by Milly Taiden
“Who hired you to break into Mrs. Wilder’s home?” He stared through her, not saying a thing. “What were you looking for?” He didn’t move. “Did Barry let you in?” That drew his eyes to hers, but he continued his silence.
“Look,” Summer said, “you’re caught. Why don’t you help yourself and tell me who’s to blame?”
“You look, little girl. These guys are killers who don’t give a shit how cute you are. You get in their way and they will have you for lunch. They are desperate and beyond caring. Leave it alone and go home.”
He hung up the phone, stood and walked out.
She could do nothing but watch. Well, if that wasn’t worth a crap. She sighed, hung up her phone, thanked Officer Pelon on her way out, and drove off with no more info than what she arrived with.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Winter pulled into the parking lot for her sister’s apartment building while Summer nearly slept in the passenger seat.
Summer sighed. “Thanks for letting me borrow the car today, sis.”
“When will yours be ready?” Winter asked.
“I don’t know. I need to ask Quinn what—” Summer clacked her mouth closed as they drove past a car that looked identical to hers except it was clean on the outside—including the tires shining.
“Is that your car?” Winter asked. “Wow, it looks new.”
Summer read the back plate. “Yeah, well, at least it has my license plate number. But how did it get fixed so quickly? An army had to have worked to get it done so fast.”
“I wonder how it got here,” her sister said with an unusual tone to her voice. Her sister was a terrible liar. She was the one who could never keep a secret and ruined surprise parties. A smile reached her lips. Oh, Summer knew how—a sexy teddy bear.
Summer opened the door before the car had fully stopped. “Thanks, Win. I think I have a visitor waiting for me. Someone who may have borrowed a key from you.”
“Maybe.” Winter laughed. “Don’t tell him I gave away his surprise.”
“I won’t. Love you.” She pushed the car door closed and waved as Winter drove off. After today, she needed some serious down time, and she knew who she wanted to get down with.
Opening the door to her place, the aroma of spicy marinara and sausage overtook her. She breathed deeply and realized she hadn’t eaten at all today. After locking the door, she set her purse on the countertop and stepped into the living room.
On the coffee table were two glasses of wine and a couple pillar candles. But she barely saw those with the scene behind them. There on the sofa, as naked as the day he was born, Quinn sat with a bouquet of flowers lying over his manly parts.
“Is that for me?” she asked.
“Both are,” Quinn answered.
“You talking about the flowers and the sausage?” she teased.
“Okay. Let’s put it this way instead, the dinner, the flowers and naked me are all for you,” Quinn amended with a wink.
Summer closed the distance between them while Quinn stood. His erection had already joined the party.
“You’re very presumptuous. Thinking you can cook me dinner, buy me flowers, and I’ll just fall into bed with you.”
“Oh?” Quinn said, dropping the flowers onto the couch. “You don’t want this?” He gestured to his body. Summer felt heat flush her face. Oh, she wanted him all right. How did he have that many abs? Was that even humanly possible? Or, rather, shifterly possible?
Quinn kissed the curve of her neck softly then let his lips drag up until he kissed her cheek. Summer shivered at the gentle caress.
“I can smell your desire, love. And it is the most delicious thing in the world.” He ran his lips across hers, before kissing her sweetly.
“You’re being a tease,” she said, feeling her legs shake from her raging lust.
“Shall we take this to your bedroom?” Quinn asked, clearly sure of himself.
Summer wasn’t going to deny that she wanted him, because, oh fuck, did she want him. He’d barely touched her and she knew her underwear were soaked through. Quinn was just that potent.
“Let’s,” she responded, making up her mind to tease him as much as he was teasing her.
Turning on her heel, she walked toward her room slowly, stripping out of her clothes as she went along. She didn’t have time to finish her striptease, though. Quinn took her in his arms and dropped her on the bed.
“You’re driving me crazy,” he growled. “You’re so sexy.”
Summer watched in fascination as he tore her underwear. Well, good riddance. They were burning up her skin anyway.
“You’re in a hurry,” she teased. “And here I thought you were seducing me.”
Quinn ran a knuckled along her slit.
“Love, you’re so wet, I could take you right now. I did seduce you.”
He wasn’t wrong. And he proved his point further by plunging two fingers into her pussy. His thumb toyed with her clit. Summer moaned and felt her skin light up with a desperate need to come. Quinn knew how to touch her, where to touch her. It seemed to be pure instinct, like he had been made to love her.
“I want to fuck you, Summer. Come for me so I can give us both what we want.”
Summer was powerless against her own lust, against Quinn’s movements. Her orgasm built quickly and surprised the hell out of her.
“That’s it, baby,” Quinn coaxed as she rode out the after waves.
He kneeled onto the bed and palmed her thighs, keeping them open. Summer blushed when she realized his eyes were glued to her pussy.
“I need a taste,” he murmured before dipping down to lick her juices. “So good,” he said. The air of his breath against her core made her shiver. “I need you, Summer.”
“I’m yours. I’m here. Take me.”
He wasted no time. He flipped her over onto her stomach and lined up his cock with her entrance. He eased in, slowly. Too slowly. Summer moaned and tried to move her own hips to accelerate the pace.
“My impatient little vixen,” he murmured against her ear. “I’ll give you what you want.”
And he did. He increased the rhythm, hands firmly planted onto her hips. It was so good. She was so full. Summer tweaked her nipples as he plowed into her from behind. She felt the tight tension building inside her.
Quinn’s groans of pleasure made her feel powerful. She was making her man lose himself in her. She wanted to hear him come.
“Fuck me harder, Quinn,” she purred.
His grunt of appreciation was delicious. He bent over her and entered her that much deeper. It only took a few more thrusts for Summer to go over the edge. She cried out her release, clenching Quinn’s hard length as she came.
She felt the change in his pace, his grip on her hips hard, and then he groaned out as his seed filled her. Quinn dropped a kiss on her shoulder before gathering her up in his arms.
“We’re not done,” he promised.
“We better not be,” she quipped back.
By the time they got to eat dinner, it was well into the night. They ate naked on the couch before Quinn fucked her from behind on the sofa.
Summer lost track of all the positions he took her in and how many orgasms she had. But by the time she fell asleep, Quinn was etched onto her skin, onto her heart.
She was his, she knew that. It had happened quickly, but everything in her knew that her bear was just what she was missing.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Summer downed her morning java requirement on her way out to the black bear town to look for Barry. Her mind kept returning to last night and how incredible Quinn was. If this was what the rest of her life would be like, sign her up.
Now she needed to get her head in the game and focus on the black bear town. She wondered why the black bears and the brown bears couldn’t live together. What made them so different that they had to be a half-hour drive apart? Didn’t seem to make sense to her, but she didn’t know all the facts either.
The s
ign for Blisstown city limits came into sight. What a name. Was this a utopian wannabe? The first building she saw looked to be a one-time family restaurant. Now, a family of weeds was the only thing in the parking lot.
After passing an intersection with an ice cream shop as the only remaining business, a small park area stretched to the corner with a gazebo badly in need of paint in the center. A one-light traffic signal dangled on sagging wires in the middle of town, but no color flashed. It was as dead as the rest of the area.
Ahead, a cute sign reading Blisstown Historical Society sat among the beige grass. She guessed this was as close to a tourist information booth as she was going to get. Pulling into the lot, she felt like she walked among ghosts.
When opening the door to the building, a bell overhead tingled, just like on old-fashioned general store.
“Just a moment” came from a backroom. The interior was quaint with wall-to-wall shelves of framed black and white photos, old books, and jars of homemade marmalade.
“Oh, hello there.” An older woman with gray hair wrapped in a bun at the nape of her neck looked Summer up and down. After a deep breath, the woman smiled and asked if she could help.
“Well, I’m actually looking for...” She stopped in front of a large photo of the town she just drove through, but she didn’t recognize it.
“Isn’t that a lovely photo,” the woman said, joining her. “That, there...” she pointed to a man standing in the gazebo, a very tall and large man. Easily an alpha. “Is our greatest mayor, Mayor Blackmon,” she said. “He cleaned up the town.”
“Cleaned up how?” Summer asked.
The lady harrumphed and lifted her nose. “At the time, there was a large group of boys who loitered and sprayed graffiti every place there was a wall.”
“That’s kind of normal in all towns, isn’t it?” Summer questioned.
“Well, of course. But there was an incident that was so heinous, it would never be forgotten by those who live here.”
Damn, if that wasn’t a story needing to be told, she didn’t know what was. Summer had the distinct impression this lady was a gossipmonger of the first degree. The twinkle in the woman’s eye as she talked was a dead giveaway.
“Oh my goodness,” Summer dramatically said, playing along by placing a hand over her gaping mouth. “What happened? Can you tell me?”
The woman stepped closer to her, looking around to see if anyone else was in the practically deserted front room.
“It so happens,” the lady started, “I worked at the town’s sheriff’s office when it happened.” Summer leaned in as if to join in the conspiracy. “It was never confirmed, but one of the brown kids and several others from out of town drowned one of the alpha’s sons.”
Oh, that was serious. As a PI, not all of her cases had happy endings, but none had ended in confirming a death. Things like this gutted her. “What do you mean ‘brown’ kids?” Summer asked.
The woman’s eyes widened and looked around. Summer didn’t think the historian meant to use those words, but it was very telling.
“I meant their last name was Brown,” she said, wringing her hands.
“So how did Blackmon clean up the town? The kids weren’t put in jail, were they?”
“Back in those days, discipline was taken care of according to cla—to tradition of the family.”
That’s wonderful, Summer thought, but didn’t answer the question.
“So,” she pushed, “what happened?” She wasn’t an idiot. A non-shifter could see the writing on the wall for that story. The ‘Browns’ were kicked out of town and started their own den a half hour from here.
“Never mind,” Summer said. “You said it was never confirmed. Does that mean there was no evidence supporting the accusation? No eyewitnesses? What about an autopsy?” Her private investigator experience was showing.
The woman stepped back, frowning. Apparently, she didn’t like Summer’s line of questions. “I’m sorry,” Summer backed down, “I get carried away with stuff like that. I watch all those forensic TV shows, you know?”
The elder headed back to the counter. “Who did you say you were looking for?”
The word witch caught Summer’s eye from a headline. “What’s this about a witch?” The woman stopped and looked back at her. With a big gasp, Summer dramatically laid her hands on her chest, hoping to entice the historian into another story. “You had a witch here in Blisstown? What did you do?”
Summer didn’t want to be condescending, but she really wanted to know about the witch. That twinkle sparkled once again in the older woman’s eyes.
“Rumor said the woman was a witch, but only the old ones truly believed that. She was an herbalist working on a line of curatives she wanted to sell to those big drug manufacturers for lots of money.”
“Curatives, you mean she only worked on cures, like for cancer?” Summer thought Blisstown was an odd place for something like that.
“I assume,” the historian said, then leaned closer to Summer. “Between you and me, I think she dabbled with the hard stuff.” Her head bobbed up and down.
“Hard stuff?” Summer wasn’t sure what she meant.
“LSD, cocaine, mind-altering nasty potions. Why else would an herbalist, as she called herself, work in a place like this? Hmm?”
“What happened to her?” Summer didn’t comment on the word potion she said. The truth came out in the end.
The woman shrugged. “I think she sold her drugs and made a lot of money. She moved away and we never heard from her.” She glanced around and leaned into her again. “I heard that she was arrested for drug trafficking, but I haven’t really followed up on that so I don’t know how true it is.”
Summer looked around for anything else to catch her eye. Nothing here was of great help, but she now knew what had caused the split between the bears.
Summer said, “I’m looking for Barry.”
The woman’s demeanor changed again. What was the deal with her?
“Do you mean Barry who worked at the fancy hotel?”
“Yes,” on the counter were business cards for a business called Dates & Mates, “do you know him?”
The woman picked up the heart-covered card and slid it in front of her. “I don’t know him personally, but Annabella would. She knows everyone here in town. She’s our own matchmaker.”
Of all businesses to still be in business, a matchmaker for an almost ghost town didn’t seem likely. She guessed love thrived during good times and bad.
“Yes,” the lady said, “go down to see Annabella right now. She’ll help.”
“Thank you. I will.” Business card in hand, Summer sauntered toward the door. Something niggled at the back of her head. Something wanted to form in her mind. In the corner of her eye, movement caught her attention, but not in time to avoid bumping into a tiny woman holding a broom and dustpan.
Summer’s shoulder tagged the little lady’s arm, knocking her against the counter then to the floor. Immediately, Summer was down to help her.
“I am so sorry. Are you all right?”
The small woman was in a daze, her eyes barely focused on Summer. Had she hit her head when she fell? She stuttered a few sounds.
“Bess,” the historian said, hurrying to the end of the counter.
“I didn’t mean to hit her,” Summer pleaded.
“Of course, you didn’t. Poor Bess hasn’t been doing well for several years.” They both helped Bess to her feet where she wobbled for a moment. “I got her, thank you.” The historian walked Bess into a back room.
Summer made her way out to her car and sat for a moment to collect herself. Something about Bess bothered her. Maybe it was that she looked so fragile, so frail. Or maybe that she looked like she’d been on LSD her entire life.
Summer blew out a breath and started her car. She glanced at the building, and peeking out between the curtains, the older historian wore a scowl on her face as she talked on the phone. When she saw Summer looking at her, s
he closed the curtain. Hopefully, she was calling for help for Bess.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Quinn opened to the door to his home and hollered out. “Hello? Dad, Ms. Grendel? It’s me, Quinn.”
“Come in,” a sweet older voice called from within the home. “Your father is still in his room.”
Quinn stepped in and closed the door behind him. “Thanks, Ms. Grendel. I’ll look in on him.” He headed down the hall toward the bedrooms and stopped at the door on the left. Immediately, the smell of his father hit his senses.
In the years since he was young, Quinn noted the slight changes in his parent’s scent as his mind degenerated. The last ten years had seen the most decline. It killed him that his father had to suffer. Most single mates would’ve died long ago. But his dad was an alpha and Quinn was more than grateful he was still around.
He tapped on his dad’s bedroom door. When he didn’t hear a reply, which he didn’t expect, he went in. The man sat on the edge of the bed, looking older than he ever had. Anguish tore through Quinn at seeing the blank sadness consuming his father’s expression.
Quinn noticed his dad held a small picture frame in his hands, which he stared at unblinking. “What’s that, Dad?” he asked as he stepped closer. When Quinn tried to take it from his hands, his father’s grip tightened.
Quinn frowned and pulled harder. His father growled and then his fingers punched through the glass, breaking the covering into shards.
“Shit, Dad.” The fragments fell to the ground, the photo coming halfway out of the cheap frame. “Dad, just let me get the glass out of the way then you can keep the picture, okay?”
The weathered fingers released the old cracked wood and Quinn took it. He gasped when he realized it was the same photo they had seen in the trunk in the house. His father had saved it from the fire when they escaped.
Quinn still wondered why his father had gone there. Quinn never knew where his mother had lived when she was young. Of course, his dad would know, but why go there after so many years? And why look in an obscure trunk in the attic? Quinn was baffled.
