One thing this house didn’t have was an elevator, and once she had struggled as far as the first landing, Matt gently lifted her into his arms and carried her the rest of the way. Mel didn’t put up even a token protest, which she was certain told the men all they needed to know about how bad she really felt. When they entered her apartment, she directed them to the front, where the combined kitchen/living room sat overlooking the street. Matt carefully set her down in the kitchen, and she gratefully sank onto one if the wooden chairs at the round corner table.
“You got any aspirin around here?” Matt asked.
Mel had to think a moment. “I have some generic acetaminophen. It’s in the upper cabinet to the left of the sink.”
Matt got it down and opened it for her. “Water okay, or you want something else.”
“Water’s fine.”
Matt poured her a small glass he found in the same cabinet then handing her the glass, sat beside her at the table. Mel swallowed the pills then laid her head in her hand. Matt gently rubbed her back and neck until she finally looked up at them.
“Won’t you sit down?” she asked. “There are a couple more chairs in the next room you could pull up.”
“I don’t need to sit down, darlin’,” the older man said. “I only need some answers.”
“Introductions, first,” Matt said, continuing to rub her back. “Mel, these are my brothers—John, Mark, and Luke.” He indicated each of the three younger men in turn. “And this is our Uncle Bart. Everybody, this is Melinda Darling. Mel, she likes to be called.”
“Uncle Bart’s here to keep us out of trouble,” John, the youngest, said as he pulled out a kitchen chair and sat down across from her.
“And I got you all into trouble tonight,” Mel said, hugging Matt’s flannel shirt to herself. “I’m so sorry.”
Bart shook his head, looking resigned, but he took the chair next to her. “These yahoos don’t need any help gettin’ into trouble, ma’am, but I’d sure like to know what tonight was all about.
“She tell you anything on the way back?” he asked Matt.
Matt shook his head. “Only that she heard us play last night, and she needs to talk to us.”
“Hey, that was you at the bar last night!” Luke said. “I just knew I’d seen you someplace.”
“And you were playing the mandolin and fiddle,” she said, attempting a smile.
“That’s right.” He leaned against the wall, between the front windows, his arms crossed over his broad chest.
Mel glanced around and marveled at the presence of these five huge men in her tiny little apartment. Then she thought about what she’d imagined she’d seen at the pub and felt herself go suddenly still.
“What did the barman mean when he said, ‘your kind’ isn’t welcome here?” she asked softly.
Matt’s hand faltered on her back for a moment then began moving again. She glanced up and saw Matt and Bart exchange looks. The others were looking to Bart.
“What do you remember, exactly,” Bart asked. He kept his gravelly voice low, she supposed, so he wouldn’t alarm her, but it had the opposite effect.
She took a deep breath. “I’m not certain. That…man had me pinned up against the bar, then he hit me, and I went down. I thought I was going to pass out, but then I heard…something. It was like a loud, well, roar, I guess, then the man who had attacked me was pulled away, and…”
“All hell broke loose,” Mark said, snagging her kitchen stool with a foot and dragging it over to sit on.
He should have looked silly, but the fact that he was tall enough to see over the table, even though he was sitting on a low stool, only emphasized how big they all were.
“Please tell me what happened.”
Bart glanced around at the others and took a deep breath. Then he nodded at Matt.
“You must have heard stories,” Matt said, “about how sometimes some people, well, change into something else.”
Mel started. She stared at Matt then around at the others. She was suddenly very conscious of their deep, golden eyes as they watched her. She had noticed their eyes last night, but now she saw that Bart, too, had them.
“You’re…?”
“The word you’re lookin’ for is ‘Shifter.’ We are. All of us.”
“It sort of runs in the family,” John said, sounding awfully cheerful about it. “At least on Pop’s side. Our Ma never Shifted, and our sisters don’t, either.”
“It’s usually the male line,” Mark said, “though there’ve been a few women along the way.”
“So what, you just…become…something else? Whenever you feel like it?”
“Bears,” John said. “In our clan, it’s always been bears.”
Mel raised her eyebrows in surprise. The youngest Saint seemed too cheerful about it all.
“And it’s not whenever we feel like it, exactly,” Luke explained. “Well, when we’re kids, when we’re just comin’ into it, we tend to Shift whenever and wherever, which can be pretty darn awkward.”
“But once puberty hits,” Mark said, “we become pretty good at controllin’ it.”
“Unless we feel threatened,” Bart explained. “Shiftin’ is all about survival, so if we feel threatened—or if someone we care about is threatened—we sometimes Shift without thinkin’ about it.”
“That’s what happened tonight,” John said. “Matt went in to get us some more beer, saw you bein’ attacked, and he just instinctively Shifted.”
“And then when we heard him,” Luke said, “we had to jump in to protect both of you by keepin’ that nasty crowd back while Matt dealt with the lowlife who had you.”
“But you don’t even know me,” Mel said, looking at Matt.
John snorted. “Our big brother’s always stickin’ up for the little guy or gal against bullies. I mean, it’s in his DNA.”
The others laughed, but Matt just continued to massage her neck gently with his powerful fingers. She could feel the calluses caused by his guitar strings on her bare skin and shivered. He smiled, then, as though he knew what he was doing to her.
“That takes us back to the first question,” Bart said. “What the heck were you doin’ in that bar tonight, young lady?”
Mel had to work to bring her gaze away from Matt’s. She took a deep breath as she fought to bring her mind back to where it belonged.
“I work for the Konstantine Talent Agency. My job is to visit as many night spots as I can, looking for promising bands and other performers for the Agency to represent. I got called away last night when my boss texted me, and by the time I got back, you guys had already packed up and left. So I asked around, and the bartender told me where you like to play pool when you’re in town.
“I know it sounds ridiculous, now, but the bartender said it was your last night performing there, and he didn’t know where you were going next or if you were even going to stay in Nashville. I just didn’t want to take the chance that I couldn’t find you again. My job depends on finding great artists, and I haven’t been having a lot of luck lately, so I decided to take a chance this once.
“Looking back, it was a pretty foolish thing to do, but I was desperate, because I just knew if I didn’t bring you in, someone else would find you and take all the credit. I couldn’t take that chance. I’m skating on pretty thin ice with my boss as it is these days, because I haven’t found anyone worthy of her notice as yet. If I don’t find something soon, she’ll probably fire me, and I won’t be able to pay next month’s rent.”
“Your boss sounds like a real piece of work,” Bart said, “expectin’ a young gal like you to take chances like that.”
Mel shook her head then wished she hadn’t. “It’s just the way things are in the business. It’s really cutthroat. And there aren’t that many jobs available these days. I can’t afford to lose this one.”
Bart sighed. “Okay.”
They were all quiet for a moment, thinking—she assumed—about her foolishness.
�
�Well, no real harm done,” Matt said. “Why don’t I put you to bed, Mel. We can talk about this in the mornin’.”
“What?”
“You’re beat, and I’ll bet your head feels like it’s about to fall right off. Let me get you into bed, so you can get some sleep. The others can go back to our hotel for the night then come back in the morning, and we’ll figure out what to do about your boss.”
“But you can’t stay here,” Mel said.
“Either one of us stays, or you’re goin’ to a hospital,” Bart said, standing up. “No arguments, young lady. We don’t take any chances with head injuries.”
“But…”
“Don’t worry,” Matt said, getting up, too. “I can sleep on the couch. Won’t be the first time.”
Mel wasn’t certain of when she had lost control, but the next thing she knew, Matt’s brothers and uncle were stomping down the back stairs, and Matt was leading her into her bedroom.
“I really am perfectly capable of taking care of myself,” she said testily then gave herself away when she had to grab for the foot of the bed to keep from falling on her face.
“Of course you are, darlin’,” Matt said cheerfully. “Don’t mind me. I’m just here in case you need a hand with somethin’. Now, why don’t you tell me where you keep your nightgowns?”
Mel looked up sharply. “What makes you think I don’t sleep in pajamas?”
Matt narrowed his eyes and seemed to study her closely.
“Nope. I got five sisters, and you’re definitely a nightie kind of gal.”
Mel sighed and gave up. “The top drawer, on the left.”
Matt headed for her dresser. Mel was relieved when he simply took the long sleep shirt that was on top.
He was grinning when he returned to her, though.
“You got good taste, darlin’.”
He had picked up her denim-colored, full-length, Winnie-the-Pooh night shirt, and she could tell he was pleased with her bear connection. When she reached for it, he set it beside her on the bed.
“Let me help you with those buttons,” he said, reaching for the front of his shirt.
“No!”
“You still nervous around me?” he asked, looking perplexed.
She swallowed hard and dropped her eyes. “Look, I know you’ve already seen me naked once tonight, but I…”
He reached his hand out to her cheek and raised her eyes to his.
“This time I won’t look. I promise.”
“But…”
“Look, I know you’re still scared of me, but if you’re wonderin’ if I’m gonna jump you, don’t even think it. I’m not the kind of guy who’s gonna try to take advantage of a gal whose hurtin’ and scared. Like I said, we have five sisters, and we all lived in a three-bedroom, one-bath house growin’ up, so I’m real good at dealin’ with women on a lot of levels.”
He grinned then. “I promise I won’t try to compromise you—at least not until your feelin’ a lot better than you do right now.”
Her head reeling from the now throbbing pain, Mel conceded defeat and dropped her hands. His were both gentle and impersonal as he helped her out of his flannel shirt and dropped the night shirt over her head then pulled what was left of her dress away. Then he helped her to the bathroom and shut the door behind her for privacy. Mel stood clinging to the counter and stared at herself in the mirror.
Not any reason at all to worry about Matt’s intentions tonight, she thought. Not when you look like this.
Her night shirt revealed bruises on her arms and neck where her attacker had man-handled her, and her cheek was turning a sickly yellow color where he had punched her. One eye was a little puffy, too, and she wondered if she would end up with a black eye by morning.
Sighing, Mel took care of business, brushing her teeth, carefully combing out the worst of the tangles in her hair, gently washing her face, and using the necessary. Matt was waiting for her outside, his flannel shirt back in place and buttoned up. He helped her to bed and tucked her in. When she sighed in relief, he reached out to touch her hair, now spread out on the pillow.
“It’s like sunrise on the mountain after the first hard frost,” he said.
Mel smiled. “And you’re a songwriter. This hair has been the bane of my existence ever since I first started school.
“It’s beautiful,” he insisted.
“Thank you.”
He leaned down, kissed her softly on her brow, and turned out the bedside lamp.
“Matt?”
“Yeah?”
She hesitated. “I’m glad you stayed, but…”
“What is it?”
“It’s just that…Well…Do you really only…Shift…when you’re in danger?”
Matt smiled. “We can Shift any time. It’s just that sometimes, when things happen—like tonight—we Shift without thinkin’ about it as the survival instincts just kick in without warnin’.”
“Could you…I mean, would you…Shift…now? Just so I can see you…like that…when you’re not…angry?
Matt’s smile broadened into a grin, which slowly morphed into something more, and before she knew it, he was a great big bear. His coat, like his human hair, was mostly dark brown, though the shades ranged from dark chocolate on his legs and belly to a lighter beaver color on his back and ending with a warm, sandy color on his long snout. His nose was big and black and looked cold and wet.
Mel knew she should be afraid. Good heavens, there was a bear in her bedroom! But somehow she didn’t feel afraid, for the twinkle she had seen in Matt’s golden eyes hadn’t gone away when he’d Shifted into his bear form.
“Thank you,” she whispered, awed by this truly handsome beast.
She heard a low rumbling that she could have sworn was a chuckle, and Matt laid his snout on the edge of her bed, nudging her lightly. Mel smiled sleepily and reached out to gently caress his face. Matt licked her fingers then turned away to head for the hallway. He rose onto his powerful hindquarters at the doorway and moved the light switch with his nose.
“Good night, Matt,” she called softly.
Matt glanced over his shoulder and snuffled.
Mel giggled, and turning onto her side in order to relieve the pressure on the back of her head, she allowed herself to fall asleep.
Mel woke slowly and turned to look at her clock, only to moan when the back of her head connected with the pillow. She tried to lie still, waiting for the pain to pass, but after a time, she heard voices coming from the living room.
“Please tell me I didn’t leave the T.V. running all night,” she grumbled.
Then she registered the tone of those voices and froze.
They’re back!
Slade (BBW Bear Shifter Moonshiner Romance) (120 Proof Honey Book 5) Page 85
