Primal Desire: a BBW Bear Shifter Paranormal Romance (Shadowlands Bear Shifters Book 5)

by Olivia Harp

  "Yes, but that's normal, work never ends!"

  "But—"

  "Audrey, this man cares about you, I haven't seen him like this. Ever. The way he looks at you was enough for everyone to know. We didn't even need to see the photos or listen to the gossip."

  Audrey laughed, "come on—"

  "I swear it. I won't let you use work as an excuse. You're both great for each other—"

  "He's the one who broke it off."

  That quieted her down.

  "Why?"

  "Same reason."

  "Oh my God, you millennials are idiots!"

  That made her laugh. She was young but not that young. Well, she was pushing thirty, how old were millennials supposed to be?

  "I'm sorry Miss Rodriguez, but if you think the relationship isn't worth it, then okay, fine. I'll believe you."

  "Thanks," Audrey said, her mood lifted, but her words hung deeply. Life would keep going and they wouldn't be together, "I think that's the best for everyone. I guess I'll learn how to be a badass woman, just like you. You're doing great by yourself—"

  The door behind Darcy opened.

  "Hey, honey, I brought you Pecan Praline and Banana Nut—"

  Darcy jumped to the side to cover the man who just entered her house, but it was too late.

  It was Peter Dunley.

  Audrey's eyes went stupidly wide, for a second she thought they were going to fall out of their sockets, like one of those cartoons from the fifties. She gasped so loud she was more embarrassed by her reaction to this than surprised at what she just saw.

  "Shut up you block head!" Darcy shouted, "I'm on a videocall!"

  "Hey! What's with the rage?" Mr. Dunley replied.

  Darcy shrugged off, shaking her head, trying to hide her smile.

  "It's Audrey Rodriguez I'm talking to."

  "Oh. Whoops," Mr. Dunley just said, and then, from the corner of the video feed, he waved at her.

  "Don't pay attention to him, dear," Darcy continued.

  Audrey took a while to put her thoughts in order.

  "Darcy... I... since when? I mean, that's great Congratula—"

  "Since years and years ago. I don't know why you didn't notice, it's not like we tried to keep it hidden, unlike someone else."

  "But how?"

  "We're professionals dear, work is work and our private life is separate."

  "How you doing, Miss Rodriguez?" Mr. Dunley yelled off camera.

  "She's doing great, thank you very much," Darcy snapped at him. She wasn't mean at all; she knew that the man was asking impolite questions. All in all, they seemed to be very comfortable with one another.

  "I'm glad," he said, coming into view, with a cup of ice cream in his hand.

  Audrey's phone vibrated again. It was an instant message. She knew who it was. She felt it in her heart.

  She grabbed it and saw she had four missed calls, and seven unread messages. The latest one began with "I need to see you."

  She had to hold her laughter.

  When she turned up to her screen, Mr. Dunley was gone, and Darcy's face said it all. She understood.

  "I'm going to serve you both flavors, dear," Mr. Dunley said from somewhere in the back.

  Darcy rolled her eyes, trying and failing to hide how happy she really was.

  "Men," she just said.

  "Men," Audrey repeated. Darcy nodded, said "good luck," and ended the video call.

  ***

  She unlocked her phone but before she could read any message, a stinging smell startled her.

  It was strong and pungent and very familiar.

  Fear filled her as she saw smoke coming into her room from beneath the closed bedroom door.

  CHAPTER 41

  "Fuck!" yelled Enzo, tossing his cell phone aside, flooring the accelerator.

  Something wasn't right. Yeah. He fucked up, but it wasn't in her to just ghost him like that. His bear growled anxious.

  It was so obvious; he should have seen it before.

  He turned right on a corner and kept on going towards her building at full speed. He looked up, the sky was clear, he could see the stars.

  "The fucking Shadowlands are back."

  That's what he told the crew, back at the mountain.

  He'd been brief.

  "How is it possible for a vampire to walk in the sun?" he asked Maverick.

  "Or the Primal Bear to fight three Shadow creatures by himself, almost dropping dead but surviving thanks to the voice of his mate? Or what about Deedee, Raiden? She closed a puncture all by herself. How?"

  They were the White Paws. They were powerful, that's how.

  But it wasn't completely true.

  "We were chosen," he told them, "we thought we found our way here on our own, but nature guided us."

  The White Paws mountain was a weak spot. A place on Earth were the Shadowlands could crawl in more easily than anywhere else.

  It was the hardest place to protect, and nature, in turn, made them all come to it.

  Because its weakness was also its strength.

  "This is a place of power," he said, "that's why there are so many incursions. Where else have you seen so many of them?"

  Nowhere. No one needed to answer.

  "It's a Ley-Line crossing. We're powerful because of it, and it is powerful because of us. Why do you think the Rot spread all the way to Alaska?"

  Franklin looked at him. He'd had the same question for years. He thought it impossible to answer.

  "The fucking Shadowlands rode the Ley-Line and wanted to spread to the furthest corner of the world."

  It didn't succeed, so now it tried spreading to a nearby town.

  "I healed Audrey, my mate," he'd told them, "and I gave the Shadowlands enough strength to cross over. There should be other weak spots."

  Damien ordered everyone to scramble on their territories. They had to find the weak spots, the places where only a greatly attuned bear shifter could sense. They were the White Paws, after all. And they'd been played.

  "My fault," Enzo said.

  "No one's fault," said Damien, the alpha, and everyone agreed.

  "Go get your mate," Maverick said, "she's in great danger."

  "We finish this tonight," Raiden said.

  The bigger weak spot was not in the forest. It was Audrey. He healed her and marked her as a primary target without realizing.

  You can't have light without shadow. I brought positive, healing energy, and part of its opposite crossed over.

  He turned left on the street of her building and saw the worst.

  "No," he gasped.

  Flames consumed the third floor.

  Her floor.

  CHAPTER 42

  He stopped the vehicle and ran into the building, passing several people along the way.

  "Wait!" someone said, "firefighters are on the way!"

  It didn't matter. She was inside. He would not wait another second.

  The first glass door to the building was locked. It didn't matter, he jumped through it as if it was nothing. Pieces of glass fell everywhere around him.

  Inside, the alarm bell screeched like a maniac, the heat could be felt even here, two floors down.

  It's an old building. Not all of the fire extinguishers worked. The owners would face his wrath later. First, he had to make sure he got to Audrey before the flames consumed everything.

  The bear inside him bellowed, it pushed hard, trying to come out now.

  He tightened his muscles and growled back at the beast.

  Now was not the time for a power struggle. He wouldn't let it out. Not yet. Its anger might blind it from acting rationally. And he needed his wits now more than ever.

  The fucking emergency stairs. Where the fuck were they? Fuck, it took him long enough to find them.

  The building reeked of death. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see a dark presence, fleeing from him, trying to remain unnoticed. It didn't matter.

  I knew it was you.

&n
bsp; But he had to focus on finding her first.

  He kicked open the emergency stairs door and ran up, the heat increasing every step of the way until it bit on his skin like a starved beast.

  The smell of his own clothes burning filled his nostrils.

  He got to the second floor, its emergency door already open, people used it to flee the building. A ray of hope went through him. Maybe Audrey did the same. Maybe she was safe and sound and he had nothing to worry about. But deep down, he knew he was wrong. They'd come for her. He continued up, up, up, three or four steps at a time. Until the third floor's emergency door greeted him like a demon. Hell was behind it.

  Burning hot smoke and flames engulfed him the very moment he vaulted into the main corridor.

  "Audrey?" he yelled, black smoke covered every inch of the hallway.

  He couldn't hear anything; his senses were flooded with his own rage and the inferno around him.

  His skin crawled with fury. The bear needed to come out, but this time, he didn't push it back. The beast itself knew it had to wait.

  His mind reached for the air around and pushed the smoke away with a strong gust of wind.

  Enzo walked to her door, smoke fleeing from him. An air bubble surrounded him, burning hot, yes, but he didn't care. He would not be stopped by this.

  Her door was charred, covered in black ashes. The fire originated from there. This was no accident.

  He kicked the door open with such strength it ripped it away from off its hinges, breaking apart as it hit the floor. She was nowhere to be seen.

  Not in the kitchen, where the flames reached outside the window, feeding on the walls and ceiling. Not on the living room.

  Here, a voice said deep inside his mind. Audrey called at him. Reaching out like she always did, and this time, not even his power could block her. She was strong. She was his mate.

  A shiver ran down his spine as he bolted to her room, going through the door in a wrathful leap. Her heart is stopping.

  Flames swallowed the bedroom: the bed, the desk... fire obliterated everything, the walls were a cascade of red hot flames, the heat impossible to survive.

  His body fought the pain. As a shifter, he could heal fast and endure any much more harm than any man ever could. But even then, this was hell, he wasn't unscathed.

  Fire embraced him, his clothes were gone now, turned to carbonized rags. She called me from here.

  But she wasn't around. He turned to his left. Of course. She hid in the bathroom.

  The first step he took was strong and firm, the next one not so much. He looked down and realized how hurt he was.

  The flames had done their damage, his skin looked charred in parts, black and red and swollen. He stumbled but regained his balance and continued forward until he reached for the door handle, now turned into a white-hot branding iron. He shouted in anger and ripped it away.

  Enzo fell on his knees but he was finally there, lying on the white tiles on the floor, his lungs burning, like a million needles pressing from inside his chest. He coughed and blood stained the floor, looked up and saw his woman laying on the bathtub, water dripping from the showerhead, a small window opened above it.

  He crawled to her, his heart beat so fast he thought it was going to explode.

  He would die for her. Nothing mattered if she died.

  Fire ate the entrance behind him, but he reached her first. He slowly lifted her head, and pressed his face against hers. He needed her.

  "Audrey," he whispered in her ear, "listen to my voice."

  He reached deeper into the bathtub and brought her closer to him, pressing his ear against her chest.

  His insides turned to stone. Her heart was beating so faintly she might as well have died.

  "I won't let you," he said, louder this time, and turned to the fire.

  "You won't take her with you!"

  The bear inside him roared and surrendered every ounce of its power to him.

  The everlasting strength of nature rushed through his veins. It was a kind of energy that he could barely contain. Like the eye of a storm. Like a ray of light finding its way to earth through a sky full of dark clouds. That's it. The light.

  He channeled it into her, healing her wounds. All of the damage the fire had done, the smoke, the heat... he would make it right again.

  He yelled. Everything in him was for her. Her life mattered so much more than his own. The beast inside roared but not in anger or fury. It was pride.

  The beast, for the first time in his life wasn't fighting him. On the contrary, they were one and the same.

  It understood Enzo hadn't shifted because a fight was the last thing he was looking for.

  A heartbeat.

  The echo of one at first, then another one, louder, then louder and louder until he could no longer hear it because of her coughing, rough and hard and beautiful to hear at the same time. It was like music to him. A sweet melody that grew in volume every passing second. She was alive.

  Her eyes slid open and Audrey saw him. She raised her hand and caressed his cheek, tears rolling down her face.

  "I heard you. I heard your voice. You came for me."

  "Always."

  She hugged him so hard that for a second he found peace... finally found peace in a world where he'd seen so much anger and wastefulness.

  "I'll never let you go again," he said.

  She looked at him, unable to speak, a smile adorning her face.

  "I love you, Audrey."

  She hugged him hard and said the words she said once or twice before in her life, never truly knowing what they meant until now.

  "I love you too, big man."

  CHAPTER 43

  Her words carried more power than he could have ever imagined. Enzo was stronger than ever. Energy flooded every cell in his body. The bear roared again with such intensity he was sure the building would be toppled by its fury, not the fire.

  Then he felt that presence again.

  He'd brought the Rot into the world the moment he healed Audrey, back at the camp. Now, after doing it again, the monstrous being that sneaked into the world gained power. No light without shadow.

  He gave his woman a kiss. He didn't need to turn around to feel it approaching.

  "It took you long enough," he said to something behind him.

  Audrey turned to see him, without knowing what was happening.

  He held her hand tight and whispered, "you are safe."

  He heard her gasp and clutch his hand in fear.

  "I won't let it hurt you again," he told her with a smile.

  ***

  A tentacled creature peeked into the bathroom. An orb with giant tendrils made of fire, a giant eye at its center. Smaller, bug-eyes surrounded it like tumors, all of them black and open and fixed on the man of her life, exuding dark hatred.

  It was an attack. One of the things the White Paws fought against. Its existence was an abomination, an offense to the natural order of things.

  She could feel Enzo's anger, and the thing felt it too. She should have been cowering in fear, but instead she was angry. Furious. This fucking thing attacked her and hurt the love of her life.

  The tentacled black orb slid into the small bathroom, just a few feet away from them. It raised one of its spiked appendages and snapped it against her.

  She crossed her arms and braced for impact, hoping against hope that it wouldn't split her in two.

  But Enzo leaped forward to meet it, and it sent him crashing against the wall. The creature's red-hot arms surrounded him, the sizzle of his skin being burned made Audrey tremble.

  He roared in pain and his hands sunk into the creature's fleshy arm, its big center eye opened in surprise.

  His roar almost deafened her. Suddenly, he was no longer a man, but a huge black bear, biting and clawing and trying to rip the thing apart.

  The thing bled. Or at least looked like it did. Liquid fire splashed throughout the room, she sank into the bathtub to avoid it just in time
before a tentacle hit it and broke it apart, dropping her to the floor, along with the few inches of water she managed to get in it.

  She looked up only to see the bear tear one of the creature's appendages in two, then get stung by another one, the rest of them sliding around his body, tightening on its torso.

  What do I do? What could she do? The fire raged outside the room, there was nowhere to run.

  The monster leaped over Enzo's head and pushed him through the wall, the impact dropping plaster and parts of the ceiling down on her. The fight kept on going outside, raging in the fire in the middle of her room... and Enzo was losing.

  ***

  Audrey was safe. That was what mattered. Now that she wasn't in immediate danger, Enzo roared at the fucking abomination and clawed at it harder and harder.

  But it was fast. Way too fast.

  He chased it over the flaming bed and into the other side of the room, it's huge tentacles letting it cover great distances quickly. There, he saw and opening and caught it midair, going through the far wall and into the living room.

  The thing reached into Enzo's mind. Madness, despair, distilled hatred caught in a storm of corruption. He shut it down. The thing was powerful but he wouldn't get caught in its games. Blocking Audrey was enough training for him. He smirked. Now he understood.

  It tried to use Audrey, and the school, to give itself power. It infected everything, that's why everyone was so jumpy, so easy to get angry, so quick to point fingers and feel hate.

  He let it all out. The bear snarled, happy. It finally had what it wanted. A fight to the death against a worthy enemy. It had to deal with it now. Before it caused more damage.

  Hell was everywhere around, flames raged on every side, the vile creature before him thought itself immortal.

  He'd be dead by now if Audrey hadn't given him the strength to fight on. He wanted to live. He wanted to be by her side for decades, to have kids with her, to make love and smile and have arguments and make up with her and kiss her good night, every night. She was the woman of his life. His fated mate.

  He roared and leaped at the thing, his claws severed three or four of its appendages before reaching the center eye.

  The thing let out a screech of pain so loud any person who heard it from so close would have had its eardrums shattered.