by T. S. Joyce
She froze when she saw Matt’s truck parked in front of her camper. Perhaps she was drunker than she thought and hallucinating? But no, Matt was pacing in the dim streetlamp light. He stopped and hooked his hands on his waist, then glared at the camper door and muttered, “Fuck it.” He reached the door in three strides, raised his hand to knock, then spun around and ran his hands through his hair as he headed back for his truck.
“What are you doing?”
Jumping, he said, “Shit. Why are you hiding behind the dumpster?”
In bafflement, she frowned at the smelly blue metal canister beside her. “I’m not hiding. I was just coming back from the bathroom.”
“Oh.” Matt was nodding like a bobble-head.
“And besides, you’re a shifter. Aren’t you supposed to have extra-sensitive hearing and night vision or something?”
“Yeah, but I was distracted.”
She walked past him, her flip flops clacking with every step.
“Your pajamas don’t look stupid,” he muttered.
She looked down at her flannel shorts and white tank top she was pretty sure was too see-through for mixed company. But since Matt was obviously not interested in her nipples, she didn’t try to cover herself up. “Thank you, I think.”
“I want to sleep with you.”
“That offer has passed, Romeo. I no longer feel like the sexpot I did half an hour ago.”
“No, I mean I want to lie beside you until you go to sleep.”
She narrowed her eyes, confused. “Like a friendship cuddle?”
“Yes! Exactly that. Friendship sleeping. I’ve never done that shit before, sooo…”
“You’ve never slept beside a girl? What about all the girls you’ve diddled? And don’t give me some bullshit like ‘I’ve only been with two’ because you and I both know you’re a man-ho.”
“I haven’t ever just slept with a girl. If you accept my offer, you would be my first. Nerd.”
She exhaled dramatically and gestured to the door. “Welcome to my humble abode. If the camper’s a rockin’, please come a knockin’. It means I’m choking or something and not actually having sex.”
Matt’s shoulders jerked with laughter, and he shook his head as he’d done a hundred times tonight. He seemed just as baffled as she was that he was back here again.
“Go on,” he murmured in a deep, gravelly tenor. “I only have an hour before I have to head back to my place.” He frowned down at a phone as he set an alarm, and then followed her distractedly up the stairs.
The bed creaked under his weight as he settled onto it, over the covers. Plucking her glasses from her face, he sighed and set them on the counter beside the bed. He lay down behind her, rigid as a mountain until she pulled his hand over her hips and cuddled back against him.
“Relax, Griz. I won’t try to molest you anymore.”
Matt’s muscles softened, and he curled around her, spooning her like a pro. She smiled at the nylon wall and sighed as her eyes drooped with heaviness. There was a big old, scary-eyed grizzly shifter snuggling her, and she didn’t feel anything but safe. That was kind of funny.
And just as she drifted off, Matt whispered, “You aren’t what I expected.”
Chapter Three
Willa gasped and sat straight up. Sweat trickled down between her boobs, and she ran the back of her hand across the moisture on her forehead. What a dream. She’d been running through the woods from something big and always in the shadows, but she’d never seen its face. She’d only known it was horrifying.
The long rattle of a locust sounded from outside as Willa looked around. Had Matt really slept beside her? Perhaps not. She’d probably tossed all the covers at some point when she was running in her sleep from the dream monster, so there was no proof Matt’s giant frame had ruffled the comforter behind her. And he hadn’t left a single trace of proof he’d been there. Oh, wait. There was a folded piece of paper on the tiny kitchen table on the other side of the camper.
Willa tried to free her legs from the comforter, failed, and flopped onto the floor, but the future bruising didn’t deter her from scrambling up and bolting for the note.
You snore.
Here is a list of touristy shit to do around town.
Microbrewery competition
Hot Pool
Art Gallery
Saloon
Here are directions for tonight. 6 p.m. be there or be square, Nerd. Bring an overnight bag in case you beg me to spoon again.
Underneath there was a hand drawn map and step-by-step directions to get to Bear Trap Falls.
She hadn’t begged him to spoon, and she didn’t snore. Did she?
She unfolded the last lip of paper at the bottom.
P.S. You don’t really snore.
“Brat,” she murmured through a grin.
Aw, Matt was like her own little personal werebear concierge, giving her a list of ways to enjoy her vacation. Screw the bombshells. She was going to make a fun trip of this without them.
****
Matt checked his watch for the hundredth time and muttered a curse that it was only three minutes past the last time he’d checked.
What was wrong with him?
“Get your head out of your ass and get back to work,” Creed barked out from the top of the landing. His alpha was all riled up and pissed off about something, but hell if Matt knew what. Above him, Creed’s dark eyes narrowed, and he spat before he jerked his chin toward the skyline hooks that dangled on the hill between them.
Matt couldn’t even pop off like he usually did when Creed was being an asshole because this time his alpha was right. He’d been distracted all day. And working distracted on a jobsite like this would get him or one of the other Gray Backs hurt. Or worse.
He had to stop thinking about Willa. She was just his nerdy little sidekick friend who was going to point him in the right direction to which one of her friends he should bang first.
But that kiss last night against the camper…
Sheeyit.
A five-foot-nothing, smart-mouthed, pissed-off, lightweight, four-eyed geek was giving him a monster boner, and she wasn’t even here.
Maybe he should stand her up.
His bear snarled inside of him, and the sound rumbled up his throat before he could stop it. Easton was up on a log tying a thick wire cord around the middle, but he turned his blazing green eyes on Matt the second the first rattle of his growl sounded. Double shit. Easton was crazy. Rule number one around a crazy grizzly shifter: Don’t growl.
“Easton,” he said low, hands up as he backed down the side of the hill slowly. “It wasn’t a challenge.”
“You growling at me, Gray Back?”
“Okay, technically you’re a Gray Back, too, so that insult doesn’t even make sense.”
Matt crouched down as a massive silver grizzly exploded from Easton. Easton? His momma should’ve named him Beaston. Well, fuck it then. Matt hadn’t had a good fight in at least twenty-eight hours, and this was an acceptable distraction away from his lady problems, so okay.
Matt closed his eyes and let the animal have his body. A snarling, ravaging bear burst from him as his skin burned from the ripping Change. Easton, the man, might be crazy, but he was no match for a bear like Matt’s. Matt’s animal had been forged from agony, taunted and tortured by IESA until the fear switch had been flipped off.
Matt’s bear was a monster, and Easton was about to get some new scars.
He shook off the last of his ripped clothes as Eason charged down the hillside toward him. Matt caught the full force of him in the chest and latched onto his neck, sinking his long canines into his scruff until he tasted warm iron.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Creed yelled from the ridge above. “Again?”
Hell yeah, again. He and Beaston hadn’t managed to establish who was more dominant yet. Second in the crew should’ve been worked out long before now, but for whatever reason, they were locked in this constant battle.
<
br /> Matt’s footing slipped on the piles of felled lumber as he and Easton bit and clawed each other until their fur was matted with crimson. Stupid mother fucker didn’t know when he was beat, and now part of his ear was torn and hanging off. This right here was why their bears couldn’t figure out who was second to Creed. Beaston would fight to the death if Matt allowed their dominance battles to go on too long. He’d fight back until he was unconscious and bleeding out, and then wake up and be ready to redo the fight again the next day as though he hadn’t lost.
Not that Matt was complaining. He loved this shit.
Matt raked a claw down Easton’s back, but roared in pain when the other grizzly sank his teeth into his leg. Pulling, ripping, snarling, Easton pushed them both off balance with his powerful hind legs, and they fell onto a pile of loose lumber. Aw, hell.
Logs slipped and rolled alongside of them as they fought, locked up. Above them, Jason and Clinton were yelling something Matt couldn’t understand. Pain blasted through him as a log landed on top of him and bounced down the mountainside. They were picking up speed, but Easton didn’t seem interested in saving his own ass. He was still focused on maiming Matt. Attention torn between defending himself and making sure he and Easton survived the lumber avalanche, Matt twisted out of the way of another falling log, but got clocked on the neck by the next. On and on they slid, hitting tree stumps and brush, faster and faster. Pain, burning, agony, the snap snap of breaking bones. Fuckin’ Beaston.
Matt swung around in time to see the lone standing pine at the bottom of the hill, but it was too late to maneuver away. Using all his strength, he kicked Easton clear and slammed into the trunk. His vision crumpled inward, and sparks shot around the edges as he curled in on himself to ease the pain.
When he opened his eyes, Creed was barreling down on them, massive grizzly body black as pitch and demon eyes to match. Dammit all, this was going to hurt.
Matt winced as Creed reached him, but his alpha leapt over his crumpled body and slammed into Easton, who was charging again. The snarling battle roars echoed off the trees, but Creed had this one. He hadn’t won alpha from being a pussy. That bear could brawl. Matt would’ve huffed a bear laugh if he didn’t feel like his bones had been ground to dust. Jason and Clinton were on him now, but were they concerned for the pain he was in? No. They were laughing. And pointing. And now Jason was wheezing and clutching his knees because he found this all so goddamned funny. If Matt wasn’t pretty sure his front leg was broken, he would have given them both a bear claw slap, but right now, his paw in question was bent at an odd angle and he felt like he’d taken a swan dive into a bathtub of hunting knives.
Creed was human again. His big dick he was always bragging about swung around as he jammed a finger at Jason and Clinton and raged. “This shit right here is why we don’t hold a candle to the Ashe Crew’s numbers! No wonder Damon Daye doesn’t challenge us anymore. He expects nothing from us because all we do is fail him. Are you proud of that? Are you proud of sucking?”
“Kind of,” Clinton said, his gray eyes dancing.
Creed reared back as if he’d been slapped. “Matt, Change back.” The hard tone cracked with power and forced his immediate transformation. Alpha’s orders could be brutal sometimes.
The roar of pain in Matt’s throat turned into a scream as he shrank back into his human skin.
Creed grabbed Clinton by the back of the neck and shoved him toward Matt. “You think it’s so fuckin’ funny? You set his bones back.”
“Are you serious?” Clinton bellowed as their alpha stomped back up the lumber littered hillside.
The dark-haired alpha shot him a glare over his shoulder. “As a fuckin’ snake bite.”
They were all quiet until Creed was out of earshot, and then Jason said softly, “Some snakes aren’t poisonous.”
Matt groaned and wanted to kill them all.
“His bones, Clinton!” Creed yelled from midway up the hill. “Before they heal crooked.”
“Fine,” Clinton muttered. “Easton, Change back. You’re half dead and the fight’s over.”
Matt couldn’t see him from here, but Easton still smelled like a full-on grizzly and was growling softly in his throat.
None too gently, Clinton grabbed Matt’s arm and started feeling around his broken wrist. Searing pain sparked across his nerve endings, but Matt gritted his teeth against the urge to yell out. The guys wouldn’t have any sympathy, and besides, he’d had much, much worse in the Menagerie.
Still, bone setting was the least fun part of this life.
Matt loved the quick healing and the sex drive that came with being a shifter. He loved his strength and stamina, and hell, he even loved to Change. But bones had to be set before they healed improperly. Before muscles repaired themselves too quickly and had to be ripped up again to make sure bones fused back together like they should. He and the boys were all pros at bone-setting. Why? Because they broke them all the damned time.
Being a Gray Back was hell on the body.
Matt had enjoyed the fight to forget about Willa, but now, as Clinton snapped his splintered bones back into place, he thought of her to escape the pain.
Chapter Four
Saratoga’s small town charm was growing on her. Willa smiled as she thought about the pottery shop owner who had shook her hand and talked to her as if they’d known each other for years. Here, everyone smiled at everyone, whether they were a tourist or a townie.
She tossed a look at the little brown bag sitting in her passenger seat and sighed. Matt would probably hate the gift, but that wasn’t going to stop her from giving it to him. She’d spent the day at the brewery festival tasting tiny samples of beer, then window shopped in the downtown district before downing a personal mushroom pie from a local pizzeria that one of the nice brewers she’d met had told her she had to try. And then she’d wandered into a paint-your-own pottery place out of curiosity and bought a piece someone had left behind. Probably on account of its hideousness, but it was on the clearance table and reminded her of Matt. Not because it was ugly. Matt was extremely not ugly, but it was a mug with a handle shaped like a jumping salmon. And bears ate salmon. At least that’s what she read in a pamphlet from the visitor’s center about the sparse wild bear population around the area. She thought it was more a trout region, but the pamphlet had listed salmon as a grizzly’s favorite food. With that knowledge in mind, she’d purchased the ugly mug from the pottery shop, two salmons from the grocery store, and thrown the smellier of her gifts into a cheap cooler packed with ice.
She was the best friend in the world. Suck it, bombshells, for not realizing her friendship potential.
Lodgepole pines lined the roads and filled the forest so thickly, she could barely see any brush on the wilderness floor. She drove curving roads edged with green and brown. Some of the trees were dead. A lot of them, in fact, but that had been explained in the pamphlet, too. Some kind of beetle infestation was taking over the forest here.
“Okay,” she drawled out, pressing the map Matt had drawn against the steering wheel so she didn’t have to take her attention away from the road to read the directions. A right turn here where the road was washed out to a well-worn dirt track, another mile winding through the trees that followed the tire marks, and then she was there. Her breath caught in her throat as she looked through the woods. Lush green gave way to a river. Even from inside the Tacoma with the air conditioner turned up, the babbling water was loud and beautiful.
She stepped out of her truck and pulled the backpack she’d brought over her shoulders. Shoving her glasses up her nose better, she hiked through the trees until she reached the water’s edge. Matt had been right. This was sort of a beach, complete with pebbles that led to sand under lapping waves. The difference was the fresh water, the lack of brine scent in the air, and the bright greenery that lined the river on both sides. And no sharks. She could hear the waterfall, but she couldn’t see it yet, so she hooked her thumbs through her backpack stra
ps and tromped up an incline.
When she got to the top of the small hill, she locked her legs and halted.
Matt was sitting on the shore, water lapping at his toes as he scooped handfuls of waves onto a burgundy stain down his side.
She was early by a half hour, and she hadn’t expected him to be here yet. And she especially didn’t expect him to be bathing what looked like copious amounts of blood from his torso. She backed up a foot, but a twig snapped under her flip flop.
Matt jerked his gaze to her. His eyes were churning silver, like mercury, and his face was bruised. He stood in a blur. “It’s mine.”
“What is?” she asked more high-pitched than she’d intended.
“The blood.”
Oh. Well that made it better. “What the hell happened?” she asked, approaching slowly.
Matt scrubbed a hand down his face and shook his head. “Nothing.”
“Bear shit?”
Narrowing his eyes, he huffed a sigh. “Yeah, bear shit.”
She brushed her hand under a long gash across his rib cage, half-healed already. “Do you repair yourself fast?”
“Yeah. Give me an hour, and I’ll look normal again. You’re early.”
“Were you hoping I wouldn’t see you looking like a murder victim?”
“Ha.” Matt’s single laugh echoed across the river, and a smile brightened his somber face. “Kind of.”
“Well, mission not accomplished. You look like shit.”
Matt bent at the waist and scooped water over his forearm. It was then she noticed his skin. Crisscrossed in hundreds of long scars. His entire back was striped like a tiger.
“Matt,” she said on a breath. Pulling his arm, she studied the marred skin across his ribs, then when he stood back up, over his stomach.
His face went hard as she studied him in horror. “I was going to put a shirt on to swim,” he muttered as he crossed his arms over his chest, but that only exposed the scars across his six-pack abs. Pink and silver, each a different length and age from what she could tell.