Hero Bear

by Candace Ayers

“You don’t have to do that.”

  “I want to.” She smiled and linked her arm through mine. “That’s what friends are for.”

  14

  Dmitry

  I watched her climb the stairs on shaky legs and waited until Hannah escorted her into her bedroom before I looked away. My heartrate was finally starting to return to a normal pace after the scare she gave me. Seeing Kerrigan go under and not come back up had convinced me of two things. One, she needed me to protect her. Two, I needed her to be safe.

  Fury like I’d never felt ignited within me. Every dark thought and every torture technique I’d ever heard of were begging to be unleashed on the man who was threatening her. My bear didn’t need the darkness to help. He was bloodthirsty. He wanted to tear the man apart with his teeth and make it a slow, painful death.

  I needed more information. When Kerrigan was sober, I was going to get it all out of her. I needed his name and where he was from. I was going to make it right for her. No matter what I had to do. She couldn’t survive the way she was going and I wasn’t going to let her go under the water again. Not on my watch.

  “What’s up? Was everything okay with Kerrigan earlier?” Serge put down his sandwich and looked at me expectantly.

  I hesitated. If it did come to me having to eliminate the asshole threatening Kerrigan, the less Serge knew, the better. “Yeah, I just needed her input on something and I couldn’t find her. Problem solved.”

  “Yeah, okay. I completely buy that.”

  I shrugged. “Buy it or don’t. Are there more sandwiches where that one came from?”

  He scowled. “Make it yourself. If there’s anything I need to know about Kerrigan, I expect you to tell me, Dmitry.”

  “What could you possibly need to know about Kerrigan?”

  “That’s what I’m asking you.”

  Hannah walked back into the kitchen and stepped against her mate’s side. “What are you two arguing about?”

  Serge fed some of his sandwich to his mate. “Is there anything going on with Kerrigan?”

  Hannah smiled. “Is there a woman on this earth that doesn’t have something going on?”

  “Anything that I need to know? As her boss?”

  “Not that I know of. I think she’s just torn up about a guy.”

  Serge groaned. “Never mind. Forget I asked.”

  My appetite was suddenly ruined. I nodded a goodbye to them and went up to my room. I could hear the shower running and sat on the edge of my bed, waiting for the water to shut off.

  It was pure torture. Since I’d held Kerrigan in the very spot I was sitting at that moment, my mind had been going in circles. I’d been beside myself. Seeing her, hearing her voice, thinking about her, all of it was painful.

  Knowing she was naked in the next room over was bad enough, but knowing that she was hurting made me ache. I knew why. My bear knew what it was. She was ours and I couldn’t stand her pain. She was under my skin bigtime.

  When the water cut off, I waited a few minutes and then went across to Kerrigan’s room. I lightly knocked on the door and waited for her to answer.

  “Hang on.” Her voice sounded tired. “Just a sec.”

  I leaned against the doorframe waiting for her to let me in. After a few seconds, I could sense her hovering by the door, thinking about whether or not she should open it. She was angry and hurt, both of which were justifiable. I needed to be in that room with her, though. “Let me in, Kerrigan.”

  She sighed and pulled the door open. Blocking me from coming in, she stared down at the floor. “What do you want?”

  My bear grumbled low in my chest, but I cut him off. It didn’t matter what the fuck he wanted. I needed to make sure Kerrigan was safe. That took priority over everything. “I want to finish talking.”

  She groaned and shook her head, but I took advantage of my size and leaned into the room and into her personal space until she reflexively stepped aside. Dirty trick, but I needed to be in the room with her. I needed to make sure she was safe.

  “You can’t just—”

  “I can and I am.” I walked over to the window, pushed it closed, and latched it. Then, I slid her curtains closed and turned to face her. She’d been hiding herself behind the door, so it was my first full look at her since I’d entered. She took my breath away.

  The oversized t-shirt she wore stopped mid-thigh and fell off her right shoulder. Her hair was damp and piled on the top of her head in a loose, spiky bun with a few stray strands hanging in her face. Her eyes looked even larger than normal behind her thick glasses. Her perfectly shaped lips were puckered out in displeasure as she watched me, slim arms crossed over her chest.

  I’d just seen her in her underwear, but something about her bare shoulder and bare stretch of leg from toe to thigh was killing me. That exposed shoulder should’ve been illegal.

  I took a deep breath and inhaled her fresh, clean scent. Okay, that didn’t help, so I turned back to the window and took a minute to compose myself. “We have to come up with a plan to keep you safe.”

  Bare feet padded across the floor. The bed let out a light squeak as she sat on it. It was the ruffling of the bedding that caused me to turn around. She was getting under the covers.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m tired. I don’t want to talk.” She looked over at me and, in a rare moment of steady eye contact, she held my gaze while she pulled the blanket up to her chin. “You should leave. It doesn’t look right.”

  Frowning, I shrugged. “It’s fine. We’re just talking, Kerrigan.”

  She popped up like a jack in a box, her face flushing as red as her lips. “It’s not fine. It’s the farthest thing from fine. After what happened…between us… You haven’t said two words to me about that.”

  I grunted. “I’m sorry.”

  “Oh, my gosh. Don’t apologize! Do you think that’s what I want to hear?” She clutched the blanket in a death grip and stared at it. “That happened between us and then you kicked me out and apologized. You don’t want me? Fine. I’m a big girl. I can accept rejection and I can move past it. What I can’t accept is you coming in here and talking to me like it’s not weird that we’re both this close to my bed and I’m not wearing any underwear.”

  I guess I had a funny bone somewhere deep inside that I hadn’t known existed because I wanted to laugh. Not at her, but just…because. She was cute. More than cute, she was beautiful and intelligent and irritating, and perfect.

  “Why are you looking at me like that?”

  I straightened my face and shrugged. “Like what?”

  “Like you want to laugh at me. Is it funny that I thought you might have actually wanted to be with me? It probably is, isn’t it? You’re this hot looking hero guy and I’m this mousy little four-eyed virgin. Literally, the last thing on your mind is someone like me. I guess the other day was just scratching an itch with whomever was available? I just happened to be in the right place at the right time? Lucky me. It’s terrible to laugh at someone because they have a crush on you.” She gasped a big breath and turned a heated stare on me. Her bottom lip began to wobble. “Please go. I’m not drunk anymore, but I still might cry about this.”

  15

  Kerrigan

  “I’m not going anywhere.” To prove his point, Dmitry pulled out my desk chair and sat in it, his long legs spread out in front of him. “And I’m not laughing at you.”

  I felt disoriented. I’d worked up a big anger and he’d just deflated my anger balloon. “What?”

  “I’m not going anywhere.” He crossed his arms over his chest and rolled his neck. “And I’m not laughing at you. Got it?”

  I turned to face him and shook my head. “No, I don’t ‘got it’.”

  He watched my finger quotes with another one of those little smirks on his face. “I’m going to make sure you’re safe. I don’t like the idea of you being in here by yourself, so far away from help.”

  “Across the hall is far away?”
<
br />   Ignoring me, he continued. “This way, I can make sure you’re safe and no one is trying to sneak in through your window.”

  My stomach twisted at the idea of Nicky Knuckles climbing in through my bedroom window. I turned and stared at it like it was a four-headed monster with drool on its fangs.

  “No one is coming in, Kerrigan. I’m staying right here to make sure of that.”

  “Why?”

  He shifted. “Because.”

  “That’s not an answer.”

  “It’s the only one you’re getting.”

  I kicked the covers off my legs and sat on the edge of the bed. My feet were just inches from his. Oddly, I wanted to rub my feet against his so some part of us touched. I wasn’t a martyr, though. I could only take so much rejection.

  “Did it feel to you like I didn’t care who I was with, Kerrigan?” The husky tone of Dmitry’s voice surprised me and when I glanced up at him, it was clear by his expression he was expecting an answer.

  I bit my lip and played with the hem of my T-shirt. I was afraid to lay all my cards out in front of him. It was so obvious to me that he had all the power in our exchanges. I needed to keep something close to my vest. “I don’t know.”

  “I’ll tell you, then. I knew absolutely who I was with and you were exactly who I wanted. It was how rough I was with you that I am sorry about, but not for touching you or tasting you. That I’m not sorry for.”

  My stomach fluttered. “Oh.”

  “It’s pretty obvious that the desire was there long before that night.”

  South of my stomach fluttered, too. I found a worn spot on the hem of my shirt and tugged at a thread. “It wasn’t. Pretty obvious, I mean.”

  As if he realized that he was saying too much, he grew quiet, but I could feel his eyes on me. They burned like a thousand suns over my skin.

  I licked my suddenly dry lips and scooted back into bed. “None of it matters, anyway. Even if there was desire, or whatever, I signed a contract. If anyone found out about what happened, I’d lose my job. And, as you know, I can’t afford to lose this job.”

  “What? What contract?”

  I made a big deal of fluffing my pillows. “To work here, I had to sign a non-fraternization contract. Dating or otherwise engaging in romantic or sexual relations with team members is grounds for my immediate dismissal.”

  “You’re not serious.”

  I looked up and found that he’d sat forward, his eyes, more smoky gray than dark blue right then, locked onto me. Nodding, I shrugged. “Yeah, I signed it before coming here. I just figured it was normal. Although, I guess I can see why they didn’t make any of you sign it. None of you seem to want to date each other.”

  He cocked his head to the side.

  Realizing what I’d said, I sped ahead, into oncoming word traffic. “I mean, it’s fine if you do. I’m not judging or anything. I was talking about us, anyway. Me. Not you. I don’t want to imply that you wanted to sleep with me. I mean, it’s obvious that you don’t. Don’t feel the need to make that any clearer, okay? Or say anything at all. No comment necessary.”

  Still, Dmitry said nothing. His eyes were so still and focused on me, his head was cocked slightly to the side as he listened.

  “Well, anyway. I should get some sleep.”

  “It’s not even dark out yet.”

  “And still, somehow, I’ve managed to tire myself out.” I sank back under the covers, needing the protection of a blanket to hide myself.

  “Kerrigan…”

  I held up my hand to stop him. “I do not want to hear anything you feel you need to say in reply to my verbal diarrhea. In fact, I’d really appreciate if we could both pretend I didn’t say any of it. So, I’m going to go to sleep. You should go back to your room. I don’t need a babysitter.”

  Dmitry was nice enough to be silent after that. He stayed where he was, though, which was torture enough. My body was so overtly aware that he was in the room and only a few feet from my bed, that I couldn’t think of anything else. All I could do was lie there and squeeze my eyes shut, hoping I’d fall asleep as fast as possible.

  Miraculously, having Dmitry that close seemed to also settle a restlessness deeper within me. Under the sexual tension, I realized all of my other fears had faded enough that I wasn’t worrying about them. It allowed me to fall asleep and I slept like the dead. The only thing stirring me throughout the night were dreams of Dmitry.

  16

  Dmitry

  My heartrate didn’t return to normal until Kerrigan had been asleep for several hours. I pondered what she’d said—and what she hadn’t said. I was all but sitting on my hands to keep them away from her, but no way was I going to touch her. I couldn’t. The contract. Her confirmed virginity. I was bad news for her. I just sat as she slept.

  I watched over her, with heavy lids tracing her outline, memorizing the details that made up Kerrigan. Her bare shoulder peeked out from under the blanket. Her skin was smooth and looked like silk. Without her thick glasses on, her face was fine-featured. Flat, delicate nose. Fringe of short, dark lashes brushing her cheeks. When she turned, I noticed a dark birthmark on the back of her shoulder that looked like one of the astral constellations. I couldn’t remember which one.

  My mother had been into the stars. She would give readings and map astrological charts for clients, telling all sorts of stories based on the position of the stars. It’d been so long since she’d passed. I couldn’t remember any astrology. That whimsical kind of thing had never mattered to me when I was young. The stars, the moon and sun, all of them were just…out there. I do remember one particular story, though. I remember her talking about how the stars had aligned just right for her and my father, and that the same would happen for me one day.

  What would my mother think of me now? Seeing that constellation shaped birthmark on Kerrigan’s shoulder touched me deeply. I wished my mother could have met Kerrigan. For the first time in quite a while, in the darkness of the room, I found myself mourning the loss of my mother.

  With the sorrow of loss came a mighty dose of reality. Life was fragile. Even a shifter’s life. Things happened. People died. Everything about Kerrigan was fragile, small and virtually defenseless.

  I knew she was my mate. I’d known it the moment I’d first set eyes on her. She’d walked into the P.O.L.A.R. office with Serge and my jaw had dropped clear to the floor. When her eyes drifted to mine, even hidden behind thick glasses, I thought I saw recognition in them as well. She’d looked away quickly, but not before I noticed the way her cheeks had flushed.

  How the stars could have aligned to send me someone as pure and delicate and perfect as Kerrigan, I would never know. I was undoubtedly damned, my soul as dark as the deepest depths of the ocean. My story was set, my deeds committed. Nothing I could ever do would make up for the acts I’d already wrought. Why fate would give me Kerrigan was a mystery. I wasn’t right for her. Christ, my fantasies alone, the things I wanted to do to her were dirtier than a woman like her ever deserved.

  None of it made sense to me, but I’d at least accepted the truth. We were mates, but we needed to refrain from consummating the mating or going through with the claiming.

  Even if it weren’t for the fact that I didn’t deserve her, the contract she’d signed would’ve made things too difficult for her. The main office would fire her, without a doubt. If they’d gone as far as to make her sign something so fucking asinine, they would surely stand by it.

  I didn’t want to cost her the job she needed, although I would handle her debt myself, and I should’ve been grateful for the excuse to stay away from her. I didn’t feel grateful. I felt pissed off that the company I worked for would dare to think they could dictate something so personal to Kerrigan. They had no right to control what she did on her own time and with whom.

  I knew it was a direct response to Serge and Hannah mating while he was on the job. It had led to the team breaking protocol and disobeying direct orders. The contract was th
eir way of showing us that we didn’t get to pull a stunt like that again. Actually, the more I thought about it, the more it pissed me off. If Kerrigan did “fraternize” with one of us, she would lose her job and we would, what? Get a slap on the wrist? A high five? Way to go, bro? Men will be men and all that? Fuck that.

  As soon as I handled things with Kerrigan’s loan shark, I was going to have plenty to say to the main office. They’d get an earful from me. I was already ticked that they’d jerked the team around by sending us here from Siberia. They’d punished us and were continuing to do so by keeping us on the island, where we weren’t doing any real work. To think they could keep our mates away from us, if and when we found them, was overreaching.

  We were trained operatives but, especially when it came to mates, we were shifters, too. Looking at Kerrigan’s sleeping form, I felt like a man first, operative second, shifter third. Maybe that’s what the main office was trying to stop from happening—an operative valuing a mate over the job.

  I knew that I would fight twice as hard as I’d ever fought if I was fighting to keep her safe. Just like Serge and Roman with their mates.

  Kerrigan rolled over and softly spoke my name in her sleep. She did that almost every night. Maybe I was an asshole for keeping my ears peeled and prying into her private moments, but I didn’t know how to stop.

  I stood up and paced over to the window, pulling just the edge of the curtain back so I could stare out into the night. Nothing but the expanse of ocean and sky stared back at me.

  Her loan shark wasn’t coming for her, yet. But when he did, he wasn’t going to like what he found. Twice, he’d gotten to her. He’d left bruises on her body. Never again. He was either going to go away peacefully, or he was going to wish he’d never set eyes on Kerrigan Tran. I’d make sure of that.

  17