by Sophie Stern
“A shifter.” He finishes with a sign, as if he’s completely resigned himself to the idea that a human wouldn’t love him.
“I was going to say with someone I just met,” I giggle. “I don’t care about the shifter thing.”
“You don’t?”
“Um, dude? Are you serious right now? You can change into a giant bear. That’s insanely awesome. You do know that, right?”
Only something tells me he doesn’t know. Something makes me think that he’s never been accepted for what he is.
I have the feeling that words aren’t going to mean much to Wyatt right now. Not if he’s been hurt. If he’s been damaged or injured in the past, he’s going to need acceptance: not promises.
So instead of making him promises I might not be able to keep, or promises he might not be able to believe, I wrap my arms around Wyatt’s neck and kiss him deeper, harder, longer.
He fists my hair and I let out a squeak, but the pain quickly turns into heat that settles in my core.
Oh.
So this is why people like spanking and being tied up and stuff, I realize.
Maybe pain and pleasure really do go together sometimes.
In the shower, the water begins to run cold, but I barely notice as Wyatt and I lose ourselves in each other. We’re so caught up in the kissing that we don’t notice the knock at the cabin door, or the knock at the bathroom door, or the knock at the shower door until it finally swings open and Carter is standing there.
“Dude!” Wyatt jumps in front of me to shield my body from his brother, but Carter just rolls his eyes.
“I’m sorry to bother you, lovebear, but we’ve got a problem. Get dressed and get out.”
Carter disappears and Wyatt shrugs as he looks back to me.
“Duty calls.”
We climb out of the shower and dry quickly with my bright red towels. I giggle as I run a towel over Wyatt’s shaggy hair and he brushes it out of his eyes in mock annoyance. We head back into my room and I grab a pair of sweats and a t-shirt and slip them on.
“No panties?”
“Not tonight.”
“Fuck me,” Wyatt groans, holding his heart. I just smile as he takes my hand and we go outside. He’s still naked because he didn’t bring clothing, but no one else seems to mind.
And, as I realize when we walk outside, no one else is wearing clothes, either. Alex, Micah, and Carter are all standing buck-ass naked in front of cabin number three, and no one looks pleased to see me.
“What’s wrong?” Wyatt asks, stepping off the porch.
“A gate was left open,” Alex says, shooting daggers at me with his eyes. “We got most of the cattle rounded back up, but we’re still missed three that we need to go find.”
“Damn it!” Wyatt cries out. “What the hell? What the fuck is going on this week?”
“I don’t want to point fingers,” Alex sneers, “but I can’t help but notice that all of this started around the same time your sweet little human arrived.”
“What are you saying?” I ask, suddenly defensive. What reason could I possibly have for letting out animals?
“I’m saying,” Alex steps forward, but Wyatt doesn’t move to stop him this time. “That someone wants to destroy the Blair Ranch, and I’m staring at the number one suspect.”
Chapter 19
Hope
Just when I think my night can’t get any stranger, it does.
“Um, no offense, but this is coming from the naked guy,” I snort, putting up a brave front. Something tells me I shouldn’t show Alex any kind of weakness. Something tells me I shouldn’t show any of them any weakness.
“You don’t know who you’re messing with,” he says, taking a step forward.
“Please,” I hold up my hand and roll my eyes. “If you want to be intimidating, try putting on pants.”
Alex takes another step forward, but Micah grabs his shoulder and holds him back, shaking his head slightly.
“Feel like explaining?” Wyatt says, staring Carter down.
“Look, brother, I don’t think it was her,” Carter says. “Sorry Alex, but you’re out of line. Micah was completely thorough in her background check and we didn’t see anything about a history of abuse or property destruction.”
“History is just that: history. It’s not a predictor of future behavior. You know that, Carter!” Alex looks mad, and I wonder if he’s some kind of cat shifter. I remember earlier, before I knew they were changers, how he reminded me of a panther or a lion.
Maybe he’s a lioness. I snicker inwardly at the thought, but try to keep my face plain.
“There was nothing to indicate she had any relationship with a rival ranch, Alex,” Micah says, stepping forward. Part of me wants to hug him for defending me to his friend. Part of me wants to close my eyes because there are so many tall, hot, naked men surrounding me.
Seriously, are all shifters built to fuck?
I focus on Carter’s eyes because he seems to be the one in charge. Making sure not to lower my gaze, I hold up my hands.
“I didn’t do any of this,” I tell him solemnly. “I honestly came to Honeypot for a fresh start. Like I told Wyatt, I just got out of a relationship and I wanted something new, somewhere fresh.”
“Jake, was it?” Micah asks, and my jaw drops.
“How did you know that?”
He exchanges knowing looks with his brothers, but Alex continues to glare at me.
“It was a very thorough background check,” Micah admits.
“If you interviewed him, he’s full of shit. Considering the fact that he was cheating on me for the better part of two years, I think it’s safe to say he’s an unreliable source.”
“And you’re an unreliable judge of character!” Alex throws in, trying to add fuel to the fire.
“No shit. Thanks for the input, Mom.” I frown at Alex. “Seriously, go put on some fucking pants. You think I didn’t feel like an idiot for not knowing my boyfriend was cheating on me? I was going to marry him, okay? I was going to marry him and he was fucking my best friend for two fucking years. So no, I have no idea who is hurting your ranch or why, but it sure as hell isn’t me!”
Alex opens his mouth, but I keep talking. I’m on a roll. Why should I stop now?
“Honeypot is the only reason I’m not living out of my car. That’s where I was headed. Carter giving me the interview even though I’m obviously not qualified for the job saved my life, so thank you, Carter,” I turn back to Wyatt’s brother. “Thank you for believing me and giving me a chance. If you don’t want me here anymore, I understand, but I would never do anything to hurt your ranch.”
Now I look at Wyatt, whose eyes look pained, and I don’t know if I’ve said something that shocked him or if he just feels sorry for me.
There’s no way he believed any of the accusations his friend threw at me. Wyatt’s smarter than that. I might not have known him very long, but I’ve known him long enough to know he doesn’t fall for bullshit lies. No way.
That’s not his style.
“I would never hurt you,” I tell him.
“I believe you,” he whispers. I move past him to try to head back inside the cabin, to stalk by and slink away, but he catches me with his arm and holds me tight. Wyatt wraps me close to himself and just holds me. He starts murmuring to me, but I can’t really hear what he’s saying because my resolve chose that moment to crumble and now I’m crying.
Great.
Crying in front of super hot guys and their asshole friend.
Just my style, I suppose.
“She didn’t do this,” Wyatt insists. Luckily for me, his brothers seem to agree.
“Either way, we need to get the livestock,” Micah says. I’m surprised to see him out of his cabin. From what Wyatt’s said before, Micah doesn’t go out much. He seems to prefer to stay on his own and read or work online. Not that it’s my place to judge. The world can be a pretty not-fun place to be in sometimes. I prefer solitude, too.
“If you don’t like it, then go to bed, cat,” Carter says. “The only thing that matters tonight is getting our cattle back. Tomorrow we can worry about who is trying to sabotage us and why. Someone wants us to close down or to keep us so busy we can’t get our work done. I don’t know which it is, but we’re going to figure that out later and we’ll make them pay.”
“Right,” Wyatt says. “I’m going to put Hope to bed, then I’ll help you, Carter.” Without another word, without asking what I want, he guides me back into my cabin and leads me to bed. I don’t bother protesting. I’m overwhelmed and exhausted and my body betrays me with a yawn.
“Hope,” Wyatt whispers, and kisses me on the forehead. With a contented sigh, I curl up and he places my blanket on me. “Tonight was amazing.”
“Mmm,” I respond.
He might say something else, but I’m too far gone. For the first time in a long time, I’m not worried about anything but getting some sleep. I’m not worried about work or boys or being safe. I’m not worried about money.
The only thing I’m worrying about as I’m falling asleep is how I can prove my innocence to Alex and how I can catch the bastard who’s been giving my man trouble.
We can’t let him get away with this.
We just can’t.
Chapter 20
Wyatt
“What the fuck, man?” Alex yelps in surprise when I strut out of Hope’s cabin and immediately punch him in the face.
“What the fuck, me? What the fuck, you?” I respond. Real mature, I know. Inside, I’m reeling. I’m trying to stay calm on the outside, minus the punch, of course. I can’t believe Alex had the gall to talk to Hope the way he did.
Accusing her of sabotaging the ranch?
Seriously?
I can’t believe what he did, but I’ve known Alex a long time. There has to be something else going on. Why else would he act like this? Alex is rough around the edges, but he’s a good guy, deep down. He’s not a complete jackass. When I look at him now, I see the jerk, but that’s not all there is to my friend. No, there has to be something else that’s stressing him out.
“Okay,” I take a deep breath. My brothers are still standing there, silent, arms crossed around their chests. I don’t worry about keeping my voice down. Hope is completely passed out and there’s no one else around. I can have it out with the guys if I need to. We can get this sorted. “What do we know? For real, please. No speculation.”
Alex opens his mouth as if to say something, but thinks better of it. He’s still rubbing his jaw. Good. I hope it hurts for days.
Micah holds up some papers I didn’t notice before. Leave it to him to have hard data when the rest of us are chasing our proverbial tails.
“I might know what’s going on,” he says. He points to the papers. “When Mom and Dad gave us the ranch, we didn’t know what we were going to do with it. We didn’t really make any announcements or go public with our ideas until about a month ago.”
“Right,” I say, remembering. “You did that interview with the paper, right?”
“Yeah. I did an interview The Beartown Daily News and was featured on Going Ape Live.”
“So, there was an article about the ranch and you were on TV. If someone didn’t like the direction we were going with the ranch, why would they wait? Why not start giving us trouble right away?”
“Maybe they didn’t think we were serious,” Alex says, his eyes flashing bits of yellow. Fucking cats. I’ll never get used to their weird eyes. “Maybe they thought it was all a pipe dream, but then you guys posted the ad for additional help.”
“That’s why they waited until the interviews were scheduled,” Carter comments, strumming his fingers along the railing to Alex’s porch. In the still night air, it’s the only sound I hear. “They wanted to make sure we were going to go through with hiring people. When they realized we were absolutely expanding, they started giving us problems.”
“It makes sense, I suppose.”
Unfortunately, it really does make sense.
Too much sense.
Someone doesn’t want us going through with our plans to transition the ranch into more of a tourist attraction, but why? It’s not like Honeypot is crawling with tourists now. Creating a drive for more visitors will benefit everyone in town: not just us.
We have a lot of great ideas for sprucing up the town in general, but we’ll start with ourselves. The ranch survives just fine on what we make with our cattle. We don’t need to draw in visitors for profit. We just want to. For my brothers and me, it’ll be a fun challenge. It’s something that will help us connect with other people, other shifters. There aren’t a lot of vacation destinations where shifters can take their families and not have to worry about prying eyes or being the star of an unwanted video that goes viral online.
Just recently there was a family who went to Florida. They thought they were at a shifter-friendly resort, but when one of their kids shifted unexpectedly, a bunch of other visitors filmed it and uploaded the footage to social media sites. Most shifters don’t go through their first change until they’re at least 12 or 13, but this child was only four. That’s pretty uncommon in the shifter world.
Still, having the films out there made it a really uncomfortable vacation and turned what should have been a private family moment into a freakshow.
My brothers and I want to avoid that.
Shifters should have just as much freedom as others when it comes to keeping their families safe, happy, and together. We want to create a place where families can spend time together in nature. We have over 500 acres of land, most of it wooded, and that’s a whole lot of place for shifters to run around.
“It explains a lot about the timing,” Micah says slowly. “But we still don’t know who wants to damage our ranch or why. Is it someone who doesn’t like tourists? I know there are a lot of grumpy old shifters in town who don’t like change, but this seems extreme.”
“No, I don’t think that’s it. This feels more personal. I don’t think it’s someone who doesn’t like visitors. I think it’s more along the lines of someone who doesn’t want competition.”
“You mean one of the other hotels or bed and breakfasts?” Carter says. “Why would they do that? They hardly have any visitors. If anything, opening the ranch up and adding things like a petting zoo and rides and nature hikes will increase their business. We won’t have room for everyone to stay on site, so there will be overflow. If we play our cards right, we can help Honeypot boom.”
“Whoever it was, we’ll have to worry about them tomorrow. Right now, we have a couple of animals that need us. Let’s go.” Micah shifts quickly and takes off toward the direction of the downed fences. Carter follows suit. Alex, however, stands around for a moment before turning to me.
“I was wrong,” he says.
“You think?” I raise an eyebrow.
“I shouldn’t have been so hard on Hope. I’m sorry. I’ll apologize to her properly tomorrow, but I wanted to tell you first.”
“What’s with you, Alex? Is everything okay?”
“Yeah. I’m just going through some stuff that I’m not ready to talk about yet. It’s nothing personal. I just…you know how I am. I want to get everything sorted out before I talk about it.”
I should have known immediately that something was wrong with Alex: something that had nothing to do with Hope. He’s usually really put together. He doesn’t usually go crazy like this or get off on tangents. I’ve known him for a long time and while he might jump the gun sometimes when it comes to work, he doesn’t usually accuse people of things without proof.
I pat him on the shoulder and nod.
“When you’re ready to talk, you know I’m here for you. This guy, whoever he is, is really getting to all of us.”
“I know, Wyatt. Thanks.”
He shifts then and I smile. Hope knew he was a cat. Most people can tell. While some shifters are good at hiding their animal form when they’re human, others are a bit more obvious.
Me? I’m a big ol’ bumbly bear. There’s no hiding what I am. Micah and Carter tend to be a bit more subtle, but Alex?
Alex is a sleek, sexy cat who couldn’t hide his true form if it bit him in the ass.
And I have a feeling that one of these days, it just might.
Chapter 21
Hope
It’s still dark when I hear a noise on the porch that wakes me. I was having the most wonderful dream about Wyatt and his brothers. They were bears and I…
I sit up in bed as I realize it wasn’t a dream.
None of it was.
Wyatt is a shifter and so are Micah, Carter, and I’m guessing Alex.
I flush as I think of the way Wyatt and I touched each other in my room and then in the shower. What is it about him that draws me to him like this?
Part of me regrets the fact that I didn’t come to Honeypot sooner. Colorado is a wonderful place and this town?
This town feels like home.
It feels more like home than my own hometown does, and that’s saying something.
Another creak sounds on the porch and I sit up in bed, holding the sheet against my skin. Who is it? What is it? Slowly, bits and pieces from the previous day come back to me and I remember that the guys thought someone had been sabotaging the ranch.
Alex thought it was me.
He doesn’t know me at all. I would never do anything to hurt Wyatt or his brothers. Yeah, I might be a little green, but they’ll see soon enough that I’m serious about sticking around.
I might not have the most experience with love or even friendship, but my small amount of experience is offset by my high amount of loyalty.
I’m loyal.
