Two Bears are Better Than One(9)

Rogue, she thought, remembering his dark hair, those burning, two-colored eyes with the flecks of gold. She imagined the way he’d touched her back, and how she accidentally grabbed him, and he’d been completely unashamed about his nakedness.

Then again, I guess most guys packing that much heat wouldn’t get too embarrassed about showing it off.

She laughed softly despite herself. At some point, what else is there to do?

The stinging, burning sensation in her side told her that she had, perhaps, not imagined the whole thing. Pulling up her shirt, she found that she’d been carefully wrapped in gauze, and an abrasion on her left shoulder was, also, very carefully covered.

She’d never seen the field building completed, but she had designed the thing, so the features weren’t a surprise. Still, it being put together as well as it was, especially for how far into the woods this place was, took her aback.

Windows lined the space, and a series of tables ringed the inside. Workstations for writing up findings, microscopes for hair examination, and a big ol’ bucket of plaster by the door, for modeling footprints, were all ready and waiting for her to use.

It was all there for her to use to find the bear she’d collapsed against.

The one who had apparently brought her back here.

She got out of bed, alert to the stabbing in her side, but not hurting enough to stop, and made her way around the room. She almost stumbled over the backpack she’d been wearing.

All of her belongings were arranged with great care, in neatly folded piles... right on the floor in front of the dresser. They were put together with like items – jeans with jeans, shirts with shirts – which was better than any boyfriend she’d had ever did, even though they were sitting on the floor. Seeing the array made her twist the corner of her mouth into a wry grin.

“But where are you?”

She shook her head, trying to clear the thoughts that would do her no damn good at all. Not out here, alone, in the woods. She didn’t have time to think the things – the naughty things about his arms, his lips, and the scent on Rogue’s skin – that she desperately wanted to think.

Her memories turned to the fantasies of the two men, and right in that moment Jill’s heart sank into her stomach.

That was him, she thought. He was... that was one of them.

The memories were fuzzy, a far-off dream, barely clinging to the fringes of her recollection. Stranger though was how clear the sensual parts of the fantasy were – the feeling of their hands on her skin, their breath caressing her neck. She couldn’t see their faces, exactly, or even identify the room, cave, whatever it was, where they were. But every detail of their kiss, their touch, the way they moved against her, the way the two men seemed like two parts of one love, and when she was with them, she was whole.

Whole, she thought. Good God, what am I doing? I obviously walked face first into an ayahuasca plant, or something. That... doesn’t grow around here, but maybe Jacques gave me some. Or it was in my canteen, or—

The door lock popped gently, and the handle turned.

“Shit,” Jill uttered. “So much for the whole drugged thing.”

The man who walked in was the same one she barely remembered, but who was right in the forefront of her mind. “I can’t believe this is real,” she said.

He just smiled, eyes sparkling in what appeared to be the orange warmth of afternoon sun. In almost a shy way, which was a little strange for someone who had apparently undressed her and doctored a bunch of wounds, he watched her face. Finally he cleared his throat. “I didn’t expect to see you awake,” he said. “You were hurt, badly.”

“How long?” she whispered, her throat parched and dry. It clicked when she spoke. “Have I been out, I mean?”

Rogue looked genuinely confused. “Close to a week.” He looked perturbed, or maybe disturbed. “More important than time is water,” he said, uncorking an ancient looking canteen, the sort she’d only seen on Band of Brothers, and handed it over.

Jill tried to close her hand around the cool metal container, but just the act of closing a fist sent a shock of pain through her that radiated from her shoulder to her knees. Rogue nodded, like it’d been a test. “You’re hurt worse than I thought,” he said, confirming her suspicions. “When the lupines slammed into you, the smaller one broke some of your ribs. Not too badly, or you’d cough blood. But all things considered, you’re shaping up fine.”

“I’m... what?” Jill said, laughing softly, which caused too much pain to continue. “I’ve been out a week? And broken ribs? You said that pretty matter of factly.”

Rogue shrugged. “How else should I say it? I could try it in a different tone of voice if that will make it more comforting? You’d be coughing blood,” he said, lilting his voice high and kind of warbling at the end of the sentence.

The beginning of a laugh came out of Jill, but instantly a wave of pain struck. She wavered, dangerously close to falling, but Rogue caught her with an arm looped deftly around her waist. His hair fell in a wavy, brown cascade, brushing against Jill’s semi-bare chest, and where it touched, goosebumps rose. And then something else, far more private, prickled to life. He either didn’t notice, or more likely, was just too polite to say anything.

As soon as she was reclined back onto the bed, Jill pulled her covers up, over her embarrassingly hard nipples, and Rogue drank her in.

“Your scent intoxicates me,” he said. His voice was deep, and booming, but he spoke so softly that his speech reminded Jill of a fading roll of thunder when a storm was far in the distance. “I’ve been watching while you sleep, and I can’t keep my thoughts off you when I’m not here.”

Jill’s stunned silence apparently spoke volumes, because he stared at her for a moment. “But,” he continued, “you said you don’t shift. So I don’t know how this is possible, but you have the mark.”

About seven hundred million thoughts began swirling through Jill’s head. The mark, the fate, a mate? What is he talking about? What is happening?

She grew dizzy, and as soon as she did, she tasted salt in the back of her throat. “Urk, bucket,” she croaked. “Quick!”

Moving like quicksilver, Rogue grabbed something, and held back Jill’s hair. She spat for a moment, and then relaxed back to the bed, breathing heavily. “That,” she said softly, “hurt a lot more than it usually does.”

A soft laugh escaped her lips, and she closed her eyes. A moment later, a warm, soft, wet cloth caressed her lips, and the sides of her face before going back underneath her head. Gently, Rogue massaged her neck and her shoulders with patient motions.

“And on top of dashing good looks, a dimple in his cheek, and beautiful brown hair, this man who watches me sleep is a licensed massage therapist? What did I do to deserve this?”

Jill’s thoughts about, well, about everything, seemed to vanish into one pinpoint of light. One beam of energy pierced her chest and went out the other side, relaxing her muscles as heat radiated from her core all the way to her fingertips. She closed her eyes, arching her neck slightly, and moaning as Rogue’s powerful hands took out the kink of sleeping for however long she’d been unconscious.

“If only you could do those same things other places,” she whispered, feeling herself speak before she heard the words coming out of her mouth. She blushed furiously, but when she opened her eyes to correct herself, she noticed that Rogue wasn’t paying any attention.

His eyes were fixated right where he massaged. It was the sort of focus she got when she was puzzling through some complex biological problem, staring at some unknown organism on a slide, or trying to identify some little-known species of bear or another.

“Hmm?” he let out, in a soft, questioning grunt. “Why do I need a license to rub someone?”

She giggled under her breath. “You don’t get out of the woods much, do you?”

“More than my brother,” he said, his voice still absent and hollow. Rogue’s fingers dug deep into her neck and Jill whimpered softly before the knot he worked at vanished under the pressure.

Then it hit her.

“Brother?” she asked. There’s no way. No possible way this is...

“Sworn brother,” he said. “We’re the Broken Pine alphas. There are always two of us to keep one from going insane and enslaving everyone. That may have been a problem in the distant past, so trust me, this way makes sense.”

“Yeah,” Jill said. “Makes perfect sense.” She was talking to cover up her astonishment, and, for the moment anyway, it seemed to be working. “What kind of clan?”

“Bears,” he said simply. For a moment, Rogue paused and watched her face, studying her lips, her eyes, and the curve of her earlobes. One of his thumbs slid up the back of Jill’s neck, tracing a line along the base of her skull, and then down her jaw. All the while, he stared deep into her eyes, not letting his gaze fall away. “We keep to ourselves mostly.”

Another swirl of his thumbs on either side of her neck sent a surge of tension sliding down Jill’s neck, and again, prickled her nipples up hard and stiff. It was like a cool breeze blew across her while she was lying naked on the beach, listening to the monotonous beauty of waves crashing against a sandbar.