Ranger Knox (Shifter Nation: Werebears Of Acadia Book 1)

by Meg Ripley

  “Because we got down and dirty in the woods?” I shake my head. “I mean, that was probably the least professional choice I’ve ever made, but the real reason is I’ve been trying to track down as many leads as possible.”

  “You sound more like a detective than a reporter,” Knox suggests.

  I laugh. “The two things aren’t all that different.”

  I have to admit, I really like Knox. I feel so comfortable around him, even though my mind is spinning with the notion that he could be involved in some weird secret society.

  “That must explain why there’s so much crossover,” Knox says.

  I take another sip of my drink. “So, I’ve been thinking I might want to wander the park again a bit.”

  “Well, you’ll be happy to hear that we’ve rounded up all but one of the guys who tried to attack you the other day,” Knox tells me.

  “Oh! I’ve been so busy that I totally forgot about it.” It’s a lie; I’ve thought about the incident at least once a day since it happened, but I’ve been working hard not to let it overshadow my investigation.

  “The last one’s still loose in the park, but the rangers will easily be able to track him down,” Knox says.

  “So, I’m guessing that you’d want me to be on my guard if I’m in the park on my own,” I suggest.

  “I’d be happy to chaperone you, if you want, or I can get one of the other rangers to accompany you.”

  “I don’t think that’ll be necessary,” I say quickly. “It’s not all that dangerous; I mean, he’s probably trying to avoid anyone’s attention, right?”

  “True, but I would hate for you to run into him,” Knox insists.

  “I’ll let you know,” I say. “In the meantime, what can you tell me about some of the odd layout discrepancies in the park?” That, I hope, should keep his mind occupied for a while.

  “Layout discrepancies?” Knox frowns in confusion and takes a sip of his beer.

  “There are some spots on maps dated before the opening of the park that have never appeared on any official park maps. It’s as if the locations have been intentionally omitted,” I say. It’s as close as I can come to admitting that I’ve actually found some information suggesting that something’s amiss.

  “Well, a lot of those old maps probably aren’t all that accurate,” Knox says with a shrug.

  “These were created by surveyors who were contracted by the government,” I point out. “I would hope they’d be accurate.”

  “If you want to come back to the park with me after this, I can show you some of the documentation we have in the office,” Knox says. “I’d be happy to show you the most recent surveys we have on file.”

  “I’d really appreciate that,” I say.

  We change the subject for a while and I find out that Knox has worked his way up the hierarchy at Acadia the old-fashioned way, getting his degree and then following it up with conferences and certifications. I have to admit: I had no idea how much work it took to become a national park ranger.

  Knox offers to pay for our drinks. He’s had two beers and I’ve had two Jack and Cokes; not enough to get drunk, but enough that there’s a bit of a buzz going on in my head, relaxing me a little more. I point out that I can just expense the charge once I get back home, but he insists and settles the bill.

  Then I’m on the back of his bike again, and he’s driving us to the park, where he has permanent quarters. The vibration of the motorcycle between my legs, along with the fuzziness and warmth of the alcohol in my system, has a predictable effect: instead of being scared that I’m going to fall off the iron horse, or that Knox is going to get hit, I can feel my nerves starting to tingle. I’m only too aware of the feeling of Knox’s back pressed against my chest as we make our way out of Bar Harbor.

  It’s too easy for me to remember how good the sex was, even if having it was a total mistake. The vibration between my legs is almost right up against my crotch, and it’s easy for me to see why girls are so into riding motorcycles with good-looking men. It’s like having a relatively low-speed massager up against me; it’s not enough to make me climax on its own, but definitely enough to get me hot all over and make me wish I could abandon professional scruples to suggest that he pull over and take me back into the woods and have me again. Especially paired with Knox’s warm, muscular body and the musky scent of his cologne.

  We park outside of his cabin, and as I get off the bike, I attempt to compose myself. What the hell is wrong with me? I’ve been attracted to plenty of guys before, but the intense way my body responds to Knox is unlike anything I’ve ever experienced.

  “Something wrong?”

  I shake my head and follow Knox’s lead as he heads toward the park’s office, not too far from his cabin. As we enter, he tells one of the other park employees that he’s going to show me some of the surveys and elevation reports. The ranger shrugs and tells me he hopes I have a good afternoon, and then he’s gone. And Knox and I are all alone.

  Suddenly, I feel like this was a terrible idea, but in spite of that thought, I can’t deny that there’s still a damp warmth between my legs, and that I’m replaying--in my mind--how good it felt to have Knox deep inside of me. Over the past couple of days since we hooked up, I’ve had to get myself off with my fingers a few times, remembering our little tryst in vivid detail.

  “Okay,” Knox says, unlocking a cabinet. “I think I’ve got the latest ones here; these are official documents. You can even see the surveyors’ notes about where they went and how they made their determinations.”

  “Do you think I could get copies of these? Or maybe take pictures?” Knox takes a thick folder out and sets it down on his spartan desk.

  “Sure, if you’d like. I’ll have to fill out a form for your request, but there’s no reason why you can’t include it in the documentation for your article,” he says, sounding oh-so-helpful.

  I sit down and start looking through the paperwork; it looks, right off the bat, like everything is above-board and meticulously documented.

  After a few moments, I sit back, and see Knox watching me intently. “Any particular reason you’re staring at me?” I feel the blood rush into my cheeks and I reach up to smooth my hair against my scalp nervously.

  “I found the form you need, but I was waiting until you decided to take a break,” Knox says. “And then I noticed how cute you look sitting at my desk.”

  In spite of the focus I’ve had on the paperwork in front of me, the humming, simmering arousal that I worked up on the motorcycle never quite went away. I sit back a bit from the desk and look Knox up and down. He’s just as hot as ever in his street clothes, and I can’t help but think how satisfying it would be to tear them right off him.

  “Thanks,” I say, blushing even harder. I don’t know what to do with my hands, my mouth or any part of my body; I’m tingling all over, hot and cold flashes of sensation dancing through my nerves, and I’ve almost completely forgotten about the survey reports. “I guess I should go ahead and fill that paperwork out,” I say, looking down at the desk.

  Knox sets the sheet of paper down on the desk, but instead of stepping away from me, he lingers, and I think--though I can’t be sure--I hear and feel him sniff the top of my head. Did he really just do that?

  I begin filling out the paperwork and Knox leans over me, watching my hand move, and touches my shoulder. Just that little bit of contact is enough to make it even harder to focus, enough to turn me on even more.

  Fuck it. You’ve already rung the bell; there’s no reason not to ring it again. I look up at Knox, turning to face him. “Maybe you could show me that cabin they set up for you,” I suggest.

  Knox smiles slowly. “The office is closed,” he points out. “I could lock that door, and no one would come in here. No one would know what’s going on.”

  I feel a little jolt of heat at that suggestion, and I notice the wetness between my legs again, hotter than ever. The idea of having a little fun with the park administ
rator in his office is just too tempting.

  “Go lock it, then,” I suggest, my heart beating faster in my chest at the thought.

  I watch as Knox crosses the room almost faster than I could imagine possible, and in near silence. He locks the door and then, just as quickly, he’s back at the desk, lifting me out of his chair and tilting my chin up to kiss me on the lips.

  I reach up and wrap my arms around his broad shoulders, pressing myself against his body; up close to him like this, kissing him back eagerly, it’s even easier for me to remember how good our first time together was.

  Knox’s hands move over my body, touching, caressing and teasing me, and I moan against his lips, gripping him tighter as I get more and more turned on. He cups my breasts in his palms, giving them a careful squeeze, and I shudder, catching his bottom lip between my teeth and nibbling at it playfully.

  Then, all at once, we’re both pawing at each other’s clothes; I fumble a bit with Knox’s shirt before I can get it off, but I’m finally rewarded by the sight of his chest. I slowly slide my fingertips over its firm planes and valleys, downward to the fly of his jeans, and my mouth is positively watering, knowing what’s inside.

  Then Knox lifts me up onto the desk and ducks down, his lips capturing my right nipple. He sucks and licks me, moving from one breast to the other, worshipping me with his mouth; I temporarily forget about the erection I know is standing at attention for me, too wrapped up in the sensations coursing through me to think.

  Knox works my breasts with his mouth for what seems like ages, sucking hard enough to make me gasp as his tongue swirls around the hardened nubs. His tongue feels strange; I noticed it the first time we hooked up, but I notice it even more now, how rough it feels against my skin, but it’s thrilling all at the same time, sending little jolts of sensation coursing through my body.

  Knox reaches down and hooks his fingers under the waistband of my panties, tugging them downward. I push my butt up off the desk to help him, and then, all at once, I’m naked. My hands wander until I find the fly of his pants, and once I manage to figure out where the button and zipper are, I’m somehow getting them open, reaching inside and finding--to my surprise--that he’s wearing nothing at all underneath. His hot, rock-hard cock twitches in my hand as I stroke him, and when I get back up to the tip of his erection, I feel the slickness of his precum coating my fingers.

  Knox breaks away from my breasts and looks down at me, flushed and panting slightly, a faint, almost-growling sound in his throat, and he looks like a starved animal as he begins to plant his face between my legs.

  “As much as I love the idea of you going down on me for hours, I don’t think that’s necessarily a good idea right here,” I say breathlessly.

  Knox laughs. “I take your point,” he says, kissing me quickly on the lips as I reach for his shaft again. His hand slips up between my legs and he starts stroking me, swirling his fingertips around my clit, falling into the same rhythm I’m using on him until I moan. “God, you’re already so wet… and you smell so good…”

  “Can we get to the main event?”

  I’m so turned on it almost hurts, but at the same time, I don’t entirely trust Knox’s promise that no one would come barging into his office at any moment. Even though he locked the door, I feel like there’s a good possibility that someone could come looking for him or hear us through the wall, but somehow, that makes the whole situation even hotter, even though it makes me worry.

  “God, yes,” he groans, shoving his pants down to the floor and pushing my hand away from his cock, guiding himself up against me as I squirm to get into the best position, perched on his desk. I love the way the tip of his cock feels against me, and my hips move almost as if they’ve got a mind of their own, trying to take him inside of me all at once.

  Knox thrusts into me and I grab his hips, pulling him closer to take him in as deeply as I can. I reach up for Knox’s shoulders, hooking my hands behind his neck, and we start moving together. It feels every bit as good as it did the first time; absolutely perfect, in fact. The heat and hardness of Knox’s cock fills me completely and the pacing of his thrusts is exactly what I’ve been craving. It’s almost magical, the way we fit together, and I love it more and more by the moment.

  I kiss his lips, his neck, along his shoulders and down onto his chest, licking and nibbling at him playfully, and I hear that somewhat strange low growl again as I feel Knox’s body tense up the closer he gets to his peak.

  He reaches down and begins stroking and rubbing me as we move together, sending little crackling jolts of pleasure through my body. I cry out and try to muffle it against his shoulder, so wrapped up in the pleasure tingling through my nerves that I can’t even think about where we are anymore.

  Knox guides me down onto my back and begins slamming into me, hard and fast, looking down at me intently, and I’m helpless in the trap of how good it feels. He unwraps my legs from around his hips and grabs me by the ankles, lifting them onto his shoulders; the shift in position is almost more than I can take, feeling the thickness of him rubbing along my inner walls, pushing deeper than ever inside of me.

  I twist my hips to meet his thrusts, trying to hold back, but Knox starts rubbing my clit as he pounds into me and I can’t stop myself anymore. I bring my hand up to cover my mouth as the tension deep down between my hips gives away with a snap, and pleasure floods through me. Spasms of sensation ripple through my body and I give into it, writhing on the top of Knox’s desk, not caring if I knock anything over or if someone hears me.

  I’m so wrapped up in my own pleasure that I barely feel the twitching of Knox’s cock inside of me or the way his body tenses. He reaches his climax in the middle of mine, and I’m only just starting to come down when I feel the hot gush of his seed deep inside me. I hear him let out a short, guttural roar as he pounds into me a with few more hard, fast thrusts, almost hitting my cervix, bringing my orgasm back with all new force. Even after Knox finishes, he keeps rubbing my pleasure center, milking my second climax for all it’s worth, until I’m limp on his desk, panting and gasping for breath.

  “That was even better than the first time,” I say as soon as I’m able to talk again.

  “It was,” Knox agrees. I open my eyes; my head’s almost tilted off the desk, and I can still feel him inside of me. I want more, but I know it’s a bad idea.

  “I should probably get back to Mary’s,” I say reluctantly.

  “Why? I can give you a ride home later,” Knox says. I feel him hardening inside of me once more and he starts moving slowly, rocking his hips against mine. “Besides, you’re on vacation. You don’t have a deadline.”

  I want to say no--I want to do the right thing, the professional thing--but I have to admit that the idea of round two is more than a little appealing...

  Chapter 10 - Knox

  I want to believe that I can just have my fun with Hannah and then say goodbye to her when she has to return home, but the animal instinct dominating my brain demands that I convince her to stay--that I need to make her mine; make her understand she should be mine--now, more strongly than ever.

  “Hey, you hungry?”

  Hannah perks at that suggestion and I feel like a champ for coming up with a good, valid reason to keep her around me for a little while longer.

  “I could eat,” she says. “But don’t I kind of owe it to you to take care of dinner? You made lunch for us the other day and paid for our drinks.”

  “If being square bothers you so much, why don’t you just help me cook something back at my place?” I ask. For a second, it looks like Hannah is going to try and argue the point further, but she shrugs it off.

  “I guess that’ll work,” she says, smiling wryly.

  “We’ll eat and then I’ll take you back to your place,” I suggest. And then I’ll convince you to stay the night.

  As we walk from the office over to my cabin, I try to remember whether it’s clean enough to be seen when I feel Cassidy’s mind
reaching out to me. It’s the worst timing I can imagine, but as the Alpha, it’s something I have to deal with.

  Knox! Someone let the other three out!

  I get a vivid mental picture of the place where members of my clan have been holding Jamie, Harris and Kevin, the guys who had been working with Shawn, and it’s empty. I bite back a groan; I have to assume it was either Shawn or someone else working with him, and that somehow, they made it past the two members of my clan who’d been watching over the assholes until we could have the conclave decide their fate.

  I have to figure out what to do; I can’t just take off and leave Hannah at my cabin without telling her what’s going on, or at least giving her a valid excuse.

  Call my cell; I’m with a human right now and I need to excuse myself without making her suspicious. Cassidy agrees to my request, and a moment later, my phone rings.

  “I should get this,” I tell Hannah. She nods and I tap ‘accept’ and bring the phone to my ear. “What’s going on?”

  “Are you with that journalist again?”

  Cassidy knew about my fling with Hannah because Hannah’s scent was still clinging to me when Cassidy and I quartered the woods after Shawn and his crew came after me.

  “Yeah,” I say, keeping my voice neutral.

  “Fun time’s over. Tell her, I dunno, that there was another sighting of those bears you dealt with the other day. It’s the truth.”

  I have to admit she has a point. I acknowledge and end the call, and turn to Hannah.

  “I need to step out for a bit,” I say. “Those bears that almost crashed our picnic the other day got out of the observation area, so I need to head out and see what’s going on right now.”

  “If you want,” Hannah suggests, as I switch into my work boots, “I could do the cooking while you’re out. That would even things out between us, anyway.”

  “Sounds good,” I say with a grin. At least if she’s making dinner, I can count on her being occupied enough not to try and snoop. I give her a quick kiss on impulse and then I’m out the door, headed for the scene of the problem.