“These two are Riker’s top fight trainers,” Hannah explained.
The smile faded from Chase’s face. “We’ll be starting tomorrow if you ladies want to come out for some tips. Even you Hannah. You should know how to defend yourself from one of us.”
“I’ll be there, but I don’t think Jo needs as many pointers. She killed a Long Claw guard defending me yesterday,” Hannah said. Pride dripped from every word. “And she faced off with Nathan too.”
Chase’s eyes lightened even more, which meant that strangely alluring hue of caramel had been his human eyes. “He’s the one who did that to your face?”
Joanna nodded and shifted her weight uncomfortably.
“He’ll pay for it,” Juan said from behind Chase’s shoulder. “I promise he will.”
“Mmm,” Chase grunted in agreement. “You’ve been in the den of the Long Claws. Would you mind coming out to the arena tomorrow? We could use your insight.”
“Of course. Whatever I can do to help.”
“Good,” he said with a friendly clap on her back. Only he was roughly the size of a full grown grizzly already and the gesture whacked the healing puncture wounds in her shoulder. She hissed at the surprising pain.
“Dude, she just fought a bear to the death,” Hannah said, grasping her arm, steadying her. “Did you miss that part of my story?”
Chase’s eyes went wide. “I’m so sorry—” His arm yanked backward and his back hit the wall so hard a picture frame fell and shattered on the tile floor.
“Don’t touch her,” Brody snarled, hands clenched at his sides as if he were trying to control the urge to pummel him.
“It was an accident,” Joanna said, rushing to put herself between Chase and Brody. They didn’t make it easy. Neither one of them was backing down. “Brody, hey.” She angled his face down to look at her. His eyes were glazed over and furious. “He didn’t mean to hurt me.”
“Is she yours?” Chase asked from behind her.
Chase and his fighters had missed the part where Brody had claimed her at the pond by a minute at most, and she hadn’t had a chance to talk to them at the hotel. Brody was swaying on his feet and he smelled like animal fur. She had to do something before he changed in the house. Yanking his hand, she led him to a dining room chair and scrambled up on it.
Hesitating only a moment, she pulled the collar of her shirt to the side and exposed the three marks he’d made. “I’m Brody’s mate. I’m sorry I didn’t get the chance to introduce myself to all of you yesterday. It’s been a crazy couple of days but I should’ve taken the time. My name is Joanna Penn and I’m the mate of Brody Bannister.” Her throat tightened as her voice shook on the last part. She was so proud to be his, it made her emotional to say the words out loud.
Brody’s hand relaxed in hers and the phantom of a smile tipped the corner of his mouth up. He folded her in his arms and set her gently beside him. “I should’ve said something in the meeting earlier. I just figured everyone knew.”
“Brody the Barbarian Bannister is mated?” Juan asked through a disbelieving grin.
A surge of bodies heaved forward, congratulating them, but Brody was already stressed enough so she stood behind him to protect her injuries. The entire house was filled with overpowering, dominant shifters and she stifled the urge to flee. Brody was here and she was safe. And on top of that, everyone was smiling and laughing so she had nothing to worry about. This wasn’t Nathan’s clan, it was Riker’s, and he didn’t strike her as an alpha who would allow questionable behavior.
There were at least thirty shifters at dinner, so seating was limited. The plate of brisket and vegetables was warm in her hand as she scanned the dining and living room for a seat.
“Over there,” Brody said, pointing to a recliner.
She settled in and her mate brought her an iced tea. Shyness washed over her as she took it from his outstretched hand. For a solitary man, he treated her so sweetly it drew her up short sometimes. He sat on the fireplace ledge beside her and ate, and contentment filled her at the sound of conversation and laughter around them. This might’ve been the best day of her life and now she was here, with shifters she was beginning to admire so much, beside the man who was unintentionally winning her heart.
After dinner, Chase and Juan started up a poker game at the dining room table and Brody, Riker, Jenny’s husband, a man named Cameron, who seemed to be Riker’s second, and three other fighters joined in. Joanna turned on the sink tap to start rinsing dishes, but a man named Shawn shot her a good humored smile and told her to scram—that he’d clean up.
Grateful for the chance to watch Brody interact with his friends, she leaned against the wall, but he gestured her to him.
She thought he’d ask her to refill his drink, but he pulled her into his lap, surprising a squeal out of her. Playfully, he nipped her neck and threw a couple of clinking chips into the middle of the table as she settled against him. “Call,” he said in an easy tone.
Hannah sipped on a beer as Riker pulled her against his side, and Jenny was bent at the waist behind her husband, Blaine, draped across his shoulders as she whispered something against his ear. Joanna couldn’t help the smile that stretched her face.
When she turned, her expression was mirrored by Brody and her heart fluttered.
“You look happy,” he said.
“I am.”
He canted his head and his gaze dropped to her lips. “You want to go home?”
Just the suggestion of going home and the promise in his eyes made her lean into him more. “Mate?”
“Yes, mate?” he said, playing along.
“Take me home.”
“Yes ma’am.” He shoved the remainder of his stack of chips to the middle of the table and said, “All in.” He showed her his cards, a two and a seven of different suites, and winked.
“You’re the worst at this,” Chase grumbled as he pulled the pile of winnings to him, but Brody only laughed and tipped his head respectfully at Riker.
“’Night everyone,” he called.
Joanna hugged Jenny and Hannah and thanked them for dinner. “I’ll be here at eight tomorrow morning,” she promised, so they could get an early start on shopping.
The front door clicked closed behind them and Joanna took off down the stairs and through the grassy meadow in front of the house. She pushed her legs as fast as they would go in flip flops, and laughed breathlessly when she could hear Brody tearing through the field right behind her. He caught her around her middle and it hurt, but she wouldn’t let on and ruin this moment. Encircling her hips with his arms, he lifted her up and she spread her arms wide, offered her neck to the moon as he swung her around in slow circles. Freedom like this just didn’t exist for someone like her, yet here she was.
She placed her palms on his shoulders and beamed down at him. His eyes glowed eerily in the light of the half moon. “Brody Bannister, I want to kiss you on every square inch of this land.”
“Hmm,” he rumbled deep in his throat. Lowering her slowly, he asked, “Where?”
Looking around, she pointed to a tree on the edge of the field. “There.”
The grass bent under their careless footfall as they bounded toward the tree. He kissed her and ran his fingertips up the side of her leg.
“And there,” she said, pointing to a wooden sign with hand painted words reading old barn. And after he’d kissed her until she felt drunk with his touch, she pointed to a lover’s bench someone had placed along the trail.
It took a long time to get back home but she wasn’t in a hurry. The pull of tiredness hadn’t found her yet and she wanted to spend every moment she could in Brody’s arms. With his house in sight, she turned and pressed her hands against his taut chest.
“Change with me,” she whispered.
“Will my bear scare you?”
Tugging her shirt over her head and wadding it into a ball, she lobbed her garments one by one onto the small porch. “Nothing about you scares me.”
>
He looked troubled as he watched her, the only sound the rustling of the breeze against the leaves above. “It should.”
Frowning at such an unexpected response, she changed and waited as he undressed. When he stood shoulder to shoulder with her, the warmth of his large, furred body seeping into her, they lumbered past the pond, through the corn fields alight with fire flies and around the cabins on the edge of Bear Valley. Late into the night, he showed her places she could tell were important to him, and she rubbed her face against the short fur of his muzzle in silent thanks. In the early hours before dawn, Brody led her home, and in human skin once again, he laid her on their bed and made love to her, his gaze never leaving hers.
She was his, body and soul, and there was no turning back from the bond they’d forged today.
She drifted in and out of sleep in the safety of his embrace, but over and over he woke her with questions, as if he were stalling to make the day last longer. And when at last he fell asleep and his body went rigid beside her, she realized it wasn’t to extend the perfect day.
It was to avoid the demons that visited his dreams.
Chapter Fourteen
Joanna awoke to a tickling sensation at the base of her neck. Rain pattered against the roof and trickled in through the screen on the open window, splashing against her skin. Groaning, she stretched and reached her toes for Brody’s side of the bed. It was empty. She frowned in the dark and sat up. “Brody?”
“I’m here.” His voice sounded raw, like he’d been screaming. He sat on the edge of the bed with his face in his hands. His shoulders were so hunched, she could make out each vertebrae of his spine through the smooth skin of his back.
“You smell like bear. What’s happened?”
When he didn’t answer, she slid over to him and put her arms around his neck, pressing her bare breasts against his back. “Another dream?”
He grunted.
“You know, if you tell me about them, maybe they’ll stop.”
His shoulders heaved with an explosive sigh. “I don’t think so.”
It had been a week of nightmares. In fact, he hadn’t gone a single day without one since she’d come to Bear Valley. She didn’t have to see his face in the dark to know he was shutting down on her, just like he always did when he woke up like this.
“At least tell me how long this has been going on.”
“Jo—”
“No, Brody.” She slipped off the bed and straddled his lap. Placing her palms on either side of his face, she rested her forehead against his. “I care about you.” No, it was so much more than that—he had to know it. She loved him so deeply it scared her how much she wanted to make him happy. “I’m here every night, and every night is the same. If you don’t want to talk about the dreams, you at least have to give me something. Please.”
He wouldn’t look at her and his withdrawal stung like the lash of a whip. She was out there, all in for him and he seemed to feel the same during the day. But in the morning he woke angry from whatever was happening to him in his sleep, and she had to work her way back into his heart. She couldn’t just go on forever like this. He was hurting and she had no idea how to help him.
“Since I was a kid. I was fourteen when…fourteen years. Half my fuckin’ lifetime.” He jerked his face away from her hands and she could smell the bitter rage that washed through him.
Fourteen years of this? How could he even want to sleep? How could he lay in bed every night and willingly let his body go unconscious, knowing whatever was in his dreams was coming for him?
Her whisper was battered and scared, even to her own ears, because she knew in her heart how wrong this was. “I don’t know what to do.”
His eyes blazed an inhuman color when his dragged his gaze back to her. His erection hardened between her legs and he nodded his chin. “Yes you do.”
“That’s the solution for this? Fuck and forget about it until we do it all over again tomorrow morning and the next?”
He leaned back on locked elbows and offered her an empty smile.
Furious, she stood, but he caught her wrist and pulled her back against him, his lips colliding with hers. He always won because she couldn’t help her need to be close to him. This wasn’t a solution but she couldn’t deny her attraction to him anymore than she could deny her heart its beating rhythm. His tongue plunged into her mouth at the same time as one of his fingers penetrated her.
Biting her lip, he ground against her, pressing her backward until the cold wall brushed her shoulders. She shouldn’t like this, she shouldn’t, but when he was so desperate for her touch to heal him, her body burned for him.
“Please,” she begged as he pulled his finger from her opening. Throwing her arms around his neck, she pulled him closer until her heartbeat thrummed against his torso.
His chuckle was deep and triumphant, like he’d won something from her, and he bit her neck as he thrust into her. Powerful strokes never slowed and he didn’t look at her. He closed his eyes to the world, and though she felt a hollowness at his distance, she was desperate for the madness he was driving her to. She yelled as her body spilled over the edge of hard and fast pleasure, and his hips tensed and bucked as he filled her with his own release. He kissed her hard and pulled away before her aftershocks had even finished. She stood panting against the wall, his wet warmth trickling down her thighs as he headed for the bathroom.
“Brody.”
He stopped but didn’t turn.
Her throat felt so tight she couldn’t breathe, but she pushed the words out anyway. “I love you.”
“You shouldn’t.” His voice sounded gravelly and inhuman.
She followed him into the bathroom, and he stepped into the shower before he even let the water warm up.
“That’s all you have to say after what I just told you?”
Through the glass, he locked his arms against the wall and let the water rush over the back of his head.
“Answer me!”
Turning away from her, his chest heaved with a miserable sounding sigh.
A sob escaped her lips and she nodded her head slowly. “I guess that’s what I get. You were upfront with me. You told me you couldn’t care about me and I didn’t believe you. I thought if I cared enough, you would feel the same eventually. If I gave you everything, anything you wanted, then you would repay me in kind. You were right though, weren’t you? You can’t care about anyone.”
She cleaned up and dressed as quickly as possible, then fled the house before he was out of the bathroom. He was impossible to understand. She’d been patient with his morning distance the first several days, but the more she pushed, the more frustrated she became. Her deepest wish was that he would just let down his walls and allow her in.
It was early but fight training would’ve already begun. Riker and Chase ran a session every morning before council meetings. Brody usually ran the afternoon classes with Juan after he got out of his meetings for the day.
Chase stood with his back turned, leaned up against the fence of the arena, scanning a clipboard of notes. He turned his head at her approach and his ruddy eyebrows shot up. “You’re here early.” He frowned and dropped the clipboard onto a table someone had dragged out to the yard. “What’s wrong?”
“I want a fight.”
“I can see that, but the only opponent we have right now at your weight is Stanton and he’s already paired up with Brad. Sorry, kid. You’ll have to wait a few.”
She hopped the fence and peeled her shirt off. “I’ll take them both.”
“Sounds hot…but no.”
She threw him a slit eyed glare to let him know she wasn’t amused with his sarcasm. Two brown bears circled each other on the other side of the arena and she peeled her jeans off.
“I don’t think this is a good idea, going into a fight pissed or upset or whatever you are,” Chase warned.
“Joanna, what are you doing?” Riker asked from the other side of the yard.
He w
as jogging toward her so if she was going to do this, it was going to have to be now. She sprinted for the two bears and let her animal rip through her. Dropping to all fours, she shook her head as the last tingles of the change washed over her, and charged the escalating fight.
So Brody’s way of dealing with whatever was hurting him was to lose himself mindlessly inside of her? She was helpless to save him from the fall he was taking and didn’t understand anything. If Brody could use coping mechanisms to avoid a real conversation, well, she could cope with his indifference too.
She’d thrown herself into training over the past week. Why? Because someday Nathan would come to hurt the people she loved, and when that day came, she would cut him down to nothing. He wouldn’t come to Bear Valley and find some sniveling almost-mate. He’d find a warrior bent on his destruction.
Brody coped with sex.
She coped with training.
Stanton bawled an angry invitation as she ran, and Brad stood on his hind legs to make himself look bigger. A raging, snarling fight ensued and just as she’d bested Brad, Stanton tackled her so hard, she lost her wind. Someone grabbed her arm and yanked her out from under him and power crackled through the air as Riker said, “Let her be.”
Chase looked pissed. Even through his beard, she could make out the grim set to his mouth. Red crept into his cheeks and his eyes blazed a strange color. “Change back. Now!”
Huffing, she pushed her bear back down until she looked human once again. The rain pattered against her skin and chilled her to the bone, and Chase yanked her up faster than should’ve been possible. “What in the actual fuck are you doing, Jo? You trying to get yourself killed? Or are you trying to kill? You don’t go into a fight during training ramped up like that.”
He spun and stomped away, his boots making slick sounds against the mud puddles. Riker stood with his arms crossed against the fence and she felt utterly defeated. She’d gone in there half-cocked and fully aggressive and she shouldn’t have.
“I’m sorry,” she said, running to catch up. The rain was so cold against her bare skin.