The house had been built with modern lines and angles, but inside it was friendly and warm.
“It’s lovely,” Dani said. “Did you take those pictures on the walls?”
Cole nodded. “I’m a freelance photographer. I shoot landscapes and wildlife for magazines and websites. Come through to the living room, and I’ll get you a drink. Do you want tea or coffee, or something stronger?”
“A tea would be great,” Dani said. She wanted something stiff and alcoholic but her tolerance for alcohol wasn’t great, and since she’d already had a beer tonight, she didn’t trust herself with anything stronger than a cup of tea.
Cole opened a door and led her into a large living room with a stone fireplace and a plush sofa and easy chairs. The carpet in here was dark green, and a thick green rug lay in front of the hearth. Logs and kindling had already been placed in the fireplace, waiting to be lit. Cole went over and took a box of matches from the mantelpiece. He lit one and touched the flame to the kindling. As the flames licked around the logs, they began to crackle.
“I’ll be back in a minute. Make yourself at home,” Cole said before disappearing out through the door.
Dani wandered around the room, already feeling at home. Every piece of furniture, from the sofas and easy chairs to the plush carpet and big fireplace, spoke of comfort. She could imagine spending lazy days here curled up with a good book in front of the fire.
The photos on the wall were of landscapes similar to the ones in the foyer pictures. But there were also some color shots of birds, and a couple of photos of a man playing tennis.
The man, who had been captured serving in one shot and swinging a backhand in another, looked a lot like Cole. He had the same handsome face and a similarly muscled, athletic body. He might be a little younger than Cole, but not by more than a year or two. The match he was playing looked like part of a professional tournament. The stands were full of spectators in summer outfits, most of them wearing sunglasses. Dani wasn’t a rabid viewer of —that was more Simone’s scene—but she was sure she recognized the grass court and the scoreboards in the photo.
Cole came back with a tray holding a teapot, two cups, a sugar bowl, and a small china milk pitcher. He set the tray on the coffee table in front of the sofa.
“Is that Wimbledon?” Dani asked him, pointing at the pictures.
He nodded. “I took those last year. That’s my brother, Brad. He travels the tennis circuit and makes a living from prize money and sponsorship deals.”
Dani grinned. She couldn’t wait to tell Simone that “pantie-melting” Cole had a sporty younger brother.
“Do you have any other siblings or is it just you and Brad?” She was sure that if there was another brother, he had to be less good-looking than Cole and Brad. There couldn’t be that many amazing genes to go around in one family.
“That’s our older brother, Carter, in the picture over there,” Cole said, pointing to a photo of a slightly older but still pantie-melting man dressed in a sheriff’s uniform. He was standing by a police car outside a building that had a wooden sign reading “Sheriff’s Office” over the door. Carter was smiling at the camera, arms folded. He had the same broad shoulders and bulging biceps as Cole and Brad. The only major difference between Carter and his brothers was the mustache he sported. It reminded Dani of Magnum P.I., and definitely suited the man.
What gene pool had these three brothers sprung from?
“How about you?” Cole asked. “Any brothers or sisters?”
“There’s my younger sister, Leigh. I don’t have a photo to show you, though.” She and Leigh had never seen eye to eye. Leigh had always been reckless, and seemed to base her actions on one simple question: Will this piss off Mom and Dad? If the answer was yes, Leigh went ahead and did whatever it was she wanted to do. Dani hadn’t seen her sister for over a year, and the last she’d heard, Leigh was bumming around in California with a group of surfers. Before the surfers, she had been involved with a motorcycle gang in New Mexico. “Shall we have that tea now?” she asked to avoid any more questions about Leigh.
“Sure.” Cole went to the table and poured the drinks. He gestured for Dani to sit on the sofa and sat next to her. Dani became acutely aware of his closeness. He smelled of the woods, but even though Dani feared that place, the smell of it on Cole’s skin excited her. Damn it, everything about Cole excited her.
“We need to talk about what happened earlier,” he said.
“Do we?” Talking was the last thing on Dani’s mind. She was sitting next to the sexiest man she had ever met. She was sure he liked her as much as she liked him, and that made her feel even more aroused. It had been too long since she’d had sex, and she had never had good sex in her life. Maybe Cole could change that.
Dani wasn’t sure why she felt so turned on whenever Cole was around, but she knew it went deeper than the fact that he was hot as hell. Her body craved him, and at that moment, she didn’t want to resist her own natural urges.
He seemed to detect her innermost needs. Putting his tea down on the table, he leaned forward toward Dani. She shuddered with anticipation as his lips brushed hers before kissing her fully. She parted her own lips slightly. Cole’s tongue delved between them, exploring her mouth. His arms supported his weight as he leaned over her, making his shoulders and triceps bulge. Dani snaked her hands around his back, feeling the rippling muscles beneath his T-shirt. He was a powerhouse of muscle and sinew. Dani knew that when Cole concentrated all that power into the act of driving his cock into her, she was going to be thrust into a world of pleasure she had never known before.
His lips moved to her neck, sending shivers up her spine as he kissed and nibbled her flesh. Dani ran her hands down his strong back to his tight ass. She squeezed it through his jeans.
Cole climbed off the sofa and slid his hands beneath Dani’s legs and shoulders. Before she could protest, he lifted her and carried her out of the room to the foot of the stairs. “I want you in my bed,” he said as he began ascending the steps. His voice was husky with excitement.
Dani had never been lifted by anyone before, and if anyone had suggested it, she would have laughed at them. She was too big. But in Cole’s arms, she felt small and delicate, a feeling she had never experienced before. Cole’s size and power made it easy for him to handle her big, curvy body.
He carried her up to the next level and kicked a door open, carrying her inside quickly. He seemed to be desperately eager to take Dani to bed, and that was another new experience for her.
The curtains in the room were half-closed. Most of the room lay in shadow except for a king-size bed, which was illuminated by moonlight shafting between the parted curtains.
“Can we close the curtains?” Dani asked.
“Why?” Cole’s voice was almost a growl. Knowing that she was getting him this excited turned Dani on even more.
“I…have issues.”
He looked down into her eyes. “I want to see you when I fuck you, Dani. I want to see every inch of you, every curve. You’re beautiful.”
His words made her shudder with anticipation, but he didn’t understand. He thought she was trying to hide her body. She had no problem with that, but the hideous scars on her back were another matter.
“I have scars,” she said.
His next words surprised her. “So do I.”
“You do?”
He nodded, and dropped her gently onto the bed. He removed his T-shirt, revealing the kind of torso Dani had only ever seen in fitness magazines. Three scars ran in parallel lines across his stomach, cutting through his six-pack abs.
“What happened?” she said, getting to her knees on the bed and tracing her fingers along the thick, corded flesh of the scars.
“A bear,” he said.
Fear chilled Dani for a split second as her mind replayed the attack that had left her with three similar lines running down her back. She suddenly wanted to show Cole her own scars, show him the connection she felt with him th
at she had never felt with anyone else.
She removed her shirt and T-shirt, loving the way Cole’s eyes roamed over her as she knelt there in her bra. Turning on the bed, she revealed the scars running from her shoulder blade down to her waist.
His breath caught, and for a moment Dani thought he was repulsed by her. But she realized it was surprise that made him gasp. “You, too,” he said, kneeling behind her and tracing the scars with his hand.
Dani trembled beneath his touch. “They’re ugly,” she said.
“Nothing about you is ugly,” he whispered. His hands slid around her waist to her belly, then up to her ample breasts. He cupped them through Dani’s bra. Her nipples hardened against his hands.
“When did this happen?” he asked softly.
Dani couldn’t concentrate. The sensation of his hands on her breasts, the closeness of him behind her, sent her mind reeling. “I don’t want to talk about it right now,” she said. “I want you to fuck me, Cole.” Her words surprised herself. She had never spoken to any man like this.
He growled in response and it seemed like the vibration in his throat was mirrored by a quivering in Dani’s pussy. She felt so hot, so wet, so excited.
She reached back and unfastened her bra, removing it quickly so that Cole’s hands could touch her again. His hands cupped her soft, naked flesh, his fingers brushing over her erect nipples. Dani gasped at the sensation that sparked through her body. Cole’s mouth went to the nape of her neck and he began laying kisses along her shoulder and up to the sensitive area behind her ear. She groaned, aching for him to be inside her.
He seemed to sense her desire, and turned her around to face him. He kissed her deeply before pushing her down onto the bed. When she was lying on her back, Cole pulled off her jeans and panties. He looked down at her, his eyes drinking in every curve, every slope, every soft inch of her body. He growled excitedly. Dani had never felt so desired.
Cole slid off the bed and removed his jeans. He stood there naked, with his gorgeous cock thick and erect. Dani gasped at the size of it. Everything about Cole was huge. Could she accommodate all of him inside her? She was going to have a damn good try.
“I’m going to fuck you, Dani,” he said. “I’m going to bury myself deep inside your sweet pussy. As deep as I can go.”
“Do it,” she whispered. “Put that big cock inside me, Cole. I want it. I need it.” She opened her legs to show him how wet she was, how ready she was for his length.
He opened a drawer on the nightstand and took out a condom, sheathing his thick length with it before getting back on the bed and positioning himself between Dani’s spread legs. “You’re so fucking gorgeous,” he said before he plunged inside her.
She cried out as he entered her, sliding deep inside her body. Dani’s pussy gripped his cock tightly, every single nerve down there coming alive and flashing pleasurable signals to her brain.
Cole groaned as Dani clenched her muscles around his hard length. “You feel so good,” he whispered, looking down onto Dani’s eyes. “I knew you’d be perfect.” He began to piston his hips back and forth, his cock retreating until only the head was inside Dani before sliding deep inside again so that he was buried in her pussy up to his balls.
Each powerful thrust forward made Dani cry out with pleasure. She felt like her tight, dripping sex had been shaped for the sole purpose of accommodating this thick cock belonging to this gorgeous man. She and Cole fit together so perfectly, like two puzzle pieces locking together to form a picture that could only be understood when the two pieces were as one.
Dani felt a wave of pure bliss building up inside her body. If she surrendered to that wave, she would drown in earth-shaking ecstasy.
She surrendered, letting the pleasure spread through her entire being until she was gasping and moaning and begging Cole to fuck her harder so she could ride the wave to its peak.
He obliged her by driving his cock faster and deeper inside her pussy. Dani screamed as pure bliss exploded through her body, lighting every nerve ending and activating every pleasure center. The orgasm rocked her to her core, making her shudder and tremble and cry out as ecstatic bliss pulsed through her body and mind. That pleasure became her whole world for a few seconds before it gradually subsided, leaving her gasping for breath, and embracing Cole’s still-thrusting body, her face pressed against his hard shoulder.
He cried out, “Dani!” and shuddered just as she had, his cock twitching inside her tight pussy as he released his seed into the condom.
Dani felt a second orgasm hit her as Cole came. She writhed beneath him, lost to sensation, until they were both spent, and Cole pulled out of her. He had filled her so completely with his thickness that she felt something was missing as soon as he was no longer inside her.
He lay next to her, the moonlight lighting up the beads of sweat that covered his perfect body. “That was amazing,” he whispered breathlessly.
“Yes, it was,” she agreed. She had never had sex like that, had never felt such passion and need, and never had that need satisfied so completely.
He lifted himself up on his elbow and let his eyes travel over her moonlit body. Dani didn’t feel self-conscious at all—how could she after what they had just shared?
“You’re beautiful,” he said.
“I could probably stand to lose a few pounds.”
“No, you’re perfect just as you are.” He sat up and said, “I’ll be back in a minute.” He walked across the room and opened a door to a bathroom.
Dani stretched out on the bed, bathing in the silver moonlight and the afterglow of the sex. She felt as if could lie here forever and be the happiest person in the world.
But she had to get back to Simone. Her friend was probably out of her mind with worry.
Cole came back into the room, naked and amazing and perfectly-toned. The shadows cast by the moonlight accentuated every slab of muscle.
“Cole, I have to go,” Dani said. “Simone will be worrying.”
“Of course,” he said, coming over to the bed and taking Dani’s face in his big hands. He leaned forward and kissed her. As their mouths and tongues danced together, Dani wished they could go for round two on the bed, but she really had to get back to Simone.
Cole broke the kiss and grabbed his clothes. “I’ll let you get dressed and I’ll see you downstairs in a few minutes.” He left the room and went downstairs.
Dani got dressed, regretting having to cover her body after showing it to Cole, scars and all. She felt so relaxed with him, it was unreal.
He was waiting in the foyer for her, a grin on his face as he watched her descend the stairs.
“What’s so funny?” she asked.
“Not funny,” he said, shaking his head. “Beautiful. You’re beautiful, Dani.”
She rolled her eyes. “Please, you’ll make me blush.”
“You’re already blushing, and that’s beautiful, too.”
She sighed, wondering if this was all a dream. In any other situation, with any other man, she would think that such flattering words were just that…flattery. But she could see from the look in Cole’s eyes that he was sincere. For some reason, Dani felt like she knew Cole as well as she knew people who had been in her life for years.
He opened the front door for her. Dani stepped out onto the porch. The night air felt cool on her flushed face.
She knew Cole was going to ask her about the scars on her back at some point. He waited until they were driving along the dirt road toward the highway.
“So what happened?” he asked, turning his eyes from the road for a second to study her.
She didn’t need to ask for clarification; she knew exactly what he was talking about.
“Every year,” she said, “Simone and I come back to Silver Rock for a vacation. We both live in New York now. I moved there with my parents when my dad inherited an Italian restaurant from his cousin. Simone moved to the city to start a psychology practice, but her work means she has to travel a l
ot. So we decided that once a year, we would come back to our hometown, drink beer, eat takeout, and have fun. I sometimes went up the mountains to paint landscapes.”
“You paint?”
“I’ve wanted to be a painter for as long as I can remember. I used to paint watercolor landscapes. Simone wanted me to bring my paints on this vacation but I couldn’t get them all in my suitcase. Anyway, two years ago, I got the stupid idea that Simone and I should spend a night camping in the woods. That would be great fun, huh? Well, it was until a bear attacked us. As I was scrambling out of the tent, he raked his claws down my back. You’ve seen the result.”
He nodded slowly, deep in thought.
“What are you thinking?” Dani asked.
“I was wondering if that attack two years ago is connected to the attack tonight.”
“It is,” Dani said. “I’m sure of it. When it happened the first time, and I was lying on the ground waiting for the ambulance to arrive, I saw the bear change into a man. Tonight, I saw a man change into a bear. It’s the same person, bear, shifter, whatever you want to call it.”
He went silent again, his face unreadable in the darkness.
“I’m not crazy,” Dani told him.
“I never said you were.”
“My parents never spoke of shifters,” she said, “But the older people in Silver Rock used to talk about them all the time. My grandmother and Simone’s grandmother were always telling us stories about bear and wolf shifters in Silver Rock and Stony Falls, the neighboring town. I thought they were just stories until I saw a shifter with my own eyes. I thought I might be going crazy, but what I saw tonight proved I was right. Shifters are real.”
McClintock Bears Box Set Page 5
