by Ruby Dixon
The door creaks open.
The three of us tense in our seats.
Heavy, muddy boots stomp in. I look up in horror at the man who’s just walked through the door. He’s got a bristling, overgrown beard that sticks out in every direction. His hair is long, tangled, and hangs on the shoulders of his dirty plaid shirt. He’s enormous, and even from here I can smell the scent of were-bear and sawdust and sweat on his skin. I know that lumbersexuals are hot right now, but those guys are sculpted, almost effete versions of the raw man standing in the doorway of the bar. This man would give Paul Bunyan a run for his money. All he needs is a blue ox.
“There’s your challenge,” Ryann whispers. “Chance Eddington. I don’t know that he’s ever gotten a haircut. Or talked to a woman. Like, ever.”
Hoo boy.
I am so screwed. How am I going to get this guy to consent to a makeover?
Chapter Two
Chance
Women. I scowl. There are so many damn women around now that the shifters have been hooking up with humans. A bear can’t even go into a tavern and get a drink without having to be assaulted by flowers and weeds and shit. The worst is Cole’s new woman, Adelaide, and her fancy schmancy shop that, from all I’ve heard, is a place where people pay ladies to rub their faces. Worse, these women don’t even offer a below-the-waist massage.
Can’t figure out why I’d pay for something like that.
The only good thing that’s come of this is that I’ve been selling houses and cottages faster than they can be built. Shifters from all over are streaming into Pine Falls, and they all want places to live. The wolves want big houses, but others, like the big cats, want homes away from the water, near trees, and as far away from other folks as possible.
Good thing we live up in the great North woods where there’s a lot of land available and at cheap prices. Although with all these shifters, land prices are going to go up. Other Pine Falls residents can take advantage of that because while I’ve got about fifty acres bordering the Superior National Forest, none of that is going to any of these new shifters.
I stomp over to the bar. “Yuengling.”
I slap my fiver on the scarred chestnut bar top as Dent, the owner, slides an ice-cold beer down to my fist.
“Looks like you’re keeping busy,”he observes.
I give him a short nod to let him know that I’m not in the mood to chatter. I rode herd all day on a bunch of wet-behind-the-ears cubs who thought they knew everything there was about building because they’d helped Eli, the local shifter leader, put together a shed behind the Lodge.
Dent wanders to the other end of the bar. One of the flowers has crept up behind me. I ignore her, too.
“I know you can smell me,” she says and then climbs onto the empty stool next to me. The scent of wild honeysuckle floods every olfactory receptor I’ve got, and I nearly spill into my work pants. Fucking hell. A wolf shifter who smells like the best spring day of the year? I’m doomed.
I lift my beer to my lips and frantically try to replace her smell with that of yeast and hops. It doesn’t work. Still, I drain the bottle and signal for Dent to give me a refill. He sidles down the bar with interest in his eyes.
“I’m Dent,” he informs the shifter next to me.
I refuse to turn to look at her. It’s bad enough she smells good enough for me to want to lay her down on the bar top and lap at her until she’s creaming all over my tongue. I don’t need to see what she looks like. Once I’m done with this second beer, I’m going home and sticking my head in a manure pile until all I smell is shit.
“Maddie Thorne. I’m Adelaide’s latest hire.” Out of the corner of my eye, I see a slender hand reach out and clasp Dent’s darker, weathered one.
“Nice to meet you, Maddie. You need me to top off your screwdriver?” He doesn’t let go of her hand. Maddie leans forward, and a flash of brown sweeps by.
“Nope. I’m good, but I wouldn’t mind a burger. Rare. Hold the bun.”
“You got it.”
They continue holding hands. What is this? A date? A growl rumbles through my body. “The lady said she wants a burger,” I say between gritted teeth.
Dent’s lips curve into a slow smile. “So she did. You want anything else with that meat, sweetheart?”
And he still doesn’t let go. I reach one sawdust-covered hand and lay it on Dent’s forearm. “She just needs the hamburger.”
He bursts out laughing. “Another one bites the dust!” he chortles, and finally lets go. He strolls over to yell to his fry cook, George, that he needs a Bessie, still mooing.
“Can I buy you a drink?” Maddie asks me.
“No.” I tip my head back and drain the second bottle. It’s doing nothing to mask Maddie’s appeal. Only thing I can do is get up and leave. Pull myself outside the danger zone. Retreat to my newly built house in the woods. Move.
Move, I order, but my body doesn’t budge.
The bear inside me has planted its big ass on the stool and isn’t getting up until Maddie’s perfect little fingernails are dug into my fur. I push a hard hand down on top of my bear’s head and swing an ugly mug toward the sweet little thing sitting at my side.
“You oughta leave,” I growl.
She arches an eyebrow at me. “Why would I do that? I’m waiting for my dinner.”
“Dent’ll deliver it to your house.” Dent would like to strip you bare. The bear snarls. He doesn’t like the idea of Dent or any other male near Maddie’s lair. My hands curl against the bar top.
“I want to eat it here. With my friends.”She tips her head back toward the table where the two human mates are sitting.
Then go. Go away and take your damn temptation with you. I wave for Dent to come back.
“Another Yuengling?”he asks.
“No. Whiskey. Neat.” My voice is hoarse because Bear and I are fighting for dominance. Bear wants to curl up in Maddie’s lap. Or grab her by the hair and drag her home. He’d be fine with either choice. But me? I don’t want a mate. All these bears around me rushing to find their life partners are fools. They don’t realize that mates mean pain.
My parents were a mate pair. For twenty years, they were happy. They had me and my brother, Lucky. She was a long skirt, long hair, flower child, and my dad thought the sun and moon hung in the sky just to see her wander this earth. Then she died, and all the light in his eyes went out. I haven’t seen him smile in years. Mostly he sits on his front porch, drinking, and shooting his skeet gun at passing cars. Lucky and I had to hide all his live ammunition and fill his bullet pail with blanks.
Every day my dad lives without my mom is a day filled with pain that not even a case of whiskey can numb. So no, I don’t want a mate. I don’t want some honeysuckle-and-lavender-smelling girl with big hips and glossy brown hair sashaying around my house, filling it with sunshine only to take it away.
There are dangers in the North woods—other shifters, traps, stupid hunters with guns who don’t pay attention to ‘No Trespassing’ signs. A woman up here, particularly a shifter who has to run around to feel alive, is prey for those hunters.
I can’t get rid of the hunters. The local police frown on that. Not to mention that it affects the economy. Tourists aren’t big on staying in a small town known for being dangerous to visitors. So my only option is to avoid having a mate.
And I’ve done a good job of it. Until a few years ago, Pine Falls was big on bear shifters, a few wolves here and there, and only a handful of human women. None of them smelled good to me, and it was easy enough to avoid the tourists. They don’t come to construction zones.
But somewhere along the line, shifters and humans started hooking up, and now the whole goddamned town is like one bad episode of The Bachelor with fucking roses being handed out like candy at Halloween. I stiffen my spine.
Just because Maddie smells like heaven doesn’t mean she’s my mate. Maybe I just need to get laid. When was the last time that happened? I think back. Shit…the last time I had flesh-to-
flesh contact with another woman was about four years ago when I went to a building convention down in Florida. I’d been trying to arrange a meeting with a fellow who was selling home solar panels. We have quite a few people up here who want to live completely off the grid.
I’m long past due. That’s my problem. Regular hand jobs aren’t cutting it. My attraction isn’t the result of Maddie being my mate. It’s just a regular biological reaction due to being near a sweet-smelling woman.
Hell, it could be anyone. Okay, not anyone. The humans at the table smell about as interesting as sawdust. As does every other woman in this town, but just because Maddie makes all my taste buds water and my dick spring to life doesn’t mean she’s my mate.
I peer at her out of the corner of my eye. I’m afraid to look her full in the face. It’s one thing to smell her. It’s one thing to know her hair is as pretty as cattails in a marsh. It’s another thing entirely to look her straight in the face. I don’t need that kind of beauty haunting me. And I know she’s like a fucking angel from the way that Dent keeps glancing over here as if she’s some kind of picture he hasn’t ever laid eyes on before
“You wanna have sex?”I ask abruptly.
“I, ah, what? I came to ask if I can give you a makeover.” Shock is evident in her voice. But that wasn’t a no.
“Sure. After we have sex.”I wrap up her hamburger in a napkin, throw down a couple of twenties, and then grab her hand.
“Wait a second. I didn’t come over because I wanted to go home with you. I told my friends I was going to give the next person who walked through the door a makeover. I need people in Pine Falls to see me as something other than mate material. I’m a stylist!”
“You can do whatever the hell you want with me. After we have sex.”
I push open the door to the tavern and drag her straight to my pickup. I’m glad I washed and vacuumed it this weekend. She protests some more about how she’s a wolf and she’s going to scratch me up. I can’t control the sexual shudder that takes hold at the thought of her claws digging into my skin.
She threatens to cut off all my hair and shave my beard and paint my toenails, but she climbs into the cab of my truck anyway.
I put the truck in gear and head home. Unless she’s cutting everything with a knife, I’m pretty safe. But I want her to be comfortable so I tell her, “I promise I’ll shower before we fuck.”
Chapter Three
Maddie
What on earth am I doing?
The thought plays through my head, over and over again, as the lumberjack from hell drives his truck through the woods.
Apparently, we’re going to fuck. Apparently, I’m not saying no to this. Why am I not telling this guy to fuck off? Maybe because the hand that grabbed mine was enormous, and I’ve got a thing for big men? Maybe because his nails were clean and neat and trimmed despite the scary hair and beard and sawdust, which means he takes care of himself despite outward appearances? Maybe because I’m secretly addicted to bossy men who like to tell me what to do and how it should be done, and that’s why I fell for my last alpha? Maybe despite my confidence and independence, I like to be told what to do in bed, and this feeds into one of my fantasies?
Maybe it’s all of the above. Whatever it is, I’m in a stranger’s car and I’m off to have sex with him.
My phone dings with an incoming text. You okay? It’s from Ryann.
I quickly send a text back so she and Adelaide don’t worry. They’re human, so they probably didn’t overhear our conversation, which means I can say whatever I want. He’s super excited about the makeover. Told you I was good at this sort of thing. Will fill you guys in with details later!
I don’t point out that in order to do the makeover, I’m going to have to fuck him. Because what human girl in her right mind would do so? Then again, I’m not human. Sometimes we don’t react the way normal humans would.
She sends back a quick Yay! Send pics!
Will do. I almost feel bad, but it’s the truth, isn’t it? He’s going to let me make him over, or so he says. I slide my phone back into my pocket and watch the man as he drives. I don’t think he’s really looked me in the face once. Sniffed my scent, grabbed my hand, but hasn’t looked at my face. “You wanna tell me your name, stranger?”
“No.”
A surprised laugh escapes me. “Points for honesty, but it’s a deal breaker for me. I like to know whose name I’m screaming.”
His big body tenses, hands gripping the steering wheel. He almost looks me in the face then. Almost. Bet he wasn’t expecting that response. And really, it’s fun to play with him. For some reason, the idea of this tryst feels very…freeing. I’ll get a night with someone who’ll boss the crap out of me in bed, get my makeover, get my freedom from everyone in town slipping me their phone numbers, and then I can settle in to a life of glorious singledom here in Pine Falls.
“Chance,” he grits out after a moment.
Right. Ryann had said that, but I’d forgotten momentarily. Something about this guy’s presence is overpowering my senses. The dominance? The bear side of him? I’ve never had sex with a were-bear; I’ve always mentally pictured them as easygoing and laid-back, which is not my type. Not this guy. He practically radiates tension, and it’s doing wild things to my body. I cross my arms over my chest and rub my shoulders to hide the fact that my nipples are pricking through my top… “I’m Maddie Thorne.”
Chance doesn’t look over at me. “I heard.”
I get the impression he almost didn’t want to know my name. Too bad for him. Anonymous sex isn’t my kink.
“Condoms?” I ask after a moment.
He grunts again. “You in heat?”
“No!” The thought makes me recoil in horror.
“Then we don’t have to worry about you getting pregnant, do we?”
He’s got a point. I should protest. Unprotected sex with a stranger? Am I crazy? But he’s a shifter. We don’t catch things like humans do, and he’s right. He can’t get me pregnant if I’m not in heat. And I shiver because he’s so damn bossy. God, this should not be turning me on this much. I clench my legs tighter together because I’m starting to smell my own juices, and if I can, it means he can, too.
I look over and study his face, trying to figure out what he’d look like without the bushy beard and the mess of unkempt, too-long hair covering his head. He’s got nice eyes—I think—and the lips under the beard are full. I imagine those lips trailing over my skin as he grabs a handful of my hair …
I shift in my seat, nervous and excited at once.
“So, let’s discuss your makeover,” I say, when the scent of my arousal becomes too overwhelming. “The beard has to go, and I’m thinking maybe a fade? Something high and tight? Unless you want highlights. I can do that, you know.”
“No fucking highlights.” Chance’s voice is little more than a growl, but there’s a husky note to it that makes my girl parts tingle.
“Fair enough.” I keep my voice light. “We can do a facial to freshen up your skin, too, and I can do a mani-pedi on you. No colors, of course. We’ll just trim things down and massage you up and—”
The truck screeches to a halt. My gaze flicks to the road, but we’re in the middle of nowhere, nothing but trees and deep woods around us. A flicker of confusion crosses my mind. I’m not worried he’s going to hurt me—I can just turn wolf and outrun him if he tries to turn on me. It’s the forest that concerns me more than anything else. I’m not wearing the appropriate foot gear for a trek, and my cute little Badgley Mischka heels are brand new.
I look over at Chance, and he’s staring straight ahead. There’s an enormous bulge in the front of his pants, though, and that makes me breathless. I open the truck door and slide out, my heels wobbling on the gravel road.
Chance turns off the truck and hops out. He paces around the truck bed over to my side, and while I stand there awkwardly, he stalks toward me. My eyes widen as he comes right for me, and before I can take a step
backward, he grabs my arm and turns me, pushing me against the door. My back is to him, and I feel him jerk up my skirt, and his hand finds my panties.
My soaking, soaking wet panties.
The growl in my ear is feral with need and leaves me utterly quivering. “I could smell this in the fucking truck,” he breathes in my ear, and I feel the tickle of his beard against my skin. My entire body is practically vibrating with need, and I have to bite back a moan. “Why are you so turned on?”
When I don’t respond right away, his hand cups my pussy inside my panties. Not in a tender way, rather the way someone does when they own something. It makes me melt. The moan I’ve been trying to hold back escapes my throat.
“You into having sex with strangers?” His other hand grabs my hair, and my eyes nearly roll back in my head at the pleasure I get from that.
“N-no.”
“Then what is it?”
I’m practically panting now. If he touches my clit, I might spontaneously combust into orgasm. “I’m just…a good…submissive wolf. That’s all.”
He stills, and then I feel him lean in closer. His hand squeezes my pussy. “You like to be told what to do?”
I nod, and it makes his hand tighten in my hair, which sets off fireworks through my body all over again.
“So if I rip these panties off you and fuck you against the car, you won’t say anything to protest? You’ll just say ‘thank you’?”
I swallow hard, because truthfully? That about sums it up. He could shove his cock in my mouth right now and I’d try to thank him around it. Just the visual of that is making me want to come all over his hand.
I am, however, a stickler for dirt, and he’s rubbing sawdust on me even as he touches me. “You…said you’d shower,” I pant. “That’s a deal breaker.”
He grunts in acknowledgment, and I think that he’s going to let me go. A moment later, though, he leans in and squeezes my pussy, hard. “You gonna be able to wait until we get to my cabin, Maddie?”
