I didn’t feel like I deserved Ophelia’s kindness. How was she even looking at me and not seeing the worthless hussy I saw in my head? Even though her brother had cruelly betrayed me, I’d still done something horribly wrong. I’d slept with her boyfriend. Well, her future boyfriend. I wanted the ground to open and swallow me whole.
Matt’s arm wrapped around me and he scowled. “Look what you did. You made her cry.”
I waved my hand at him. “They didn’t do anything, Matt.”
“You’re crying, sweetheart.”
Ophelia snorted. “Matt, we cry when we’re happy, too. Now, go on. We’re going to take care of her.”
I waved my hands more and turned to them. Veronica, the librarian, stepped forward. She wiped the tears on my cheeks and shook her head. “It’s okay.”
I cried harder. “I don’t deserve this…”
Matt pulled me into his chest again. “Sweetheart, what’s going on with you?”
Ophelia tugged me away from him and to her side. “Go, Matt. We know what we’re doing. Presley and I are going to have a chat, just the two of us. Trust us, we’ll get her changed and dolled up good as new.”
I found myself being pulled into the guest room. Ophelia spun around to ask me something, but she turned faster than I’d expected causing me to flinch and duck away.
Her face fell and she slowly and gently took my hands. “Presley, what’s going on? Did you think I was going to hit you?”
I tried to shake my head, but her eyes boring into mine made it impossible to lie to her. I had thought she was going to hit me. Suddenly frustrated with myself and the weakness that I couldn’t seem to shed, I stepped away from her, towards the window.
“I would deserve that, Ophelia. How you can even look at me after everything…I’ll never know.”
She frowned. “We’ve already talked about that stuff, Presley. I know all about what happened with Kyle. I’m not mad at you. Not at all. I’m disgusted with my brother for what he did, but you’re innocent.”
We had talked, true. But our conversation hadn’t done much to squelch my guilt. “I don’t feel innocent.”
And wasn’t that just the kicker. Somehow, while simultaneously feeling like a child who couldn’t take care of herself, I also felt like a shameless trollop who’d carelessly hurt people just because she was hurting.
Ophelia grabbed my arms again and gently shook me. “You’re innocent. While I don’t love the fact that you slept with my ma- boyfriend, he wasn’t my boyfriend at the time. I also know that neither of you would entertain any such thoughts now. Kyle was awful to you, of course you were in pain and looking for a kind shoulder. Not your fault. If anything, I should go punch Sterling for it. It seems like he just took advantage of you.”
I didn’t know what to say, how to respond. There were several seconds of silence where neither of us said a word. Then, Ophelia spoke softly, “What did they do to you out there in Macon’s Edge, Presley?”
I met her eyes and pulled myself up straighter. I wouldn’t fall apart. If I fell apart, they’d all know, and there’d be nothing left. No home, no stuff, if there was no solid me, I felt like I’d cease to exist. I lifted my chin. “Nothing that I couldn’t handle.”
She wrapped her arms around me and hugged me. “There she is. That’s the badass I want to see. No more meek, ‘fraidy cat Presley. You, my friend, are a badass. I don’t know what you lived through out there, but I get the impression that it wasn’t all daisies and puppies. You made it through that, and you can make it through this. Okay?”
I blinked back emotion and nodded.
“Good. Keep that spine straight. Georgia will eat you alive if you’re not strong.”
“Hey! I heard that!” Georgia called through the door. No longer hiding her eavesdropping, she pushed inside the room and frowned. “I won’t eat you alive. We’re going to have a girl’s day today and talk. I feel like I’m out of the loop on a lot of stuff here, and y’all know how I hate to be uninformed.”
Matt stepped in and smiled at me. “Take today off, Presley. You and I can talk later.”
Allie popped her head in. “Are you two dating? Sam didn’t mention that. By the way he sounded, I actually thought that he was interested in Presley.”
My cheeks heated and I felt myself slumping towards the bed. Things were a mess.
Ophelia pressed her hand to my back. “Nuh-uh. Straighten your back. No hiding.”
Veronica, the librarian, turned a puzzled gaze to Matt and frowned. “You’re not dating, are you?”
I groaned and threw myself on top of the bed. “This is crazy.”
Matt cleared his throat. “Yeah, we’re, uh… dating.”
“Are you sure?”
I looked at Veronica and by the way she was eyeing Matt, I knew she knew he was gay. I quickly realized that that made sense. She had to know, because the way I had found out was by stumbling upon the book he was reading. It was a gay love story, checked out of the Burden Public Library.
I threw up my hands in a gesture of surrender. “No, I lied. We’re not dating. We’re just friends.”
When they all just quietly stared, watching me, I let out a long, frustrated breath.
I sat up and ran my hands through my hair. Tugging lightly, I made an unhappy face. Scowling felt good so I kept doing it. “I lied because Sam was holding me and things were happening! It was too much—too intense! I couldn’t handle it. I’m a big chicken and I’ve never felt quite so overwhelmingly sexual—nothing like that. So, I lied. Worse, I made Matt lie and I’m terrible.”
Matt quirked an eyebrow. “You don’t look like you feel terrible.”
I realized I was still scowling and had crossed my arms. A laugh bubbled up from my stomach and I didn’t keep it down. The sound was ridiculous, but I couldn’t stop, and more laughter bubbled up. Who knew confession could feel so good?
“I don’t feel terrible right now. I probably will later, but right now, I just feel like doing something crazy, something fun.”
Matt frowned. “She’s snapped.”
Ophelia shook her head and laughed with me. “No, she’s branching out. Come on. Let’s go get crazy.”
10
Sam
I sat at our usual table at The Cave after a long day and watched Kyle Barns across the dance floor. How he had the nerve to come back into a shifter owned bar after the things he’d said about shifters during a fight with Sterling was beyond me. That wasn’t even my biggest issue with the asshole, anymore. I’d found out from Allie that Presley Gray was Kyle’s ex-fiancée.
My mate had been engaged to the shithead standing across the bar with his pool stick, looking smug about getting a ball in the corner pocket. The fact that that creep had touched her, made me want to snap his weak little backbone in half.
“What’s going on with you? You look like you want to snap Kyle Barnes in half like a twig. Not that I don’t agree, but brother, you’re putting some extra heat in that glare.” Hutch looked at me and then over at Kyle. “On second thought, maybe you should just break the asshole.”
I growled. “He was engaged to Presley.”
“Presley? Matt’s girlfriend?”
I growled louder, drawing eyes to our table but not giving a fuck. “My mate.”
Hutch froze for several seconds before emitting a low whistle and sitting back in his chair. “Son of a bitch.”
Sterling joined us, spinning the chair next to me, and straddling it backwards. He raised his eyebrows when I turned a glare at him. “What?”
“I would like nothing more than to put you and Kyle in a room and beat the living shit out of you both right now.”
Hutch whistled again. “This just keeps getting better.”
“What the hell did I do?”
“Presley Gray, that’s what you did. She’s my mate.”
His face paled, “What?”
Thorn dropped into his chair and looked around. “Say again.”
“She’s
mine and you touched her.” Thinking about it was eating me alive. I felt like killing someone.
“Wait, you found your mate? What the… When the… I really missed something. Can we back up here?”
Sterling’s face burned and he slowly folded his hands together on the tabletop and met my eyes. “Dude, I didn’t know she was your mate. That was a lifetime ago. I promise.”
“Who’s your mate?”
I ignored Thorn. “You don’t understand the fury coursing through me right now.”
“Presley Gray. Matt’s girlfriend. Kyle Barns’ ex-fiancée. Sam’s mate.”
I tossed a glare at Hutch. “Thanks.”
Thorn joined Hutch in the whistling game. “Shit, man. She’s the girl that made Ophelia hate on you for a while, right, Sterling?”
I swiped my arm across the table, knocking everything to the floor. I stood up and planted my hands on the table top while leaning over it, getting closer to Sterling. “She’s my mate. The rest of it doesn’t matter. Don’t talk about her. Don’t look at her. Don’t fucking think about her.”
Sterling gritted his teeth. “I’m not! I don’t! You know I’m mated, right, Sam? I’m not a threat.”
“That’s not what my bear says.”
“Come on, Sam, calm down.”
“Fuck you. Would you be calm if one of us had fucked your mate?”
Thorn growled. “Don’t even fucking say that.”
I straightened and shook my head. “I don’t want to look at you right now.”
Sterling stood up and grabbed my arm. “You need to realize that I’m a brother. I didn’t intend to hurt you. It was an accident.”
“Stop touching me, Sterling. I’m not in the mood.”
“No. This isn’t happening. Fight it out with me.”
I shoved him away from me. “I don’t think that’s safe for you right now.”
Thorn stood up and caught Sterling before he could shove me back. “I don’t think this is the time, Sterling. He’s not ready.”
“No, it’s perfect. If he wants to fight me over a woman that is dating his cousin, fine. We can do that.”
I growled and lunged for him. “My fucking mate. Don’t disrespect that.”
Thorn yelled for everyone to get out of the bar and got out of the way as I knocked Sterling in the jaw. My bear had other interests, though. Out of my peripheral vision, I saw Kyle slowly strolling towards the door, not a care in the world. Even as Sterling landed a punch to my face, I spun and charged Kyle.
Thorn grabbed me before I could reach the asshole and held me back while yelling at Kyle. “You want to live, I suggest you get the hell out of here.”
Kyle glared at me. “What’s your fucking problem? You boning my sister, too?”
Sterling growled and came after Kyle, too, barely held back by Hutch. “Watch your fucking mouth!”
“Presley is mine!” I’d completely lost control. My voice was more bear than human at that point and the effect seemed to scare Kyle into moving.
He fled from the bar and left us growling and brawling with each other.
I couldn’t calm down and I felt panic blossom in my chest. I didn’t know if I’d ever find peace again. Throwing my head back, I shifted and roared at the top of my lungs. Looking around the bar, I watched Thorn approach me with his hands out.
“You’re okay, buddy. You want to go splash in the creek and drink some whiskey?”
I growled at him and lumbered towards the door. I knew I couldn’t make it through the doors as a bear, so I shifted back to human, but just as my hand touched the door handle, the sweetest scent washed over me.
“Incoming.” Thorn yelled and tossed one of the servers’ aprons at me.
11
Presley
My anxiety was causing second thoughts to arise, but my new friends had refused to let me back out of my desire to throw caution to the wind and get a little crazy. Matt had sent me with them, letting me have the day off. I owed him big, but that wasn’t anything new. I owed all of the women around me, too. They hadn’t just brought me clothes and makeup, that I didn’t know how to use, they’d offered me a new life.
Veronica owned a house that she didn’t live in anymore, now that she’d moved in with Hutch. For a while, Ophelia had stayed there, but she’d since moved in with Sterling. So, Veronica offered the place to me. She practically begged, saying that she didn’t like the place to sit empty. When she offered it at the same rental fee as the other house I’d been paying on, I couldn’t refuse. Best of all, it came fully furnished.
I’d gone from losing everything that I owned to blinking and having it all replaced with better things. It was like magic. I felt a little awkward taking their things, but they were pushy and insistent about me keeping the clothes and makeup. For some reason, they warmly welcomed me into their little group and made sure that I was taken care of.
They also teased me mercilessly about Sam. So much so, that I’d cracked under their pressure and admitted everything. I told them that he’d scared me and that I’d panicked. I’d claimed Matt as my boyfriend in the heat of the moment and didn’t know how to go forward. They encouraged me to call the whole thing off and go for Sam, but I couldn’t express enough how much I’d been scared away from relationships by Kyle. I didn’t want to say it either, knowing that Ophelia was listening. He was still her brother. I didn’t want to upset our newly formed friendship.
I’d done things that day that I’d never done before. Things as simple as drinking a margarita that Georgia made for us and swearing out loud with something worse than the word h-e-double toothpick. Father would’ve been horrified, and I was learning that I was probably okay with that. I was still scared of him, it seemed, but a day of fun with friends who weren’t judging me was unbelievably freeing.
They got me situated in Veronica’s house and waited while I showered and got the “hippie smell” off of me. Then, they laid out clothes and made me pick the ones that I liked the best. I didn’t know what to choose. The clothing that I would normally have ventured towards wasn’t there. None of the women seemed to own full-coverage clothing, or they’d kept those items for themselves. Instead, I was presented with and array of tight jeans and small tops that showed my bare stomach. I finally found myself a long skirt, and grabbed one of the shirts and went into the bathroom to try them on.
I was terrified to come out of the bathroom in the outfit I’d chosen, but once I did, their positive reactions charged me. The skirt brushed the ground as I walked, slightly too long, but it made me feel ethereal and a little like a princess. The tank top didn’t meet the top of the skirt and showed my belly button. I tugged at it, but that dragged the low-cut hem down too far, until I had to yank it back up.
I wore my long hair down my back, waving wildly, and let them show me how to apply mascara and blush. I wasn’t crazy about the feel of lipgloss, but it tasted like strawberries and I could get used to that.
When I was done, I looked in the mirror and couldn’t help but smile. The woman staring back at me looked just like the woman I wanted to be on the inside. Free, a little wild, eager to wander and explore her world. Funny how a few articles of clothing and a little makeup did amazing things for my confidence. I noticed myself standing taller and holding people’s gazes for longer.
After a long day of hanging out at my new place, enjoying giggles and girl talk, they wanted to head to the bar and really corrupt me. Their words. I wasn’t sure. The first, last, and only time I’d set foot in a bar, it hadn’t ended well. Now, they wanted us to go to the same bar here in Burden.
Feeling slightly tipsy from the margarita, I was in tune with something wild in me, begging to get out. The new me wanted to test her limits. She was so far from the old me, who I’d left back in Macon’s Edge, I needed to get to know this new me.
I was nervous, but I knew that I was ready to face whatever was waiting for me this evening. I was mature and ready to start handling my life.
The other
women filed into the bar and an explosion of giggles erupted. When I stepped inside and looked around to see what laughter was all about, I got more of an eyeful than I expected. My body heated to an inferno temperature, a crazy feeling of instant arousal threatened to devour me whole.
Standing in front of me was Sam, naked except for a too-small apron tied around his waist. His facial expression morphed from surprised to ravenous. His eyes raked over my body, and mine trailed over his. Without his helmet, I could see his dark hair was short-cropped and matched his stubbly beard. He had cute, boyish dimples. There was nothing boyish about his body, though.
Tall, with wide, broad shoulders and a tapered waist, he was perfection. His chest was hard and the small nipples there were slightly tanner than the rest of his golden skin. His abs looked like I could hand wash clothes on them. Only his groin area was covered by the apron, and my eyes followed thickly muscled thighs, lightly coated in dark hair leading down to large, bare feet.
Knowing that he was naked except for that little square of cloth did something to me. My body ignited. I tried to remember some of the bible verses about staying pure that Father had forced my sisters and me to chant over and over, and I couldn’t think of a single one. My only thought was that obviously, God had played a role in creating the man in front of me, because he was perfection, and who was I to not steal as much time as I could appreciating God’s creation?
My brain emptied even further when he stepped towards me, his dark blue eyes burning brightly as they continued their examination of my body. I’d just done the same to his, but having him do it to me set my skin on fire. Heat spread from my cheeks to my neck and chest.
When his eyes met mine again, he licked his lips slowly and a low growl purred from his chest. I’d never heard a man, other than him, growl. I was quickly discovering it made me weak in the knees.
Bears of Burden Complete Series Box Set Page 43