Leeward Bear (BBW Shifter Romance) (Fisherbears Book 3)

by Becca Fanning

  Colby was already reaching for the second. Gemma scooted back out of the way. If she could stay out of it, she'd make it easier for him. She yanked her phone up, hit camera, then watched, amazed, as Colby sent a stunning blow at the second man, but left him winded, barely bleeding from a scratch.

  He wasn't hurting them. He wasn't trying to kill them. He was fully animal but he maintained control.

  Until Gemma stumbled back another step, pocketing her phone. She backed directly into the arms of the third man.

  She'd never even seen him move. Gasping, she drove an elbow toward his ribs, but he moved easily. His arm crooked around her neck. Automatically, Gemma dropped her chin into the V of his elbow, giving herself breathing room. Her hands went up to either side of her face, grabbing his arm. She'd bite, she'd kick, she'd –

  Freeze, when the gun cocked, directly beside her ear.

  "Beast!"

  It wasn't the word. It was the sound of the gun that made Colby stop moving.

  "That's good. That's a good dumb beast." The man behind her stank of cologne and beer and gun oil.

  Gemma retched.

  "What's the matter, little girl? Don't like humans anymore?" He jammed the barrel of the gun into her temple.

  Gemma rocked with the force of the blow. The world slid away and back again.

  Colby slid away and back again. Almost human. She saw his cheekbones and lips emerge from the fur and the black outlined mouth. She saw the fury in those golden eyes, saw the fur turning back to hair.

  She wanted to beg him not to. The man would kill him. He was only waiting until Colby wasn't a bear. That much she was sure of.

  Colby was too. She thought. Because he went halfway back to man, his hands emerging from paws, held up before him, placating.

  The man with the gun laughed. The gun swung toward Colby.

  In the split second Gemma saw Colby look directly into her eyes. His meaning was clear. Don't move. Let me do this.

  In that same second, he moved. The gun swung toward him. The man's trigger finger whitened under pressure.

  Colby surged away from the man.

  Colby the bear moved faster than the man, spinning out of reach of the gun.

  The muzzle flashed. The world rocked with concussion of sound.

  The man holding Gemma flailed, trying to bring the weapon to point at her again.

  He never got the chance. Giant paws grabbed him, talons sliced into his forearm, his shoulders, his chest.

  His throat.

  The man who had attacked them slumped to the ground. Red gore splattered the black version of the No Shifters t-shirt.

  The shifter stood over him, human again, holding Gemma.

  "We have to get out of here," she said, when she could speak again. The shivering had started the same moment he stopped asking if she was all right.

  The same time he'd stopped kissing her.

  Only seconds had gone by. But people would be coming.

  "Come on," Colby said, and took her hand.

  No sign of Owen when they went through the arena and the underground structure. They kept away from the bodies, left the dead man crumpled in a little used storage area. The other two men had fled.

  They found Owen getting ready to ride. He came out of the locker room and nearly ran into both of them.

  "What's happened?"

  There was blood on Colby's shirt. Colby wasted no words telling Owen what happened.

  "It doesn't tell us much we didn't know," Owen said, when he put down the phone. He'd called someone, though Gemma couldn't imagine who, to collect the body. A report had come back instantly that the man wasn't identified or recognized. Now Owen paced, furious, full of energy. "The shirts, the symbols – we knew what they meant."

  Colby said, "Now we know at least some of them are actively doing something about the No Shifters policy." His voice was bitter.

  Gemma suddenly stood and reached into her back pocket. The men stared at her. She held out her phone. "I've got photos." She hoped. She'd been shooting fast and pretty freaked out.

  "Good," Owen said and Colby took her phone, turned it on, scrolled.

  "I know this guy," Owen said. His voice was the distant of someone trying to remember where they'd seen an actor before. "Good job." He looked at both of them. "You look beat. Gemma, you mind if Colby runs you home? I'd just as soon you're not alone tonight. On the ride," he added. "Cole, take her car, so she doesn't get broken into and they don't get her address."

  Gemma shuddered. "Do you really think -- ?" But Owen had already turned away, back on his phone.

  She turned to look at Colby. "Do you mind?"

  He gave her a grin had had already forgotten the bloodshed. Or at least put it aside for the time being in favor of more important things. He smelled muskier than before. "I'd be honored to drive you home."

  They didn't make it that far.

  There wasn't any reason to rush out of the arena. The events were going on for hours. The two men who'd attacked them had fled. The third was being taken care of. No one was going to call the police. No one was looking for Colby.

  There were no sticky questions to avoid.

  Just heat, rising between them. When they left the office where Owen paced, on the phone with Holden by then, Colby held his hand out and she slipped hers into it. He coiled his fingers against her palm, making her lightheaded.

  They stopped just out of sight of the office. He pinned her to the wall. His mouth came down over hers, hot as his hands were. His tongue traced her lips, then slid between her lips. She met it with hers, tasting the animal scent there. But when her hands traced his face, he was all male. All human.

  Her hands continued up, into his hair, knocking his cowboy hat off onto the dusty concrete floor. His hands slid up from her shoulders, along her throat, cupped her face, tangled in her hair and removed the clip, throwing it down after his hat.

  Her long, cinnamon colored hair came down, curls filling his hands. He pressed it to his face, breathed in, mouth slightly open as he tasted her scent.

  Gemma let her head fall back against the wall, her hands grabbing his shirt to pull him hard against her. One of her legs snaked behind his. She wanted him pressed against her from head to foot.

  Colby bit her throat, licked the hollow between her collarbone and down into the V of her blue shell. The fabric shredded under his hands. She blinked, looked, but they were human fingers, human hands, now spreading open her shirt, exposing her black lace bra,

  They were only in a concrete underground hallway. Anyone could come at any time. The thought just made her press herself harder against him.

  One huge, rough, calloused hand moved down from her throat, found her breast and squeezed, cupping it, squeezing, his thumb playing hard over her nipple. Gemma groaned and spread her legs, widening her stance. Colby moved into the space she'd made, sliding one thigh between her legs.

  That wasn't close enough. She moved one leg upward, suggestively, and he took her up on it. "Is that what you want?" His voice was a low growl, a chuckle.

  He scooped her up, his hands under her ass. Gemma, pressed against the wall, wrapped her legs around his waist and pressed her core against him.

  Colby slid one hand down between them before she could properly grind against him. She pouted at him.

  He laughed. "Just want to feel you, darlin'. Oh, girl, you're wet, clear through. I can feel your heat through your pants." He leaned forward and bit her ear, licked it with a hot wet tongue and whispered, "I can smell you. You smell like want."

  She bit at his chin as he pulled back. "I can smell you, too. You smell like an animal."

  His eyes were dangerous. "You ought to know what you're getting into." But as he spoke he pulled his hand away.

  She ground her wet, hungry core against the front of his jeans. The package she'd seen outlined earlier was huge, hard as a rock under the denim.

  "I know what I'm getting into."

  "Do you?" he purred. Teasin
g. Licking. Biting. "I'm not like other men. Think you can handle it?"

  "Oh, hell, yeah," she said, and pressed harder against him. Her legs were starting to tremble, the cut starting to throb.

  He eased her back onto her feet. Knelt at eye level with her core. Second time today he'd done that. This time she felt wild, carnal, anything but embarrassed. She thrust her hips forward. "Do you know what you're getting in to?" she teased.

  "I'm about to find out." He grasped her totally ruined linen pants in both hands and tore them from the waist, shredding them off her body. Gemma barely had time to react when he had plunged his face into the sopping wet black lace of her panties.

  "God, you smell so good."

  She arched her back, self aware for an instant, then grabbed handfuls of his curls as he yanked aside the lace and plunged his tongue far into her. His fingers followed, spreading her wide, exposing her clit, her pussy, his tongue following the line of her opening, dipping deep inside and lapping forward like an animal, pausing to suck like a man on her clit, making her buck and moan. She clutched his hair, ground herself in his face.

  "More," she moaned. "Take me. Take all of me." Her eyes were closed and the scents of hay and horses and cowboys filled her senses.

  The scent of bear.

  His thumbs came down over her clit. She bit back a scream, pulled on his hair. "I want to touch you. I want to taste you."

  "Patience," he muttered into her.

  She didn't have any. She pulled away from him, trying to get to his jeans, his fly, her fingers grazing his cock through the denim but he was too strong. He spun her around, making her laugh, said, "Not yet, my lovely," and pressed his still clad cock into the crack of her ass, pressing aside the last of the black lace, making her pant and moan. Her breasts pressed hard into the wall and she rubbed them there, seeking every sensation, every feeling. Her own hand traveled down the front of her body, her fingers sinking into her own pussy.

  "Yeah, show me where you want me," he growled into her ears and she wanted to laugh, wanted to run her hands over her entire body to show him what she wanted.

  She heard the zipper on his jeans, and turned back. "Not fair. Not yet. Not without me seeing."

  He grinned, gold eyes blazing. "You are greedy." He sounded impressed.

  She answered with her own growl, tearing open the snap button denim button-down and exposing his chest. The muscles weren't ripped – there was a layer of insulation over the muscles, making his chest amazingly thick, strong, hugely muscled, like a classical statue. She ran her hands over it, then ran her nails over it, hard, leaving trails, following the red lines with her tongue, leaving him shiny with her saliva even as she worked his belt buckle, grinding her backside against the wall for lack of sensation. His jeans parted.

  His cock was enormous, thick, full, hard as any she'd ever had. Her fingers met but just barely when she wrapped her hand around it and slid it all the way to the base, leaving the proud crown out where she could lean down and wrap her lips around it.

  He gasped, pulled away. "You'll have me coming doin' that," and even as she said, "That's the idea," he had pulled her up, his mouth on hers, tasting of her. His tongue took her mouth, his teeth grazed her lips. She ran her nails down his back, under his shirt.

  He turned her again, facing the wall, rubbed himself on her ass. When she pressed against him, hard, he pulled away and tore off the last of the lace. She was naked from the waist down, hot and wet and aching and she pressed herself to him, let him drag her hips into his.

  His cock nudged her opening. So hard, so hot, and she was so wet and ready. Even so, the size of him sliding in made her catch her breath, then catch her lip between her teeth. He thrust hard and sank into her up to his balls. His breath on her neck was hot as the bear’s breath. She shuddered. The hands on her breasts, kneading hard, pinching her nipples, were totally human.

  She shoved herself back into him, pressing hard, taking him as far as she could, as deep as possible before they both started to rock. She could feel him in every inch of her, pressing, thrusting, bringing wave after wave of pleasure until her knees were too weak to hold her and he pulled her around to face him, forced her legs up around his waist again.

  Pulling her a little farther from the wall he lengthened her body so her upper back pressed against the wall, her legs around his waist, his cock sunk as deep in her as he could be.

  She could see the sweat on his forehead, the growl on his lips. His eyes were deep, dark gold, watching her as she writhed in another orgasm, feeling the liquid between them overflow. Her legs were wet with their mingled juices when she saw his face change, the look of concentration gone, his eyes half closing as his own massive orgasm shook him.

  Colby pumped his hips, giving her ever drop, filling her until Gemma clawed at his shoulders and came one more time.

  When he let go of her legs, she slid down the wall and splayed out on the floor. Colby still stood, one hand on the wall above her, his jeans still half on, his cock still half hard. She let her eyes close and reached one hand up to guide him down to the floor beside her.

  "We can't stay here long," he said.

  "No," she agreed.

  "People will come along and find us."

  "Yes," she agreed, and this time managed to open her eyes. He was watching her, an expression of mingled lust and maybe love on his face. She thought something had just started today, not just the events of the day, but events setting the stage for days to come.

  At the same time, other things had ended. Gemma had no intention of running off with the rodeo, going all country and all bull riders, all cowboy, but she thought she might end up in a few of the cities that Colby did if he didn't invite her to go with. Somehow she didn't think he'd mind.

  The door to the past had finally closed, too. Not with a bang. But as a gift. She'd loved her childhood. She'd run in part because it wasn't there anymore and in part because she wanted something new and turned her back on childish things.

  But it hadn't been a bad childhood. This didn't mean she had to embrace the lifestyle.

  She just didn't have to shut it out completely, either.

  It might be nice to see her dad again.

  Introduce him to the new man in her life.

  "You planning to stay around a while?" Colby asked her as if reading her mind.

  His words were too close to her thoughts. he had to mean something else. "I've got to try and get that other interview," she said. As if she were the consummate professional. On the concrete floor. With no pants. She started giggling.

  He gave her a patient look. "I meant, you going to be around the circuit for a while?"

  She met his eyes, wondering what he was asking.

  "I mean, if most of your interviews are by phone, doesn't much matter where your body is, does it?" He sweetened the offer with a stroke of his hand over her bare leg.

  She shivered. Not only was the door to the past closed, the door to the future was opening.

  Colby stood effortlessly and held out a big calloused hand.

  Gemma slipped her hand into his. "You were going to give me a ride home," she said. "Let's talk about it on the way."

  He looked just slightly uncertain.

  She grinned. "I have to pack, don't I?"

  END

  Jacob

  Rodeo Bears IV

  by

  Becca Fanning

  Chapter One

  She saw him from across the arena.

  First day of the rodeo in Las Vegas, Nevada. The weather was perfect, dry and hot. The opening ceremony fireworks the night before had been perfect. She'd lost all the weight she'd wanted to lose before the rodeo started.

  And now, across the enormous modern arena from Cara, was Jacob Tyrell. Of the Tyrell clan of bull riders, bronc busters, rodeo superstars – and shifters.

  She was looking at a bear. Dressed as a man. Wearing a man's skin. He was working with one of the horses. Dawn had barely broken, the day only just
beginning to heat.

  Cara melted back into the shadows. She stood in one of the chutes that led the bulls out when the rodeo was in full swing.

  There was almost no one else in the stables. Probably no one else in the arena. This time of year sunrise happened before 5:30 and it was still dark out.

  Cara moved cautiously. Inside the arena was shadowy and dark. One or two dim lights stayed on overnight but for the most part everything was shadows. She didn't want to trip. She definitely didn't want to fall into anything left behind by the behind of an animal.