Bearing The Long Road Home (Ice Bear Shifters 7)

by Sloane Meyers

  Chloe had felt a reasonable measure of confidence with her plan, until the door had opened just a crack, and Seth’s face came into view. Suddenly nervous, she had looked quickly down at the floor, trying to figure out what words to say to explain her surprise, late-night visit to his room. When he said her name, softly and with a questioning tone, the sound had filled her with courage. She had looked up at him, her eyes full of desire. She bit her lip in nervous excitement when she saw her own desires mirrored in his eyes.

  “Seth,” she said, before she could change her mind and dart down the hallway away from his room. “I…I was just wondering if I might come in for a bit.”

  She mentally kicked herself for such a weak-sounding opening line. Couldn’t she have come up with something better? But Seth didn’t seem to notice how flustered she was. Or, if he did, he was doing an amazing job of hiding it. He took a deep breath and ran his fingers through his hair, obviously struggling with what decision to make. After a few seconds, which felt like an eternity, he nodded and opened the door wide for Chloe.

  “Come on in,” he said. Chloe stepped inside the room and shut the door behind her as Seth turned on a lamp near his bed, bathing the room in soft light. What she saw as the light hit him made her gasp.

  He hadn’t been kidding about the scars. His chest and back were covered with them. They were huge, and deep, and Chloe couldn’t believe that he had actually survived an attack bad enough to leave him with such significant scarring. They didn’t detract from how gorgeous he was at all—his chest was broad and massive, and his abs perfectly sculpted. He was exactly what you pictured in your mind when you thought of a man’s man. But the magnitude of the scars was somewhat startling when you weren’t expecting it.

  Seth saw where her gaze was heading, and he frowned.

  “I told you I have a lot of scars,” he said.

  “I do, too,” Chloe said softly. “They’re not as visible as yours, since they’re emotional, but the reminders are just as painful.”

  Seth let out a huffing sound, and Chloe wasn’t sure quite what he meant by it. She took a deep breath and decided to keep talking.

  “I think you know why I’m here,” she said. “The pull of the lifemate bond. You feel it too, don’t you? I don’t know why destiny is trying to bring us together, but do you think there is a chance we could ever see past each others’ scars?”

  Seth looked at the ground as he spoke. “I don’t know. It feels so wrong to be so drawn to a Blizzard. And I’m not sure whether my clan would ever accept you.”

  Chloe’s heart sank. She shouldn’t have come here. Even fate wasn’t strong enough to overcome the walls that stood between them. She turned to head for the door, but just as she reached for the door handle, she felt a strong hand covering her own. Her heart skipped a beat as she turned to face Seth, finding his face just inches from her own.

  Chapter Ten

  “Wait,” Seth said. “Stay.”

  Chloe did as she was told. She stood still, her hand still on the doorknob with his hand covering it. He held her gaze, looking deep into her eyes. His own eyes were searching, looking for something. Chloe wasn’t exactly sure what he was trying to find, but he must have found it, because the next thing she knew his lips were on hers.

  A jolt of passionate electricity shot through her, starting where his lips met with hers and shooting through the rest of her body. His hand reached up and held the back of her head. He was gentle, but she could still feel his strength. She closed her eyes and drank in the sweet sensation of being kissed. It had been so long since she’d had even a friendly hug, and she hadn’t realized how much she had been craving the touch of someone who cared about her.

  Seth seemed encouraged by how electric the kiss had been. He slipped his tongue into her mouth and kissed her deeper, then reached behind Chloe’s back and pulled her legs up around his hips. He held her there off the ground, with his strong hands positioned under her ass to easily support her weight. It was then that Chloe noticed his erection, pushing hard against her from underneath his sweatpants. If early indications were to be trusted, then she had been right in her assumption that his dick would be huge, just like the rest of him. He felt enormous.

  His kiss grew deeper and more urgent, and Chloe felt moisture growing between her legs. She wrapped her arms tightly around him and returned the intensity of his kiss, letting her tongue slide back and forth over his in a forceful motion. He moaned, and carried her over to his small bed, where he let her drop with a small bounce onto her back. Then he climbed over her, straddling her and continuing to kiss her as he reached down to grab the hem of her t-shirt. He pulled it up and over her head, only pausing his kiss for the brief moment it took to get the t-shirt over her face. Chloe’s breathing turned rapid with anticipation as she felt his hands sliding behind her back, searching for her bra clasp. The rational side of her mind screamed at her that this was crazy. They shouldn’t be sleeping together. She shouldn’t be lying here, half-naked under a shifter who knew who she was, and what her clan had done.

  But any hope of rationality flew out the window as Seth found the bra clasp, and quickly unfastened it. He pulled her simple light pink bra off and threw it across the room, then moved from kissing her lips to kissing her breasts. He used his tongue to tickle her nipples, which had hardened from the adrenaline of passion running through Chloe’s veins. He used his teeth to nibble first the left nipple, and then the right. He started out gently, but soon increased the pressure, stopping just short of truly biting as he sent blissful little shivers throughout Chloe’s body.

  After several minutes of pleasuring her breasts, he moved down to slide off her sweatpants and panties in one swift move. She was naked and exposed in front of a shifter who could have easily killed her in one fatal movement. And yet, she had never felt so safe. He stood, and slid quickly out of his own sweatpants, revealing his steel rod of a dick in all its full, erect glory. He slowly lowered himself back to the bed, where Chloe’s chest was heaving with rapid excited breaths.

  “I shouldn’t be doing this,” he panted out. “But I can’t stop myself. You’re too damn beautiful. Too damn sexy.”

  Chloe closed her eyes for a moment and moaned. She was so aroused at this point that just the sound of his voice was enough to make her skin tingle. When Chloe opened her eyes, he was straddling her with his dick hovering just above her dripping wet entrance. His eyes were churning with passion and desire, but he didn’t lower himself into her just yet.

  “You know that if we do this, we’re going to be bonded. The pull between us is too strong to expect anything else.”

  Chloe could only nod. Seth paused, as if trying to decide for himself if he was ready to take such a serious step. After a few moments where the only sound in the room was both of them breathing heavily, Seth spoke again.

  “To hell with it,” he said. “I want this, and I won’t be able to stop thinking about you until I mate with you.”

  Then he slammed into her, his large erection filling her completely and bringing an immediate surge of hot pressure. He thrust hungrily back and forth, hitting every sensitive spot inside of Chloe and driving her wild. She had never experienced anything so intense, and she yelled out his name over and over as she came to the brink of release. The heat, and the tingling sensation suddenly exploded into a succession of intense muscle spasms, as her inner walls clenched desperately around Seth’s dick. Chloe moaned and thrashed her head back and forth, wishing the sweet sensation would last forever. Seth let out a roar and shot a hot stream into her as he found his release right after her, and Chloe felt her whole body burning red hot.

  She looked up at his face as he slowed his movements and then slowly rolled off of her. She could see from his face that he felt that red hot sensation pulsing through his body as well. They had bonded. It was no surprise, and yet the intensity of the moment still caught Chloe off guard. She lay with him in silence for several minutes, both of them wondering the same thing,
until Chloe finally spoke the words aloud.

  “What now?” she asked.

  Seth sighed a long, weary sigh. “I don’t know. Do we really have to worry about it at this point? For the next three months, we’ll be here. Far away from anyone who knows our history or might judge us for being together. Let’s see how the next three months go, and then worry about what next.”

  Chloe breathed out a sigh herself as relief flooded her body. “I think that sounds like an amazing plan,” she said.

  Then she snuggled up next to her scarred but perfect bear and fell asleep.

  Chapter Eleven

  The next few months passed in a blur for Seth. He spent most of his time hauling loads back and forth across the frozen ice, as did Chloe. But they often spent nights together, forgoing an extra hour of sleep for the chance to make love. And when an occasional snowstorm brought the trucking operations screeching to a halt, Seth and Chloe spent their unplanned days off together. They would go into Yellowknife and shop at the small mall, or enjoy a dinner out together.

  They couldn’t hide their budding romance from their coworkers, and before long Seth was constantly enduring teasing and ribbing from his fellow truckers. He didn’t mind, though. Let them tease all they wanted to. They were just jealous because he had managed to snag the only female ice road trucker that winter—who just so happened to be drop dead gorgeous.

  As time went on, Seth’s conflicted feelings over Chloe began to diminish. In the beginning, he spent most of his hours alone on the road staring out at the ice and wondering how he was ever going to face his clan again, knowing that he had been sleeping with the enemy. But the more time he spent with her, the more he realized how much Chloe was the opposite of a bloodthirsty murderer. She was sweet and friendly, and seesawed back and forth between spunky and shy. She had obviously been through quite a bit herself. Even way out here, far away from almost all civilization, she was still constantly looking over her shoulder, worrying about who might have tracked her down with the intent to kill her.

  Chloe eventually went into more detail with Seth about what she had suffered at the hands of her alpha. Tears filled her eyes as she remembered with fondness the days before Dominic had taken over the clan.

  “We used to be a close-knit group,” she had said. “We kept to ourselves, mostly, but we did everything together. We were always looking out for one another. That all changed when Dominic took over. No one trusted anyone anymore. You never even knew if you were safe confiding in your own family what you thought about the clan wars. Then, when the males were all killed, the females started bickering because the stress of fending off attackers on our own was so high. Life has been an absolute shit-show for me since the day Dominic was sworn in as alpha.”

  Seth had held Chloe close, letting her talk and letting her cry. As they began to trust each other more, something amazing happened. The emotional scars they both had began to heal. Seth began to understand why they had been fated to become lifemates. They needed each other. After everything they both had been through, they could understand each other and rebuild a future together. By March, when the ice roads had begun to melt to levels unsafe for driving, Seth had made up his mind that he and Chloe needed to stick together no matter what.

  Chloe felt the same way, but she did not want to return to Alaska. One of their few arguments occurred a week before they were scheduled to leave Yellowknife. They were in Seth’s room, and Chloe was watching him pack up most of his things into his small duffel bag.

  “Look, Seth,” Chloe said. “I don’t think you understand. Alaska is a death sentence for me. Not everyone is as nice as your clan. A lot of shifters don’t respect any kind of rules about not killing women or children. They just want any remaining Blizzards dead. And, besides, even if your clan doesn’t kill me, they’re going to hate me. Look how hesitant you were about me at first, even when you knew that I didn’t support the clan wars that my old alpha had started.”

  “I know I hated you at first,” Seth said. “But I did come around eventually. Actually, I came around pretty quickly, once I had the full story. You have to give me that.”

  Chloe looked at him with her mouth set in a hard line, and did not reply.

  “Chloe, please just give my clan a chance. They are really good people, and I have faith that they will accept you and love you just like I do once they get to know you.”

  Chloe’s eyes widened a bit at Seth’s words. “Wait a minute,” she said. “Did you just say you loved me?”

  Seth paused for a beat. He hadn’t exactly meant to say those words for the first time as part of a plea for Chloe to come back to Alaska with him, but they had just kind of slipped out. “Shit, yeah. I suppose I did, in a manner of speaking. Sorry, I guess that’s not the most romantic way to tell you I love you. But I do love you, Chloe. I can’t imagine life without you.”

  “I love you, too,” Chloe said, chewing her lower lip as she looked over at him. “But I don’t think you understand how terrified I am of going back to Alaska and meeting your clan. I don’t care how much you try to tell me it’s all going to be okay. They’re going to hate me, and you know it.”

  “Maybe they’ll hate you at first, But they will come around,” Seth said.

  “How can you be so sure?” Chloe asked. “And what if they don’t come around? You can’t expect me to just stay in Alaska where I’ll never find peace.”

  “I’ll make you a deal. Come back to Alaska with me. Let me introduce you to my clan, and spend a month there with me. I honestly believe it won’t even take them that long to accept you. But, if for whatever reason, you still don’t feel at home with my clan after a month, I will go with you wherever you want to go. If you want to go to Maine, I will go there with you. If you want to go to freaking Africa, I will go there with you. Although I wouldn’t necessarily recommend somewhere that warm for a couple of polar bear shifters like us.”

  Chloe looked over at Seth with misty eyes. “Really? You would really do that for me? Leave your clan and Alaska behind?”

  Seth left the bag he was packing and came to sit on the bed next to Chloe. “I hope I don’t have to, but I would. I would do anything for you,” he said, drawing Chloe into his arms and planting a kiss on the top of her head.

  Chloe leaned into Seth’s embrace and sighed. “Okay,” she said. “It’s a deal, then. I’ll give you one month in Alaska to convince your clan I’m not evil. But if a month passes and they still don’t like me, then we’re moving to Maine, like I originally planned to do. I have enough money to get me over there, now, and I don’t want to live in constant fear anymore.”

  “Save your money, sweetheart,” Seth said bravely. “I know you’re going to find a new home with the Northern Lights Clan.”

  * * *

  Despite Seth’s display of confidence, his nerves were shot by the time he and Chloe landed at Glacier Point’s airport. He hadn’t told anyone the exact time his flight landed, because he didn’t want one of his clan members picking him up at the airport and meeting Chloe there. He had figured he would take a cab back to the cabins, and then just march up to Neal’s cabin and explain the situation. Seth had figured that telling his alpha in person that he had bonded with a Blizzard was the best way to go. He would make the announcement quickly, like tearing off a band-aid. Neal would be shocked, but hopefully he would give Seth a chance to explain.

  As their cab approached the Northern Lights cabins, though, Seth couldn’t stop second-guessing his plan. What if someone saw Chloe and caused a commotion before he got to Neal’s cabin? And what if Neal was angry that he had brought a Blizzard to their cabins without warning? Maybe Seth should have asked for permission, first. Seth felt his stomach churning with anxiety as the cab pulled up in front of his cabin. One glance at Chloe told him that she felt even more anxious than he did. Seth paid the cabbie, then took a deep breath and went to open Chloe’s door for her. He grabbed their bags from the trunk, praying that he could at least make it inside his
cabin and regroup with her for a moment before anyone could see him.

  No such luck.

  Just as the cabbie drove away, and Seth put his foot on the first step of his cabin’s small porch, he heard a voice calling out behind him.

  “Seth! Buddy! I didn’t know you were getting back today! How are you man? And wait, what? Is that a girl I see next to you? Did you bring back a Canadian girlfriend?” Alan said, then sniffed the air. “Whoa, and she’s a shifter? Nice, man. Hannah will be happy to have another female shifter around.”

  Seth groaned inwardly as he heard Alan’s voice carrying across the open space between the cabins. Alan was the lifemate of Hannah, who was another shifter from Seth’s now extinguished clan. Alan had been trapped in the Blizzards’ caverns and almost died of starvation along with Hannah. Needless to say, Alan’s hatred for the Blizzards ran deep.

  Seth turned around to face Alan, and smiled weakly. “Hi, buddy. Yeah, I’m back. I didn’t want to trouble anyone to pick me up at the airport. And yes, I have a girlfriend now. She’s not Canadian, though. She’s Alaskan.”

  Chloe had frozen in place as she climbed the steps of Seth’s cabin. She didn’t want to turn around, and Seth couldn’t blame her. He knew that as soon as Alan saw her eyes, he would know she was a Blizzard.

  Alan gave Seth a funny look. “What’s wrong, Seth? You look kind of pale. And is your girlfriend super shy or something? Why doesn’t she turn around and say hello?”

  Chloe slowly turned, and when Alan saw her eyes, it was his turn to go pale.

  “What the hell, Seth. A Blizzard?” Alan said, letting out an angry growl.

  “It’s not what you think,” Seth said, keeping his voice low and even.