“Call me as soon as you find out.”
“You know I will.” Alex ended the call and stared off into space. He would need to call his mother next and then he could get down to the real business of managing the complex and powerful company he inherited.
Eric’s attempts to compete with him had had some benefits, Alex’s counter-move, to improve the company’s business in new areas that the Lasko Corporation couldn’t move into as quickly, had driven up profits across Oberon Industrial. The boom was driving up the company’s value, and Alex was more than happy to reap the benefit. He would be making a tidy bonus for the year if things kept up the way they were going. Maybe, he thought, he would take Daphne away on vacation, visit some of the bear reserves in Europe, or south to Mexico, perhaps out to the Caribbean. Alex wondered idly if Daphne had ever left the country as he moved to call his mom to inform her of the upcoming meeting she could expect.
*
Daphne stared at her computer monitor, trying to keep focused on her work in spite of the other thoughts filling her mind. Even as she continued typing up her report, Daphne remembered, all in a flash, the moment she found out about Alex’s true nature. She had received an email at her personal address, anonymous—it had made it through her spam filter somehow, though she wasn’t sure how the sender managed it.
There are things you should know about Alexander Oberon, it had read. If you want to know the truth about him, reply to this email with the statement “I’m ready.”
Curious, Daphne had followed the instruction. A few minutes later, she’d gotten an anonymous text message with GPS coordinates. When she fed them into her map app, it showed her a nature preserve.
How do I know you’re not just going to kidnap me and hold me for ransom?
She asked the mystery person. The idea of going into the deep woods to meet with an anonymous stranger ostensibly about Alex didn’t sit well with her sense of self-preservation.
Bring a gun if you’re worried.
Daphne had gone back and forth the rest of the day, not sure if she would actually follow through with the meet-up. It was a stupid idea, she told herself. It was incredibly stupid to meet with someone she didn’t even know, on the promise of “truth” about the man she was developing feelings for. But she had to admit she had definitely noticed something hinky about Alex. He kept her at arm’s length, picking and choosing the times when they would be together, disappearing off the face of the planet on a semi-regular basis, not telling her where he was or what he was doing, just that he was going away.
She had taken the stranger’s advice and asked one of her coworkers to borrow his gun. When he wanted to know what she intended to use it for, Daphne answered, with a small amount of truth, “I’m going into the woods on a project and I’d rather not be there by myself unarmed, just in case.”
ARC regularly sent people to nature preserves to check on things. It was only common sense to have something that could keep a person from getting killed when encountering wild animals. Even if the organization had an animal rights focus they were not careless about what could happen to a human being who ran into a bear, or a wolf, or another predator of any size.
When she’d gotten to the meeting place, Daphne had stopped short at the sight of the two bears fighting. One of the bears, the enormous grizzly, had looked familiar to her in a way she couldn’t quite define. She had watched in shock and more than a little fear as the grizzly bear threw the black bear into the trees, having already disabled it. When she saw the bear was wounded, her natural instinct to try and take care of an animal—any animal, even wild—had taken over. If she had been able to get cell phone service, she would have tried to call animal control to get some help. It was just as well that she had no service in the preserve.
When the bear had sunk down onto the ground, falling unconscious before Daphne’s stunned eyes it transformed into Alex. The fur receded, the bones shifted, the face seemed to almost relax as the long muzzle flattened into a human face. For a long time, or so it seemed afterward, Daphne had simply stared at the sight of the man she loved, naked, bleeding, on the ground. He had just been a bear. He was a human. She had sat down heavily to try and understand what she had just seen. It was impossible. But the realization that Alex was seriously injured cracked through her shock. Daphne had ripped the hem of her skirt, wrapping the fabric around the man’s shoulder to try and stop the bleeding. He was heavier than his lanky, rangy body suggested. As she dragged him through the woods, intent on getting him to a doctor, Daphne’s brain replayed, over and over again, the sight of the grizzly bear transforming into the man she loved.
Ever since Alex had come to, and they’d had what passed for a conversation about what she had seen, Daphne’s thoughts had been in a swirl of mixed emotions. She was relieved Alex’s secret was not something of the nature of being a serial killer or some kind of criminal. But it was difficult to know how to feel about the fact that he was a human being who transformed into a bear. You don’t… have sex in that form, do you? Daphne could only cringe at the words that had come out of her mouth. Alex showed no intention of transforming in front of her again. He certainly didn’t seem to have any interest in having sex with her in that form.
She wanted to be okay with the fact that Alex was so different. She wanted to tell herself that she was not the kind of prejudiced person who would hold an accident of birth against the man she loved. He hadn’t asked to be born a shape-shifter, it had just happened to him. But in the back of her mind, a thousand questions popped up, silly and serious alike.
Does he get fleas?
He said that he didn’t have sex in his bear form with humans—but does he have sex with other bears?
With other people like him?
Would he leave me for another person who could… be a bear with him?
It was bad enough to wonder if she was good enough for the man she loved because of the fact that he was a billionaire and she was, at best, middle class. It was another thing entirely to wonder if that man would leave her once he found someone who shared his abilities.
But he wanted her to meet his mother. That had to count for something, didn’t it? Daphne shifted her weight in her desk chair, smiling slightly to herself. She wondered just how serious it was that Alex wanted her to meet his mother. He had said it wasn’t serious but meeting a lover’s parents was always at least a little bit of an indication of an intention for more than just fooling around. Daphne wondered, though, if he was introducing her to his mother, and if things were getting more serious between them, was she ready for it? Did she know for sure she wanted to be with Alex? Did she know for sure she could deal with the fact that he was so different, so strange? You can really call yourself an animal lover now. Alex’s quip to her, right after they had had sex, right after she had discovered the truth of his nature, had the power to both amuse her and to give her more than a little discomfort.
She had avoided the topic ever since, but it was difficult not to let it weigh on her mind. What if he transformed in his sleep? I figure if you were going to go into crazy grizzly mode and maul me in my sleep, it would have happened already. She had been in so much shock, had been so worried about Alex’s injuries, that it hadn’t initially occurred to her to be afraid of the consequences of Alex being a bear. It hadn’t been until later that she had started to think about it. Ever since then, even though she couldn’t quite make herself talk to Alex about it, she wanted to know more but she also wanted to completely forget what she had seen.
Daphne’s phone bleeped, alerting her of an incoming text. She smiled to herself as it lit up on the screen: it was from Alex. My mom would be honored if you would meet her at the Fontaine Hotel for lunch on Sunday. Daphne chewed at her bottom lip. Well, she thought, she had already told him that she would meet with his mother. She couldn’t back out now.
I don’t have anything to wear! Daphne texted back. As long as she doesn’t expect me to be in designer clothes, I’m game. Daphne smile
d to herself again. No one at ARC knew, so far, that she was involved with Alex. She wasn’t completely certain that a relationship with the spokesperson she was working with would get her automatically fired but Amelia was definitely on the lookout for something to give her an excuse. Daphne wondered if the reason that Amelia was so bent on raking her over the coals was because she had succeeded where the older woman had failed, or if Amelia was jealous of Alex. It wouldn’t be difficult to imagine: Alex was incredibly good-looking and incredibly wealthy. Daphne’s phone chirped again.
I’ll make sure you’re adequately clothed. Daphne rolled her eyes. Since they had started seeing each other regularly, he had, without being ostentatious about it, bought her trinkets, the occasional dress. He had already replaced the skirt she had torn to bandage Alex’s shoulder. Daphne was glad that so far, over the months they had been together, he hadn’t exactly showered her in gifts. He picked his moments, he gave her things that would be useful, things she liked, things that, he said, reminded him of her. But never was there a feeling that he was doing it to buy her off. None of the gifts, such as the dress she had worn to one of the major fundraising events for ARC, or the bracelet he’d given her one night, or the pair of intensely comfortable heated slippers she wore when she spent the night at his house, were the kind of things a man would get for a woman he thought of as just another lay.
Daphne shook her head and got back to her work. Just because she had a successful partnership with Alex on a professional level, she didn’t have any excuses for shirking her other responsibilities. Amelia was sharp-eyed as ever, and if she didn’t somehow manage to get the reporting done on her new recruits for the spokesperson project, Amelia would come looking for it. And, if Amelia had an excuse to criticize her work, it would probably mean even greater trouble ahead for her.
CHAPTER 7
Alex sat in the living room of his house, pretending to watch TV and trying to resist the urge to get up and start pacing. It was two o’clock in the afternoon on Sunday and he was more anxious than he had been the first time he had gone into work to assume his responsibilities as the new CEO of Oberon Industrial. Even assuming the slow, sedate service of a high-end restaurant like the one in the Fontaine Hotel, Daphne should have finished her lunch with his mother. They had made plans to be together in the afternoon. Alex had told her that he wanted to spend what little free time he had with Daphne but he knew she was already aware that he really wanted to debrief her, to see how she felt about his mother, how the lunch had gone.
Alex sighed. Ben had called him the day before, saying Eric was beginning to show signs of surfacing once more—that Alex’s rival and former partner was “like the fin of a shark,” barely peeking out of the water, the warning before the attack. Thus far, Ben wasn’t certain exactly what move Eric would be making but Alex knew that it would be something big. There was no viable way that Lasko could come after Oberon Industrial. There could be no merger; there could be no buy-out. Oberon was doing too well to be bought and, at the moment, there was nothing that Eric could do about that fact. Lasko, a smaller corporation, was working at full capacity just to compete at the level that Eric had brought it up to when he had first contacted Alex. The attack would come from some other sphere. Eric couldn’t ruin his life, at least not directly anymore. But Alex hadn’t grown up in the competitive atmosphere of private schools and networking without knowing there was no way to completely remain invulnerable to attack. Eric would make a move soon. The best Alex could hope for would be to find out hours or maybe a day or two before the plan went into motion.
The doorbell rang and Alex glanced at the clock: two-fifteen. It had to be Daphne. He stood up quickly, walking to the front door of his home before the housekeeper could get to it and smiled as he opened it up to reveal the woman he had been waiting for so impatiently. The sight of her, the scent of her, was enough to make Alex want to rip the expensive clothes from her body immediately, carry her to his bedroom, and spend the rest of the afternoon talking only in fragments of conversation between moments of touching her, bringing her to orgasm again and again. Instead, he took a deep breath and leaned in, kissing her lightly on the lips and let his hand fall to the small of her back to usher her into his house.
The day before he had invited her over after work. He had had his assistant purchase the clothes he wanted her to wear to meet his mother and even if the date hadn’t been on the calendar, Alex knew he wouldn’t have been able to resist coming up with some reason to invite her to stay the night. The clothes fit Daphne’s curvy body like a glove; a summer-weight dress in soft green and creamy white, the perfect colors to accentuate her dark hair and eyes, her slightly tawny skin. It fit her perfectly, emphasizing her hourglass shape and flaring into a full skirt from the hips, the hem hitting just above her knee. Alex pulled her into his arms and buried his face against her neck, nuzzling against her soft, slightly velvety skin.
“I’ve been impatiently waiting for you,” he murmured, nibbling sharply along the column of her throat.
“Well if you’re annoyed, blame your mom,” Daphne said, chuckling softly. “She was very charming, by the way.”
Alex smiled. “I thought she would be. Does she just love you?”
He felt Daphne’s skin heating up, pulled back to see her blushing. “She said she was glad to see that you were cultivating a deeper taste.”
Alex chuckled and kissed Daphne lightly on the lips. “What did you have?” Daphne shrugged, and Alex led her to the couch, sitting down and pulling her into his lap. He smoothed the skirt over her legs, fighting back the urge to slip his hand up under her clothes.
“It was several courses, of course,” she smiled at the quip, raising an eyebrow. “There was a really good soup. I think it was leeks and some other spring vegetables? And lamb for the main course, a really delicious salad. Your mom insisted on the dessert. I thought it was kind of appropriate that it was honeycomb ice cream.” Alex chuckled lowly, dragging his lips along the line of her neck.
“She loves that ice cream, always gets it at the Fontaine.”
Daphne snorted. “How much of a cliché is it that a couple of bear-humans are into honey?”
Alex nibbled carefully at her bare shoulder. “You’re small enough to be a bee,” he murmured. “But I’ve yet to find your stinger.”
Daphne laughed out loud, twisting around in his arms, turning to face him. She kissed him hungrily and Alex could feel the deep-down stirrings of arousal, could feel his body heating up, his pheromones shifting to draw her in.
“As long as you never hurt me, you won’t see my stinger.”
Alex smiled. Daphne’s voice, low, almost purring in his ear, couldn’t fail to distract him entirely from the subject of what her lunch with his mother had been like. He lifted her easily in his arms as he stood, leaving the couch, abandoning the living room entirely. He carried Daphne into his bedroom, shifting her in his arms so that he could bring her face to his, so that he could kiss her hungrily. For the time being, any other consideration was unimportant. All Alex could think about was stripping Daphne’s dress off of her and tasting her.
Daphne laughed as he dropped her carefully onto his wide, deep bed. Alex unbuttoned his shirt quickly and tossed it aside without caring where it landed, reaching out as he moved to pin Daphne to his bed. He found the zipper along the back of the dress by touch, tugging it down slowly along her skin as he kissed her again and again, feeling the pulse of lust in his veins quickening. He shifted down to straddle Daphne’s legs at the knee, pulling the dress down off her shoulders, along her arms, over her breasts. Alex’s smile deepened at the sight of the lingerie she was wearing underneath. He had bought it for her on another occasion; a matching bra and panty set, cream lace with dusky pink ribbon edging, barely concealing her breasts or her pussy, from his hungry, lust-filled gaze. Alex let Daphne fall back among the pillows, taking in the sight of her, breathing in the smell of her pheromones. She was unquestionably and completely turned on.
Alex cupped Daphne’s breasts through the thin lace of her bra, teasing her nipples into firm little nubs, feeling the current of electric sensation crackle through his nerves as she let out a slightly whimpering moan. He could smell the thick, sweet scent of her arousal. She was already starting to get wet. He loved how quickly her body responded, how readily she fell into lust. Alex tugged the barely-there fabric of the bra down and leaned in, burying his face against Daphne’s breasts, nuzzling her for a moment before he began to kiss a trail to her right nipple. He glanced up at her face as he claimed her nipple with his mouth, sucking and licking, his tongue flicking against the sensitive nub as fast as he could manage. Daphne arched into his attentions, biting her bottom lip to stifle the moan that rose up out of her. Alex could feel her pulse fluttering, could smell the intensification of her arousal. Every moment Daphne became more turned on, every moment of her pleasure made him harder and harder, made it more impossible for him to focus.
There had been a point in his life when Alex had been afraid that in a moment of passion, he would transform, that he would lose control completely of his bear essence and he would shift right in the middle of sex with a woman he loved. It had held him back from trying to form any kind of permanent attachment. But with Daphne, although Alex was determined never to frighten her by slipping into his bear form without warning or without need, he was at ease. At least she had seen him in that form. At least she knew. But he had told her, honestly, that he had never had sex in that form with a regular human woman. It was as true now as it had been before. He wanted to devour Daphne sexually, but he would never, ever, give her the kind of fear that could only come from a partner suddenly transforming into a bear in the midst of sex. And he knew, somehow, that with Daphne he could hold back the transformation. He could never be so overwhelmed, so out of control that the change happened without his ability to forestall it.
Simply Bears: A Ten Book Paranormal Bear Shifter Romance Collection Page 21
