The woman angled her face and frowned, then pointed at Beast. “Do I know you from somewhere?”
“Nope,” Beast said immediately, but he was ducking his gaze now. “The room is under Kiera Pierce.”
The woman cast a quick, suspicious glance at Kiera, then back to Beast. “You’re one of the shifters, aren’t you?” She looked around and lowered her voice. “I follow you guys.” The woman, Regina, her nametag read, pulled up her phone and started poking buttons and scrolling.
A soft growl rumbled from Beast, but Kiera slid her hand up his back and put on her most polite smile. “We’re unregistered to a crew, and we’ve been driving for a while, had a long night. We really just want to check in and—”
Regina gasped. “Here! I knew it. Beast, dominant mega-psycho. Don’t mess with this one unless you want to lose limbs. Badass brawler lion.” She grinned excitedly up at Beast. “Lion!” She looked back down at her phone and read faster. “Giant dick.” Regina put her hand to her mouth and murmured out the side of her lips, “I believe it,” then went back to reading. “Former king, in contention for third under the mother fuckin’ dragon, zero STDs, no short-shorts ever, likes to wear monochromatic colors, and is the powerhouse of the Blackwing Trailer Park. Blackwing Trailer Park! You’re part of Dark Kane’s crew?”
“Where are you reading that from?” Kiera asked, leaning over the counter.
“I’m fangirling so hard right now! Air Ryder Croy posted the Blackwing Crew a couple days ago. Oh! He updated it a couple of hours ago to include you, Kiera Pierce! Lioness, nice. There’s a picture of Beast drinking a beer. Your scars are even scarier in person. Can I have your autographs? And one for my little brother. He will freak out. He has posters of his favorite predator shifters on his wall.”
“Fuckin’ Air Ryder,” Beast muttered as he signed his name in dark scrawl across the hotel stationary Regina had shoved across the counter to him. He was making the air feel too heavy, too unbreathable, and Kiera’s touch wasn’t helping.
“I’m never throwing this pen away!” Regina exclaimed. “Brandon!” She waved down a bellhop and started frantically pointing at Beast. “Shifters,” she whisper-screamed.
Brandon didn’t look like he gave a shit, but he did give them a tired smile as he continued pushing a luggage cart toward the elevator.
Kiera shook her head at the strange turn her life had taken and signed right under Beast’s name. He’d ripped through the paper in two places. She pursed her lips against a smile.
Beast scrubbed his hand over his blond hair and pulled a black winter hat on in a gesture that looked more irritation than to keep his head warm. When movement caught her eye, Kiera looked out the massive front windows.
Outside, past the circle drive, fluffy snowflakes were floating to the ground. She gasped. “Beast, you were right! It’s snowing.”
“Beast is such a cool fucking name. Eeep! I mean freaking.” Regina dipped her voice low again. “We’re not allowed to say fucking in front of guests, and this is my very first week working here. And I really need this job.”
“It’s fine. We won’t tell,” Kiera said with a smile. To Beast, she said, “Can we go out there and enjoy it a minute before we go up to the room?” Really, she needed to get this moody lion outside for a breather before they shoved themselves into a cramped elevator or a small room.
Beast dragged his lightened gaze down her dress to her legs and boots. “You’ll get cold.”
“No, I won’t. I’m warm now.”
“What if you get sick?”
“Do lion shifters get sick? You kind of cured me of every possible germ, remember?”
“Right.”
He still looked troubled, though, so Kiera snatched his jacket from the crook of his arm and shrugged into it. “Happy?”
“Oh, my gosh!” Regina exclaimed, eyes feverishly bright and trained on the computer she was typing away on.
Beast jumped and asked, “What?”
“You ordered the honeymoon package.”
Beast looked at the woman with such exasperation in his eyes Kiera couldn’t help but giggle.
“Sorry!” Regina said. “I get so nervous and excitable around you shifters. You’re like this badass hot guy, but like a giant, and look at the goosebumps on my arm! You’re all scary, but the sexy kind. Oops, I said badass.” Regina blew out a shaky breath and said more calmly. “What I mean to say is I can get the welcome platter and sparkling grape juice you ordered if you want to take it outside instead of up to your room. And I can get you a blanket.” She gave Kiera the biggest grin. “It’ll be so romantic. I’m gonna get you laid, girl.”
Kiera was belly laughing now and nodding because that sounded great. “I’m actually really hungry.” And if she didn’t eat soon, this baby was going to have her good and nauseous again.
“Did we just become friends?” Regina asked.
Kiera cracked up and nodded. “I think we did.”
Regina pretended to faint in her chair.
“What is happening right now?” Beast asked, his eyes narrowed on the limp woman.
“I think she is going to set up a picnic in the snow for us,” Kiera explained.
“Yes!” Regina said, coming back to life. “Be right back. I’ll get you the good stuff. Are you sure you don’t want champagne?”
Kiera cupped her belly and shook her head. “Grape juice sounds good to me.”
“Right.” Regina bustled off, then brought a platter of chocolate covered strawberries, green and purple grapes, and assorted cheeses with crackers. She handed the unopened bottle of sparkling juice and a dark green comforter over the counter as well. “Don’t tell my boss. He’s a total snobby prick.” She poked her nose up like a pig and winked at Kiera.
“We’re very good at keeping secrets,” Kiera told her.
“I bet you are, you saucy shifters.” She was giving Beast the hungry eyes, and Kiera was pretty sure Regina would’ve fit right into the D-Team.
Beast paid, then had Brandon take their things up to the room. When he looked at the keycard for the room number, Beast hesitated. He huffed a breath and gave Kiera the strangest look. “This number just keeps showing up.”
“What number?”
“Ten-ten.”
Chills washed over her forearms. “Hey, I’m staying in room ten-ten at the motel outside of Bryson City.”
“I know. It’s also the number on Kane’s house. And it’s one of the numbers Dustin makes all of his wishes on. Anytime I’m around him at 10:10, or 11:11, he loudly makes ridiculous wishes.”
“Ridiculous wishes?” she asked as she followed Beast out the sliding front doors.
“Yeah, he told me all his wishes came true the day he paired up with Emma, so now he makes all these dumb wishes for me.” He muttered as an aside, “It’s fucking annoying.”
“What wishes?” she asked as they jogged across the street toward a garden lot with grassy hills, mums all over the landscaping, and a quaint pond in the center.
Beast sighed, which tapered into a snarl. He was holding all the supplies, but he still rested his fingertips under her elbow to keep her from slipping on the ice patches forming on the road. “First one I heard was ‘I wish Beast would realize he is my best friend.’ He does that shit to piss me off.”
Kiera snorted. She believed him. Dustin had a fascination with irking people. “What else?”
“Wish number two that I heard… And by the way, he looks so dumb when he does it. He puts his finger on his watch, tilts his head to the sky, closes his eyes, and says them with such earnest and a stupid smile on his face because he knows I’m glaring at him. Wish number two, he wished I would share my teriyaki beef jerky with him two Thursdays ago.”
Kiera’s smile stretched so big. She put her hand out and caught snowflakes on her palm. “What was wish number three?”
“He did that one after we saw you for the first time at the barbecue place. He wished for me to get a blow job and be nicer to everyon
e. Number four was ‘I wish Beast would smile more.’ Number five was ‘I wish Beast would go camping with me.’ Fucking camping, Kiera. We live in a trailer park, and he wants to go camping out in the woods right next to his damn house like a boy scout. Number six. ‘I wish Beast would forgive me for drinking all his moonshine.’ Seven. ‘I wish Beast would stop choking me.’ And last but not least, eight. ‘I wish Beast would stop being a double-douche-biscuit and pick Kiera.’”
Kiera wrapped her arms around his bicep and rested her cheek on the curve of his shoulder. “So wishing on 10:10 does work then.”
Beast kissed the top of her head. “I guess sometimes it does. I’m still not going camping with him, though. And I probably won’t stop choking him anytime soon. Asshole drives me insane.”
“What else do you like to do?” she asked, her boots echoing against the concrete of the sidewalk that wound around the pond.
“I do weapons training. I shoot guns when the fury in me gets too much. Anytime I wanted to jump the gun on challenging Justin, I would go to the range, or out to the middle of nowhere, and unload all that stress with shooting targets. Long range. I like rifles. I like the precision, the guns, cleaning, the scopes, sighting them in, everything. Everything about it calms me and focuses my energy on something other than obsessing over Justin. What do you like to do?”
“I knit scarves.”
Beast laughed a rich, echoing sound. “I shoot and keep my body in shape to fight, and you knit scarves.”
Kiera pushed him playfully. “Shut your sexy mouth. You’re being mean. And knitting scarves isn’t the only thing I like to do. You just didn’t let me finish.”
“Okay, I’m ready. Tell me what other badass stuff you like to do.”
“I can cook. I’m really good at cooking tenderloin. And breakfast food. And sometimes when I get upset, or have my own stuff to work through, I bake…and clean.” Kiera frowned. “And none of this is as cool as weapons training.”
Beast chuckled and shook his head. “If you teach me how to make biscuits and gravy, I will teach you to shoot.”
“That’s the easiest thing to make in the world.”
“Oh, my gosh,” he said, giving her an exasperated look. “Are you negotiating backwards?”
“Right. Nope. I’ll teach you the ins and outs of sausage gravy, and you take me to the range. And also teach me how to…how did you say it? Brawl like a gorilla?”
Beast’s grin curved even wider. “You’re making me really hard right now, just so you know.”
Kiera squeaked and looked down, and sure enough, he was sporting one serious boner.
“Good.”
“Feeling cocky about yourself now, are you?” he asked, spreading out the blanket on the snow-speckled grass.
“Yep.”
“Come here,” he growled, pulling her down onto the blanket beside him.
She giggled and laid on her back, looking up at the churning gray clouds as fluffy white flakes floated this way and that around them. She stuck her tongue out until she caught one. Beast laughed. He was on his side, elbow on the blanket, palm under his cheek as he watched her with dancing eyes.
And then he did the most incredible thing anyone had ever done in her life. He leaned in and kissed her lips gently, and then just as tenderly, he moved down and kissed the swell of her belly, too.
His face went serious as he rested his cheek against the taut curve of her stomach. “Tonight while you were sleeping in the truck, I made a wish.”
“On 10:10?”
He nodded, draped his arm over her hips, and cradled her close. His other hand slid up her stomach to cup the growing life there. “I wished I could keep you both.”
“Beast,” she whispered, sliding her hand down to his cheek. The rasp of his whiskers felt good against her palm. “Wishes work on 10:10,” she said, feeling desperate to ease the sadness that had suddenly flooded his eyes.
He smiled back at her, so strikingly handsome with the pond behind him and the white snow floating all around. He covered her stomach protectively. “Yeah. Sometimes they do.”
Chapter Fourteen
Kiera stretched her hand out for Beast, but though his side of the bed was warm, it was empty. She blinked blearily at the soft gray light that filtered through the opening between the blackout curtains. Propping up on her elbow, she frowned at Beast’s back. Every muscle was tense, and he was sitting on the edge of the mattress with his head in his hands. Kiera crawled to him and laid her hand on his back. He was vibrating with power. She could feel it pulsing through her and bouncing off her bones. The air was so heavy it was like trying to breath cement.
“What’s wrong?” she choked out, sliding her palm gently up his spine.
“Bad dream, Kiera.” Beast’s voice came out a terrifying, gravelly sound that belonged to demons. “Go back to sleep, I’m okay.”
“Tell me about it so it won’t come true.” Those words tugged at something deep in her memory though. While she waited for Beast to summon the strength to tell her, she dug deep at the sense of déjà vu. And suddenly, like lightning, the memory flashed across her mind. Kiera gasped. “I just remembered something about my mom,” she huffed on a stunned breath. “Something that was buried.”
Beast twisted and looked at her over his shoulder. His eyes couldn’t pass for human, glowed bright gold, and his face had half morphed into his ferocious animal. “What is it?” His teeth were still gritted, jaw clenched, body rigid as stone, but his eyes softened a little.
“I used to get nightmares when I was a kid. Bad ones. I would get them for a few weeks, every night, and then nothing for months, and then three weeks on again, a few months off. My mom knew the pattern, so she would sleep in my room when I was going through it. And every time I woke up scared, she would say, ‘Tell me about it so it won’t come true.’” Kiera smiled and rested her cheek on the back of his neck, wrapped her arms around his strong middle. “I don’t know if it really works, but I believed it did, and none of them ever came true. If I said them out loud, they couldn’t hurt me anymore.” She laid a light peck on his shoulder and squeezed him gently. “So tell me, Beast, and that way it won’t come true.” She dipped her voice to a whisper. “I’ll help you carry the dream to the cliffs, and then we’ll throw it over together.”
Beast huffed a breath, then another, and finally the air became thinner and easier to breath. He slid his hand over hers, as if he wanted to keep her against him just like this. He rolled his head back and rested it on the top of hers. “I was with my pride. We were hunting. We had woods where we lived, but these looked different. More pines than oaks. It was cold. December, maybe. Stormy but not snowing. Gray sky, and pine needles quieting our footsteps. The woods even smelled different. I looked to my left and right, and they were there. Alisha was right beside me, mouth open, panting like we’d been traveling a long way already. She and the others were waiting for my signal. I thought they were on the trail of something. A deer if we were lucky. Hunting deer always brought us closer. I was confused because I couldn’t smell any deer. I smelled something else.”
“What was it?” she murmured.
“You.”
Kiera stopped stroking his chest.
“We were hunting you. You stood at the edge of this clearing, a steep cliff jutting up behind you, trapping you. You looked beautiful, hair whipping in the wind. You weren’t crying. You looked me dead in the eyes with such hatred. I was proud and heartbroken, all at once. You wore this flowing green dress that fluttered against your figure. Your eyes were gold, and beside you stood a little boy. Three maybe. Looked like you, same blue eyes. He looked scared, and he was clinging to your leg. I turned to lay into my pride for what they were doing. I was going to punish them severely for hunting you and your child. I knew it had to be jealousy because I’d chosen you, and they were just pride females. But when I looked at Alisha, it wasn’t her. None of the lionesses were mine. I didn’t recognize a single one, and when I looked down at my
paws, they were different from mine. Different size, different scars, different color. My mane was black.”
“Justin,” Kiera whispered in horror.
“Yeah. I was leading the Tarian Pride in a hunt for you and your cub. And Kiera, it felt so real,” he rumbled. “You won’t be coming with me today.”
“But Beast, this is my battle.”
“A battle you can’t protect yourself from. Not while you’re pregnant, not while you can’t call on your animal.”
“I can’t ask you to do this alone.”
“And you didn’t,” he said, turning suddenly. His bright gold eyes pleaded for understanding. “I don’t want you anywhere around Justin or his pride. Not today, not ever. If something happens, you take my truck, and you drive straight back to Kane’s Mountains. You plead sanctuary, you register both you and your unborn cub to the Blackwings—”
“Beast stop! We’re going to do this together. Stop talking like this.”
“Kiera, listen. Listen!” When he gripped the back of her neck, her lioness drew up inside of her, wanted to expose her neck in submission. She could see it there in his eyes, the rigidity he’d ruled his pride with. He had never pushed her to obey him before, but on this, he wasn’t going to budge. She could see that much in the grim set to his mouth. “I’m not saying I’m not going to come back for you. I’m saying if I can’t, don’t ever give Justin an opening to get to you.”
Beast was conjuring something deep inside of her, opening her lioness up with the way he was looking at her. His nostrils flared slightly, and his gaze raked down her sleep shirt to her thighs, then with a slow blink, he lifted that brilliant gaze back to hers, his pupils adjusting slightly as he focused on her.
“Sexy mate,” she whispered, running her hand up his chest.
“Again,” he growled, pulling her hand until it went over his shoulder.
“Sexy mate,” she repeated breathlessly. God, she would do anything he told her to right now.
He bit the inside of her bicep almost hard enough to break skin, and then he crawled up her body, maneuvering her toward the middle of the bed, his lips inches from hers. “Turn over.”