Bear Your Teeth (Alpha Werebear Paranormal Shifter Romance) (3 page)

A laugh – really more of a honking snort – burst out of Rika. Dr. Melton was smiling too, she could tell by the way his eyes crinkled just a little in the corners and sparkled. If he didn’t have that mask on, she woulda seen him twitch the corner of his mouth, his own little spoiler move for an upcoming joke.

“Guess we do kinda stick together, huh?” she asked, eager to keep the tension broken. If she didn’t, Paprika was a little afraid of her own imagination. What if she started imagining... things happening? What if she just lost all sense of decency and just jumped his bones? That wasn’t too likely, but better safe than sorry, right?

A noncommittal grunt was his answer, though she could see he was still smiling behind the mask.

“How did you say this happens?” he was just idling chatting, but he couldn’t possibly have asked a more horrifying question.

“I dunno,” Paprika said. “Happens at night mostly. I’ll wake up, retainer’s broken and my teeth are out. It’s like I’m shifting in my sleep or something.”

“Mm-hmm,” he sailed right on past.

For a few moments, he worked in silence, checking for cavities she never had, and then taking a handful of X-rays since it had apparently been a year since the last set. They came back clear. About ten minutes of idle chit-chat and small talk and dentistry later, he turned the boat back around. “What kind of dreams do you have?”

“Hunh?” Paprika said, almost swallowing the mouthful of fluoride she was supposed to spit in the sink. “Dreams? What do you mean—Oh,“ she said. “Oh, uh... I didn’t say that.”

She spat, several times. Had to make sure that goo was all gone. And also had to make sure she didn’t say anything ridiculous, such as telling the truth.
Oh nothing much, just sex dreams where you spank me and sometimes I scratch you some and then you spank me harder.

There it went, the blush. It crept up her stomach and flushed her cheeks, turning the sides of her neck bright red.

“Well,” his voice was soft, but there was a little huskiness to it, a little gravel in the stream. “If it happens at night, it’s probably tied to a dream.” His fingertips brushed along Paprika’s jaw. Or at least that’s what she thought. Really he was checking alignment – her mother had TMJ – but to her, it was a light, sensual brush of his fingertips against her jaw, then her neck.

Okay, pretty sure neck brushes aren’t part of a normal dental exam.

She looked up, squinting against the overhead exam light. Dr. Melton was staring down at her, fingers curling absently against her neck. “Oh!” he said with a start. “Sorry about that, I, uh,” he trailed off.

“Yeah, dreams,” she said, saving him from being awkward that time. “They’re usually just regular ones, you know, the things people dream.”

Okay that sounded about as stupid as my poetry in middle school.

“Right,” Thor whispered. “Regular dreams. Flying? That sort of thing?”

What is going on? Like what is really going on here? First I’m having weird sex dreams about my mysterious, thirty-something bear-shifting dentist and now he’s apparently doing the same thing?

She let out a nervous giggle and decided to test the water. “Well I guess they might’ve been a little steamy.”

That was innocuous enough. Right? Right? Oh God why isn’t he talking? Did I just offend the—

“Incredible,” he whispered. Those dark eyes were trained straight on Paprika’s, like he was drilling holes straight into her soul. The warmth she felt was unmistakable, the tingling that ran up her spine, then down her legs? She didn’t want to imagine what was going to happen thirty seconds from now if one of them didn’t get some common sense.

“Fuck it,” she said out loud. Paprika, red coils of hair splayed all over the exam chair, reached up and grabbed her bear by his ears since that was all she could reach. She opened her mouth, expecting a kiss, but got a mouthful of soft, but rough, paper surgical mask.

For a second, the two just sat there, lips pressed against each other, through a mask, and then Paprika first, Thor second, both of them started laughing. What else was there to do? The choices were laugh, get all embarrassed, or admit the reality that she just grabbed a guy she didn’t know past the twinkle in his eyes and the glint of laughter in the tiny crinkles at the corners of his eyes, and
kissed him in the middle of an exam.

“I’m... I’m sorry, I have no idea what the hell I was thinking, Dr. Melton,” she said. “I guess I just started thinking about being a Twinkie or a cheeseburger or whatever it was, and—“

Taking off his mask, he was all smiles. “Nothing to worry about. I admit that I don’t usually stroke the necks of my clients. Something came over me,” he paused for a second. “I was staring at your eyes, and your hair, and those beautiful teeth, and—“

“Wait, did you just say beautiful teeth? That’s, okay well that’s a little weird in any case, but mine are far from beautiful. They stick out like a cartoon rabbit.”

He shook his head and immediately looked distracted, like he’d gone about four steps too far, which he had, although in this case, it wasn’t really him that took those first steps straight off the edge of appropriate and into possible-court-date town.

For that though, someone needed to be upset.

“But they’re you,” he said finally. “They’re nothing to be ashamed about. Looking at you, I—“ He cut himself off. “You know, this is a game I won’t win. I play it with myself, with my heart. And I’m doing it again.”

“That took a turn for the dark,” Paprika said, still smiling with one corner of her mouth. “Do you wanna, like, get a coffee or something?”

“I think I’m moving,” he said. “Business is dying down, and I’ve been looking at new places. I saw a job posting online that was vague and weird, but honestly? It sounds pretty good right about now.”

“Whoa, whoa, wait a second. Stop the press. Why are you telling me this?”

He scrunched up his forehead. “Because you’re going to have to find another dentist?”

“No, I mean, why are you telling me this
now
? We hardly even know each other, I got all excited and kissed you through a mask and then you said some stuff about me being beautiful and then you announced you were leaving. It’s all kind of fast paced, you know?”

“I’m sorry,” he said, looking down, obviously thinking about something else and wishing he’d never said half the stuff he said. “I’m not used to dealing with, you know, not-bears. We’re kinda direct.”

“Yeah,” Rika said with a chuckle and a playful grin. “Yeah, I kinda get that. If my mom knew what just happened she’d probably already be planning a wedding and four baby showers.”

He cocked an eyebrow. “Four?”

“Big litters in my family.”

It was Thor’s turn to let out a booming laugh. When he
really
got going, he leaned his head back all the way and just roared.

“I talk when I’m nervous,” Rika offered, like she was extending a sympathetic hand. “And also kiss, apparently.”

“I do too. Terrible habit. I have the even worse habit of seeing something I want and refusing to let go until it’s mine.” His voice went all growly and gravely and so sexy it almost hurt.

“Like trashcan Twinkies?”

He watched her face, his look hungry and intense. “Yeah,” he said.

She was starting to get so flushed and flustered that if she didn’t do something
quick
, Paprika was going to take her public display of desperation to a whole new level. A kiss was one thing, but pushing her dentist over and actually jumping on him? Probably somewhere over the line.

“Hey,” she cut in, “uh, you said something about finding a job ad online? Where are you looking to go?”
I’ll go with you, God as my witness, I don’t care where we go, I’ll go with you
is what she wanted to say.

He furrowed his brow again, a deep frown line crinkling his forehead. “Weirdest thing. I’m not sure. There was a job posting, and all it said was something vague about mountains, and then gave a number to call if you were interested.

“That’s not normal. Wait, was this in one of
our
papers?” Shifters, weres, whatever they’re called, have “for them” papers that usually contain old news stories about this bear or that tiger making the draft in the NFL, or a seal getting elected to the US Senate. But they also had job postings that, if you looked at them with the slightest squint, seemed like creepy sex ads you’d find in a vintage 1976 corner paper in Vegas.

He shook his head. “Well, mine.”

She quirked an eyebrow. It had worked. Apparently.
Thank God
.

“Dental journal. You know, job ads for dentists.”

Slowly, Rika started to nod. “Well, if you want, I can ask my sister if the place she went needs a dentist, Dr. Melton.”

“Is it friendly?”

“Apparently. I mean, they tolerate Petunia.”

For a moment, Thor’s mouth hung open. But then he clapped it shut. “I can’t ask you to do that. In fact, I can’t believe I’ve done most any of the things I’ve done today. And anyway this is all a pipe dream. I can’t move without a place to work, there are a scarce few places I’d even feel safe, let alone comfortable.”

“I hear that,” Rika scoffed, standing up and desperately needing to either get out of there or kiss him again because her heart was just about to erupt if one of the two didn’t happen.

“Next time I see you, do me a favor?”

He’s going to tell me not to come back. He’s going to want to get the hell away from crazy rabbit-lady for fear of a lawsuit, he’s—

His hands on her shoulders, his lips against hers, Thor Melton took a deep breath through his nose, inhaling Paprika’s scent. As his tongue explored her lips, and then moved inside, he ran his hands through her hair, grabbing big handfuls and letting the curls slide between his fingers.

He released her, and she sank back, mouth open. The heart that had been threatening to explode seconds before suddenly ached worse than ever – but this time because she’d tasted what she wanted worse than anything, and then it was gone.

“Next time I see you, call me Thor. And promise me there
will
be a next time.”

“Y-yeah,” Rika said. “And call me Rika. And uh, hell yeah there’s gonna be a next time.”

When she finally made her way out of the office, the world felt different, like how after the Thanksgiving-Christmas-New Year’s holiday trifecta, the world just feels slightly off? That’s the sense she got.

But this? Definitely, definitely the
good
kind of off.

––––––––

“A
bby?” Thor Melton called down the hall to his assistant – or at least that’s what she was right then. The patients were drying up. Hell, the whole town was drying up, so when there weren’t any teeth to clean, she answered the phones.

Of course, there wasn’t much of that to be done either.

She stuck her head in the door, a tendril of mousy brown falling across one of her tortoiseshell patterned plastic-framed glasses. “’Sup, T?”

Formality wasn’t something Thor Melton took very seriously. It actually made him nervous when people called him doctor, mister, whatever. He’d grown up too fast for his own liking, but barely fast enough to keep ahead of the cubs his mom and dad kept having without the money to support, or the bills that kept piling up.

Hippie parents might be awesome in all kinds of ways – open talks about the dangers of government intervention and public school, for one, and naming him Thor for goodness sake for another – but when it came to fiscal responsibility, there was a little to be desired.

He’d started working when he was thirteen, lying about his age to get a job sacking groceries. Having a huge, full beard turns out to help with that kind of thing. He just never stopped. He was the oldest of the bunch by three years, so by the time he was thinking about going off to college, he was helping his parents support twelve younger siblings. Mom was fertile, especially when it came to twins.

Thor turned the picture of the whole Melton crew around, it usually faced outward, and looked at them. It was taken two years ago, just after he’d left the commune and moved to Cedar Falls. “I used to think this was the big time, you know?”

“What, dentistry? Or the town?” Abby walked in, grabbed one of the chairs that was scattered with model train catalogues, and sat on top of them.

“I’m glad we’re at a point in our professional relationship that you’re comfortable sitting on my stuff.”

She shrugged. “I’m glad we’re at a point where you don’t bother to hide the model train catalogs when it’s just you and me in the office.”

He smirked at that, knowing she was right. She was the first friend he really had in town, and hell, really the only one. After he moved to the Falls, he spent a solid year building his practice as one of the only two – and the only
licensed
– dentist in a town of just about six thousand people. He’d spent lots of time thinking about relaxing, kicking back, finding a mate and getting himself a brood of cubs just like his mom and dad, but... okay maybe not
just
like that. He’d always thought two was a better number than thirteen.

“You wanna get married?” he asked casually. This wasn’t the first time, or the second, or the tenth.

“Sure,” Abby shot back. “But you oughta know that I’m not much into body hair. Might be a sticking point.”

That wasn’t the first time she’d given him that line, not by a long shot. She, outside of the pair of bulldog shifters, and the Lewis crew, was the only soul around who knew about the whole bear thing.

“Why didn’t it ever bother you?” he asked, leaning back in the chair and deftly picking the engineer’s cap up off his desk, stashing it in a drawer.

“The train thing? It does. Always did.”

He glowered playfully.

“Oh right, bear. Well, to be honest, you’re not the only one I know. I mean you’re the only bear, but I’ve known Clark and Dana forever, and I never understood why people were such pricks to them.” Clark and Dana were the bulldogs. “There’s all kinds of stuff we get along with, religion, Republicans, why not people who turn into animals?”