Bears of Burden Complete Series Box Set

by Candace Ayers

  She sat up a little and looked around. I tried to picture my place through her eyes—a wooden cabin devoid of any knick-knacks, sparsely furnished with too many windows to ever really feel warm inside. Her eyes moved back to me and then she scooted off my lap. “Why did you bring me here?”

  I instantly missed her body and had to fight to keep my hands to myself. “I needed to talk to you.”

  Her pouty lips turned down and she tugged at the hemline of her dress. I struggled to suppress the growl in my chest. It was too short for her to be wearing around town when I wasn’t there. It hugged her curves and left my mouth watering. I wanted to rip it over her head and devour her whole.

  “What do you want to talk about?”

  “First, how do you feel? You went out like a light. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

  Her cheeks brightened. “I drank on an empty stomach. Haven’t felt much like eating, I guess. And you shocked me. I wasn’t expecting you to show up while I was still in town.”

  “Thorn told me you’ve been throwing parties. He’s more than a little distraught. Allie told me to tell you that you were voted the official party planner, though. She seems excited.”

  “Lot of good that’ll do me when I go back home. Look, I’m sorry you had to come to my rescue. Again. I’m fine, though. I’ll go.”

  I stood up and blocked the door, not caring that I was still naked. “We haven’t talked yet.”

  She waved her hands around. “I don’t care. I don’t need to be formally dumped or whatever, Wyatt. I just want to go.”

  I crossed my arms over my chest. “You might want to listen to what I have to say first.”

  She looked at me and then jerked her face away. “Could you put some pants on? A shirt, too.”

  I laughed. Things were lighter for me since I’d realized what a sonofabitch I’d been. Once I realized that I was the biggest problem here, there was nothing I wouldn’t do to win her back. “I don’t plan on needing them for a while.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  I stalked towards her. “I was wrong. I was a dumbfuck for letting you go. I was an dumbfuck for making you stay. I tried to force you into my life, even if just for a couple of days, and I didn’t stop to ask you what you wanted. I let myself think that because you didn’t fit perfectly into my life the way it was, that we didn’t belong together. I was stupid and blind. Too stupid to realize that I was the one who needed to compromise, and too blind to see how much you were trying.”

  She met my eyes and absently reached up to tug at the shorter strands of her hair. She looked amazing. The shorter length revealed the smooth delicate expanse of creamy neck.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t treat you the way you deserved and I made you feel bad and that makes me the biggest dumbfuck on the planet. I just saw my parents and how easy it was for them to live together. I thought it would’ve naturally been that easy between us. I never stopped to consider that it wasn’t easy for them at first either.

  “My mom corrected me. Told me I was an asshole, which was probably the first time I’d ever heard her cuss. She told me that nothing had been easy for them at first. My dad was like me, more bear than man. He’d spent all his time hiding on the mountain. My mom liked the city. She spent her weekends in Dallas, going out with her girlfriends and exploring.”

  The shy way that Georgia spoke next shot an arrow through my heart. “How did they make it work?”

  I stepped closer to her. “My dad learned to wear clean shirts and shoes more than a day or two a week. My mom learned to love the wild in Dad and with Dad. They met in the middle.”

  “What if there isn’t a middle for us?”

  The question forced my hand. I threw caution out the window and scooped up my sad little mate.

  27

  Georgia

  Wyatt grabbed me and picked me up before carrying me back to his couch. He sat with me in his lap, straddling his thighs. I barely had time to blink before he covered my mouth with his and parted my lips with his tongue. It wasn’t like his other kisses; this one held desperation. He used his lips and tongue to convince me that we could make it work. He put everything in that kiss and I felt my heart melting.

  “We’re mates. There are no mistakes. You are mine. I will follow you wherever you go. I will move to the city with you if I have to. I will do whatever it takes.”

  My throat squeezed as tears filled my eyes. “It’s not real. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  The issues that I had been stuffing down finally came to the surface and what spewed out wasn’t pretty. “I lied. I lied about having my dad around and giving people their weekends off because I’d wanted more time with him. The truth was I only ever saw him a handful of times in my entire life. Each, while he was leaving my mom’s bedroom. He didn’t care about me, didn’t want me. The only reason I got the business was because somehow, he died without a will. He’d never drawn one up, and there was no other family.

  “His lawyers made me do a paternity test because they hadn’t realized he even had a kid. He didn’t keep pictures of me on his desk, or brag about me to his friends. He didn’t love me. No man ever has. I’m unlovable. I ruin things and I’m too high maintenance. I spend too much time thinking and men leave. Even my mate didn’t want me. You knew it. You wanted to run. If you really think about it, you’ll still want to. There’s something wrong with me, Wyatt.”

  When I tried to get away from him, he tightened his hold and held me until I quit fighting him. “It kills me to know that you feel that way about yourself, Georgia. And that I made it worse. I will spend my life convincing you that this is real, that I want to be with you, that I love you.”

  I froze. “What?”

  He laughed and pulled my head down until it was on his shoulder. “I said I love you. Because I do. I love you, Georgia. I think it started the moment I saw you. Then, I realized it again when you were fussing at that bear like you’d lost your damned mind. My world narrowed to that moment and I knew that if anything happened to you, I’d die, too.”

  “You don’t know me, Wyatt.”

  “Yes, I do. I know that you’re kind—to other people anyway, funny, fierce, sexy as hell, and so fucking alive that everyone around you can’t help but feel it. I’m fucking lucky to have you as my mate.”

  Tears were falling faster now. My heart was daring to hope, but knowing how easily it could get crushed again made my palms sweaty and my lungs struggle for air. “How can this work? You practically live on the mountain. I can’t do that every week with you. I don’t have that much hair to lose.”

  Wyatt wiped my tears away. “I’ll shorten the trips. Only do longer ones on special occasions. Seeing the party you threw around the campfire gave me some ideas, too. Maybe you could come up for a night or two. If you wanted to. You liked the fishing. We could do that and then you could put together something fun at night.”

  I blinked at him. “Something fun?”

  He shrugged. “Whatever you want. A party or whatever. Everyone loved having you there. The guys kept talking about how much they wished you were on every trip they made. I know you can’t do that and I won’t ask you to. Maybe we can work something out, though.”

  “You’re serious?”

  “Yes, Georgia, I am. You and me. It’s happening. Forever.”

  I shook my head. “I have to go back home for meetings sometimes. I have to… I have stuff there. I… I’ve never done anything like this. You’re going to get tired of me. I’m no good at stuff like this. I stare too much and I get quiet and I get bitchy and I… I’m just not good.”

  “Do you like this dress?”

  I looked down at it and shrugged. “It’s okay. Why?”

  He grabbed the neck and effortlessly ripped the silky material down the middle of my chest. He ignored my scream of shock and tore it completely down the middle until it fell to my sides. “You aren’t supposed to wear little things like this when I’m not around to growl a
t every man who looks your way.”

  I crossed my arms over my chest and felt a little bit of annoyance flare up. “I do what I want. Also, it’s not just men you have to worry about. While you were still up on that mountain, I decided that I’m going to go for women from now on. Men are too much work.”

  He growled. “You’re mine, Georgia. Didn’t you hear me? I love you. No other men. No women. Only me.”

  I gasped as he took my hips in his hands and pulled me harder into his body. I felt every inch of his hard erection pressing into me and bit back a moan. I wanted him. I wanted him more than I’d ever wanted anything, and in a different way than I was used to. Long term relationship kind of want.

  “What if it doesn’t work?”

  His eyes softened. “It will. I will do anything for you.” He buried his face in the crook of my neck and shoulder and inhaled deeply. “You don’t have to be scared, Georgia. This is it. You have a man in your life who is going to fight for you, who will not let another second go by without you knowing how much he loves you, who will help you see that you’re the best damn thing that’s ever happened to him. This is going to work. I swear to you.”

  My heart felt like it was going to explode in my chest. There was hardly enough room in there for the emotions that Wyatt was stirring in me. Forever. Forever with the man in front of me. I looked at him, at the raw desire in his eyes that obliterated the fear and self-loathing that had been threatening to strangle me over the past few days. “Yes. I want this.”

  His grin was wicked. “It was never a question, sugar. I’m not letting you go.”

  28

  Wyatt

  I pulled Georgia’s face down to mine and held her there, a breath away from the kiss that I needed. “I’ll spend my life making sure you forget every worry you ever had that I could leave you.”

  Her eyes fluttered shut and a soft sigh fell from her lips. “We can live here.”

  I leaned back and watched her. She was stunning. I ran my fingers through her hair and rubbed the ends between my fingers. “I like it like this. It’s sexy.”

  She pressed her cheek into my hand and gave me a soft smile. “I’ll have to go back every so often for a few days at a time to sign off on things. I like it here, though.”

  “We’ll have to go back. You’re stuck with me from now on.”

  “Okay.”

  I quirked an eyebrow. “Okay?”

  She nodded. “Yeah. Just…be easy with me, okay? If you do get sick of me, just give me some warning.”

  I stood up, wrapping her legs around my waist as I did. I carried her into my bedroom and placed her gently down on the bed. “One day, you’ll see that you’re stuck with me for good. I don’t deserve you, but I’m not questioning it anymore. I’m just going to take.”

  Her hair fanned out around her and I hovered over to rub my face against it. Her hands held my sides, her fingertips pressing into my skin harder as I brushed my lips over her ear.

  “You smell like the berries from the mountain. Fresh, wild, and a little dangerous. You taste that way, too. One kiss and I have a boner as hard as a rock. You do that to me.”

  She reached higher and wrapped her hands around my neck. Her back arched and her chest rubbed against mine. “Keep talking to me. I feel like I’m going to go up in flames.”

  “I want to spend the rest of my life waking up next to you. Waking up in the middle of the night, in the morning, from naps, here, there, wherever.”

  I pressed my weight into her and trailed my hand from her throat down to her hip. “I’m going to make sure there isn’t a day that goes by that you don’t know what I feel for you.”

  She moaned when I pressed into her harder. “Even when I’m old and wrinkled?”

  I dipped my head and ran my tongue over my mark on her shoulder. When she shivered under me, I slipped my hand between our bodies and down the front of her lacy panties and slid a finger into her soft, wet folds.

  “Even when you’re old and wrinkled. Even when you stare at me too long and I start to wonder if there’s something on my face. Even when you’re a little bitchy. Even if you burn the rest of your hair off.”

  Her laugh turned into a moan as I used the heel of my palm to rub against her clit as I worked my finger in and out of her core. She pressed her head back into the pillow and tried to widen her legs. “Wyatt. More.”

  I nipped her collarbone and then lowered my mouth until I could take one of her nipples into my mouth. I sucked hard, sliding another finger into her, stretching her and readying her body for me.

  Georgia’s fingernails bit into my back as she gasped. Her body tightened around my fingers and she lifted her thighs to wrap them around me. “I want you in me. I want you, Wyatt. Always.”

  I bit her nipple and then soothed it with my tongue before moving up to her mouth. I’d been a fool, but I wanted her forever. I loved her.

  “I’m so close!” Her lips parted and her eyes squeezed shut as I shifted my fingers slightly. She clamped down around my fingers as her pussy started to pulsate. Her nails dragged down my back and then she clamped her teeth closed on my neck.

  I gritted my teeth and quickly ripped her panties off. When I sunk into her, her teeth scraped down my skin and then she was gasping for air.

  “I love you, too,” she whispered in my ear.

  My chest threatened to split in two, my heart was beating so fast. Hearing her say that she loved me was the single most powerful moment of my life.

  “I want forever. I want…you. This… Forever.” Her voice was broken as her body continued to convulse under me.

  I stopped moving, desperate to last longer. Hearing her say those things to me put me way too close to the precipice. “You’re going to make me embarrass myself. Fuck, Georgia.”

  She opened her eyes and met mine in a fierce stare that took my breath. “I want to feel you come. I want you to feel as good as you make me feel.”

  I was gone as soon as she said those words, but then she tightened around me and it was over. I thrust into her a few more times and then I came hard. I buried my face in her neck and breathed in her scent as I tried to recover.

  “Forever.”

  I rolled onto my side, taking her body with me so she was curled against my chest. “Nothing less.”

  Her arms still held me and she slowly stroked my back as she pressed sweet kisses into my chest. “I was miserable at the idea of leaving.”

  “Me too, sugar. Letting you walk away was the hardest, and dumbest, thing I’ve ever done. I don’t plan on making that mistake again.”

  She smiled into my skin. “I’m going to start some kind of women’s club.”

  I furrowed my brow. “Huh?”

  “I heard all about your little boy’s club. You and the guys sit at the same table and you talk guy talk and do things together and you’re tight. The women don’t have that. We’re going to, though. We’re going to have our own table and we’re going to rule that bar.”

  I sighed like it was a hassle, but secretly I was more than enjoying the idea. Georgia was not only staying, but she was putting her mark on the place. “I’m sure Thorn will love that plan.”

  “I’ll go up the mountain with you some, too. Not too much. I’m really bad at it. I did like the fishing, though. And the party. I had fun making everyone happy.” She blinked up at me. “When I come, can we have a real tent?”

  I groaned. “Sugar, I lead a survival tour. If I’m the only one in a tent, I’m going to look like a pus-”

  “Wyatt.”

  “Sure. We can sleep in a real tent when you’re there.”

  She grinned and I felt my world move. “Thank you.”

  I would do anything to keep that smile on her face. Even if it meant being wrapped around her finger and sleeping in a tent that smelled like plastic. Anything to make sure she knew that she was lovable and loved. Forever.

  THE END

  HUTCH

  1

  Veronica


  I was drunk. No, I was beyond drunk. I was wasted, trashed, blitzed, besotted...ugh! My head swam and I grabbed the back of a chair to steady myself, ignoring the man sitting in it. I tried to gauge how far I was from the table where I’d been sitting earlier in the night, before dancing. Ten feet? Maybe fifteen? I closed one eye to stop seeing double. I could do it. If I just propelled myself, using the chair I was leaning on, I could make it to the table. Probably. Then, I could sit there until I felt less like I’d been riding in one of those little tea cup rides for hours.

  I counted down from five and then made my move. I pushed off as hard as I could manage, but the guy who’d been in the chair must’ve stood up at the last second because the chair was suddenly weightless. It went flying across the room and I fell flat on my ass.

  It probably wasn’t as funny to anyone else, but there I was, sitting on a dirty, sticky bar floor, giggling my butt off. This was so unlike me. Normally, I’d be embarrassed by drawing any attention to myself, but in that moment, I couldn’t find shame. Instead, I just found the whole thing funny. I was wasted, and not in a cute way. Was there a cute way to be wasted?

  Allie’s face appeared in front of me, sporting a big grin. “Looks like you took a tumble.”

  I waved it off. “I just decided to have a sit-down for a few seconds. You’d be surprised how comfortable this floor is… this nasty, icky floor.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “I believe that’s the first time I’ve heard two sentences back to back from you, Ronnie.”

  Ronnie. The ladies had nicknamed me. I’d never been nicknamed before, unless you counted when the mean kids in high school called me Virgin Veronica.

  “I like Ronnie much better than Virgin Veronica.” Did I say that out loud?