My Heart Laid Bear (Blue Moon Junction) (6 page)

              “That’s so…sweet.” Clover summoned up a smile, while thinking
, Note to self. Stay on Autumn’s good side.

              “See you all Monday morning,” Sam said, nodding to Clover. “Call me if you need anything.” And he turned and walked off.

              She felt a strange pang as he walked away.  She wanted him to stay so she could keep giving him a hard time. That was why she wanted him to stay, of course. Not because she wanted him to accidentally brush up against her and send that little thrill through her body again.

What had just happened? Had she forgiven him? Why did he have to keep sweeping in and rescuing her when she was trying really hard to hate his guts?

              As they walked into the coffee shop, Clover asked Autumn, “Who were you talking to on the cell phone?”

              “Nobody.”

              “Really,” Clover said irritably. “So you have some mental illness issues? You just talk to a cell phone with nobody on the other end?”

              “Yep.”

              Great. There was nothing more fun than a sulky teenager.

              Clover moved to block Autumn as the other kids walked up to the coffee shop counter.

              “I’m not screwing around. Give me the phone.”

              Autumn handed it to her, and Clover checked the phone numbers.  There were half a dozen incoming calls made over the past few days – all to a blocked number.

              “Tell me who you were calling.”

              Autumn rolled her eyes in exasperation. “A boy I used to know.  Back in North Carolina.”

              “Name?”

              Autumn appeared to think for a second. “Mike,” she said finally.

              Mike. Right. Autumn hadn’t even put any real effort into the lie.

              “So why didn’t you want me to know about it?”

              Autumn shrugged. “No reason. Doesn’t matter. I won’t let him call me again. You want my cell phone?”

              “No.” Clover sighed. “I want you to have it so you can make calls if there’s an emergency. Just…if you have a problem, you know you can talk to me, right?”

              Autumn shrugged. “Sure,” she muttered, and headed over to the pastry counter, pretending to be very interested in the donut selection.

              Sapphire came over on Sunday to have lunch with them.  She was wearing tight jeans and heels and a crop top. So far she wasn’t showing. She was the kind of girl who probably wouldn’t look pregnant until her eighth month and then she’d have her figure back the day after she gave birth.

              Clover grimaced at the thought of Sapphire being a parent.  She had really, really hoped that being pregnant would make her act more mature, but obviously that wasn’t happening. Sapphire was still refusing to say where she was living or where she was working, which did not bode well.

              “I’m crashing with friends. You never like my friends, so it’s not like you’re going to come visit,” she said to Clover.

              “There’s generally a reason why I don’t like your friends.” Clover couldn’t keep the exasperation out of her voice.

              “You’re always so judgemental. And you wonder why I don’t want you to come visit?” Sapphire said petulantly. “You’d just be rude to everyone and look down on them.”

Just then Autumn walked into the living room. When she saw Sapphire she made a face and turned around, heading back out of the room.

              “For God’s sake!” Sapphire said, exasperated, and ran after her.  Clover could hear Autumn heading up the stairs, with Sapphire hurrying up behind her. Then she heard low, angry voices, but she couldn’t make out what they were arguing about.

              She came back down a few minutes later, shaking her head.

              “What is she mad about?” Clover asked.

              “Teenage adolescent angst. Also she found out that I’m pregnant and I guess she’s being all judgey about it. Whatever. What’s for lunch?”

              “Pot roast and potatoes. How did she find out? Never mind - it is impossible to keep anything a secret from these kids.”

              “Speaking of my fatherless child, any news on Jeffrey?”

              Clover sighed. Might as well break the bad news.

              “Apparently he’s in Europe. I’m going to see if there’s a way I can find his number there.”

              “Europe!” Sapphire wailed. Her eyes glittered with tears and she blinked hard. “So he hates me so much that he left the country to get away from me. Great.”

              “No, that isn’t it!” Clover protested. “His jerkoff brother made him leave town.”

              “The jerkoff you’re working for?” Sapphire said bitterly. “Are you sleeping with the enemy? I know how Jeffrey’s big brother bowls over all the ladies.”

              “I beg your pardon,” Clover said stiffly. The memory of her and Sam kissing by the picnic basket flashed through her mind and she flushed self-consciously and looked away, unable to meet Sapphire’s gaze.

              “I knew it,” Sapphire said, scorn dripping from her voice. “And you all looked down on me for getting knocked up by that rich asshole and thinking that I even had a chance with him. Well, you’re no smarter than I was. I guess you think you’re so much better than me that Sam will actually want you for more than a quick lay.”

              “Excuse the hell out of me,” Clover said hotly. “I am not having sex with Sam McCoy. And if you think Jeffrey’s an asshole, why do you want to marry him? Last thing I knew you were madly in love with him.”

              “I don’t want lunch anymore. I just lost my appetite,” Sapphire said coldly, and she turned and slammed out of the room. Clover heard the front door slam, and then she heard the screech of tires as Sapphire peeled out of the parking lot.

              Great. Clover would love to blame Sapphire’s mood swings on her pregnancy, but the truth was, she’d always run hot and cold. One minute she was your best friend, the next minute she was making cutting, bitchy remarks and accusing everyone of being against her. The problem was that when she was in her nice phase, she was so damn charming that she sucked you back in.

                            She spotted a green matchbook on the floor by the doorway. It hadn’t been there when Sapphire came in; it must have fallen out of her purse. She bent down to pick it up. The matchbook cover said “The Snakepit”, and had a picture of a coiled-up snake on it.

              She went to her computer and searched for “The Snakepit, North Florida” on Google, and found out it was a biker bar in Anhinga County, which was the county bordering Blue Moon County. Awesome place for a pregnant girl to work.

              She forced herself to put it out of her mind for now. There was nothing she could do about it at the moment. Sapphire was a grownup; she could work where she wanted. She spent the rest of the weekend wondering if Sam was going to try to drop by and sweet talk her again. She was so, so ready to shoot him down.  Unfortunately he never showed up and gave her the chance.

* * *

The porch swing creaked as Autumn swung back and forth, staring up at the silver crescent of the waning moon.  The black velvet dome of the sky was a deep purplish black, and millions of stars winked down at her. She felt tiny and alone.

              The back door swung open and Clover stuck her head out.

“Autumn, mom and dad are on the phone. They want to talk to you.”

Of course they did.

Autumn’s stomach twisted into an angry knot. She felt something dark and dangerous rumbling inside her, just under the surface of her skin. She’d never felt this way before. Something was wrong with her. Something was changing.

She leaped to her feet. “I’m about to go for a run.”

“What? Now? It’s dark out!” Clover protested.

“I won’t go far. I’ll stay on the property,” Autumn said, quickly shedding her clothes and leaving them in a pile by the steps. She heard Clover saying “Sorry, she still doesn’t want to talk to you. She’ll come around.”

Oh, if only you knew,
Autumn thought as she sank down to all fours and leaped off the porch.
If only I could tell someone.
Her burden was like a heavy stone weighing down on her heart. She’d meant to do the right thing. She really, really had. Instead she’d made everything a million times worse.

She shot off into the darkness, her vision shrunk down to blacks and grays but her scent keen and sharp.  The dark, angry beast that lurked inside her fought with her coyote, fought for control, but she didn’t recognize this beast, and she sensed that it was dangerous. She forced it back down and ran for the trees. She’d run and run and run, bathing in the sensations and the sounds and smells of the forest until she’d burned everything else from her troubled mind.

On Monday, Autumn stayed home to help Imogen around the boarding house while her siblings headed off to camp.

Clover spent the day writing up copy for the website. She kept waiting for someone to burst through the door and tell them that all three kids had been arrested, but the day passed uneventfully.

At 5 p.m., Clover was about to head out to pick her siblings up when Sam strode in her door, carrying a tray with three jars of honey on it. There was a bowl with several spoons in it next to the jar. He shut the door behind him. Had he just locked it? She raised an eyebrow at him.

“Now what are you up to?”

“Hello, nice to see you. Amazingly enough, everybody survived their first day at summer camp,” he said. “And apparently they taught everyone to escape from handcuffs. Moonshine brought them. Said she’d borrowed them from a police officer when he wasn’t looking.”

              “Oh. Dear God.” She buried her face in her hands.

              “What are you upset about? It’s a valuable skill.” He grinned at her and set the tray down on the table.

              “I’m upset because I can’t afford bail money. What are you doing?” she demanded, pushing her chair back and standing up quickly. Her, alone in a room with that bear and a bunch of honey? That was a dangerous combination. “I have to go get the kids.”

              “I took the liberty of asking Imogen to come pick them up, because we need you to work late. She’ll watch them.” As she started to protest, he sat down on the desk next to where she was standing. He was wearing jeans and a black T-shirt today, and the T-shirt molded perfectly to his massive biceps. She tried not to stare.

              There was a large bulge in the crotch area of his jeans.  She tried not to stare, but it was difficult not to. Good lord, everything about him was oversized.

              “We have these three new flavors of honey coming out. I need you to taste each one and write up the copy describing it.”

              “Anyone could do that!” she protested.

              “But we hired you.” He smiled winningly. “And we pay overtime.”

              “Why do you need it done tonight? I could do it tomorrow,” she argued. She could feel her willpower fading fast.

              “We’d like to get this new website up and running as soon as possible.”

              Without waiting for an answer, he unscrewed the lid from a jar of honey.  “This jar is mango honey.”

              She looked at him suspiciously. “I do not trust you.”

              “Smart girl.” He winked at her.

              She tried again. “My sister says that you use women for sex, just like your brother.”

              “Would that be your sister Sapphire? How are things working out with her?”

              Clover shrugged and looked away, mumbling a noncommittal, “Family. What can you say?”

              Sam nodded. “I thought so. And what she says is not true of my brother or me, ever. I have told the women that I’ve dated that I’m a very busy man, and I don’t have time for relationships, which has always been true up until now. If I’m not interested in anything serious, I’m always honest about it.”

              “And what do you want with me?”

              He stared into her eyes. “I want you in my bed right now, and every night for the rest of my life.”

              Her heart leapt in her chest. Her knees suddenly went weak and she sank into her chair. “Excuse me, you what? You can’t possibly know that.”

              “Ever heard of fated mates?”

              She shook her head. “That’s a fairy tale. Modern shifters don’t believe that.”

              “I do. I felt it the second that I saw you. It just took a little while for me to admit it to myself. The more I get to know you, the more I want to claim you forever.”

              “But you…you’re just telling me this now.”

              “Yes. I didn’t want to rush you. We have our entire lives.”

              She struggled to find words, and failed.  Arousal blazed through her body and she found herself thinking about what it would be like to wake up in bed next to him every morning. To see him walk in the door with that sexy grin on his face every night after work. To feel his hands on her body...

Was she about to let him make a huge fool of her? Would he lie to her like that? Fear mingled with desire and made her feel faint. Was that how Jeffrey had talked to Sapphire before he’d abandoned her?

She thought about Sam’s family. Every last one of them was wonderful to her, and they were wonderful to one another, and clearly loved one another, and she’d never heard a bad word about the McCoy family. Yeah, she knew that Sam and his cousin Flint both had reputations as players, but not as men who led women on. And word around town was that as soon as Flint met Coral, the wolf shifter he’d married, he was strictly a one-woman man.

              Sam dipped the spoonful of honey into her mouth, and she swallowed the sweet, sticky liquid. She could taste the mango flavor, and it complemented the honey perfectly.

              He slid the spoon out and set it down on the desk.

              “I want to know what it tastes like,” he said, and, cupping her chin in his hand, bent down and kissed her hungrily.  Her lips parted with a moan, and he kissed her long and hard. His tongue was hungry and probing and she swirled her tongue around his in an intimate duet.

              “And now I’m going to prove your sister wrong,” he said. “I am not here to use you for sex. I am going to worship your glorious body, and then I’m going to walk you to your car, and then I’m going to do the same thing again tomorrow night.”

He gave her a crooked grin that had heat pooling low in her belly, making her feel restless and needy. He was so big, and so close. She could feel the heat emanating from his skin, and felt a blush rising over her throat and in her cheeks. His eyes sparkled.

              He dipped the spoon into the second jar, coating it with the rich golden fluid.

              “This one is clover honey,” he murmured. He brought the spoon to her lips and she obediently opened her mouth. He ran the sticky bowl of the spoon over her lower lip, a tacky drizzle of honey escaping to drip onto her collarbone, then popped the sweet treat into her mouth. She closed her mouth around the spoon and saw his pupils dilate as he slowly withdrew it, watching her lips slide over its surface.

              She couldn’t help but imagine how it would feel to have his cock in her mouth and she closed her eyes and shuddered as arousal dampened her panties.

              The honey had a subtle floral taste that made her think of slow, warm days and making lazy love in the sunshine.

              She ran her tongue over the sweet residue on her lower lip, then gasped as Sam stepped closer. She felt the hard length of his cock pressing against her stomach, and whimpered when he gave an involuntary flex of his hips, pressing even closer. “Tell me how Clover tastes,” he growled, and the hair stood up on the back of her neck, sending a frisson of sensation down her spine.

              “It’s…sweet,” she stammered. He grasped the curves of her hips in his large hands and bent his head, bringing his lips close to hers. “It’s…delicate. Unlike me.” She gave an awkward laugh, then cringed internally. It wasn’t as if he could have missed the fact that she was a bigger girl. Not for the first time, she found herself wishing she’d inherited her coyote-shifter father’s slender build, as Autumn had.

              She was on the verge of struggling out of Sam’s embrace and fleeing in embarrassment, hiding under a rock and never coming out again, when Sam dipped his head to lap at the drizzle of honey on her collarbone. He gave a low, primal moan, and without meaning to she reacted by pressing her body closer to his.

              “That’s not what I taste,” he said, kissing his way up her throat. “I’d say it’s delicious…complex…moreish.”

              He ran his hands into her curls, and she saw that his eyes had gone feral; almost the same golden color as the honey that still played on her tongue.

              He kissed her. Gently at first, then with increasing fervor. She responded eagerly, opening her mouth to him and allowing him to savor the sweetness that still lingered on her lips and tongue. He nipped and suckled, kissing her ravenously, as if he couldn’t get enough of her; couldn’t control his passion for her. She ran her hands up the firm planes of his stomach and chest and he drew back for long enough to pull his T-shirt over his head and toss it onto the floor. She struggled out of her dress and bra, then he pulled her into his arms again, hitching one of her knees up so that her damp panties were pressed against his erection and the denim of his jeans abraded the insides of her thighs. She gasped and wriggled closer, running her hands over his muscled shoulders and broad back, marveling at his size and strength.

              Sam stepped back and, with his hands on her waist, lifted her onto the desk as if she weighed nothing. He parted her knees and stepped between them, but drew back slightly when she leaned forward, oblivious to anything but the desire to have his lips on hers again.

              “Tsk, tsk, tsk,” he chided.  “We’re on company time. We still have work to do.” He leaned across and there was a quiet clink behind her as he loaded the spoon with the third type of honey.

              “This one is something different,” he told her, holding the spoon temptingly in front of her lips. “Fruit honeys and floral honeys – they’re good, but they aren’t exactly groundbreaking. This could be a real social media…sensation.”

              Her lips parted and he moved the spoon towards them, but then at the last moment he pulled it away and popped it into his own mouth.

              Clover blinked in surprise. “Didn’t you want me to taste it? I can’t write it up if—”

              He cut off her words with a kiss. She moaned as sensation exploded over her tongue. The heady sweetness of the honey had been cut by the subtle heat of chili, and it was both delicious and warming. She pushed her tingling tongue against his, caught up in his kiss and the taste of the honey and the scent of the big bear shifter. He growled against her mouth, and hoisted her farther back on the desk so he could plant her feet on the wooden surface and draw her knees apart.

              He drew her panties down over her thighs and down her calves, and tossed them aside. He planted a tender kiss on her knee, then on her thigh. She closed her eyes and shuddered, hyper-aware of how exposed her soaked pussy was to his gaze. She could scent her own arousal, and her heart was thudding in her chest. The taste of honey and chili lingered in her mouth.

              Then he parted her pussy lips and gently tongued her slit, and she thought she was going to lose her mind. The traces of chili on his tongue provided a subtle tingling that, combined with his steady lapping, had her writhing against his mouth.

              She reached down and pushed her fingers into that thick, glossy brown hair, holding him to her and panting as he swapped his attention to her clit, sucking it between his lips then flicking it delicately with his wickedly clever tongue.

              Sam worked patiently between her legs, reacting to her every whimper. He slid his hands under her full, rounded buttocks so he could draw her even closer, and swirling pressure began to build between her thighs. Her breath was short and her legs were trembling as sensation rocked through her. She released his head and her hands fluttered on the desk, seeking something to hold on to as Sam worked her to the brink of an orgasmic abyss and held her trembling on the edge…and then she fell.

              Her pussy spasmed and she gave hoarse little cries of completion, struggling to catch her breath as her heart banged against her ribcage and a warm, liquid pleasure enveloped her. She squeezed her thighs against the sides of his face, and he kept licking until the last spasms died away and she was limp and sated.

              He stood and stepped back, licking his lips then wiping his mouth with the back of his hand to remove the sticky evidence of her pleasure.

              “Delicious,” he said. “Complex. Moreish.”

              The look in his eyes was one of deep satisfaction, but she could see the hard bulge of his cock pressing painfully against the denim of his jeans, and suddenly she wanted nothing more than to have him in her mouth.

              She sat up and tucked her fingers into his waistband, drawing him towards her and reaching for his fly, but he caught her hands in his and shook his head.

              “That isn’t what this was about.”

              He retrieved her dress and her underwear and handed them to her.

              She hesitated, bewildered. “But you—”

              He gave her a slow, lazy grin that had her pussy tingling all over again. “This wasn’t about me. It was about you. I told you I was going to worship your body, then walk you to your car, and that’s what I’m going to do. So put your clothes on, because as much as I can’t get enough of those amazing curves, if any of Marjorie’s little gang of Stepford Wives see me walking you to your car butt-naked, she’s liable to have a conniption fit.”