Tears burned behind her eyes. Her stomach twisted into knots. “Why?” The question slipped out before she could stop it, but once it was out, she needed an answer. “Why now?”
Her hands trembled at her sides. She wanted him to touch her, stroke her, warm her body while she slept. All the things she’d dreamed a mate would be.
“I’ve watched you pull away bit by bit. The bright strong amazing energy inside you shrivels and dies a little more with each passing day. I am losing you right in front of me. I am watching your soul die and I am dying with you.”
Tears ran down her face now, scalding her cheeks as much as the hot water from the shower burned her shoulders.
“I don’t know how it will work with us, with the tribe, with whatever might be left of my pack, but I want you Ava. I want to be your mate. I want you to be mine. Fate put us together and I ran like a coward because I thought it would be too hard.”
He knelt to the floor in front of the shower stall and bowed his head. Ava shuddered in a breath and put a hand against the wall for balance. Her knees felt like jelly and her head was swimming.
It couldn’t be real. She was dreaming.
“I am at your mercy. I will rise only if you wish it. I will touch you only if you wish it. I will leave if you do not wish to have me any longer. I deserve whatever fate you speak.”
Ryder looked up, regarding her with the same careful expression she’d seen in the eyes of his wolf. Her body was humming. Her heart was drumming. She’d dreamed of this moment. How it could be. How he would claim her, but not standing naked in the shower, water spraying over her, him kneeling on his knees in Connie’s bathroom. Beautiful and regal and asking her to forgive him.
This she hadn’t dreamed. This she hadn’t expected.
She took a deep breath, feeding her lungs the oxygen she’d deprived them of over the last minute or so. Then the air came easier. Ragged quick shuddered breaths. She couldn’t breathe fast enough to keep up with the pace of her racing heart.
Ava licked her bottom lip and clenched her thighs. A punishing wave of pleasure blossomed deep in her belly, even more than before.
Ryder’s nostrils flared. His gaze dipped to the apex of her thighs and a husky groan rolled from his chest. Deep. Desperate. Determined.
She forgave him. She did. There was no life without him. Only emptiness and despair. She’d felt it descend upon her as the days had dragged on. It had been killing her soul, just as he claimed.
Ava reached out a hand, tracing the line of his cheek with her fingertips. A spark tingled through her fingers and up her arm and straight to her heart like a lightning strike.
Did he feel it too?
Ryder didn’t speak, but he rose from the floor and stepped into her. He was taller and broader and for once she felt small and feminine and protected. His arms circled her, strong and secure.
They’d touched before. She’d carried him down the mountain. But it was the first time he’d held her. The first time she’d felt as though she belonged in his arms. The first time she’d felt her need mirrored by his own.
It was good.
The unrest and doubt and worry settled in her chest, sunk to her feet, and slipped away, draining out of the shower along with the running water.
He does feel it.
The spark in his mate’s gaze gave him hope. She touched him and everything was right in his world again. Everything he’d been fighting against fell away just like his shed tosa. This was all of him. Everything he had to offer.
His heart.
His soul.
His life.
He was hers. Completely and eternally as the Fates had decided in that split second on the mountain in the middle of the fight. Her soul call had glowed from within her from the first moment he saw her, but it had been fading over the week they spent together, dying out like an untended campfire. Now her skin was brightly luminescent from the magick again and she glowed brighter than ever before. She was his moon in a dark night sky.
He’d nearly wasted Fate’s gift with his stubbornness and foolish notions of what was acceptable and what could work. He was wolf. She was bear. On Reylea perhaps it would’ve been impossible. But here in this new world. It was a fresh start. The old rules didn’t have to apply.
The tribe in Mystery was an example of how much things had changed. Those warriors had all found humans as mates.
Ava was his and from this moment on he would fight for her.
9
One of Ryder’s strong hands slipped around the back of her neck, tightened, and pulled her mouth to meet his.
Everything poured out of Ava at once. Her frustration. Her doubt. Her desire. Her fear. Her pleasure. The kiss was everything she’d dreamed it would be and the promise of more. Her belly tightened. He angled his head, kissing deeper. Harder.
A half moan slipped from her throat. Her hands rose of their own accord, digging her fingers through his long black hair, wrapping tightly and pulling him closer. She stroked her tongue against his and a growl erupted from his chest.
He took charge of the kiss. The amazing mind-numbing all-encompassing kiss. He stroked every part of her mouth. Fought with her tongue. Nibbled at her lips.
Her body quivered and shook as desire coursed through her body. Her skin tightened. Her nipples were hard against his bare chest. Need for him burned away all other thoughts. She reached for his hard cock, wrapped her fingers around his thick girth and tugged.
Ryder fingers laced into her hair and he growled into her mouth. “Shuarra,” he said, his voice breathy and deep. “I would take you now.”
“Yes,” Ava said, her tone more of a desperate whine than she would’ve preferred to admit. She let her hand slide down his granite hard silky length. “Make me yours.”
A moment later her back was against the shower wall. She slapped at the lever until the running water shut off and stopped pouring over them.
His hands were on her ass now, lifting her up, aligning her core with his shaft. Everywhere he touched burned like he was fire and she was ice. His mouth trailed down her collarbone, kissing and sucking and nipping until her breath hitched and she gasped for air.
Pure unadulterated desire tugged from deep inside her, radiating out from her belly to between her legs to the very tips of her fingers and toes. Every inch of her body was primed and ready and hungry for his touch.
His chest heaved against hers. He pinned her tighter to the wall of the shower and guided her legs around his waist. She ran her hands over the magnificent expanse of his body, appreciating and memorizing every small line and detail. She would know him by touch. By smell. By so much more than sight.
His cock bobbed just below her sex, teasing and prodding and testing her non-existent patience. “Ryder,” she moaned, her voice a husky growl. “Please.”
His mouth clashed with hers again. Their tongues mated and danced and consumed each other. A promise of how he would claim her very soon.
“I will not be slow, Shuarra. I will not be gentle.” He tore his mouth from her and nipped at her wet shoulder, a precursor to a real bite.
“I need you now,” Ava said, digging her fingernails into his biceps. She rocked her hips, dragging her wet throbbing clit over his waiting cock.
Ava’s back arched. Pleasure unlike any she’d ever felt rocketed through her body with his first thrust. Then again with his second. So deep. So full. In and out. Harder. Harder.
She whimpered and clung to him, wanting more. Needing more. And then she crested. A soft scream tore from her throat as wave after wave of her orgasm washed over each and every cell in her body. Ryder kept pumping and driving and taking everything she had to give.
“Mine. Shuarra.”
“Yours,” Ava cried out as Ryder ground his pelvis against her already super sensitive clit. Another orgasm rocked through her before the last one had completely faded.
So good. So good, she thought desperately. Wildly. And yet, she wanted more. She let herself si
nk into the trance he was weaving around her. There was only Ryder. Only his scent. Only his touch.
Her bear rose from inside, the growl rumbling from inside her chest like a caged animal. Magick swirled through her and around her. Her fangs elongated and she snarled possessively before sinking them into the meat of Ryder’s shoulder. The bitter metallic of his blood spread through her mouth along with a peaceful feeling of completion.
Ryder tasted his mate’s blood. Felt her body wrapped around his. Felt her clamp down and milk his cock.
Everything was amplified, the pleasure unbelievable. He continued to mate her, thrusting into her hard and fast, joining them as one. As Fate intended from the start.
His wolf recognized her bear. Her mouth remained clamped to his shoulder, giving him a mark he would carry for a lifetime. His fangs descended and he leaned into her neck, licking and tasting until he found the soft spot he sought. Then he bit.
Her body tensed around him. Her sweet sex spasmed around him as another climax rocketed through her body. This one brought his forward. Brought his seed up and he roared, jerking his hips, pinning her even harder to the cold tile wall.
“Ryder,” she moaned through where her lips and fangs met the skin of his shoulder. Her bite burned with a pain he relished.
He needed her more than he’d ever needed anything in his whole life. More than his pack. More than his family. She was everything.
Time froze while they soared together, flying in their passion and new soul mate connection. He forced his eyes open and watched the glow fade from her tanned skin. It was done. They were bonded. Connected forever.
He released her neck and licked the puncture wounds his fangs had created. They would heal quickly. Reyleans always did.
“Mine, shuarra, Ava.” He shifted, drawing his cock in and out again, and loving the little moan of surprise that slipped from her lips. She released his shoulder from her mouth, licked the wounds a couple of times, cleaning the blood and then leaned her forehead against his arm, taking in little shuddering breaths.
He wasn’t even close to finished with his new mate, but he wanted more than a cold wall to show her how he could care for her. How he could make her scream until she had no energy to move from his blankets. How he would never leave her again.
He glanced behind him at the small wash room. The floor was hard stone squares except for the bright rug and his discarded tosa. But his mate slept in this house. She had to have a sleeping mat or bed somewhere.
“Where do you sleep, shuarra. I would make you mine again. Every day until I breathe my last.”
Afterword
You have reached the end of Ava and Ryder’s story…for now. Thank you for coming along on this fantastic ride with me. There’s so much more to come and I’m excited to share this world with you. I hope you loved Bearly A Chance!
Never fear there will be more of Ava and her wolf in the upcoming books!
This series is the ultimate combination for me. Not only do I get to write about more soul mates (which is a theme of mine, if you hadn’t figured that out already) I get to write about all different kinds of shifters from a different world. The town of Mystery gets to be my home for the next year or so and I’m just flipping excited. There are so many stories to tell. So much more going on beneath the surface that you’ll find out as the books progress and our cast of characters and Mystery family grows.
To learn more please connect with me on Facebook or in my Facebook Clubhouse! And on Instagram (if you want to see pictures of my dogs, lol) , and please consider writing a review of Bearly A Chance. They help. Really they do. Sometimes a review makes the difference between a new-to-me reader giving my books a chance or not.
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About the Author
Krystal Shannan lives in a sprawling ranch style home with her husband, daughter, and a pack of rescue Basset Hounds. She is an advocate for Autism Awareness and shares the experiences and adventures she’s been through with her daughter whenever she can.
Needless to say, life is never boring when you have an elementary-aged special needs child you are homeschooling and half a dozen 4-legged friends roaming the house. They keep her and her husband busy, smiling, and laughing.
If you’re looking for a story filled with adventure, passion, and just enough humor to make you laugh out loud. Welcome home!
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Bearly A Chance
Copyright © 2019 by KS Publishing
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No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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