by Mina Carter
Had he been any other bear, Dean would have suspected he’d changed slowly on purpose. To prove he could do it and as a subtle snub to Creed that he wasn’t a dangerous enough opponent to warrant a fast chance. But no, as Prime he knew the capabilities of all his bears and Brad Harrison really was a slow shifter.
Harrison, now fully furred up, roared across the pit. Creed ignored him, lifting his hand to study his fingernails as though checking whether they were dirty or not.
The fact his opponent didn’t consider him a threat seemed to piss Harrison right off. Dropping to all fours, he charged. The crowd held their breath. With the big bear lumbering toward him, Creed’s admittedly big frame seemed dangerously small and fragile. He’d be torn apart by Harrison’s lethally sharp claws…
Just before the bear reached him, Creed looked up, yawned and twisted to the side. Almost bending over backward, he slid under Harrison’s paw and front leg as he lashed out with his claws. They slashed across the air where Creed’s head had been moments before, hitting the side of the pit and biting deeply into the wood.
The bear grunted in surprise, the sound carrying across the pit, but before he could yank his claws free, Creed had moved. Lightning fast, he hammered three or four blows into the bear’s furry side. When the last blow hit, Creed’s knuckles buried in Harrison’s fur, bone cracked like a gunshot. A broken rib… a favorite move of Creed’s. Dean was surprised Harrison had fallen for it. Surely he’d asked people about how Creed fought before facing him in the pit?
The bear grunted in pain, wheeling away to favor that side as he tried to track his opponent around the pit. Creed didn’t give him a chance to settle down or catch his breath though. Throwing dirt up into Harrison’s eyes, he attacked hard and fast, stepping in close to Harrison to slam blow after blow into his furry opponent.
He danced around the bear, making Harrison howl in pain and fury as he twisted and turned, trying to land a claw on the still human Creed. But he was too fast, never where Harrison thought he was going to be, or already moved on from where he had been. He added slaps in between the punches, enraging Harrison and making him lose his temper.
Not for long though. A right hook to the jaw threw Harrison’s head to the side with a meaty crack. A tooth flew loose from the bear’s mouth, embedding itself in the wood like a bullet as blood splattered around it.
The bear staggered to the side, shaking his head. Then his back legs folded under him and he sat down heavily, an almost comical look of surprise on his furry face. It seemed a world where he didn’t win hadn’t occurred to him.
Dean rose to his feet, his expression set as he looked down into the pit. Harrison was still sitting, but had started to sway from side to side as though he were in his own private little world.
So be it.
They’d all known the outcome of this match before it had begun. Only idiots like Harrison with his puppet master, Anderson, whispering sweet nothings in his ear, thought otherwise.
“Since Harrison looks to be unable to continue the fight,” Dean announced, pitching his voice to carry to all those crowded around the pit, “I declare Creed the winner.”
A cheer went up from the crowd, proving again just how well-liked Creed was, despite his reticent bear. Only Anderson’s little group turned away, muttering angrily among themselves. Dean sighed. There was a problem he was going to have to sort out, and soon. Because he’d turned to watch them go, he missed movement in the pit below.
“No! Creed, watch out!” Kait’s scream made him snap his head around to see Harrison surge forward and swipe his claws across Creed’s unprotected back. Creed staggered, his face suddenly pale. Several bears lifted their heads and sniffed as a metallic scent hit the air.
“The bastard used Carve!” Lilly roared as she dropped into the pit at the same time.
“You want to poison someone, asshole?” Lilly snarled, backing Harrison up into the corner. “How about you try that on me?”
“And me,” Dean snarled, dropping down into the pit next to her. Other bears lined the edge of the pit, ready to help but none dared drop down with both Lilly and Dean in there.
He didn’t expect them to. No one in their right mind wanted to get into the pit with him, not for any reason. Not when he loosed his hold on his bear and let the beast start to broaden his back. The two of them stood between Harrison and Creed, shielding the stricken bear as they advanced on his attacker.
Fury swirled through Dean. To attack a man when his back was turned was the lowest form of cowardice—something he didn’t like to see from any bear in his clan.
“See? See! It wasn’t Carve!” Harrison all but screamed, sweating where he was pinned between Lilly and Dean, and pointing toward Creed. “How could he be on his feet if it was Carve? He’d be deader than a dodo!”
Dean looked over his shoulder to see Creed roll to his feet.
“He’s mine,” the big man growled.
The murderous expression warned Dean to move out of the way and fast. He might be Prime and mean as fuck in a fight, but there were some looks in a man’s eye that warned a brother not to fuck with him. Harrison had put a claim in for Creed’s woman and then tried to kill the man himself—and not in a fair fight. It would be fair to say that Creed was pissed, and from the look on his face, hell was coming with him.
Dean shrugged and stepped back, spreading his arms. “He attacked while your back was turned. He’s all yours.”
He turned away. Lilly followed him, pausing for a moment to murmur to Harrison, “May your soul be welcomed with loving arms.”
It was the bear prayer, said to those who were certain to die. The last rites of the furry kind. It was all they said, all they needed.
“What?” Fear filled Harrison’s voice as the two walked away, leaving him with Creed. Dean reached Kait, cupping his hands to boost her up out of the pit before hauling himself out with a swift move that spoke of long experience.
“No, no, no…” Harrison whined. “You can’t leave me with him. It wasn’t Carvix. It was horse sedative mixed with rat poison. Just something to slow him down.”
“Makes no difference,” Creed growled and then grinned. Even Dean would have given it up as a bad job and hauled ass out of the pit if he’d seen that expression on an opponent. “You’ve had your fun. Now it’s my turn.”
Then Creed…changed faster than any bear Dean had ever seen. Apart from himself, of course. Within a heartbeat, his tall figure was replaced by four hundred pounds of pissed-off werebear.
“Please, no, don’t hurt me…” Brad whimpered.
From then on, the fight went quickly. Dean stood by, next to Kait, in case she needed anything. Most of his attention was on the fight though. For all that Creed was one of his, he’d be failing in his duty as Prime if he didn’t study how all his bears fought. One day he could be facing a challenge from any of them.
He sure hoped it wasn’t Creed. As a man, he was dangerous, but as a bear…
“Fuck me,” Lilly whispered. “He’s freaking lethal.”
“Agreed,” Dean murmured. “Not on the fucking thing though. No offense.”
“None taken,” the she-bear replied, folding her arms as Creed finished the fight right there in front of them.
Standing, Creed folded his bear back inside and growled at his whimpering and bleeding opponent. “Fuck off, Harrison, and remember today. Remember you owe me your life.”
The beaten bear scuttled off as fast as his legs could carry him.
“Anyone else?” Creed challenged the crowd clustered around the pit. There was a shuffling of feet and a general avoidance of his gaze as no one answered. Dean hid his smirk. Yeah, right. After seeing Creed in action, none of them wanted to step in the pit with him, and Dean didn’t blame them.
“That’s it, folks. Show’s over.” He stepped forward, drawing all eyes to him. “That means buggar off and go home!”
Chapter 4
The next time Kacie woke, she was alone and her head was
a lot clearer. For a moment she lay there, looking up at yet another ceiling that wasn’t hers. Then her memory kicked in.
“Oh. Oh, shit.”
Heat flooded her cheeks as she remembered being in Dean’s arms, being kissed… Oh god, that had really happened, hadn’t it? She pressed her hands to her cheeks in an attempt to cool them down, a small squeak of dismay escaping her lips. Shit, shit, shit. She’d thought she was in a dream, but she must just have been rattled from the accident.
She stopped, hands halfway down from her face. Her mind filled with memories of the alley, big men attacking, the flash of claws in the moonlight. Pain in her stomach and blood everywhere. Then…nothing.
“Oh my god…” she breathed, horrified. They’d been attacked behind the library. How the hell could she have forgotten? Horror filled her. Shit, were Kait and Lilly okay? Of the three of them she was the most capable, the other two wouldn’t have stood a chance.
“Dean! Dean!” she bellowed, hurtling herself out of bed and across the room like a small, human-shaped missile.
Reaching the door, she almost yanked it off its hinges and raced through it. The unfamiliar corridor took her aback for a moment. She’d never been in Dean’s house. Hell, before now she’d hardly been on speaking terms with the guy. Ogling, yes. Speaking, no. Apparently though, if her memories were correct, they’d skipped speaking and gone right the way up to near-sex-while-standing terms.
“Dean!” she yelled again, trying each door in the corridor as she passed it. For heaven’s sakes, how many rooms did one guy need? Had he gone out?
She got her answer as the last door opened before she touched the handle, revealing Dean, naked to the waist with rumpled bedhead.
Ohmyfuckinggodhesgorgeous.
She stopped dead, like a rabbit caught in the headlights, her eyes wide and riveted to the wide expanse of chest with its sexy smattering of hair.
“You yelled? Is everything okay?” he asked, his voice all sexy and deep from sleep. Within a few seconds, though, his gaze sharpened and became worried. Instantly, he was by her side, taking her hand in his as his free arm wrapped around her waist like he was worried she’d collapse right there on the landing.
“Uh, yeah. I’m fine,” she answered automatically and then quickly gathered her wits about her.
“We were attacked. By men with…” Oh fucking hell, he was going to think she was crazy. “With knives. Are Kait and Lilly okay? Please tell me someone’s checked on them.”
“Knives, huh?” He had an odd look on his face as he led her into the room, the door swinging shut behind them. She tried to ignore the fact that it was his bedroom, and the big, wide bed was the one he’d just slept in. “Are you sure it was knives?”
No, it was goddamn claws, but she couldn’t tell him that. She nodded. “Uh-huh, definitely knives. One of them…”
She trailed off, her hand smoothing over her stomach. A frown creased her brow as she tried to make all the pieces of her memory fit. “One of them stabbed me. That’s why there was so much blood. But for an abdominal wound…”
Her words trailed off again and she just looked at him. Nothing at all about this situation added up, and she couldn’t blame it on a dream or the after effects of an accident now. Which left either the possibility that she’d fallen down some freakishly big rabbit hole, or she didn’t have all the information she needed. But Dean obviously did…
“Right, handsome. How about you start telling me the truth?” she said, scooting away from him on the bed. Not far, just enough to put a little distance between them so she could collect herself.
She had to be realistic. Dean was a big man, and fast as hell… or he used to be at school. Like the rest of the girls, she’d watched him on the field and boy, the guy could move. She didn’t suppose his service in the army had lessened that speed, probably increased it, what with people shooting at him and all. So, if he wanted to grab her, there wasn’t much she could do about it.
“I don’t know what you mean.” He gave her that little half-smile and confused shake of the head that all but short-circuited her brain. But she was onto him now. Either he was the world’s biggest cute but gullible nice guy, or he was playing her with misdirection and her own feminine responses.
“I’ll lay it out for you then, shall I, hotshot?” she cut in, anger and frustration making her voice rise.
“We were attacked by men with knives. I’ll call them knives, but right now? I’m not convinced they weren’t something else. No,” she snapped, lifting a finger when he opened his mouth to speak. “You don’t get to talk yet. I am. So… we were attacked and I was stabbed in the stomach. Now, since you’re a veteran, I’m assuming you’ve done more than basic level first aid. So you know that the appropriate emergency treatment for abdominal wounds is to take the casualty to a hospital… NOT the dining room of whatever guy finds them, no matter how sexy he is. So, cut me a break and tell me what the hell is actually going on here?”
He considered her for a long moment, and then slowly, a broad grin spread over his face. “So you think I’m sexy?”
* * *
The look that flashed across Kacie’s beautiful heart-shaped face was a mix between frustration and rage, tempered with a little, more than a little, feminine interest. Whatever it was, Dean found it utterly fascinating and delightful.
“Anyone ever tell you that you’re cute when you’re mad?” he murmured, reaching forward to chuck her under the chin.
Anger flared in her eyes and she shook off his touch. “Only those with a frigging death wish. Now are you going to explain why you didn’t take me to a hospital and…” Her face fell. “Oh god, Lilly’s terrible with blood, she’d have passed out. Kait’s made of stronger stuff so she’d probably be alright. Please, are my friends okay?”
The pleading note and the way she looked at him, like he could make everything in her world okay again, did him. That trust humbled him. Scooting closer to her on the bed, he took her hand in his.
“I promise. Your friends are fine. Lilly didn’t pass out—” He had to smother his smile at the idea of the head enforcer being squeamish about blood. She wasn’t, no alpha could be in a clan structure, but he understood why she’d let her human friends think that. “— And Kait is definitely made of stronger stuff.” Strong enough to accept that her soul mate was a bear-shifter anyway.
Before answering her other questions, he closed his eyes for a second, preparing himself. He had to get this right. Not just almost right, or nearly right, but spot-on, one hundred percent dead right. Bear clans didn’t have many when it came to laws, so the ones they did have were cast in stone. The most sacred of those was that humans did not know about bears.
If they found out, one of two things happened. They either mated a bear… or they were killed. No ifs, buts or maybes about it. Dead.
But he couldn’t kill Kacie. That knowledge welled up from the center of his soul and he knew he just couldn’t do it. He couldn’t even give the order to someone who could. If she rejected him as a mate…
He opened his eyes and looked up, studying the ceiling without seeing it. He’d send her away, say she had mated someone else. It would kill him but, hell, he’d even find her a suitable mate himself. Anything as long as she lived. Anything.
A soft touch on his arm brought him back to the present, and he looked down into her chocolate-colored eyes.
“Still with me?” she asked in a soft voice. “You went somewhere else there for a moment.”
She grounded him. Completed him. Dean sighed. And he had to tear her understanding of the world apart.
“We didn’t take you to a human hospital because they couldn’t have treated you.” In the end he went for bluntness and honesty. “The men who attacked you weren’t men. They weren’t human and those weren’t knives they were carrying.”
She nodded slowly, keeping her gaze on his. He could see the cogs turning behind her eyes and pride filled him. His mate was smart. She’d already started to
put it together even though it didn’t make any sense to her.
“They were—“
“Claws,” she cut in. “They were claws. And if they were claws, they could have given me something, couldn’t they? Like rabies?”
He managed a small nod. “Possibly.”
“So what were they? You said they weren’t men.”
“They were ursanthropes.”
“Ursanthropes?” Her brow furrowed at the unfamiliar word. “What, like lycanthropes?”
“The same thing, yes, but lycanthropes are wolves. Ursanthropes are bears. Bear-shifters to be precise.”
“Bears.”
Just one word. That’s all she said, watching him like he’d gone out of his mind. He braced himself, waiting for either hysterics or outright laughter. Neither seemed immediately forthcoming. Instead, she sat next to him on the bed in silence, a thoughtful look on her face.
Dean held his breath, hardly daring to hope. His bear was equally quiet, as though it too, held its breath waiting for her answer.
Finally, she looked up at him, curiously. “I take it you’re one…a bear?”
“Yes, sweetheart. I am.”
Just that little admission felt good down to his soul. He’d told his fated mate what he was. Now all that remained was to show her and then bite her… He hauled his over-active imagination back from its little joyride. She had to actually say yes to being his mate first…
He didn’t stop her as she reached out, touching his chest lightly. He flexed his pec just as she did, making her jump and squeak.
“Dean Sterling!” she gasped, slapping his arm lightly. “Stop making me jump.”
“I won’t do it if you touch me again,” he promised, and he didn’t. He just watched as she reached out to press her fingertips lightly against his skin.
“Your bear is inside you?” She seemed fascinated, but he wasn’t complaining. Being touched by her, the feel of her soft little hands smoothing over his chest was like all his Christmases come at once.
