Timberman Werebear(31)

Denny didn’t slow down, nor did he offer to help her up a steep embankment like he usually would. Perhaps he was still angry about her leaving and had decided she couldn’t be trusted after all. She swallowed hard as tears stung her eyes from the thought of losing all she’d found over the last week. The endless days of joking with Denny and the nights in his arms. Feeling like she belonged somewhere for the first time. She thought of her friends and how badly it would hurt to leave them when Denny made her go. By the time she stepped into a clearing on the side of the mountain, she’d worked herself up quite capaciously.

Denny stepped from behind a tree and pulled his shirt off. His chest was heaving, as if emotion was choking him like it was her. He approached slowly, then hooked his finger under her chin and lifted her gaze to his. With a serious look that was completely at odds with the natural smile lines of his face, he murmured, “This is me, Danielle. Remember your promise.”

Her eyes went wide, and she gasped as she absorbed what he was saying. Denison kicked out of his boots and jeans, then tossed them into a pile near the tree. Behind him was rolling mountains covered in pines and the gray morning sky. Above them, a giant bird screeched a call, and Denison stretched his neck up, watching it.

The first drops of rain spattered across his shoulders, and when he looked back at her, his eyes were the color of silver pond minnows. Flashing like the lightning in the distance.

She held her breath, afraid if she kept panting so hard, she’d pass out.

A smattering of pops echoed through the clearing, and his neck snapped backward. His form grew, and in a moment of disorienting confusion, a giant animal exploded from the man she loved.

Sand-colored fur covered every inch of him, and six-inch razor sharp claws the color of tar stretched from paws that were bigger than her face. His big block head shook back and forth as if he needed to rid himself of the last tingles of his transformation, and those silvery eyes she’d come to love watched her. His lips pulled back over impossibly long canines, weapons made for ripping and killing.

Her shoulders sagged, and she sank to the earth on her knees as he opened his mouth and let out a thunderous roar.

All this time, Denny, her Denny, had been harboring a grizzly bear inside of him.

****

Denison waited for the running.

He waited for the screaming.

Hell, he would’ve settled for a few curses tossed his way like Danielle usually flung into the universe when she was scared.

What he hadn’t been prepared for was crying.

Shit.

He lowered his head and approached her slowly, trying not to scare her any more than she probably already was.

Now she was sobbing, hiccups filling her throat as the rain came down harder on his mate. He didn’t want that—hadn’t meant to hurt her.

He was too riled up and scared to change back into his human skin, so he crept forward and emitted a low rattling noise, a worried question if she was a bear shifter and understood the language.

“I thought you were evil,” she sobbed, throwing her arms around his neck.

Denison froze, utterly baffled as she clutched his fur in her clenched fists. If he wasn’t mistaken, there were a few hysterical sounding laughs mixed in with her crying. Well, that couldn’t be good. Right?

“Denny, you’re not evil,” she said, easing back and looking him right in his bear eyeballs. “You’re a bear!”

Okay, Danielle was starting to sound excited.

Tagan had been preparing him for days for Danielle’s reaction, but none of the scenarios included her hugging her boyfriend, the freaking grizzly, around his terrifying neck.

Clearly, Danielle had been grossly underestimated.

He huffed a shocked-laugh sound and nuzzled her face until she giggled.

Relief flooded his veins, making him feel high as a kite. He’d smoked joints that didn’t have this much kick. With a rocking motion, he scooped her up, careful of his claws near her fragile human skin, and pulled her against his chest.

She was hugging him tightly and laughing like a maniac, proving all his fears and nightmares over the past week null and void. He’d been wrong to be so scared of her reaction.

“Denny, Denny, Denny, my big silly bear. This is your secret?”

She clutched tighter to his fur, and he rubbed his face against her cheek, then moved to the other side, showing her just how much he appreciated her being such a brave mate.

“I thought you were a vampire! Or a zombie. But you’re a werebear. How fucking awesome is that?”

Uh, not awesome at all until now. Mostly, being a werebear was a pain in the big furry ass.

She was sobbing again, shoulders shaking, and he hugged her tighter. And then she was…petting him. She ran her hands in long strokes down his shoulder blades as she cried against his fur. It wasn’t the scared kind of weeping he would’ve understood. Her shoulders relaxed with every heave of raw emotion.