Winston (BBW Bear Shifter Wedding Romance) (Grizzly Groomsmen Book 3) (72 page)

They slid under the smooth, cool sheets of her bed and fell asleep curled into each other.

Blair rolled over and found her bed empty. She sat up and looked around. Had he left?

She slid out of bed and wrapped her robe around her. She was halfway downstairs when she smelled the coffee and eggs. In the kitchen, he stood naked in front of the stove. She wrapped her arms around him from behind, covering his groin with her hand.

“That’s kinda dangerous, don’t you think? One grease splatter…”

“Then, I guess you’ll have to keep your hand there.”

She chuckled and kissed his shoulder and neck as he flipped the eggs in the pan. Before they sat down to eat, she ran out to his car to get his clothes.

“You don’t have to put them on yet, though,” she said, winking at him.

He let them fall to the floor as they sat to eat. “Guess I owe you a new coffee table.”

She looked over at the two pieces lying on their side. “It looks like a wild animal was set lose in here.” She pulled her lips into a grin.

“I’ll clean up.”

After breakfast, he kept his word. He helped her scrub the blood from the floor, replaced the broken lightbulb in the lamp, and swept the pieces of broken glass from a fallen picture frame. By the time he left, the place looked somewhat livable again.

Months later, Blair popped open a bottle of champagne and poured two glasses.
 

“I have you to thank for this,” she said to Dax.

“Just a little creative marketing.”

She looked again at the sales book, at the huge numbers that proved the store had the best quarter of its history. A true accomplishment for her and her career. The local organic spin had taken off. With Daxton’s help, she’d found suppliers for many products and now, fully half of the products on the shelves were made locally. Of the other half, only a small percentage were not organic or whole foods. She’d cornered a specific audience and they loved her store for it.

They hadn’t seen or heard from any of the men who’d come after Daxton. Though, one time he thought he saw one in a building supply store. He didn’t know for sure because the man had run off quickly.

Blair had hired back the employees she’d laid off and even hired a few new ones, including a security guard. Daxton’s honey and soap sold well. She gave both products large displays and prominent places. The other local honey hadn’t done well at all, and she’d asked the woman who brought it in to come pick up her product. There was only one honey that Mason’s would sell from now on.

Dax winked at her as he poured some of his moonshine into their glasses. She giggled and took a sip, the sweet honey whiskey giving a kick to the fizzy champagne.

“There’s one other thing we’re celebrating tonight,” he said.

“There is?”

“Yup. It’s the first time I said I love you.”

She set her glass down to kiss him. “Do you really?”

“I do. I love you,” he said, kissing her again. “And I love your hot body,” he whispered.

“Hmm,” she said, looking around her office. “We’ve never done it in here.”

“Then what are we waiting for?”

They began kissing heavily until he turned her around and bent her over the desk. Lucky she was wearing a skirt today. He slid up her skirt and pulled down her panties and shoved deep inside her. In only minutes, they both cried out in pleasure and she fell into his arms.
 

“I like when you take your time,” she said. “But sometimes, there’s nothing like a quickie to end the day right.”

“We’ll have to remember that next we have a ‘business meeting.’”

“Maybe we’ll just need to schedule ‘business meetings’ a lot more regularly.”

“I like the way you think.” He rubbed his nose against hers, purring softly.

“I love you, too,” she said, realizing she hadn’t told him earlier. “And your wild animal ways.”

He growled at her and she growled back, then wrapped herself around him and refused to let go.

Dietrich

Bear Dating Agency I

by

Becca Fanning

The night of June 4
^th
was horrific, embarrassing and terrifying. On June 5
^th
, Elise Davenport thought that her life couldn’t possibly get any worse. She was wrong.

For starters, she was lost in the woods. Elise had entered the wilds of Fairhaven Park about an hour ago, chatting away to her agent about the disaster of the night before, only to find that when she hung up the call, she had veered off the path. The sun had long-since settled into the blackness of night, turning leafy green trees into heaps of shadow. Elise’s spine tingled with cold, despite the balmy air of a summer night in the California countryside. Something was very, very wrong.

And that something was a bear.

Elise wasn’t sure what she was looking at, at first, but she froze on the spot, staring into the forest ahead. The huge lumbering shape made a move, just a few steps forward, and suddenly it was fully defined. Elise saw the impossibly wide, shaggy head of brown fur, and the huge paws with long, curling claws. The bear had small, dark eyes, which caught the moonlight and reflected it in silver discs. It took a few more steps, out of the foliage and straight into Elise’s path.

Frozen with fear, Elise could only imagine the horror of being mauled to death by a bear. It was a grizzly too, which was totally impossible for California, yet there it was in all its hefty glory. People wouldn’t believe that this was how she’d died. They’d imagine that she had faked her own death, rather than face the backlash of the biggest mistake of her modelling career. When the bear took a sudden lunge, a deep growl caught in its throat, Elise lost her thoughts completely.

And then, as if fate didn’t hate her enough, another bear entered the small clearing.

It was even larger than the first, and slightly darker in color. The fur seemed to glisten as if it was wet, picking up silver strands of reflected moonlight. Elise’s body shivered, her breathing escaping in stunted puffs of air. The new bear glanced her way, and its eyes were golden. Even in the depth of night, those two shining orbs burned like sunlight. It was both the most beautiful and terrifying thing she had ever seen. The two grizzlies faced off, each eyeing the other for a long, silent moment.

Elise took one step, daring to try and back away. At her movement, the golden-eyed bear leapt in front of her, teeth bared to its smaller adversary. Elise heard the clash of gigantic muscles as the creatures started to tussle, and her breathing gave way to a cry. Every blow was powerfully violent, and Elise willed her shaking legs to work again. The golden-eyed bear was beating the other one back, but that surely meant that he wanted this tall, blonde woman for his very own midnight snack. Elise couldn’t afford to be around when that moment came.

She ran for all she was worth, racing desperately towards any sign of life.

“You poor thing,” Anina soothed. “Here, have another sip of cocoa.”

The morning sun was peeking over the horizon by the time that Elise found the Rangers’ Lodge. Shaking and terrified, she’d been welcomed into the three-story cabin by an elderly lady with small, hunched shoulders. Her face was streaked with silver wrinkles, and behind her glasses there was a kind gaze that shone through milky-amber eyes. The woman had introduced herself as Anina Best, and at first glance, Elise felt safe with her.

“I guess I can afford the calories, after all that running,” Elise said in a hoarse tone.

“Who thinks about calories after a bear attack?” Anina asked in reply.

Elise gave a shrug, her disheveled blonde hair flicking out at strange angles.

“That’s the model mentality,” she supposed.

Elise had only been modelling in LA for the last year, after leaving college with a degree she probably wouldn’t use and a huge pile of debts to pay back. She’d been getting pretty good at it too, until she’d put her foot in her mouth at the Shine Awards. She tried her hardest to push the embarrassment back again, burying her face in the steamy mug of chocolate heaven. When the warm, gooey liquid had calmed her nerves, her voice became smooth and bright again.

“Thank you so much for your kindness,” she told Anina. “I’m supposed to be renting a cabin on the West Ridge. I didn’t realize it’d be so far to get to on foot.”

“Are you the last minute booking? Miss Davenport?” Anina asked.

Elise gave a nod. Anina pulled herself to her feet, shuffling gently over to a large door made of pale wood. The room they were in was decked in the same timber, and filled with comfortable easy chairs and coffee tables. It was a place designed for guests. It even had a flickering fireplace, despite the total lack of a need for extra heat. Anina had called out into the hall from the doorway, and Elise quickly realized that she hadn’t spoken in English.

“Are you European?” she asked as Anina came back to her chair. “I thought I heard something in your accent before.”

“The Bests are a German family originally,” Anina explained with a nod. “Ah, and here they are.”

As her words faded, four huge guys entered the room. At once Elise thought of how awful she must have looked after fleeing through the woods, and she tried to calm her wayward hair with a nonchalant hand. Two of the young men looked fairly similar, both with shaggy blonde hair that was in need of a cut, and they were flanked by a darker, more lithe guy and a brown-haired man with a look of contempt on his face. None of them were past twenty-five, and they all had muscles bulging beneath their Park Ranger uniforms.

“My grandsons,” Anina said, beaming. “Benedikt, Kurt, Hartwin and Reinicke.”

They were standing in that order, and each one nodded at their name. Except for the last one.

“Ry-ni-ka,” Elise said, sounding it out, “that’s an interesting name.”

“I’m an interesting guy,” Reinicke replied, in a tone flatter than roadkill. “Gram, can I go? You don’t need all of us to handle a bear scare.”

Anina gave a rueful little nod, and the one called Reinicke made his escape. On his way out of the room there was the sound of a clash, and suddenly a fifth man pushed his way through the middle of the group. He was bare-chested, a towel clinging to his huge shoulders. Elise let her eyes travel over the rippling muscles of his abdomen as he heaved for breath.

“You called, Gram?” he asked, in a deep, smooth voice. “What’s happening?”

His eyes travelled to Elise, and it was not the fact that he was tall, dark and handsome which took her breath away. When he looked straight at her, his eyes were golden. Elise knew that she had seen those deep, burning eyes before. Silenced by her shock, Elise’s gaze travelled to Anina’s other grandsons, and now they were all looking straight at her too. All of them had those golden eyes. And perhaps, behind her glasses and the pale cloudiness of old age, Anina had them too.

“Why are you all wet, Dietrich?” Anina chided. “You should be in uniform for morning patrol.”

Dietrich looked down at his bare chest, one hand raised somewhat protectively over his damp skin.

“Night swimming,” he explained, “but something came up.”

Elise caught sight of something dark as Dietrich moved his arm. She must have mistaken it for a shadow initially, but the light of the fireside suddenly revealed its true nature. Dietrich had a huge, fresh bruise emerging down his right side. Benedikt, who appeared to resemble Dietrich closely, gave a wince and sucked his teeth.

“How in the hell did you do that, bro?” he asked.

Dietrich’s eyes flashed to Elise for the briefest moment. Another flash of gold.

“That’s not important right now,” he replied. “Gram, who’s this young lady?”

“Young lady,” Anina said with a grin. “You’re so formal, Dietrich. Why, I’ll bet she’s your age. Twenty-two.”

Anina looked to Elise, and she gave an apologetic shrug.

“Twenty-one,” she corrected.

“Close enough,” Anina replied. “This is Elise Davenport. She’s taking a little vacation from LA, but she encountered two of our grizzlies off the Northern trail.”

“I’ll bet one of them was Silo,” said the guy called Kurt. “He was a rescue from a Russian Circus. He doesn’t understand that he shouldn’t get so close to people. Hey Ben, you wanna put fifty bucks on it being Silo?”

“This is the hardly the time, Kurt,” Ben replied. He ran a hand through his dark hair. “I ought to draw up a report.”

When Ben moved to the far end of the room, heading for a wide wooden desk, Kurt followed him with a burr of low chatter. Elise found her eyes drawn to Dietrich again. He stood tall now that he’d stopped panting for breath, and his body was peppered with black hairs, the same dark shade as those on his head. He had a shadow of stubble on his square jaw, which he scratched at with a large, strong hand. Another flash of gold shot her way.

“Can I ask about the grizzlies?” Elise said tentatively. “I mean, I didn’t think we had any outside of San Diego Zoo.”

“Fairhaven’s a sanctuary for the grizzly bear,” said Hartwin. He had a softer jawline than the other grandsons, and he smiled whenever he spoke. “Most people who come here go trekking to try and spot them. But you didn’t know?”