Mate Fur Hire (Bears Fur Hire 3) (9 page)

Tobias shrugged. “Even so, she’s gone so you’re shit out of luck. What did you think would happen? Did you plan on coming out here and fighting your own son to put down the shifter you created?”

“I didn’t want to put her down, Tobias,” Clayton yelled, eyes darkening. The smell of apex predator wafted from his skin. “You disobeyed my orders and brought an out-of-control shifter within spitting distance of Galena. I wanted her back on Perl to find a solution to the McCall’s broken genetics.”

“She tried and failed, Clayton! Eustice died, and now she has to live with that. She’s not cold like you.”

“She failed
once
! There are a hundred other McCalls to—”

“Don’t you fucking say ‘experiment on,’ old man.”

Link smelled like wolf behind him, and the soft sound of snapping bones echoed through the clearing.

Tobias offered Clayton a dead smile. “Link doesn’t appreciate you talking about his family like that.”

“I should’ve known you would befriend a McCall. You were always the weakest out of my sons. Ian and Jenner…now they are Clayton material, but you? Not even close.”

“Thank you,” Tobias said. He didn’t want to be anything like the asshole standing in front of him.

Movement in the brush caught his eye, and he jerked his attention to Vera, standing much too close to Clayton for comfort and holding a limp rabbit in her jaws. Her gold eyes danced from Clayton to him and back before a spark of recognition took her.

She skittered away as Clayton lunged for her, and Tobias’s inner monster roared to be released. As his neck snapped back and his form began to reshape, he hoped he would be enough to keep Vera and Link safe from the clutches of his father—the most brutal enforcer in the long history of grizzly shifters.

Vera dropped the rabbit and scampered out of reach of that awful man. Clayton. The vile name whispered across her mind.

Don’t let him catch you.

She bolted for safety, ran for the men who had been watching over her, but Tobias and Link were breaking apart. Misshapen forms with elongating snouts, curving teeth, claws ripping from their hands and fur sprouting across their skin. She watched in horror as Tobias’s shredded pants fell like snow around him as he stood on his hind legs, a massive grizzly bear with murder in his eyes. She bore her teeth, confused. Should she attack him? Should she attack the wolf behind him? No, they were animals now, too, but they were with her. A malformed little pack. She’d found the misfits again.
Misfits.
Confusion swirled around in her head as she dared a look behind her. Clayton was shaking off the last of his Change, dark fur trembling as he landed on all fours. A roar bellowed from him, frightening the birds from the trees behind him.

Terror kept her frozen into place as the two bruin bears charged each other and crashed hard enough to shake the earth beneath her paws.

The bears fought with such raw violence that, for a moment, she was awestruck. It wasn’t until Link attacked Clayton as a gray wolf with his jaws open and his eyes blazing almost white, that she realized what this was.

Clayton was here for her, and Link and Tobias were standing in between her and that devil of a man. When Link went sailing through the air and struck the trunk of a tree with a sharp whimper, crimson rage boiled her blood. Red sprayed the ground where the titan bears fought. Clayton was hurting them. With a snarl of fury, she bolted and latched onto the hump of muscle between Clayton’s shoulder blades. He roared and bucked, his attention caught between her and Tobias’s ripping, shredding attack.

She sank her teeth deeper, clawing just to bleed him. Clayton jerked to the side and slammed his side against a tree, pinning her leg and shocking her into letting go. The earth was unforgiving as she slammed into it with a yip. Tobias was pulling the fight away from her, drawing Clayton’s attention while she scrambled up. Link was on him again, biting and scratching with that constant growl. She’d been wrong about him. Link was good. Link was strong and loyal like her Tobias.

Digging her claws into the soil, she launched herself at Clayton again, this time latching on to the tender skin under his arm, only to be tossed a second later. He was streaming blood from where she’d gotten him, but was undeterred as he fought with the fury of a tornado. Tobias’s fur was matted and dark now, and pink slices crisscrossed his skin.

No, no, no. She wasn’t enough to help him. Couldn’t defend her mate from a damned grizzly.

Let me out. We can do this together.

A snarl rattled her chest. Fucking human.

Fox! You can’t save him alone. We need one of Link’s rifles. Change back! Let me out! We have to help him. Love him. Love him. Love our mate. Help him. Please.

Fuck.

With another second of hesitation behind her, she ran for a clear space between two pines and closed her eyes, then imagined that puny, weak, hairless human body she used to be trapped in.

Pain rippled up her spine, and she groaned at the agony of her bones snapping and her muscles reshaping. God, how could anything hurt this badly? The snarl in her throat turned to a scream of agony as her nails retracted and turned blunt.

“Oh, my God,” Vera whispered, her voice hoarse from disuse as she watched the battle of the brown bears in front of her. They were going to kill each other.

Off-balance, she scrambled upward and stumbled toward the house. She’d been in Link’s cabin the first day Tobias brought her here. She’d torn up his couch, and as Tobias had dragged her out of there, she’d noticed the rifles near the front door.

Walking upright felt strange after so long as a fox, and she fell on the stairs, slamming her bare shin against a porch stair. Biting her lip at the pain, she forced herself up and through the door. She stumbled inside and lurched for the trio of guns leaned against the wall. The .30-06 was the one she wanted.

Vera checked the load, slammed a bullet into the chamber, and staggered outside into the waning evening light. Pointing the gun into the air, she pulled the trigger.
Boom!

She slammed another bullet in the chamber and continued her trek to the brawling bears. Link had pulled off and bolted at the sound of the gun, but Tobias and Clayton hadn’t paid attention.

Boom!
Another round into the air and Clayton hesitated as she lowered the barrel to the vicinity of his face. “Back the fuck off my mate or I’ll blow a hole right through you, asshole.”

Clayton apparently thought she was playing because he sank his teeth into Tobias’s shoulder. Furious, she aimed the barrel at his leg, held her breath to hold the rifle steady, then pulled the trigger.

“Change back or you won’t live another day, Clayton. Do it now.”

Tobias swung around and positioned himself in front of her as Clayton arched his furious gaze to hers.

“I said Change back!” she screamed, shoving another bullet into the chamber with the crack of metal on metal.

Another rifle cocked behind her, but it was Link she smelled on the wind. “Do as she says,” he demanded in a low, gravelly voice.

Her chest heaved and her arms shook, but she was pissed at the scent of Tobias’s blood in the air, and her patience was as thin as soggy paper right now.

Eyes narrowed at Link over her shoulder, Clayton slowly retreated to the edge of the clearing, then began to Change back to his human form.

Tobias paced in front of her as if he couldn’t make himself give up the grizzly. He let off a short roar, and the scent of his fury smelled bitter against the oversensitive lining of her nose.

Clayton stood with his weight on his good leg, human, clawed up, wet with blood, and naked.

“Well, this is awkward, future dad-in-law. I can see your dick.”

Clayton’s eyes tightened, and he opened his mouth to say something, but Tobias paced in front of her and blocked her view completely.

Keeping the gun angled away from him, she shoved his furry side with her elbow. “I’m okay. Move.” He did by inches, so she aimed her rifle in Clayton’s direction again and said, “Here is how this is going to go down. I’m not coming with you. I’m never going back to Perl, and if you’re here on a kill mission, well, you’re shit out of luck on that one, too.”

“You’re dangerous out here on your own.”

“I’m not on my own.” She twitched her head toward Tobias and Link. “I have them watching out for me. And I’m not leaving here until I have full control over my Changes and my animal, so all of your arguments won’t hold up here. You want me to do your dirty work and discover your cure? I can’t do anything about the McCalls, and I’m tired of using my medicine on shifters who don’t want it.”

“The misfits need to be contained—”

“Says you, you controlling freak! Despite you withholding supplies, they’ve done just fine on Perl for the last month without being medicated. And I can tell you right now, suppressing animals for too long will make them unmanageable.”

“You’re going to ruin my boys.”

“
You
ruined your boys, Mr. Silver. You did. You raised them poorly. My decision to help them avoid hibernation won’t ruin them. Their baggage is on you being a shit father. I mean, look at you. Look! You are here to hurt your son’s mate. How do you think he’ll feel when you take me away or hurt me? Have you thought about him at all? On your journey here, did you ever once stop and think about what it would do to your son to have to fight his father to keep his mate safe? You’ve dug yourself into a hole that is deep and dark, mister. Hurt me, and you’ll drag your son into that same fate. I’m no threat to you or any other humans. I’m here rehabilitating, you unobservant taint-bucket. I didn’t escape Perl to terrorize the humans. I escaped to try and build a life. Now, be a good father for once in your miserable life and let Tobias be happy.”

“You’ll ruin his bear.”

“Oh, my God,” she drawled, tossing her head back. “You’re like a broken record player. Mr. Silver, listen closely. I’m going to marry your boy. I’m going to do it wearing a pink, floofy, bejeweled gown with my hair piled up in curls, just like I imagined when I missed my prom, circa 2008. We’re going to have a white cake with raspberry filling and a karaoke machine.”

“What’s your point?”

“My point is that you’re invited. This is me letting you be a part of our lives despite the bullshittery you have pulled. And let me tell you, Mr. Silver, it is really hard to stand here and put my pride away and invite you after all you’ve done to me. But I believe in family, I want Tobias to be happy, and he deserves you and Link and his brothers up there standing beside him on the best day of his life.”

Link snorted behind her, but when she tossed him a narrow-eyed look, he pursed his lips and hid the smile.

“It
will
be the best day of his life, you smartass. He gets all of this.” Vera gestured to her dirt-smudged body, complete with bloody shin and wild hair, which she blew out of her face to better glare at Link.

Tobias, who had disappeared around the back of Link’s cabin, reappeared, human again and limping badly as he zipped up a pair of jeans.

“Your mate just invited your dad to your wedding,” Link said blandly.

“What? Why?”

She winced at Tobias’s torn neck and chest. “Because he’s your dad, and he should be there.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t ruin your big day,” Clayton said, pulling on his sweatpants. He jammed a finger at Vera. “This isn’t over. You can’t give grizzly shifters that medicine.”

As he stomped off into the woods, she called out, “I’ll send you a save-the-date.”

Link snickered behind them.

“None of this is funny,” Tobias said, his hands hooked on his hips as streams of red trickled down his chest from the claw marks that crisscrossed his torso.

Link shouldered the strap of his rifle and didn’t even try to hide his grin. “She just shot your dad and then invited him to your wedding. It’s kind of funny.”

Tobias tried to maintain his severe look, but his lips lifted in a smile. “Vera, I haven’t even asked you to marry me.”

“Yet. I want a princess cut ring. It doesn’t have to be big. And I’ll settle for cubic zirconia if you need to save up—”

“Stop talking,” Tobias murmured the second before he cupped the back of her head and pressed his lips onto hers.

Vera sighed and melted to him. She slid her hands up his chest as he angled his head, his lips moving against hers. If her fox would’ve recalled the feeling of safety she had all tangled up with Tobias like this, she never would’ve denied her human side for so long.

Tobias eased back, then kissed her in soft, sexy smacks before resting his forehead against hers and exhaling a shaky breath. “Damn, Vera, I missed you.”

Pushing up on her tiptoes, Vera hugged his neck as tight as she could and blinked rapidly at the colorful horizon. She wouldn’t cry like a wimp right now—not when Tobias had been so patient with her time as a fox. She had to be strong for him, like he was for her, because he deserved a strong mate. “I’m sorry I was gone for so long.”

“Don’t be sorry,” he whispered, shifting his weight from side to side with her. “It was always going to be hard to find a balance with your animal. You did good.”

“How long was I gone?”

“Vera,” Tobias warned, hugging her tighter as he rasped his two-day scruff against her cheek.

She frowned, then pulled back to look him in the eyes. “How long, Tobias?”

A muscle twitched in his jaw as he clenched his teeth, and all the humor died from his emerald green eyes. “Two weeks.”

The blood drained from her face, leaving her cheeks cold and clammy. “Two weeks?” she whispered. How had she lost so much time? “What is today?”

“August thirteenth.”

“But you could hibernate as early as next month!”

“Shhh,” he crooned, cupping her cheeks. “It’s okay.”

“It’s not. You don’t understand. It will take me time to make the medicine.”

“I thought you already knew how.”

“Yeah, but I have to make a specific serum for each type of shifter. I need your blood to start it, and some of the steps take a long time.”

Trouble washed through the mossy color of his eyes, and her chest ached for him. She wasn’t keeping up her end of the bargain. “Okay, one month. That’s enough time. I can do this.” She lifted his palm to her mouth and kissed it. “Everything will be fine. Where’s the package we brought back from Perl?”

“It’s in the shed, still all taped up.”

“And my suitcase with my lab equipment?”

“Sitting right beside it, just waiting for you to come back.”

“I need space.”

“You can use my cabin,” Link offered. “I have work in town, and I’ll be trapping most nights. Will it be big enough?”

“It’ll have to be. Thank you.”

“Yep. I’ll get it cleaned out for you,” he murmured as he hooked his thumb behind the strap of the rifle he carried on his shoulder and turned for the porch.