just ask Mav.”
Harmony sighed and took a sip. It was strong but also sweet, with a hint of something burnt that reminded her of toffee.
“Well, if it was fate, fate has a weird way of doing things,” Harmony said to herself.
“What do you mean by that?”
“I mean he doesn’t want me,” she said a little louder, the words stinging even as they left her own lips.
Wyatt turned to her and raised one dark eyebrow questioningly, as if he knew some sort of intimate detail but wasn’t going to say it out loud.
“Is that so?” he mused.
“Yes,” she said. Now that it was coming out, she didn’t want to stop, even if this man was more or a less a stranger. Maybe because he was a stranger, it was easier to admit, like telling a secret to a random person in a bar or at a party. “I didn’t think I’d do it. Didn’t think I’d fall for that stupid man. But then I did. And when I told him I loved him, he didn’t say it back.” Tiny tears of anger welled in the corners of her eyes.
“What exactly did he say?”
“A bunch of crap about me being his mate and how I was the one for him. But he couldn’t bring himself to say he loved me, not even once.” She took the small glass and drank the rest of its contents, making her feel hot and cold at the same time.
“I see…” Wyatt said, listening intently.
“Am I just stupid for having hoped for something more?” Harmony said.
“No, you’re not. He shook his head.
“I’ll leave this here with you,” he said, sliding the bottle closer to her, “Just promise me you won’t overdo it. The bartender will be here in fifteen minutes or so to open up and keep an eye on things. Just tell him Wyatt brought you here. I’m going to go talk to Mav and see if I can talk some sense into that man.” He stood and put his hat back on.
“No, don’t. Talking to him won’t solve anything. I don’t need your pity,” she replied.
“Harmony, there are men that would commit murder to be with someone like you. And from what I can tell, there’s at least something mutual between you two. I can see it in the way you look when you talk about him. So if he’s not smart enough to see what he has right in front of him and he can’t be reasoned with, then he deserves a lickin’ from me,” he said, rolling up the sleeves of his oddly crisp button-up shirt.
Harmony just watched as Wyatt walked away and headed out the door.
13
Maverick was interrupted by the sound of an ATV engine buzzing nearby.
“Mav, you dumb bear, come out already!” He heard Wyatt’s voice calling into the nearly silent forest.
Ever since last night, he’d roamed around the hills and mountains around the lodge, unsure of what to do.
“If you don’t show yourself, I’m going to go back and take your mate for myself,” he heard, this time a little louder.
That got to him. Maverick came roaring out of the bushes where he’d been lying, pissed at the audacity of the presumptuous were-cat. He leapt into a clearing, just in front of the blond buffoon. He came to an abrupt halt on the ATV and smiled up at him.
“Ah-ha, there you are,” he said, seemingly pleased with himself.
“What did you say about my mate?” Maverick growled, ready to knock the man off his feet with his claws.
“Easy there, pumpkin. From what I hear, you’ve gone and made a mess of things yourself already,” Wyatt said, getting off the ATV and approaching him, not in the least intimidated.
Maverick had no response, just turned to the side and grumbled.
“That’s what I thought. I was just speaking to Harmony, actually. Apparently, you don’t love her? Sounds kind of odd considering you mated her.”
Maverick turned around to start walking off. He had nothing more to say about the matter.
“Don’t you walk away from me, bear,” Wyatt said, tugging at the fur on his hind legs like some sort of doorbell. “You stay and talk it out. No more running.”
Maverick faced his old friend. “She doesn’t want me. Doesn’t want what I can offer.”
“Like hell she doesn’t. I’ve never seen a woman so upset… and about you no less.”
“She wants me to say I love her,” he moped. “Nothing else is enough for her.”
“Then just tell her you love her, dumbass,” Wyatt said, exasperated.
“But that’s not how bears feel about their mates.”
Wyatt didn’t respond, just cocked back his fist and hit Maverick’s bear in the face with a thwack. Maverick backed up, unhurt by the punch but surprised by the audacity of it.
“What was that for?”
“There’s a hundred more where that came from if you don’t listen up. You’re not just a bear, Mav. You’re also human—as much as you’d like to think otherwise. So that means you have some human feelings, like it or not.”
“Yeah, so?”
“So it means you probably do love her,” Wyatt exclaimed.
“No, I don’t.”
Wyatt groaned and buried his face in one hand. “Okay. Do you want to protect her?”
“Yes, that’s what bears do. Protect their mates.”
“Do you want to pleasure her?”
“Of course. I’m very good at it too,” he said, pleased with himself.
“Do you want to only be with her for the rest of your life and not let her be with anyone else?”
“Obviously.”
“Does her happiness mean more than your own?” Wyatt asked.
Maverick pondered that for a moment. It occurred to him that in the short amount of time he’d known her, truly the only thing that gave him satisfaction was her happiness. Seeing her smile when they held hands the other day. Seeing her blush when he looked at her. Feeling her heart beat as they made love.
Wyatt let it stew for a minute, then grew impatient and grabbed Maverick by the scruff like he was handling a cub.
“That’s love, Neanderthal. And if you don’t recognize it and haul your ass down to her now and say it, you’re going to lose your mate. Forever.”
Maverick let out a low growl.
“So if that’s something you want, then stay here in the bushes.” Wyatt continued. “But if Harmony’s what you want, I have a change of clothes in the ATV.”
Wyatt was right. It didn’t really matter what had happened in the past or whether he’d ever known love.
He did right now, with Harmony. And in the face of losing her, nothing else really mattered.
“Where is she?”
“Down at the Fifty Star,” Wyatt remarked.
Maverick shifted and changed quickly. In no time, they were both on the ATV, headed back toward the ranch. Maverick could feel his heart pounding faster as they got closer, hoping it wasn’t too late to make things right.
They pulled directly in front of the main lodge, and he and Wyatt headed inside toward the bar where the two of them used to steal beers when they were kids.
But when they got there, she wasn’t there. The only person inside was an older man, taking chairs off of tables and setting the place up.
“Hey, Joe, have you seen my friend Harmony? She was here just a minute ago.”
Joe looked up from what he was doing. “Nope, nobody’s been here but me ever since I got in a couple minutes ago.”
Worry rose in Maverick.
“This isn’t some kind of prank, is it, Wyatt?” he growled angrily.
“Hell no. I’m as confused as you
are,” he said, turning to leave. “Keep an eye out for her. If she shows, give me a call.”
For a few minutes, Wyatt wandered the corridors, searching around and knocking on doors. But there was no sign of Harmony anywhere. And every second that passed, Maverick could feel his instincts telling him something was off. That something was wrong.
“She’s not here,” Maverick said, her scent too faint to indicate she was anywhere in the building.
“Shit. She was right there,” Wyatt said, frustrated.
“I can’t make out her scent well enough like this. I’m going outside to see if I can track her,” Maverick said, taking off his shirt and heading out the front door.
“I’ll call your brothers. See if they’ve seen her and have them come help.”
Once Maverick was outside, he took a quick glance to see if anyone was around in the courtyard, saw no one, and turned back into his bear. In this form, all his senses were enhanced, but especially his sense of smell. Even the faintest of smells he could pick up from a mile or two away, thanks to his closeness to his animal. He doubted even his brothers retained such keen senses.
As Wyatt dialed the phone nearby, Maverick sniffed around the parking lot. It was even harder to scent his mate out here, with the wind and the dust and the cornucopia of other things to pick up, but he zeroed in on the unique scent that was hers alone. It got slightly stronger as he moved to a spot where a car had clearly been parked not long ago, based on the strong odor of motor oil and engine fumes that still lingered in the dirt.
Someone had taken Harmony. And whoever it was, they were going to pay dearly.
His senses only further heightened by rage, Maverick took a good look at the car’s tracks and followed them out of the courtyard and down a small, overgrown path that led off the property. When he couldn’t scent Harmony, he followed the tracks as they snaked through the mulch and undergrowth of the forest. Behind him, he heard Wyatt riding close by on his ATV (one of them would need to stay in human form for when they found her) again, barely keeping up with him as he lumbered at full speed down a hill that led into a small valley packed with trees and bushes.
As he ran, his mind was full of the endless, terrible possibilities. Had someone abducted her? How long had she been gone? Was she in danger?
And with every scenario, Maverick could feel his bear burning with fury, roaring for vengeance on whoever was responsible.
After a few minutes, charging at full speed following the vehicle’s tracks, he could scent Harmony getting closer. The stronger it got, the more certain he was they would find her.
Finally, the path opened into a small clearing, where an old, dilapidated log cabin sat. Maverick would have thought it abandoned if not for the small rental car he saw parked in front of it.
And the voice coming from inside.
Wyatt slowed down and turned off his ATV and crept into the bushes near Maverick, watching.
“So are you gonna do it or what? I got her here. I did what you weren’t willing to admit was what you wanted. Now are you going to go through with it or not?” one voice said, sounding on edge and slightly drunken.
“I don’t know. I don’t think I can…” Another voice trailed off.
Maverick instantly recognized the voices of the two men from before. The men from the trail ride that had been from the city.
“If you won’t, then I will,” said the first voice.
Mav could hear footsteps inside. Then he heard the sound of his mate.
“No. Geroff o’ me,” she said, her speech slurred beyond what could have been drunken, like she’d been drugged.
The rage of a thousand burning suns coursed through his veins. Anger beyond description, so hot he felt on fire.
Maverick leapt from the bushes and charged at the house.
“Wait. Mav!” Wyatt called from behind him. But it was too late. Maverick was on the warpath. His bear was in full control now, possessive and angry and dangerous.
“Did you hear that?” one man asked just before Maverick ripped through the front door like it was made of tissue paper. Inside, he saw both men standing around an old bed on which a half-conscious, groggy Harmony lay.
Both of them turned in shock and horror as Maverick let out a blood-curdling roar that filled the small cabin and shook it to its very foundation.
Maverick didn’t wait. He reached one long, enormous paw inside and swiped to the side, throwing one man across the room and into a wall with a crash. He ricocheted off the logs and onto the ground with a thud, unconscious for the time being.
Maverick would be back for that one.
The other let out a shriek and pulled something from his coat. A revolver.
The man fired on the raging bear, shot after shot, but Maverick felt nothing. Whether it was his thick hide or the fact that there was more adrenaline than blood in his veins right now, the shots were like beestings.
They’d be healed before he was even done rampaging.
Even when the gun was empty, the man continued to press the trigger, which responded only with a hollow click, click, click. Realizing his own doom, the man turned to run to the back of the house, but he was too slow.
Maverick leaned in, his shoulder pressing against the doorframe and cracking it like toothpicks, and grabbed the man in his sharp fangs by his pant leg, dragging him outside so he could kill the fucker once and for all.
As he dragged the man from the house, Wyatt ran inside and carried Harmony back out, laying her on a soft patch of ground a safe distance away.
By now, the man was begging for his life and clawing at the ground, trying to escape Mav’s viselike clutches. But it was no use. Maverick’s bear couldn’t be reasoned with, couldn’t be bought or begged or stopped.
These men would die.
He came to a stop and turned to the man, let out one long, dominating roar, and moved to tear the man’s head off.
Before he could, though, Wyatt jumped in front of him, flailing his arms and shouting.
“Whoa, whoa, boy. Your mate is safe now. Don’t go doing something you’ll regret,” he yelled, trying to create space between the bear and its quarry.
Maverick was so angry he couldn’t even speak. He was so far away from his human it was like trying to communicate with a person on the other end of a tin can phone with the string cut. So instead, he stood on his hind legs and roared out again, loud and furious and thirsty for blood.
“What is this, some kind of crazy circus act?” the man said as he cowered on the ground.
“This ain’t no circus act. This is a real, live, angry-ass bear that will tear your face off if you don’t shut your mouth and pray he doesn’t decide you’re on the menu,” Wyatt called behind him, then turned again to the angry bear.
Just then, a truck came barreling down the hill at top speed. It stopped a few dozen feet away, and Jesse popped out of the driver’s seat.
“Maverick, calm the heck down!” he called, running toward them.
“You? What the hell is a McAllister doing here?” the man said, still overcome with fear.
With one swift turn, Wyatt whirled around and punched the man in the face, knocking him out, then turned back to Maverick.
Mav finally felt more coherent, but it only helped him better form thoughts in human words to describe the myriad ways he wanted to disembowel and rip apart these two lower-than-life cretins.
“I need to kill him. Must protect mate,” Maverick roared, still standing incredibly high on his rear legs. Below him, even the very large Wyatt seemed like a rodent.
“If you do this, you’ll never be allowed in Bear Haven again,” Wyatt warned. “You can’t do something like that and get away with it.”
By now, Jesse had joined Wyatt in trying to coax Maverick from the ledge of committing a double murder.
“Mav… is that you?”
Maverick, Jesse, and Wyatt all turned at the same time to the sound of Harmony’s voice. It was soft and puzzled.
�
�Harmony?” Maverick said, his bear turning and lurching down onto the ground, which made it shake with a heavy thump.
“It is you, isn’t it? But how…?” She trailed off. She tried to walk forward, but her legs began to shake and she tripped, losing her footing.
In a split second, Maverick ran forward, shifting from bear to man to catch his mate as she tumbled into his arms, just in the nick of time.
A moment ago, all Mav could think, feel, or hear was rage. But seeing his mate, seeing her safe now in his arms and holding her with the knowledge that nothing had happened to her, changed everything.
For her, he somehow found it easier to be human.
Once the adrenaline began to fade, his whole body began to shake. But all he could do was run his hands over her, making sure she was fine, threading his fingers through her hair.
“Harmony,” he said hoarsely. “Harmony.”
The thought of what had almost happened shook him to the core, and he didn’t know if he’d ever feel safe again.
But then she was murmuring soft words to him, accepting him, holding him as they lowered to the ground together. He pulled her into his lap and rocked with her, and she snuggled in, humming a song that soothed the bear inside him.
Both Wyatt and Jesse let out a huge sigh of relief, and then Wyatt stepped forward with folded arms.
“Not that I want to interrupt this little moment, but we should get both of you home.”
Maverick nodded and started to stand. He nearly stumbled but then caught himself.
His mate was fine. He’d come in time. Now he could take her home. And tell her he loved her.
And never let her out of his sight again.
14
While the others took the men down to town to the police station, Maverick took care of Harmony.
He had insisted on taking his mate back to his cabin where he could watch over her alone. She was mostly sleeping, and he didn’t know how much she would remember when she came out of it.
He didn’t know what they’d dosed her with. It wasn’t so strong that she couldn’t talk or move, and she’d been semiconscious, so that was hopefully a good sign.
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