by Zoe Chant
Then she pushed her hand beneath all those layers of fabric and finally found what she had been searching for: hot skin, velvet-soft against her palm although his shaft was hard as iron.
She drew him free. God, he was massive! And gorgeous.
She stroked him, and he groaned again. She shivered a little at the way he felt in her hand. He seemed incredibly large against her palm, and a pulse of heat ran through her when she remembered the sensation of him inside her.
He had felt impossibly large inside her as well, but he’d made her feel so good...
The memory was enough to make everything inside her clench with need. She could feel that her panties were drenched; she wanted him so much right now that the emptiness inside her ached.
“Tell me what you want,” he said. His voice was so hoarse it came out as another growl. “Anything you want. I’ll give it to you.”
Suddenly she remembered the ridiculous movies she’d seen: couples making love in the sunlight right on the floor. Or the kitchen table. Or that thing in the book her cousin had loaned her with the blindfold and the large feather...
She blushed, and then she shook her head.
“I want you. Only you,” she said suddenly, and then slowly dropped to her knees.
Whoa, he looked even bigger like this!
She didn’t really have much experience with this. Timothy had always wanted her to, but the few times she’d tried, she hadn’t enjoyed herself at all. And of course Timothy hadn’t really cared, as long as he got off.
But this was different.
A shiver ran up her spine, but it was one of need as she leaned closer. She pressed her lips to Kayden’s erection. He was hot against her mouth, and when she parted her lips and breathed warm air against him, he moaned.
“You don’t have to,” he groaned.
Sidney laughed softly. “I know,” she said simply.
And perhaps that was why it felt so good. She really didn’t have to. She knew that.
But she wanted to. For the first time in her life, she knew what she wanted, and that was Kayden. She wanted to be the one who made him feel good.
She licked upwards. He tasted good too, clean with a hint of soap and beneath it all that masculine musk.
He groaned again. His hand came to rest against her cheek, gently caressing her. When she reached the crown, she slowly swirled her tongue around him. He was so hard for her that she could taste his desire already. There was a hint of salt and bitterness, and the overpowering taste of male arousal. It rushed through her, filled her up with need.
Heat clenched between her thighs, a trickle of wetness dripping from her folds, and with a moan she closed her lips around him.
After a moment, Kayden gasped, “Enough!” and gently drew her away.
He was flushed. His chest was heaving as though he’d run a marathon, and his eyes were dark with hunger.
“Enough,” he repeated, more softly, “or I won’t be able to do this.”
With those words, he scooped her up in his powerful arms. The motion was so sudden that Sidney let out a small gasp of surprise.
Kayden carried her to her bedroom. The room was filled by the warm light of the late afternoon sun, and he set her down on the bed, in the circle of gold the light cast onto her cushions.
Wordlessly, they helped each other undress. Her fingers trembled as she worked on the buttons of his shirt. The shifting muscles beneath distracted her for a moment. Intrigued, she followed the valley between his impressive pecs downward with her lips, until she had to raise her hips so that he could pull off her jeans and the soaked, pink panties she’d worn beneath.
She was already trembling with desire. Kayden pushed his jeans down while she struggled out of her top. And then, finally, his large hands cupped her breasts, pressing a kiss to a nipple through the lacy fabric of the bra before that was finally unhooked and slung aside as well.
“Come here,” he said softly, his voice thick with desire as he sat down with his back against the headboard.
He drew her closer. She straddled his lap, his shaft teasing against her folds—and then she sank down.
“Oh,” she breathed, eyes wide as she felt him filling her.
He felt just as large as the first time, but it felt good too. She clenched around him, needing that sensation of him filling her.
His hands came around her to hold her steady.
“Yeah, just like that,” he murmured, eyes watching intently. “Just like that. Just—”
His fingers found her clit, circling it teasingly. Abruptly, she arched her back, his shaft so hard and deep inside her that it felt like she was nothing but throbbing heat.
Orgasm ripped through her, coming over her quicker and more powerful than anything she’d felt before. She whimpered, her fingers clenching around his powerful biceps, shuddering around him while she tried to regain her breath.
After a moment, when she had calmed again, she almost felt disappointment well up inside her. She’d never come so quickly before—it had been too quick, somehow. It hadn’t been enough, and now the ache inside her wasn’t satisfied, the pleasure was slowly ebbing away and the hunger for him was still biting at her.
“Oh,” she sighed again, still breathless but a little calmer now, trying to fight back the disappointment.
She’d wanted to make him feel good—that was what should matter to her, right?
“Good,” he purred against her ear. “And now we can really get started.”
The look in his eyes was wicked. When she gave him a questioning look, he clasped her hips with his hand.
“Try moving—here, like this. See?”
His large hands guided her in a new rhythm. She found herself riding him slowly. His large erection was sliding in and out of her again and again, rubbing against her inner walls in a way that made her feel sparks erupt somewhere inside her. She moaned dizzily, clenching hard around him, and the feeling intensified. Her fingers grabbed his shoulder again—but his hands on her hips made her keep moving, keep riding him.
The feeling was nearly unbearable. She had never felt anything like it; it was driving her crazy. She was so slick inside that she could take him even deeper in this position. And with every motion, his hard shaft rubbed past her inner walls while she clenched around him and gasped for breath at the sensation.
“Wait.” His voice was thick with need and pride. “You’re so gorgeous like this.”
“Oh God,” she moaned, arching her back as a new wave of pleasure threatened to carry her away. The feeling of him inside her was maddening, it was too good, it was too much, she couldn’t bear it—
“Now,” he murmured.
His fingers, slick with her own wetness, circled her clit again, and at last she let go with a sob.
Pleasure crashed over her, moved through her in electric waves, red-hot heat throbbing through her as she trembled in his arms. Dimly she felt his own orgasm. Heat was filling her up while he moaned her name and then buried his face against her neck as she was still throbbing around him, waves of pleasure running through her again and again.
“That was...” She searched for words when she could finally breathe again.
Kayden slipped from her, breathless himself as they settled down.
“Incredible. The most incredible thing I’ve ever felt,” Sidney finally said.
“Really?” There was a hint of smugness in Kayden’s voice, but there was a possessive pleasure, too.
Sidney decided that he deserved a moment of smugness after that amazing experience.
“I told you,” he murmured, his cheek resting against hers. “Anything you want, I’ll give it to you.”
“Hm...” She chuckled softly, a pleasant tiredness creeping up on her. “There was that thing in the book my cousin Cleo gave me, with the feathers and the blindfolds...”
“Feathers, hm?” Kayden laughed softly. “I’ll see what I can do.”
“This was... just fine...” She yawned, fighting to
keep her eyes open as exhaustion finally caught up with her.
The last thing she remembered was Kayden gently kissing her before he pulled up the covers.
Chapter Eight: Kayden
When Kayden woke, everything was dark. At first he couldn’t say what had disturbed him.
He was in bed with Sidney. Her warm body was resting in his arms. The heightened senses of his bear picked up her slow, regular heartbeat, and he could feel the heat of her breath exhaled against his shoulder.
He was comfortable. He was with his mate. Everything was as it should be.
But something was wrong.
Slowly, that niggling sense of urgency in him grew.
Silently, he slipped from her embrace without disturbing her. Still naked, he moved towards the window. By the light of the moon, he could make out her garden. The grass was already a little too long because Sidney was too busy with the wedding chaos. His eyes moved along the small patch of lovingly tended flowers and herbs, then past the two small apple trees she told him she’d only planted last year.
The garden was empty.
After a moment, a rabbit crossed the lawn. It vanished beneath Sidney’s roses, and then everything was still and silent once more.
Kayden kept watch. The strange urgency in him had not left.
When nothing else had happened after a minute had passed, he gave Sidney a considering look. He didn’t want to leave her—not like this, without a word. What would she think if she woke during the night and found him gone?
Still, the senses of his bear could not be denied. For much of his life, his bear had kept him alive.
If his bear thought that something was wrong, Kayden had to believe him. After all, if something—or someone—had trailed him here, then Sidney was in danger too.
On bare feet, he walked silently out of her bedroom. When he came to the patio door, the garden was still silent and undisturbed, a vision of peace in the silver light of the moon.
I need to— his bear began.
Yes, Kayden agreed quietly.
For once, he and his bear were in agreement.
As one, they slipped out of the patio door and closed it silently behind them. The grass was a little wet beneath their feet, the wind cool, carrying the tantalizing scents of the creatures of the forest.
Carefully, he walked through Sidney’s garden until he reached the small creek at the end that divided it from the forest. He crossed the creek easily. A heartbeat later, he had vanished silently into the underbrush of the forest as though he’d never been here.
Once he was safe from human eyes, he stopped and took a deep breath.
Shifting came naturally to him. He’d known how to shift back and forth without effort long before he’d spoken his first word. It was not truly a change to him, just as some people could easily switch between languages. He was both bear and human. It took no more than a single thought to shift from one form to the other.
One moment, his thoughts and his senses were those of a human—the next moment, instead of his bare feet, he stood on the wet moss on four paws, and his thoughts and his senses were those of the bear.
The change was accompanied by an electric tingle, a sudden, overpowering sense of being alive, of being ancient: a part of that ages-old species that had ruled the forest for much longer than mankind. He was bear: the forest belonged to him, and the strength of his muscles, claws and fangs would descend with fury onto any intruder who dared to challenge him.
While he was in his bear form, the sense of urgency and alarm was even stronger.
The breeze carried Sidney’s scent from the garden, and the flowery perfume of her detergent that she had used for the tablecloths. His sensitive nose picked up the trail of a deer and the scent of the rabbit that had crossed the garden. Above him, an owl hooted softly.
A moment later, it fell abruptly silent, and Kayden’s fur rose.
Bear.
The scent was distinct, and closer than he liked. Somewhere in the forest, there was a bear. Another shifter.
Kayden’s lips drew back to reveal his fangs as he snarled silently.
Then he set off into the forest at a run. He did not care about the branches that broke beneath his powerful paws or the fact that the wind was shifting and could carry his own scent back to the intruder.
Right now, he was following the most powerful instinct of all: the need to protect his mate.
If there was a shifter in the forest, he needed to draw him away from Sidney, no matter what the consequences might be.
If it’s Blood Claw, we’ll kill him, his bear growled.
And this time, Kayden found himself growling along in agreement. If Blood Claw threatened Sidney, nothing and no one would hold Kayden back from eliminating that threat once and for all.
But first they needed to lead the intruder away from Sidney’s quiet garden.
Kayden ran for a long time. At least an hour passed before he found himself stopping on top of a hill, his senses still on high alert. For a while now he’d been certain that he was being followed, and as he watched the forest spread out beneath him, the wind carried the sharp scent of another male bear to him.
Much closer now, his bear said grimly.
Kayden waited until at last, he thought that he spotted movement beneath the trees. Had that been a flash of brown fur?
We have him on our trail. Good job, Kayden said.
Baring his teeth in dark amusement, he set off again. Their plan was working so far. They had drawn their challenger away from Sidney. They still didn’t know if it was truly Blood Claw—but who else could it be?
If it’s Blood Claw, we won’t be able to shake him off again. He’s too good for that. And we can’t lead him back to Sidney.
They had to keep running. They had to lead him as far away from Linden Creek as they could. The quiet little town didn’t deserve to be the stage for a shifter war.
And once we are far away, once we get tired of running—we’ll face him. And we’ll end this problem once and for all.
Kayden rose up on his hind paws, a vision of ancient power and fury in the cold light of the moon. He let out a loud growl of challenge and rage, a roar of his anger at having an intruder in his territory—and then he began to run once more.
If it was Blood Paw, he’d know now that he was hunting Kayden himself. The hunt was on for real.
And it wouldn’t end until one of them was dead.
Chapter Nine: Sidney
Panting, Sidney woke from her nightmare.
There had been bears—bears! Roaring and racing and snarling at her with giant teeth, and—
There was another dull roar somewhere in the distance. Her heart clenched in her chest when she realized that it was coming from outside, the sound carried in from the forest through her open window.
Worse—the spot next to her was empty. There was a bear outside somewhere, and Kayden wasn’t in bed with her.
For a moment, horror held her frozen. Then, with trembling fingers, she switched on the light.
The room was empty. Kayden was indeed nowhere to be seen. His clothes were still discarded on the floor where they’d flung them as they’d stripped each other.
Maybe he went to the bathroom. Maybe he went to get a glass of water. Maybe...
She swallowed, then rose from her bed. When she checked the bathroom, it was empty. The tiles were cold beneath her bare feet.
She couldn’t say why, but something made her hastily pull on her clothes before she went to explore the kitchen.
It was empty as well.
Despite the shirt, she suddenly felt cold. She crossed her arms, hugging herself as she stared in desolation at her coffee maker.
Had she really heard a bear? She’d dreamed of one, she remembered that. Maybe it was the dream that had woken her, and not a sound from outside.
Rationally, she knew that this explanation made a lot more sense. Still, even if there hadn’t been a bear—then where was Kayden?
&
nbsp; I was too clingy. Came across as too desperate. That talk of him being here in the winter—maybe he got cold feet and ran.
She swallowed against the sudden shame and fear.
No. No, he isn’t that kind of guy. Even if it wasn’t working for him, he’d tell me before leaving.
She frowned when she remembered that he’d left his clothes on her floor as well.
And he definitely wouldn’t run without his clothes.
The sudden panic fell away. Instead, it made place for a new sense of both alarm and determination. Something was wrong. She couldn’t say how she knew, but she knew something was wrong.
And whatever it was, Kayden was at the heart of it. He wouldn’t have left her like this—unless something had happened.
Still frowning, she made her way to her patio. Outside, everything was peaceful and quiet. The darkness was slowly receding. She could see the first blush of rose creep up at the horizon, announcing the rising sun.
How strange. There’d been a bear, too, when Kayden had arrived. At least she’d initially thought there was one. And Kayden had arrived without clothes—and now he’d left the same way.
Maybe Kayden was the bear, she thought, then began to helplessly giggle.
Or maybe I’m going crazy. I don’t know what’s wrong, but I need to find him.
She grabbed her phone and stuffed it into the pocket of her jeans. She chose sensible shoes and rummaged in a drawer for a flashlight. Then she began to search her garden.
There were no traces of Kayden to be found. She surprised a rabbit hiding beneath one of her rosebushes. Surprise made it jump into the air, and then it raced towards the back of her garden, crossing the small creek effortlessly to vanish into the forest.
Once the sun is up, I’ll call Eve, she thought. Or Chris. He’ll know what to do!
Then, with sudden shock, she realized that she’d somehow crossed the creek as well, following the rabbit without conscious thought. As if her legs had developed a will of their own.
I should go back. I should—
There was a footprint in the muddy ground in front of her. She stared at it in alarm.
