He breathed in and realized that over the loamy musk of forest smells, he could smell the spicy warmth of Daphne’s pheromones, the acrid tang of fear an undercurrent that brought him abruptly to complete alertness. “Daphne,” he said, groaning with the pain lingering from Eric’s bites. That had been the man’s larger game—to expose the fact of Alex’s status as a shifter to the woman he loved.
“Alex!”
He felt his movement abruptly stop and then he was shifting down onto the ground; Daphne had been dragging him—he couldn’t blame her, he would be too heavy to carry for her slight size and the lack of any preternatural strength.
“What did you see?”
Daphne’s face swam into view and Alex felt his heart beating faster—he wondered if the blood on his wound had clotted yet. “Well,” she said, taking a deep breath and exhaling forcefully. “I’m not entirely sure of what I saw, but I’m fairly certain it involved bears.” Alex sat up, struggling against the fatigued inertia of his body.
“You saw me change back,” he said. He chewed his bottom lip, breathing as slowly as he could to stay calm. “I knew you were there—I would have spared you knowing the truth…” Daphne’s dark eyes widened and her look of bemused worry changed to a frown.
“You would have lied to me?” she asked him sharply.
“Not lied,” Alex said, trying to think of words to explain. The pain was too intense; Eric had bitten more deeply than he’d thought. “How’s my shoulder?” Daphne smiled wryly and stood up, showing him where her skirt had been ripped along the bottom.
“I think the bleeding has stopped,” she said, looking at the wound. “But you should probably go to a doctor. Or would you need to go to a vet instead?” Alex laughed, shaking his head.
“There are special doctors we go to,” he told her. “Are you… you do know what you saw, don’t you?” Daphne shrugged.
“I saw a grizzly bear fighting a black bear. And then I saw that grizzly bear transforming into you.” She shrugged again. “Either someone spiked my drink or you’re a person who changes into a grizzly bear.” Daphne frowned slightly. “Or a bear that turns into a person. I can’t rule that one out.”
Alex frowned. “You don’t exactly seem shocked.”
Daphne shrugged again, and Alex could smell the lingering fear in her pheromones. “I’m pretty shocked but I mean… it’s not like I can exactly deny what I just saw. I saw it.” She chewed on her bottom lip for a moment. “You don’t… have sex in that form, do you?” Alex stared at her for a long moment and then laughed again, closing his eyes against the jolt of pain the movement caused.
“Not with humans,” he told her firmly. “I would never…” Daphne began to chuckle.
“Well,” she said slowly, pressing her lips together as she thought, “This is… certainly something I’m going to have to process a little bit more.” She looked down at her hands for a moment. “But when I saw you lying there, injured… I wasn’t really thinking about how weird it was. Just that you were hurt, and I was the only one here to help.”
Alex reached out and touched her chin, tilting her face up to meet his gaze; to his surprise, she didn’t even flinch.
“Are you afraid of me?” he asked her. Daphne met his gaze in silence for a long moment before shaking her head.
“I figure if you were going to go into crazy grizzly mode and maul me in my sleep, it would have happened already.” Alex chuckled again, shaking his head. He pulled her closer to him, feeling the simmering aftereffects of his transformation; in spite of the pain that throbbed in his shoulder, in spite of his fatigue, the scent of Daphne’s body, so close to him, made his lust spike in an instant.
He found her lips in the darkness, kissing her hungrily, his hands moving down over her body slowly, carefully; giving her plenty of opportunity to pull back, to break away from him.
Instead of reacting with revulsion, Daphne deepened the kiss, her tongue slipping past his lips to bat playfully at his own, and her hands slowly—hesitantly—trailing over his body, still naked after his transformation. When she broke away from the kiss, panting slightly, it wasn’t fear of him or even disgust at his secret.
She looked into his eyes, her pheromones a heady mix of leftover fear, spicy warmth, and lustful musk. “Are you—would it hurt you more if we…” Alex smiled, crushing her body against his, breathing in the scent of her arousal.
“We heal quickly,” he murmured, his hands trailing down to the hem of her blouse, slipping underneath to caress her warm, yielding skin. “Besides, I can’t imagine a pain that’s so intense it stops me from wanting you whenever I can have you.” Her clothes slipped away under his hands, her blouse and then her bra, and Alex cupped Daphne’s breasts, bringing them up to his lips. He kissed every inch of them, sliding his tongue along the underside curve until he came back up to her nipple.
Alex wrapped his lips around one of the firm nubs, sucking and licking until he felt Daphne writhing on top of him, smelled the unmistakable scent of her increasing arousal. Her fluids were flowing—he could feel the heat of her pussy through the thin fabric of her panties, pressed against his bare leg in the darkness.
Alex held back from ripping Daphne’s skirt off of her body, fingers playing with the frayed edge at the bottom where she had torn away the fabric to wrap his wound. “I’ll replace this for you,” he murmured softly, tugging the garment down over her hips.
He dragged her panties down with it, wanting—needing—to get Daphne naked, to feel her body wrapped around his and mark her with his scent once more. She had found out his secret—and hadn’t run screaming, leaving him helpless. It may devolve from there, but for the moment Alex couldn’t deny his need for her; he had to have her.
Daphne shifted on top of him, rocking her hips against his, and Alex let out a low groan that was half growl, his hands falling to her hips and then slipping down between her legs. She was so wet, so hot—so inviting, more so than any other woman he had ever been before in his life.
The heady aroma of her soaking pussy sent a jolt of heat through his body, and as she rocked against him she was rubbing herself against his hard cock, teasing them both. Alex let out another low growl, grabbing at her in his urgency.
“Now, Daphne, now,” he told her firmly. She made a sound somewhere between agreement and a whimper, and shifting on top of him, he felt her guiding his cock up against her inner labia.
She sank down onto him all at once, and Alex’s hands tightened on her hips. He wanted her to stay still like that forever—he wanted her to start moving immediately. Her inner muscles flexed around him as if her body was every bit as conflicted as his own, as if she wanted to hold him inside of her.
Daphne began to move, rising and falling on top of him, taking his cock deeper and deeper inside of her. All of the pain in his shoulder evaporated as Alex kissed everywhere his lips could reach, lingering at her soft, supple neck, her full breasts, and her delicious, hot mouth. He thrust up into her, meeting her movements, falling into a tidal rhythm she set as she picked up her pace gradually.
Alex reached down between their bodies and found Daphne’s clit by touch; he couldn’t hold back for much longer—but he needed to feel her come, needed to know that she was hitting orgasm just as well as he was. He stroked and rubbed her, his fingers moving in tight circles as he held her steady on top of him with his other hand on her hip.
In a matter of moments, it seemed, he felt her muscles rippling around him in erratic spasms, heard the telltale breathy moaning whimpers that left her lips as her pleasure mounted more and more, and then she was gushing around him, her body tensing. “Mm, Alex, god… Yes, yes Alex…” Alex reached his own orgasm in the midst of Daphne’s, letting out a long, low, growling moan as he felt the first hot spurts of pleasure shooting through his body and into her. He filled her up in wave after wave, gripping her body tightly against his as he thrust into her a few more times, hard and fast, desperate to keep going for as long as he possibly could.
For long moments, they lay in the leafy, deep underbrush, limbs tangled and bodies slick with sweat, panting to recover their breath. Alex let his mind drift for a while, satisfied, the pain from his shoulder forgotten—though he would have to see his doctor about it to make sure it wouldn’t become infected in the rapid healing process.
He didn’t know what would become of his relationship with Daphne, but for the moment he was content with the fact that she knew and hadn’t completely rejected him. He had never even considered that possibility.
Daphne shifted on top of him and looked down, a mixture of concern and satisfaction in her eyes. “Are you okay?” she asked, tenderly and carefully touching his injured shoulder. Alex shrugged with his good shoulder, pulling her in for a quick, satisfying kiss.
“You know,” he said with a little smile, “You can really call yourself an animal lover now.”
Daphne groaned, chuckling in the darkness. “That is not the best thing to tell me after I just had sex with you.”
Alex pulled her body against his, holding onto her tightly. “We’ll talk about it later,” he told her, feeling himself beginning to get hard once more. They would leave the woods eventually—they had to—but for right now he wanted to take full advantage of the simmering animal lust he felt. “Right now, I need some more natural pain relief. You up for it?”
Daphne’s dark eyes glittered in the tree-filtered moonlight. “I could be persuaded.”
Alex grinned up at her. He decided—before his lust overcame his ability to think—that he would introduce her to his mother the next week.
CHAPTER 6
It had been a week since Daphne had found out the truth about Alexander. Alex found himself waiting, waiting for the other shoe to drop, waiting for Eric to make his next move, waiting to see if things would really work between Daphne and himself. He had told his mother—finally—that he had met a woman, and she was anxious to meet Daphne as well but Alex wasn’t certain Daphne was ready to meet his mother.
He knew it would only be a matter of time before Eric reappeared in his life; he had injured Eric, possibly gravely, when they had fought in the forest. But he knew that he hadn’t killed the other shifter. Alex didn’t mention the issue to Daphne in the days following the revelation but the issue was on his mind constantly. Eric was clearly interested in complete revenge; he thought Alex had gotten everything as a result of the failure of their business together, so he was not likely to stop trying to take everything from him just because one gambit had failed.
Alex sat across from Daphne at the dining room table, watching her reading emails on her phone. She had spent the night with him, and Alex smiled to himself privately at the sight of his robe draped around her, the long ends of it gathered up onto the seat so as not to drag on the floor where she sat. Every time they had sex, it was better and better and Alex could feel her responding to him more and more openly, not even worrying about the consequences, totally in the moment with him. It was strange, he had gone so long moving from partner to partner, carefully keeping the women he slept with out of his real life. Daphne was something completely different, though; he knew she was still struggling to overcome her shock at learning he was a shifter, but in the week since he had—through Eric’s machinations—revealed his other nature to her, she had stayed with him.
“What would you say to the idea of meeting my mother for lunch this weekend?” Daphne looked up at the question, her eyes briefly confused. She considered it for a moment.
“I could do that. Your mom… she’s… like you, right?” Alex knew that at some point, very soon, they would have to have a lengthier discussion about his nature, about the world of shifters that he inhabited right alongside the regular human world. But that was a conversation for another day.
“She is,” Alex said simply. “She’s been after me to find someone to date seriously ever since I inherited my father’s company, sort of a gambit to get me to settle down and think long-term. I really think she’d like you.” Daphne pressed her lips together and shrugged.
“Sure,” she said, smiling quickly. “I’d love to meet your mom. We’ve been seeing each other for a few months anyway, right?” Alex nodded, the smile growing on his face.
“It’s not a big deal,” he told her. “This isn’t some serious step in our relationship.” It wasn’t entirely true. Alex wanted to introduce Daphne to the shifter community gradually, to let her see that he and the rest of the shifters in the world were, by and large, normal people outside of their ability to transform.
“I trust you,” Daphne said, pressing her lips together. “If you want me to meet your mom, if you think we’ll get along… I’m happy to meet her.” Alex stood up, smiling slowly as he took in the look of gradually resolving confidence on her face. He walked around the perimeter of the table and reached out to Daphne, lifting her up out of the chair and into his arms, holding her close.
“You know,” Alex murmured, brushing his lips against hers in an almost-kiss, “I think… if it’s not too soon to say it, that I love you.” Daphne stiffened briefly against him, before relaxing once more, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and her legs around his waist. Alex kissed her lightly on the lips, breathing in the honey-apple smell of her perfume, the deeper spicy, warm musk of her natural scent. He smelled the intensification of her pheromones as she started to become aroused and smiled to himself, letting his hands wander over her body. They didn’t have time but Alex took a little happy thrill from seeing Daphne riled, seeing her turned on and wanting him, even when he wasn’t sure that she was entirely certain about their relationship.
“If this is my reward for meeting your mom, who else do you want me to meet?”
Alex chuckled lowly, slipping his hands underneath the robe that barely covered Daphne’s body and brushing his fingertips along her bare skin. Alex nipped along the column of her throat, breathing in her scent. He wanted to do more. If he had his way, he would carry Daphne back to his bedroom and ignore the responsibilities of his company for the entire day. But they both had work to get to and Alex couldn’t love Daphne without loving the fact that she was dedicated to her job.
“Remember this,” he murmured against her skin. “We’ll get back to this tonight.” Daphne made a disappointed noise, but then shifted down from his arms, flashing a smile at him before she picked up her phone and moved quickly to retrieve her things.
Alex watched as Daphne got dressed, taking in her movements with a mixture of animal and human perceptions. She was, he thought, quite possibly the most beautiful woman he’d ever known. There was something about her, beyond what he could quantify, that added a kind of awkward grace to her movements, a sense of things falling into place without any kind of premeditation. She could be a shifter herself, he thought with a little bit of pride in his discernment. She wasn’t—he knew she wasn’t—but the way she moved, when she was relaxed, was instinctual in a way that he rarely saw in other regular humans.
Before she left for the ARC offices, Alex gave Daphne a final long, lingering kiss, trailing his hands over the curves of her body. He could smell his mark on her, the touch of wild animal that tinged her scent. Any other shifter she encountered would recognize it immediately. He knew he’d have to tell her eventually. He hadn’t intended to mark her, but he had, and she had a right to know what that meant in the community he belonged to. But he wanted to give her a little more time to become accustomed to the idea of what he was before he made things serious with her.
Before she meets anyone other than mom, he told himself firmly. Jessica Oberon wouldn’t comment on the scent of her son on a woman, the mark of his intent to mate with her, but someone else might. Eric’s observation of the scent-mark had lingered in Alex’s mind. If Daphne wasn’t ready to be his mate, and someone let it slip that she was already marked… Alex pressed his lips together firmly as he finished tying the knot on his tie. He could lose her. He took a deep breath. He had plenty of time. All he had to do was get a l
ock on Eric, get his rival out of his life for good. Everything else would come together just fine, if only he could take care of the issue with Eric.
Alex stepped into his office, walking past the receptionist and into the inner sanctum, the peaceful quiet. First things first, he needed to check in on Eric. Alex picked up the phone as he sat down behind his desk and dialed a number he knew by memory: a personal investigator he had on retainer for general purposes.
“Ben,” Alex said the moment the other man picked up. “What’s the news?” There was a rustle of papers on the other end of the line.
“I’ve got nothing for you right now, unfortunately. Neems is lying low, or at least it looks like it. I’m going to dig a little deeper but you know I’ll ring you any time I have something to report.” Alex nodded, sighing to himself. In the week since his altercation with Eric, he had mobilized Ben—a werewolf, with a keen sense of the hunt—to find out what Eric was doing, what his next moves would be.
“Have you gotten a read on him yet?” One of Ben’s strongest talents was not just that he had the keen senses of a wolf wrapped up in a human body. Ben was also a master of psychology, and tracked his targets not just by catching their scent but also by getting into their minds. It took time and Ben had only been on the case for several days but it might be enough time.
“He really wants you destroyed,” Ben said. Over the phone, Alex heard the creak of a chair being pushed back. “Totally consumed with the revenge he thinks he deserves against you. He’s patient though. He’ll wait until everything comes together to actually act. I mean he waited years to get to the top of the food chain at a company he could use to compete with you, right?” Alex nodded. “He’s going to make another move for sure, but I don’t know enough to know what it will be.”
Simply Bears: A Ten Book Paranormal Bear Shifter Romance Collection Page 20
