Sabina's Ex-con

by Miranda Bailey

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Epilogue

  About The Book

  A Note From The Author

  Sabina

  Tavin

  Sasha’s Mountain Bear

  Bonus Books

  About the Author

  Sabina’s Ex-con

  Bear Club 2

  Miranda Bailey

  Copyright © Lovy Books Ltd and Miranda Bailey, 2018

  Miranda Bailey has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  In no way is it legal to reproduce, duplicate, or transmit any part of this document in either electronic means or in printed format. Recording of this publication is strictly prohibited and any storage of this document is not allowed unless with written permission from the publisher. All rights reserved.

  Respective authors own all copyrights not held by the publisher.

  Lovy Books Ltd

  20-22 Wenlock Road

  London N1 7GU

  Contents

  About The Book

  A Note From The Author

  1. Sabina

  2. Tavin

  3. Sabina

  4. Tavin

  5. Sabina

  6. Tavin

  7. Sabina

  Sasha’s Mountain Bear

  Bonus Books

  About the Author

  About The Book

  Bear Club is its own universe, a place that only appears to those that need it. Not long ago a young woman walked into the club and found two of the most beautiful men she’d ever seen in her life. But those men had a sister, one by blood and one by choice. A sister with a need, a need to be loved, by anyone, by all, but deep down, she needed the love of just one. For a brief moment she’d thought that woman was Trudi, but then Trudi goes for her brothers. Will anyone ever come for her?

  A man in need, with secrets to share, changes everything. But will he bring the taint of the human world with him, a taint that stole her parents from her?

  This is a super-sexy, tough as nails, bear-shiftery tale full of steam, and a HEA, meant for 18+ audiences ONLY. There are no cliffhangers, but this does tie in with Bear Club 1, so if you love this one, be sure to check that one out too!

  A Note From The Author

  This tale is for readerland, for those that make each day brighter with their love and support, and for those that seek out the light in the darkness. May you always find your way into the light. I have included a soundtrack for this book, because, well, music rocks and makes the world a better place. Have a listen to the songs I played as I wrote each section, or don’t, but I bet you might like one or two…

  - MB

  Playlist:

  1. Pistol Annies-Hell on Heels

  2. Ruby Friedman-I’m Not Your Friend

  3. Miranda Lambert- Tinman/Vice

  4. The Weekend-Rescue You

  5. Banks-Beggin for Thread

  6. Marin Morris-My Church

  7. David Grey, Alibi

  8. The Brian Jonestown Massacre-Open Heart Surgery

  9. Delta Rae-Bottom of the River

  10. You Don’t Own Me-Grace

  11. Hozier-Work Song

  12. Tove Lo-Cool Girl

  13. Clutch-Regulator

  14. Tove Lo-Moments

  1

  Sabina

  Pounding music soothed the ache in my head as I danced, my eyes watching the woman in the mirror. Dark haired and full of sensuality, she moved against me, our bodies matched to the rhythm driving us both. Her eyes were dark, brown, and full of warm promise where mine were cold and blue. The expression in my eyes was a warning, hers was an invitation.

  She belonged to my brothers, she was theirs, which meant she could never be mine, no matter how desperately I might want her. Desire thrummed through my abdomen as her round little bottom swirled against my hips, desire that I could not show. I looked in the mirror again, my lips only a whisper of a graze against her neck as I watched.

  Quinn and Travis had changed the bar we called home since Trudi came back six months ago. She and I now had our own little perch, a small stage for our nightly dancing, an improvement on the tables I used to dance on. As my hands clutched at her hips, I turned us, away from the mirror that reflected two dark-haired beauties, to the audience, busy with their own moves. It seemed the crowd wasn’t so lost in their dance partners that we’d go unnoticed, though, because a loud cheer pierced the pounding beat as they saw where my hands were.

  I found heat between Trudi’s firm thighs, one hand teasing her just at her the apex of her thigh, my hand not quite where she wanted it, so that she twisted against me, trying to bring my fingers higher, so that I’d touch her through the tight black pants she wore. My other hand made its way up her abdomen to cover her breast, just as I breathed out a sigh against her necks, my lips almost touching her sweet skin. I cupped her breast, massaging it through the material, until I felt a tremor run through her body at last. I did my part and jumped away. She wanted me, but that didn’t mean she’d ever have me.

  “That’s rather cruel, don’t you think, Sabina?” Travis, not my biological brother, but brother all the same, came to the bar when I trotted up for a shot of tequila.

  “I’m sure you’ll be able to peel her off the walls, later, Travis.” I gave him a smirk and slammed back the tequila, wanting oblivion.

  My little tease of his mate might have been cruel to her, but I’d been even crueler to myself. I didn’t have a man to ease the ache, or a woman for that matter. I’d spurned all advances made to me since Trudi came along and changed all of our lives. I wanted what she had with my brothers, that all-consuming love, that need that drove you to give up your life-goals for something so much better.

  The problem was, I couldn’t have that with Trudi. Oh, if she wanted it badly enough she could have it, she could have me too, but I wouldn’t do that to my brothers. Even if they did say they didn’t mind, I would. I knew I couldn’t have all of her, that she’d go to sleep each night with one or both of them at her side, not in my bed.

  That’s not what I wanted. Before she came along, I was happy to take whoever I wanted to my bed. I didn’t need love, or someone to whisper my hopes to. I just needed to fuck, and get on with my day. I looked around, hoping there’d be someone to catch my eye tonight, but every face left me cold. I needed to get out of this place, I decided, I need new blood, new bodies.

  Taking the next shot of tequila Travis set down for me, I slugged it back and walked away. The fiery liquid heated my blood and made it sing in my veins, but it didn’t help the itch inside of me, the one that craved more. I needed some fresh air. Trudi was still on the stage, dancing for the crowd, for a captivated Quinn. My real brother, his eyes as blue as mine, couldn’t take his eyes off of his mate. She moved in a new rhythm, one she’d learned just for him and Travis. She took my breath away, but I forced myself to breathe anyway.

  I walked out of the club, pushed the solid oak doors closed, and went to my motorcycle in the parking lot. Travis and Quinn bought it for me on my 21st birthday. Now, at 25, I was an expert rider, and the bike gleamed as brightly as the day they’d brought it home to me. I ran a finger along the powder coat paint, black as midnight with an electric blue bear on the tank. Flecks of reflective blue dotted the finish, giving the impression of stars, stars that formed the Ursa Major constellation.

  I glanced back, my thoughts on leaving.

  “You really should stay you know?” Quinn, my brother, my father-figure since I was 13 an
d our parents died, leaving my 18 year old brother and his best friend to care for me as best they could. What did 18 year old boys now about teenaged girls? They’d learned a lot and coped, I have to give them props for that.

  “How do you always know what I’m thinking, Quinn?” I sighed and leaned against the seat of my bike. The air was cool, but not cold enough to need anything more than the leather jacket I’d snagged from the wall-hooks as I walked out of the door.

  “I know you like I know the back of my hand, little sister. You’re restless again.” He always knew, even when I tried to hide it.

  “I suppose I am.” I sighed again and stood up, too twitchy to sit still for long.

  “You know that’s not our world out there, Sabina. That’s the world that took our parents.” Quinn shifted in place, his anxiety making him just as twitchy. He hated talking about that, but he would if he had to. I guess he thought this was one of those times.

  “A hunter shot them, Quinn, I know.” I looked away, not feeling the same pain he did, not the way he did. I was only little when our parents went out into the human world, I didn’t feel a responsibility like he did, a responsibility that said he should have been with them, to help them, to protect them as a full-grown bear. I was young when they died, certainly old enough to remember them, and love them, but I have a hard time remembering them now. I think most of the memories I can still bring to mind came from pictures and the stories Quinn and Travis told me. They weren’t really my memories at all then. I couldn’t miss them the way Quinn did, I could only miss what I didn’t have, what I’d missed out on.

  Travis had ended up parentless in that fiasco too, and he’d been a brother to me since.

  “Yes, but do you know why that hunter shot them?” Quinn was making me go through the same list of questions he always did when I got like this. It was his way of reminding me why we stayed in our world.

  “Yes, because they were in their bear shapes. The outside world has a strange fascination where some revere bears and find them sacred. Or they think we’re all teddy bears and cuddly. The other half side of that coin is the side that hates us and hunts us down for sport. Mom and Dad, the rest of the pack, went on a run, nothing more, and were spotted by a farmer. He and his son shot them all before they could get away.”

  We’d lost 7 adults that night, and we hadn’t really recovered from that loss yet. We had physically, but emotionally? None of us went into the human world now. Sure, we’d take in whoever showed up in our world, that was what Bear Club was about, after all. We were a place for those in need, those that needed safety and a place to hide. Otherwise, our world would never be revealed to the human world, a world that hunted our kind without any understanding of what we were.

  Quinn nodded his head, his dark hair a match to my own. “Then why do you want to go out there so desperately?”

  Love, I wanted a love of my own and I didn’t think I would find it at our little haven. I couldn’t tell him that though.

  “I have to find out for myself, that’s all Quinn. I have to see it, just once in my life.” I turned my head away, looking down the road that led away from the sanctuary I called home. There had to be somebody out there for me.

  “Just wait a little while, Sabina. You’re restless, it happens to us all. It will pass.” Quinn sighed and ran his hand along the right side of his jaw. He needed to shave, and his hand made a rasping sound along his face that made my skin crawl with discomfort.

  “I’m going for a run, big brother. I’ll be back in a bit.” I turned back to look at him, needing him to understand. I could see it there, begrudgingly given, but given.

  “Sure, little sister. Have a nice run.” He did something then that he hasn’t a in a long time. He reached out, ruffled my hair with his broad hand, and kissed me on the cheek before he went back inside.

  I sighed in relief, as he walked back into the bar, but I knew the battle wasn’t over yet. None of them would want me to head out into the human world, just look at Trudi’s experience there. She’d been raised as a human, forced to hide her true nature from the world, almost to the point of hiding it from herself. She rarely shifted and didn’t know anything about what it meant to be a bear. Only what we’ve taught her since she came back to us.

  She’d hidden it so well that none of us had even suspected Trudi was a bear when we met her. Normally, we have a sense of each other, a knowing sensation that we all learn to identify early on in our lives. Trudi hadn’t triggered that sense at, and I can only imagine what kind of strength it had taken her to pull that off. She’d told me about her mother, about the episodes of shifting by accident and the “training” her mother had given her.

  Trudi called it training, I called it abuse, let’s call the whole thing off. Locking your kid in a closet is not training, it’s straight-up abuse in my opinion, but Trudi had a forgiving nature. She’d found more inner strength, something I knew I wouldn’t be capable of, to let it all go and move on with her life.

  Abuse and murder, I thought as I went back to a barn behind the bar and breathed in to calm myself down. That’s what the human world had to offer me. A shiver ran down my spine as I went to a private room in the barn, one of many rooms inside the dilapidated looking barn. It looked like it was falling down on the outside, but the inside housed two rows of well-maintained and modern rooms designed to serve as a place to rest for all of our patrons. Each one had a lock on the inside of the door, and a key lock on the outside. The patrons could get the key from any of us that worked behind the bar at no cost. It was just a service we provided.

  I looked around the tiny room, a bed, a table, and a television, nothing more. Just enough for a drunk patron to sleep off the night’s fun. Or get into even more trouble, I thought, remembering some of the shenanigans that gone on in the barn hidden away and camouflaged to hide it from any outsiders that might stumble upon us. There’d been some wild parties back here, and I’d taken part in more than one.

  I settled onto the duvet covered bed and looked around. When had I become a miserable little cow, I wondered, propping my feet on the table. When had I stopped enjoying the life I had? Was it only Trudi, or was there something more wrong? Was I getting to the stage in life where all bear females want a mate and cubs? I laughed and stood up, a kid, yeah, that’s just what I needed.

  A troubled mind does not make for an easy shift, and mine was about as troubled as it could be. I went back outside, to the edge of the forest, and tried to shift. I concentrated, I tried to clear my head, but found I just couldn’t do it. I gave a frustrated cry of anger and looked up at the sky. Up there, in the clouds, was peace, but there was none down here for me. I couldn’t even shift, and it had always been as easy as blinking my eyes my whole life. Something really was off for me, then.

  I tried one more time, calming myself first, breathing in and out, letting my worries go, until I felt peaceful and then I did the trick that can’t be explained. It wasn’t really a movement that made us shift, or a spell, there was no trick of crossing the eyes and twisting your knees, it was just something you wanted, and then it was. There was no pain to shifting, no tearing clothes, it just happened; one minute I was human, the next I was bear.

  I took a first step into the forest, my human brain intact, but now less tame, a wilder animal. I wanted to run, I wanted to chase bunnies, and forget my human self. I launched myself into the trees, my paws hitting the cool, leaf-strewn ground with confidence as I made my way through the forest. I ran for hours, or minutes, I don’t know, I just let all of my frustrated worries go and ran in the wilds of the forest.

  I was breathing hard by the time I made it back to the parking lot, I’d pushed myself beyond my normal pace. I hadn’t even chased the little chipmunk I’d found on a fallen log, I’d just ignored it and kept running. A familiar sound had distracted me for a moment, but I’d let it go when it wasn’t repeated. I had to run, nothing else mattered.

  I didn’t want to go back to the bar, was the pr
oblem. I’d have to make a decision, a real one, if I did that. As much as I wanted to go, as much as I wanted to find a new world, I loved my brothers and the club too much.

  A frustrated growl left my throat as I slowed to a loping pace, letting my heart slow down as I came back to familiar territory. I stopped when I heard that noise again. I knew that sound. My blood went cold as I finally processed what I’d heard before, and heard again now, a sound like a gunshot. There couldn’t be hunters here, they weren’t allowed, they wouldn’t be able to find their way in. I looked to the bar, but there was no way anyone could have heard that shot and it had come from the other direction.

  I looked to the place where the sound had come from and saw nothing at first. There was a mist playing along the ground, and it hid anything that might be there. I felt my heart begin to pound again, something was wrong out there. Someone might need help. I knew I should call my brothers, the other bears, but I didn’t. I set off quickly, slowing as I came to the edge of the mist.

  There was someone there, someone lying in the road. I stood there, staring at the shape, a man from the looks of it. He wasn’t moving at all, he was just lying there, his hands out as if he’d tried to crawl up the road for help but had passed out before he could get any further. I didn’t stop to ask questions, or wonder who he was, why he was being shot at, because something inside of me twisted when I saw his face.

  Something that growled mine and wouldn’t stop growling.