Roland, page 4
part #2 of Werebear Mountain Series
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Roland had stayed well away from Maggie since the moment he’d slammed the front door behind him and noted that she jumped in place. She eyed him like he’d just tossed a fresh kill down on the floor at her feet and demanded that she skinned and gutted it ready for the damn fire pit. At least, in his mind she did.
“Rayner?” She had hope-filled eyes again, and he hated to disappoint her a second time, but on the other hand, the longer Rayner stayed away then, the longer she’d be obliged to stay in his cabin with him.
He certainly didn’t want to spend his time following her around like a lost puppy, but he thought that was what might happen if he didn’t man up and take her scent before she got fed up of waiting for her friend to return and left.
Roland’s beast growled long and hard at him. Somehow, he didn’t think the bear was going to let her go that easily.
She had to be his mate. Even for the simple fact that his bear was overreacting every time he thought about her leaving, he wasn’t feeling much better about that prospect either.
“Not yet, sorry,” Roland said. At least, it wasn’t a lie, technically Rayner wasn’t around. “I need a drink — do you want a drink?” Boy, could Roland use one?
“When you say drink…?”
“Scotch — beer — something stronger than water.”
“Sounds good.” Maggie didn’t see how a little Dutch courage was a bad thing. There she was, sitting in the kitchen of a bear shifter’s cabin, with no idea what she was doing there, except that she needed help, and she didn’t even know if Rayner would or could help her.
Her big, growly, host wasn’t how she’d expected a shifter to be, especially, a bear shifter. He might not have had the social graces, barking out orders, and stuff, but then neither did she.
He seemed … off, like something was bugging him, annoying or frustrating him, but she couldn’t put her finger on what it was. Obviously, it could have been her presence.
Perhaps the man didn’t like humans.
Perhaps the man didn’t like females.
He sort of looked at her as if he liked females, but what did she know? She was clueless too — maybe, they should be clueless together.
Maggie caught herself on that thought. Together? Them? The man probably looked at her with pity, and she just didn’t realize it.
Maybe his irritation was that he wanted to get rid of her, wanted Rayner to come back faster, and she could understand that. He probably regretted offering her shelter in the first place.
“It’s strong — go slow,” Roland said as he handed her a tumbler that was a quarter full of Scotch.
Maggie acknowledged his warning with a nod of the head, lifted the glass to her lips, and downed the whole thing in one. Damn, did she need that?
The fiery liquid heated her body all the way down. He was right; it was a good Scotch.
Roland stood with his mouth hanging open and his eyebrows reaching for his hairline. She’d surprised him.
“Well,” he gave a small shake of his head and snapped out of it. “Okay then.” He chuckled.
He guessed you never could judge a book by its cover. Something which he should already have known considering he was a shifter.
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Rayner, Bowie, and Dane had doubled back over the land to where Dane had parked his truck. There was Maggie’s beaten up old car, blocking Rayner’s truck in, and making it impossible for her to move it.
That got a goat. She liked being in control, driving herself places, and now Dane would be in charge.
Who was she kidding? Dane was always in charge. He was the alpha, and that was something that she was going to have to get used to.
“Shotgun,” Bowie said.
“I’m his mate — you’re in the back,” Rayner informed him, grinning from ear to ear with smugness.
“She’s not wrong,” Dane said and watched as Bowie’s shoulders dropped at the same time as his head hung low from his neck. He grumbled something to himself that even Dane couldn’t hear, and yanked open the back door.
“Hey, would you look at that,” Rayner announced. “Being a mate to alpha had its advantages after all.” She chuckled, and Bowie grumbled some more as he slammed the back door shut.
“You’re planning on torturing him in other, subtle, ways, aren’t you?” Dane chuckled.
“You bet I am,” Rayner lied.
After her talk with Bowie, Rayner had a better understanding of why the man couldn’t look her in the eye. An accident was an accident; she just needed to remind herself of that every now and again.
CHAPTER EIGHT
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It was getting and harder, and harder for Roland to resist the urge to take one damn big sniff of the air, and with it; her scent, and find out once and for all if Maggie was his mate.
His length was harder than steel, his muscles felt as if they were twisted in knots, and he had urges – damn big ones – that involved taking her down to the kitchen floor, caging her in, and scenting her properly.
He was doomed. If she wasn’t his mate, then there was something really screwy going on in his head and body.
His bear rumbled a long, deep growl inside of him, and he slammed the palms of his hands down on the kitchen counter to try to quash the ripple of urges that threatened to become a tsunami.
“I’m sensing – issues,” Maggie said. That was the second, or maybe third time that he’d caused her to jump in her seat and boy, was she not appreciating it. “If you want me to go…”
Roland held onto his temper that wasn’t aimed at her, but right at his damn stupid bear, and he turned a quick look in her direction. That quick look became a stare; a long, hard stare that he couldn’t seem to break.
He was mesmerized by her. Something akin to need clawed within him, and he cursed under his breath as he turned on his feet and started toward her.
Maggie snapped up straighter in the chair. She wasn’t sure what was going on with the man, and she wasn’t sure that she wanted to stick around to find out either.
Now, he was headed right for her, and she had little to no chance to get away. With the two, or three steps that it took him to close the gap between them, she didn’t stand a chance in getting the heck out of there and making it as far as the edge of the kitchen, let alone to the front door.
“What’d I do?” Maggie squealed out as Roland’s large hands clasped around her upper arms, and he hauled her out of her chair to her feet.
“Not a damn thing,” Roland growled before dipping his head toward her neck and taking a really big sniff.
“O … k,” Maggie said with a grimace as she waited for the crap to hit the fan.
There was definitely something going on with him that she wasn’t privy too, but when a hard, deep – and what sounded like hungry to her ears – growl went through his body and vibrated against hers, she was sure she was about to find out.
Mine…
Roland’s bear stated the claim that, really, they had both already known, and the man wasn’t sure if he wanted to fall to his knees at her feet and worship her, run headlong into a damn brick wall, or kiss her until his lips were tired. Not that they would get tired.
“Umm,” Maggie wasn’t sure what to do.
In her book, the good news was that it didn’t seem he was planning on biting, chewing, or eating her in any way shape, or form. The bad news was that he was sniffing her like she either smelled really good or really bad – without a roadmap to bear shifters, she couldn’t make that one out.
“Mine…” Roland growled against her ear and every inch of Maggie’s body that wasn’t already tense, due to his sniff test, went rigid.
“Wanna tell me what the hell that means,” Maggie rushed out, although, she was sure she might have stammered there somewhere, but her brain was otherwise occupied, and she couldn’t remember.
Roland reluctantly pulled back from his mate. His eyes were jet black, and he stared at her as if he’d just seen something really tasty that was on the menu.
She wasn’t. At least, she hoped that she wasn’t.
“It’s kind of self-explanatory, don’t you think?” Roland teased, and those jet black eyes were laughing.
Maggie didn’t much feel like laughing in those seconds. What she did feel like doing was getting the hell away from him before he went bear-shit crazy.
She didn’t know what that would look like, but she wasn’t prepared to stay around and find out either. This whole thing had been a horrible mistake, and she steeled herself.
One well-placed knee in his groin and his eyes weren’t laughing anymore. His hands never lost their grip on her upper arms, and she squealed out in surprise when his knees caved, and he fell down to the floor, and worst of all, he took her with him.
That was not how she’d planned that panning out.
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Dane pulled on the steering wheel and smoothed the car into a U-turn. Rayner had heard the conversation that Dane had on his mobile phone, and a buzz of excitement went through her. Adrenalin dumped into her system, and she was more than ready for action.
A friend, who wanted to remain anonymous, had spotted Tank in a property on the edge of town. That was the good news. The bad news was that he wasn’t alone.
“You stay in the truck.” Dane shot a sideways look at his mate and noted the scowl on her forehead.
“Right,” Rayner nodded. “Bowie stays in the truck.”
The sound of Dane’s low growl of annoyance rumbled toward Rayner’s ears in the small confines of the cab, and her bear grumbled back. Bowie pushed forward in his seat, and his face appeared between the mates.
“Stop growling like that; you’re upsetting Rayner’s bear,” he said. Rayner snorted a small chuckle as Dane shot him a glare.
“I’ve got it, thanks,” Dane grumbled, lifting his hand, facepalming Bowie and shoving him backward. Rayner chuckled a little more.
“I’m not debating this one, Rayner. You stay in the truck, or I’ll turn this thing around right now,” Dane said, trying his damnedest not to growl along with his words.
His brother was probably right. He didn’t need to be growling at her, not when they were traveling down the road at fifty with nowhere for her bear to burst free but on the passenger seat.
Somehow, he kind of thought that would make driving a real pain in her furry backside.
“Geez, Dane, so damn serious,” Rayner tried to distract him, but it didn’t work – she guessed that he was getting used to her tactics – she’d have to come up with some new ones.
“I mean it. Say yes, or I’m turning the truck around right now.”
“Yes, pouty,” Rayner grumbled. “I’ll stay in the damn truck.” Rayner sighed. She’d do what he asked – right up until it was time to do something different.
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Roland was in sure-fire agony from the knee to the balls that his little human she-demon had delivered to him. He felt sick to his stomach, and the fire that lined his belly came right from the white-hot pain in his damn sack.
If he didn’t know that his body would heal him sooner than the average person, it might have been a tempting thought to just cut off his own balls. It probably would have hurt a lot less than they were right then.
He was also painfully aware that his mate was trapped beneath him. She was groaning at the crush of his weight pressing down on her, but he wasn’t exactly crushing her to death, at least, it didn’t much sound like it. Just squishing her a little. She kind of deserved that.
Still, he’d rather get off her sooner rather than later, but he just couldn’t find any strength within him to do anything other than hold his balls.
Maggie was wriggling like a damn snake beneath him, and at any other time then he might just have enjoyed that feeling, it might even have sent his mind off in a very X-rated way, but not when his balls were burning with the fire of a thousand supernovae.
He could truly say; hand on heart, that he wasn’t enjoying being on top of his mate, not even a little bit. In fact, right then, he’d probably have considered wringing her neck, if he had the strength to do it, and his hands weren’t kind of busy.
CHAPTER NINE
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“Get off me,” Maggie bit out, and Roland had a few choice words that he’d like to offer back to her, but all he could do was gasp for breath, and offer a rumble of pain in the back of his throat that he couldn’t even push past his lips.
Maggie finally managed to get both hands free and palm his rock hard chest. There was a momentary urge that flashed within her mind to go all touchy-feely against those muscles and see just how hard they actually were, but that was wrong, and she knew it.
She felt bad that she’d kicked the guy in the balls. It wasn’t her usual go-to move, not that she had a go-to move because situations like these never arose for her.
If she wasn’t out at the library, bookstore, working, getting groceries, or grabbing takeout and coffee, then she was normally curled up in bed or on the sofa reading a good book. Men didn’t really figure in her life in anything other than a work-shop routine, and there was the nice librarian that liked the same books that she did and commented on them once in a while, but even he was married.
There she was, thinking naughty thoughts that didn’t belong in her mind, and lying under some sexy bear shifter guy after she’d done him wrong. Whoops.
But, she still needed to get up and get the hell out of there before he stopped holding his balls, and started trying to kill her. Even if he didn’t, it would still be … awkward.
Life just didn’t seem fair, somehow. She pushed against his chest, and he barely moved at all. He was a dead weight and little wonder.
Maggie felt as if it was a hopeless cause, and then he offered up a growl, a good one; it was deep and sounded angry to her ears, but she finally felt his weight shift a little as one large hand slammed, palm down against the floor next to her head, and his head came up. She winced at the sight of his beetroot red cheeks, and his accusing eyes didn’t help matters much either.
“I just want to go now,” Maggie rushed out, by way of an explanation, and he growled again.
“If ever – there was a time to say – not damn cool – this is it,” Roland bit out between sucking in hard breaths.
His balls would recover, his trust in her; not so much. And there he was thinking of her like the sweet little human that needed to be handled with care.
Damn, she’d certainly blindsided him with that one.
“Can you get off me?”
“Still, kind of busy holding my balls.”
“Only with the one hand,” Maggie said with a small wince, but he caught it. Maybe she had a conscience. “You’re heavy.”
“And you’re deadly with your damn knee. Had a lot of practice?” He growled as he tried to push up and ease his weight from her a little more. She was right; he needed to move, he didn’t want to squish his mate.
“You’re my first…”
“You’re a natural.” He offered her a sour look, and she couldn’t help herself – she chuckled.
Roland almost choked on his tongue at the sound of her amusement. She thought kicking someone in the balls was funny – who the hell did that?
“You’re…”
“Pissed off.” He growled again; he couldn’t help himself.
“Funny – you’re funny.” Maggie pressed her lips together in an attempt not to laugh. She wasn’t laughing at the man’s pain, she actually still felt guilty for that, but the look on his face, the tone of his voice, and his sarcastic humor was just like he’d walked out of one of the books that she liked to curl up with.
“Glad I could amuse you,” he said with a deep frown of uncertainty cutting into his forehead, and a look of pure suspicion in his eyes.
“Stop pouting…” she chuckled again.
“I don’t pout…”
“That bottom lip says differently.”
“You kicked me in the balls!” he bit back with a big dollop of disbelief for her actions.
“I didn’t kick you…”
“The searing pain I just experienced says…”
“It was my knee…”
“That’s nitpicking.”
“Nothing wrong with picking a few nits,” she said and followed it up with a beaming smile that lit her eyes and held him mesmerized.
Roland wasn’t sure if she jabbed him with her little fist in his stomach. It sure felt like something hit him there.
His shifter blood was both a blessing and a curse. His balls felt a whole lot better, but his length was getting harder with each second that ticked by.
He needed to get the hell off her, and fast; before she felt something that he couldn’t deny.
“Is that…?” Maggie stopped in mid-question, and her eyes narrowed as she considered it, filling in the blanks.
Roland winced. Busted.
“By-product of being kicked in the balls…” he rushed out.
“Knee…”
“It likes to prove it’s still alive…” he lied. It was all her and being that damn close to her.
“Like; you can’t keep a good man down?” She grinned again.
“Well, they do have a mind of their own.” Roland pushed up from her, and she sucked in a breath.
His body protested the loss of contact. His bear protested the fact that he hadn’t acted on instinct and claimed her. His balls still protested a little, and he groaned.
He wasn’t going far, and neither was she. Roland wasn’t going to let his mate out of his sight until he’d made her his.
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Tank saw the two big bear shifters through the window as they climbed out of their pickup truck, and had rushed out of his sister’s house in full protection mode. He wasn’t one for asking questions when his sister and her cub were around, and he’d shifted into his bear before Dane could say a word to him.
