Bear the Consequences

by Rochelle Paige

  I laughed lightly at the name and the reminder of something else we hadn’t discussed. “So, I was right? Your animal is a bear?”

  “Yeah,” he confirmed. “And you’re a wolf?”

  “All my life,” I joked, starting to feel uncomfortable at the idea of introducing my dad to my mate when I only knew a few things about him: his first name, that he was a bear who lived in Bear Creek, and what it felt like to have him deep inside me. But I guess it was too late to be worried since he was already out of the truck and opening my door to help me out. He clasped my hand in his and walked me up the stairs.

  “My dad should be inside meeting with the alpha,” he told me as he lifted his hand to knock.

  “Don’t worry, I know where they’ll be,” I offered, opening the door and walking back to my dad’s office. I hesitated when we got there, though. “Daddy doesn’t like me to interrupt him when he’s busy in his office.”

  Alasdair’s head cocked to the side and his mouth turned down at the corner when I looked up at him. His eyes held none of the warmth from earlier as he raised his hand to knock lightly on the door.

  “But my dad is expecting me to join him in there,” he replied before gripping my hand and pulling me into the office with him.

  Daddy was standing behind his desk, his arms crossed over his chest and his face carved from stone. When he noticed me standing next to Alasdair, surprise filtered through his eyes and his expression softened before he breathed deeply and schooled his features once more. In that instant, I knew he realized I had mated with Alasdair and he wasn’t happy about it.

  The man sitting across from my father looked so much like Alasdair, only older and a little bigger. “Took you long enough to get here. I thought you were going to be quick,” he said as he leveled a glare at my new mate. His eyes flicked down to me questioningly and back up again. “Found a friend along the way? Now hardly seems like the time or place for that.”

  “Not a friend,” I corrected softly, gulping when his glare turned my way, “his mate.”

  “Fuck!”

  I swiveled around at the hissed swear and found another man leaning against the wall.

  “Ohmigosh!” I gasped in surprise. He looked exactly like Alasdair, but I didn’t feel the same pull toward him.

  “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” he said as he raked his eyes up and down my body. “You mated the alpha’s ‘little princess’?”

  I didn’t have a chance to object to the nickname I hated—one I had only been able to shake off within the last few months as my packmates finally started to look at me with respect.

  “Shut the fuck up, Camden,” Alasdair growled. “I really don’t need your shit right now.”

  “Your brother’s right, Camden. It appears things have gotten a little more complicated than we anticipated. I think it would be best if you waited for us outside.”

  “She might be little, but this is one helluva big complication,” Camden muttered as he left my dad’s office.

  “I don’t understand,” I murmured, looking up at Alasdair. “Why would you and I mating be a problem?”

  “Sit down, princess,” he replied, only this time when he called me princess, it didn’t hold the same warmth as it had back at Honor House.

  Things were starting to add up in my brain and I didn’t like it one bit. Bears were in town on “family business” and my mate’s first stop was Annora’s old house. Nobody was happy to see Alasdair and I were fated mates. Apparently, their business in town wasn’t going to smooth things over the way I thought it would.

  Chapter 5

  Alasdair

  “You took my daughter as your mate?” Finley’s dad growled.

  “I don’t think I’d word it that way,” I answered, pulling Finley further into the office before getting her settled into a chair since she had gone pale and was shaking. I stood behind her, resting my hands on her shoulders and lightly tracing the mark I’d left earlier.

  “How would you word it exactly?” he demanded.

  Finley stiffened and would have jumped from her chair had I not been holding onto her. “Daddy, you know what he means. You can’t just take a mate. We were meant to be together, we’re fated mates.”

  “If only it were that simple,” my dad muttered as he moved until he was standing beside me.

  Finley’s dad was looking at us like he couldn’t believe his daughter was mated to me. I understood his shock, especially since I wasn’t expecting her to be his daughter. But it wouldn’t have mattered either way—my bear wasn’t willing to give her up. That didn’t, however, mean this situation wasn’t going to be tough as shit to navigate. Fate seemed to have a twisted sense of humor went it came to the mates she picked for the McMahon men.

  “Like Finley said, we’re fated mates,” I confirmed. “She’s mine now.”

  If the growl erupting from his chest was any indication, her dad wasn’t too happy with my choice of words. His wolf flashed in his eyes and I felt waves of dominant power pouring off him while he struggled to control himself. Luckily for me, I had my father’s blood running through my veins. I wasn’t going bow down to Finley’s dad just because he was an alpha wolf. Instead of lowering my gaze, I held his stare until he managed to calm down enough to speak.

  “And you’re hers. That makes us family.”

  “This changes nothing,” my dad growled.

  “Changes what?” Finley repeated quietly. “I don’t understand what’s going on here.”

  “I’ve already had my say, Alasdair. I’ll wait outside for you, too,” my dad said before he walked out the door. I knew he and Camden had questions, but they’d wait until we weren’t in enemy territory to ask them, which was a good thing. Odds were, I’d have my hands full with getting my new mate out of her father’s home without doing something to make her hate me.

  Finley turned in her seat to watch my father walk out the door and then looked up at me, confusion clear in her eyes. “I thought you said you were here on family business?”

  “He was,” her dad answered before I could, drawing her attention to him. “They’re the McMahon bears—Annora’s family.”

  “Annora has a family?” she gasped.

  “You didn’t tell her anything?” I growled, shaking my head. “Are you adding cowardice to your list of faults now? Too afraid for your daughter to know how badly you fucked up with my sister?”

  “Your sister?” she repeated.

  “Yes, my sister,” I confirmed. “The daughter my father never knew he had after leaving your town and the mate who rejected him so many years ago.”

  “You said when Annora left she found her mate and now she’s expecting a baby,” Finley said, looking at her dad. “She found a whole family, too?”

  Her dad nodded his head. “Yes, baby girl. She did.”

  “But that’s wonderful news! Why would you be so angry about this?” Finley asked me.

  “Because they blame me for what happened while Annora was part of our pack.”

  “Of course we blame you,” I muttered. “You were her alpha. The wolf who should have protected her from her mom and the jackass of a wolf she chose over my dad.”

  “Just like he blames himself,” she whispered. “But now we’re family. And she’s happy, right? She has everything a she-bear could ever hope for. A mate who loves her. A father and brothers. A baby on the way.”

  “She had the baby last night,” I corrected.

  “She did?” she gasped.

  “Yeah, a baby girl named Kyla.”

  “So sweet,” she whispered, smiling softly.

  “Go pack a bag and wait outside for me, Finley,” I ordered. She looked torn as her gaze flitted back and forth between her dad and me, so I softened my voice before I spoke again. “I’m sure there are things you’d like to take with you to your new home.”

  “With you,” she whispered.

  “Yes,” I confirmed, “with your mate.”

  Her eyes lit with happiness
and she nodded her head before turning on her heel to race out of the room. I listened to the sound of her footsteps on the stairs and waited until I heard the sound of a door opening and closing before I confronted her father.

  “Finley’s special,” he told me. “She’s an innocent in all this.”

  “Not so innocent anymore,” I taunted.

  The glare he leveled me with told me my jab struck him the way I wanted. If I’d heard anyone else saying shit like that about Finley, I’d kick their ass. But the need to piss this man off was driving me right now and I knew there was nobody else around to hear the crap coming out of my mouth.

  “You better hope my father protects your daughter better than my sister fared when she was raised in your pack,” I warned.

  “That’s where you’re wrong, boy. You better hope you protect her because if anyone hurts my baby girl, you’re the one who’s gonna pay. That girl has spent her whole life with her head in the clouds dreaming about the man you’re supposed to be. I don’t think you want to be the one to take those stars out of her eyes.”

  “I’m not the one who caused the issues between our families. That would be you,” I reminded him.

  “Even so, maybe you should have thought about that before you took her as your mate.”

  “Maybe I would have if I had realized who she was,” I shot back.

  “And maybe she would have been better off if you had,” he replied. “She deserves a mate who wants her more than he wants anything else—even revenge. Can you honestly stand there and tell me that man is you?”

  The thought of Finley with anyone other than me made my bear howl with rage. “It doesn’t matter what you think she deserves because I’m the only mate she’s ever going to have.”

  “And I’m the only father she’s ever going to have, so I guess you’re going to have to get used to having me around.”

  His parting words rang in my ears as I watched Finley hug him. I stood at the door, her suitcases in my hands while I waited for her. “Tell Momma I’ll call her soon.”

  “She’s going to be sad she missed saying goodbye. You know she’s going to call you the second she gets home,” he told her, his eyes locking with mine over her shoulder.

  “I’m only a short trip away. Right, Alasdair?” she asked, turning to me with hope in her eyes.

  “Yes,” I confirmed, since it was the truth. Although her dad and I both knew it didn’t mean her parents were welcome to visit us anytime soon.

  “What about my car?” she asked. “I don’t want to leave it behind.”

  “I’ll have someone drive it down to you later,” her dad offered.

  “No,” I barked out, not wanting anyone from her pack to have a reason to be in our town. “We’ll take it with us. My dad can drive my truck and we’ll follow in yours.”

  She beamed up at me. “Sounds like a plan.”

  “I guess this is goodbye,” her dad said as she stepped away from him and walked over to me, placing her hand in mine.

  “For now,” she tossed over her shoulder as I pulled her through the door. “I’m sure I’ll see you and Momma soon.”

  I led my new mate to her car and got her settled in the passenger seat before walking over to my truck where my dad and Camden were waiting. Tossing my keys to my dad, I looked back at Finley before stepping closer so I could make sure we weren’t overheard.

  “Daddy’s little princess is coming with us?” Camden muttered.

  “She’s my mate,” I answered simply.

  Chapter 6

  Finley

  The drive to Bear Creek would have been way more awkward had I stayed awake the whole time. I spent the first hour asking Alasdair all the things I wanted to know about him, but he only supplied one-word answers. It quickly became clear he wasn’t in the mood to talk and I began to question my decision to follow him home blindly. In all my dreams about my mate, I never once thought our beginning would be this uncomfortable. The reality of our situation was I’d mated a man I didn’t know at all. Even worse, he didn’t seem to want to get to know me.

  I was pulled out of my nap by the car slowing down. When we pulled into a driveway, I saw a man standing on the front porch with his arms crossed in front of him. His eyes gleamed in the darkness and I felt a shiver go down my spine. I got the feeling he wasn’t happy to see me with Alasdair. Oh, great. Another person who didn’t seem thrilled that my mate and I were together.

  It wasn’t until I got out of my car and climbed the steps that I got a good look at his face. “There are three of you?” I gasped.

  “That’s my other brother, Braden,” Alasdair said as he nudged me past his brother and through the doorway.

  “I don’t think they like me very much,” I whispered.

  “They’ll learn to like you,” my mate whispered back, his breath hot in my ear.

  “And you? Will you learn to like me?” I asked.

  His eyes gleamed down at me. “I like you just fine, my little mate. This might not be what either of us expected, but I have no doubt we’ll make it work.”

  ****

  I swore my mate turned me into a sex-crazed maniac over the last couple weeks. Apparently his idea of making things work between us consisted of fucking me morning, noon, and night without many conversations in between. I quickly learned his hours at work weren’t normal. Or, at least, what I considered normal. When he wasn’t in bed with me, he spent his mornings with his dad discussing important business or taking care of things for him while he was out of town. That’s what I assumed they were talking about anyway, he didn’t share a lot of the details with me. His afternoons seemed to be reserved for his brothers: workouts, basketball games, poker games—they had something planned each day of the week. Throw in busy nights at work and there wasn’t much time left over for sleep, let alone me.

  Though, the hours weren’t what bugged me the most—it was feeling like I was the least important thing in his life. Two weeks might not be long for a relationship between humans, but I expected so much more progress in my relationship with my fated mate by now. His dad and brothers still kept their distance from me and the things I had learned weren’t all great. For example, finding out your mate’s family owned a successful chain of strips clubs wasn’t exactly a pleasant surprise.

  On the one hand, I knew I’d never need to worry about money again. On the other, I had to deal with the fact that my mate was surrounded by strippers whenever he was at work—something he probably should have mentioned during that car ride into town. Or my first night here. Or any time before Annora, her mate, and their baby girl came to visit yesterday. My reaction to Parker’s joke about the Winnie the Pooh honey pot on Kyla’s little onesie wasn’t pretty. At first, I felt irritated because I didn’t realize what was so funny. When Annora casually explained how Parker thought it was hilarious when Camden gave Kyla the outfit since Carrick owned all the Honey Pot strip club locations, I didn’t find being left in the dark funny at all.

  While Alasdair’s days were packed with things to do, my social calendar was pretty much nonexistent. If it weren’t for my Kindle and an unlimited supply of e-books, I would have gone crazy. Clan life was incredibly different from living in a pack. Carrick’s clan was much smaller than my dad’s pack since bears usually stuck to family groups while wolves welcomed others into their pack. Carrick, Braden, and Camden weren’t mated and they only had a couple male cousins in the clan. Their grandmother was the last she-bear in the clan and she passed away five years ago, so there weren’t any women around to welcome me into the family. I found myself on my own, trying to find a place where I fit, but coming up empty.

  Glancing at the clock, I realized Alasdair was going to be home in about an hour. He always stopped by between his morning with his dad and his afternoon with his brothers to eat lunch and spend some time with me—time we spent in bed before he ran off to work. I just needed to find a way to be strong enough to resist the temptation he presented when he walked in that door. He w
as too damn hard to resist. My pussy clenched at the mere thought of the pleasure he gave me.

  Wandering upstairs to change, it dawned on me. Maybe if I gave myself an orgasm before he got home, I’d be able to stick to my guns when he flashed that panty-melting smile my way. If I took the edge off, maybe we could spend our time together talking about where our relationship was going instead of fucking each other’s brains out.

  I tore off my clothes and leaped into bed, determined to make myself come. Closing my eyes, I imagined Alasdair’s hand trailing down my skin, circling my nipples, pinching them, and sliding down my stomach to tease along the top edge of my panties. I slipped my fingers under the silky material and gasped when they brushed against my clit. Gathering moisture on a fingertip, I slid it back up to circle my clit. My heart was pounding and my body was already drawn tight. I didn’t think it was going to take very long before I came. Breathing deeply, his scent surrounded me, driving me even wilder...until I heard his growl and realized he was in the room with me.

  My eyes popped open and I found him standing at the edge of the bed. His dark eyes gleamed with unrestrained lust as he stared down at me.

  “Alasdair,” I gasped, yanking my hand from my panties.

  “You need to come?” he purred. “You do it on my fingers, on my tongue, or on my cock.”

  The promise in his voice made it crystal clear that he meant every word of what he just said. “I’m so close.”

  “I’m going to give you the best orgasm of your life,” he promised as he climbed onto the bed. “Clearly I haven’t been taking good enough care of you if you’re resorting to your hand when I’m not home. This time is going to be all about you while I watch you come on my fingers and in my mouth.”

  “But no sex?” I asked disbelievingly. I was stunned that he was offering to make me come without taking me since I could see the outline of his cock pressing against his jeans.

  “That’s why I’m gonna have you keep your panties on,” he breathed into my ear. “As long as they’re covering your pretty little pussy and I still have my jeans on, I might be able to keep my cock out of your body. But don’t worry, I’ll still make it damn good for you.”