by T. S. Joyce
One week, and she’d go back to her life in Minden.
One week, and she’d have to say goodbye to Matt and the people here.
One week was all she had to make memories that would last her whole life.
Chapter Ten
“Clinton, quit!” Willa yelled, trying not to laugh as she pulled a third crawfish out from under her shirt.
Clinton was chortling like a lunatic as he danced out of swatting range.
“See,” Matt called from the road where he and Jason were tossing a football to each other from a ridiculously long distance apart. “This is why I don’t trust them to cook. Food wasters, all of them. Leave her alone, or I’ll eat you.”
“From what we heard all night, you should be full of eating people,” Clinton said.
Willa’s eyes nearly popped out of her head as she scooped rice into paper bowls. “Clinton!”
“The walls are thin. Oh, Matt. Oh!” he crowed in a high-pitched voice.
Mortified, Willa hid her searing face and scooped gumbo into each bowl.
“Where’s Easton?” she asked, desperate to change the subject.
Creed leaned back on the prep table and jerked his chin to the woods. “At his place.”
One, two, three, four. How had she not realized there were only four trailers in the semi-circle and five bears in the Gray Back Crew?
“Why does he live up there?”
“Uh, because when he moved here two years ago, Matt pissed him off day one, and Easton picked his trailer up and dragged it through the woods,” Clinton explained helpfully.
“Picked it up and dragged it through—you mean with his bare hands?”
“Easton needs to live in confinement. His bear does best away from the rest of us,” Creed said as he lifted the draining pot of crawfish out of the water and settled it on the top ledge.
“That’s sad,” she said, heart aching at what could make a man need such solitude.
“Spare your pity for someone who deserves it,” Matt muttered as he approached the fire pit, tossing the football up and catching it. “Beaston lives the way he lives because he chooses to.”
Clinton snorted and repeated, “Beaston.”
Beaston? Willa tossed a look at the trail he’d walked up earlier. She should be afraid of all these men, but for some reason, she wasn’t. Perhaps her instincts were broken.
“Food’s on,” Matt said, pouring the crawfish, corn, potato and onion boil onto thick brown paper Creed has spread over the prep table.
“Shouldn’t we tell Easton?” she asked as everyone gathered around and began twisting tails off the steaming crawfish.
“You can try, but it’ll be a waste of breath,” Jason said around a bite. “He doesn’t like social calls.”
Well, she knew exactly how it felt to be left out by the bombshells, and she’d be damned if she was going to do that to someone else.
After Creed dug into his bowl of gumbo, he rolled his eyes heavenward. “Damn, woman, you can cook.”
She grinned and thanked him, then snatched a bowl of the piping food and headed for the trail that led to Easton’s wilderness trailer.
“Willa,” Matt warned.
“I’m not leaving him out.”
She could feel Matt’s eyes boring into the back of her head, but she was doing this. The evening had been perfect, and she was enjoying getting to know Matt’s crew, but there was something seriously disjointed when one of them was so ostracized like this.
She stomped up the uneven trail, clutching her warm bowl of gumbo, but with every step farther into the woods, her confidence wavered.
The boys called him Beaston for a reason, and here she was, like a horror-movie dumbass, headed out to his hidey hole alone, all human and weaponless.
But if she was really in danger, Matt wouldn’t have let her come out here by herself.
Easton’s trailer sat in a small clearing. A large woodpile covered most of the front of the house, but why he was stockpiling wood like this when it was summertime, she hadn’t a guess. Perhaps he needed to chop it to settle his animal? Her hands shook even more.
“Easton?” She didn’t lift her voice too loudly. He was a bear shifter and would hear her. Hell, he probably heard her tromping through the woods like a tranquilized elephant. She wasn’t graceful, or even quiet, when she walked.
The door banged open and Easton stuck his head out, green eyes narrowed on her, then on the bowl in her hands.
“I come in peace,” she joked with a little snort.
He didn’t smile.
Scrunching up her nose to readjust her glasses, she walked carefully up his porch stairs and handed him the bowl. “I made gumbo. We’re all eating if you want to join us.”
Easton frowned, eyes still on the bowl. “You want me to eat with you?”
“With all of us, yeah.”
“I hurt your mate.”
Mate. That word sent chills skittering up her spine. “He hurt you back.” She gestured at his arm, which he seemed to be able to use now.
His unsettling gaze drifted to his arm, then back to her. So fast he blurred, he snatched the bowl from her hands and disappeared inside.
Okaaay. She turned to leave, but her name whispered softly froze her in her tracks.
“A gift for a gift,” Easton said gruffly behind her.
On his palm was a hunting knife, encased in fine leather. Willa swallowed hard and took the knife, then unsheathed it slowly. The silver glistened in the evening sunlight, and the blade looked sharp as a razor. “It’s beautiful. Did you make this?”
Easton nodded once.
“Thank you.” She shifted her weight from side to side.
He was watching her now with an unreadable expression.
Clearing her throat nervously, she said, “There’s plenty of food down there.”
Easton shook his head and turned, then disappeared inside his trailer, the door banging loudly behind him.
Clutching her knife, Willa made her way back down the trail. Easton might be more bear than man, but he’d given her a present when she’d shown him kindness. Wild as he might be, he still had good in him.
“Told you,” Jason said when she returned and settled into an opening by Matt’s side. “And here I thought you were intelligent.”
Willa tucked Easton’s gift in her back pocket and plucked her first crawfish from the enormous pile of food. Twisting the tail, she exposed the seasoned meat inside. “Why do you think that?”
“Because you wear glasses and talk fancy. I bet you even went to college.”
“You’d win that bet,” she said. She gripped the spicy meat in her teeth and pinched the tail to release it from the hard shell. Oh damn, this was good. Whatever spicy seasoning Jason had used was perfect.
“I bet you majored in something super nerdy,” Jason said, licking his fingers.
“I did. I majored in micro-penises, and you have the perfect specimen.”
Matt snorted beside her, and Clinton slapped Jason on the back as he let off a booming laugh. Even Creed was hiding a smile from the end of the table.
She shoved her glasses farther up her nose with her shoulder as the sound of eating and joking hummed around her. This reminded her of crawfish boils she’d had at family reunions when she was growing up. Back when Grandma and Mom were still around. She and Dad had never picked up the tradition after they passed, and now she regretted that. Maybe dinners like this could’ve fixed what was missing with her and Dad.
Movement along the tree line grabbed her attention, and the others looked up in unison, as if instinct had drawn their gazes. Easton paced just inside of the shadows.
“Well, come on,” Creed called out, waving his hand. “Food won’t last forever.”
“I’ll be damned,” Jason murmured as Easton made his way around the trucks and toward the table.
He didn’t join them right away. Instead, he grabbed another bowl of rice and gumbo before he came to stand beside Clinton.
/> “Food’s good,” Easton muttered with a quick look at her. “I forgot to say thank you.”
“The knife was thanks enough.” Willa was getting all choked up with happiness that he had joined them.
“You got a knife?” Clinton asked. “I’ve been asking for one of Easton’s knives for two years.” Turning to Easton, he said, “Why does she get one?”
Easton frowned and scooped another bite into his maw. Gulping it down, he growled out, “Because I like her, and you’re an asshole.”
“Oh,” Clinton muttered before he went back to peeling crawfish. “Fair enough.”
Matt chuckled warmly beside her and pulled her snug against his side. He’d been quiet tonight, but she couldn’t tell if it was because his injury was still hurting or if he was exhausted from work or what. All she knew was that she was happy his distance didn’t seem to be caused by something she’d done.
And as she looked around the table, a warm, fuzzy sensation filled her middle. Jason and Clinton were tossing empty crawfish shells at each other, while Creed shook his head and laughed. Easton ate her gumbo stoically, and Matt—her Matt—whispered in her ear. “I missed you today.”
Moments like these were ones she’d remember all her life. Tonight, she felt like she belonged, and that was a rare thing. She’d drifted from the bombshells to other friends she kept at a distance, just so she wouldn’t get hurt again. And she’d been stung when she’d tried to reconnect with Brittney, Kara, and Gia on this trip, but here, things were different.
She didn’t feel like an outcast with this crew. She wasn’t the ugly friend or the wingman. She wasn’t the pity call or the tagalong.
She was just Willa—knife-wielder, good cook, easy banterer, smarty-pants, lover-of-fun, and potential mate of Matt Barns.
She hadn’t ever fit into a box, but here, no one tried to shove her into one.
In the Grayland Mobile Park with these off-kilter bear shifters, she could be herself, and it was enough.
Chapter Eleven
Bear Trap Falls, six thirty, don’t bring clothes.
Matt’s texts were never dull. Skinny dipping? Okay, she’d never done that, but she was game.
Willa pulled her Tacoma up to the clearing near the river an hour early, then saddled herself down with a bag chair, cooler of fruity beer, and a beach towel. Just the thought of relaxing on the shore was enough to push away the stress of the week coming to an end. Tomorrow, she was supposed to pack up her camper and head back home. The bombshells had already left, siting that Saratoga was too boring for them. Willa had tried not to giggle when Kara had called her and told her that.
Saratoga had turned out to be the least boring place she’d ever been.
Her days had been filled with exploring the growing list of local attractions that Matt compiled for her, and her evenings had been spent with the Gray Backs. This week, she’d learned how to drive an ATV through mud, fish for trout, and climb trees. The last bit was because Clinton had hung out with her on his day off and dared her to hang a rope swing from one of the old trees near the river. She’d hung that thing like a boss, then giggled herself breathless when Matt had nearly fileted Clinton for putting her at risk. Protective, sexy bear.
And nights…oh, nights in Matt’s trailer were magic. She’d learned lots and lots of interesting lessons from him this week.
She set up her chair and pulled a book from her bag. Clad in the tiny green triangle bikini she’d bought earlier this week and a floppy hat, she settled in the sun for an hour with her guilty pleasure. She’d read three saucy romances this week in her spare time and didn’t even care when the boys teased her for reading them. Plus, one of them was missing from her pile on Matt’s porch table, and she was pretty sure it was either Jason or Easton who had stolen it. Imagining one of those burly bear shifters off in the woods, secretly reading a hot, erotic western romance made her laugh.
Something big moved across the river, and she jumped, startled. It was a massive grizzly, but she’d seen this one before. Matt had explained that the river served as a natural border between Gray Back territory and Boarlander territory.
“Hi, Harrison,” she called to the Boarlander alpha.
The dark bruin gave her one last look, then ambled off into the brush.
“Geez, I’m never going to get used to that,” she murmured as her heart rate settled. Or maybe she would if Matt would ever show her his bear. So far, he’d refused. In fact, she hadn’t seen any of the Gray Backs’ bears. Creed said it was a safety precaution around her, but Harrison never even bothered her when she was near the river. He just checked his territory line and moved on.
An hour passed like no time at all as she was lost in the imaginary world of Isla Homes, Bernard Duncan, and their romantic adventures through time.
“Do you regret not going to the beach now?” Matt asked.
With a grin and a bone-deep hum of relief, Willa twisted in her chair. Matt was leaning against a tree, arms crossed over his broad chest, white T-shirt streaked with dirt, and speckles of mud all over his arms. At least today he wasn’t bleeding, and after a week of him and Easton fighting, it felt like a victory.
“How long have you been here?” she asked.
“Not long.”
“Hmm. No regrets. This week has been the best of my life. Besides, the beach has sharks, and I’m afraid of sharks, remember?”
“And deep water. And jellyfish, giant squids, hermit crabs, sea cucumbers—”
“Yeah, yeah, we’ve established I’m afraid of everything.”
His bright blue eyes crinkled at the corners with his smile. “Everything except for bears.”
She sighed happily and pushed off her chair. When she was snuggled in his strong arms, she admitted, “I missed you.”
He rested his chin on top of her head. “I don’t want you to go.” It was the first time Matt had mentioned the looming end of her trip. He’d avoided it like the plague, probably because admitting she had to leave soon would make it real.
Willa squeezed him around the waist, then eased away and pulled his hand. “Come on.”
Matt pulled his shirt off slowly, a troubled look in his eyes as she sank down in the water and waited. He was acting strange and distant, and she hated it.
“Do you have regrets?” she asked softly. The answer mattered more than anything.
He gave her the ghost of a sad smile and shook his head. “No.” His abs flexed as he peeled off his jeans and kicked out of them. He was beautiful. A perfect Adonis. Perhaps other women wouldn’t think so because of his striped skin, but Willa barely noticed that anymore. His scars and flaws were just a part of him.
“I wish my mom could’ve met you.” Sadness washed through her at what couldn’t ever be. “She would’ve liked you.”
Matt dragged his legs through the waves until he reached her, then sank down until the water lapped at his chin. “You haven’t talked about her before. What happened to your mom?”
“She died three years ago, just a few weeks after my Grandma.”
“Jesus,” Matt murmured sympathetically. He encircled her waist and pulled her deeper into the water. “Is your dad still around?”
“Yeah, he still lives in Minden.” She scrunched up her face and swallowed the emotion that was clogging her throat. “If you can call it living. He’s filled his house with pictures of him and my mom together when they were younger, and sometimes he talks like she’s still around.”
“It must be hard on you to see him like that.”
“Yeah. She was sick for a long time, so I thought we were prepared, but when she went so close to Grandma passing, Dad just kind of shut down.”
“Who did you lean on then?”
She shrugged her shoulders up to her ears. “No one.”
The water babbled around them as Matt pulled her in closer and rested his chin on her shoulder. “I don’t remember my parents.”
This was it. Matt had kept his past carefully guarded since she’d
met him, and this was the first time he’d even hinted at why he’d had to raise all those kids in the woods.
“I have this image in my head of them, but I think I’ve made it up. I imagine my mom as this tall, striking woman who talked in this powerful tone, and my dad as a quiet, silver-haired man with a straight back and strong shoulders, like mine. I really don’t know what they looked like, though.”
“Why not?”
“I was taken.” He said it like a question, and his voice broke on the last word.
“Taken, like kidnapped?”
“The International Exchange of Shifter Affairs had this place they called the Menagerie. They picked up kids and…well, that’s where I got my scars.”
Willa’s heart broke with his words, and she pulled him close so he wouldn’t see the tears building in her eyes. “They did experiments?”
Matt swallowed audibly and nodded his head, spinning them in a slow circle in the water. “It wasn’t so bad for me—”
“Matt,” she warned. “I’ve seen your scars, remember?”
“It really wasn’t, Willa. I’d been in there as long as I could remember, and at some point, I got used to the pain. It was just a part of my life, and I didn’t know any better. But when I had to watch the other kids go in for tissue samples, it broke something in me. I was the oldest one there, and those kids felt like mine. Like my brothers and sisters to protect, and I couldn’t do a damned thing. I was the only grizzly shifter, but they gave us medicine to stop our Changes. In the Menagerie, we only Changed when they let us off the meds, and in a controlled setting.”
“A controlled setting?”
“Chained.”
Fuck. Warmth streamed down her cheeks as she closed her eyes against the stabbing pain in her heart. “How long were you in there?”
“You’re crying. I should stop.”
“How long, Matt?”
Matt eased back. His eyes had gone dead, his face passive and emotionless. “Ages four to sixteen. Twelve years. I was Reynolds’s first specimen.”
“Reynolds was who you mentioned after you had that nightmare.”
“He was the head of the Menagerie. He died a few years ago. I got to see it. He’d caught up to a couple of bears in the Ashe Crew, and the Gray Backs and Boarlanders came to help. Brighton and Denison Beck took him into the woods and put an ax to his neck. They took a kill I’d dreamed about my whole life. I was mad and relieved all at once. It dredged up a lot of memories, but it was finally over.”