Bear Mountain Clan Brides: romantic bbw werebear menage (4 page)

Finally Bernhard Grarr asked if I was alright, and offered me something to drink. When he leaned towards me to ask, “Are you okay?” I felt a swirling well rise inside me, but I took a deep breath. The look in his eye had warmth and it touched me.

After what I’d just been through, I really wanted something strong, but I was determined to hold myself together. I asked him for a fruit juice. Between the billionaires and the bears, not to mention the transition of one into the other, there was already more stimulus than I could easily cope with.

Bernhard fetched a silver tray with a jug of juice with ice and two tall, straight glasses. He put the tray on the table, poured juice into a glass and set it near to me.

I thanked him and took a gulp.

“I see now why you like your privacy.” His eyes were soft on me. Searching. I went on, “The thing that Mischa said. About you putting me in the picture. What’s the picture, Bernhard?”

He bowed his head and shook it slowly then he looked back up at me. His strength and a fierce pride beamed out of his eyes but along with it there was something else. Something in the way that his head inclined, in a twitch in his lips. Something in the way that his eyes crinkled at the corners, something felt like a connection.

Since we met outside in the grass, I had felt like an unwelcome invader, a clumsy gate-crasher in Mr Grarr’s personal domain. Now he seemed to look at me in a different way. As though he was seeing me for the first time.

Benjy had said that I was beautiful. He called me ‘gorgeous.’ And Bernhard had agreed with him. There was something of that light in his eyes now.

“The picture is that we’re a dying breed.” Bernhard said, “Literally. We three are the last of our line. If we don’t find a way to produce a litter or two of cubs, our clan will end with the three of us.”

“I’d have thought three great looking billionaires could find girls willing to help out without too much trouble.”

His brow knotted with pain, “But you’ve seen what can happen. That happens if we come in physical contact with almost every human.”

“That would hamper the reproductive process.” I sipped my juice. He still hadn’t taken anything for himself.

He said, “There are very,
very
few human women who could be compatible for us. It really is less than one in a million.” He watched me intently. “It’s possible that you are one.”

I dropped my glass. The juice seemed to rise up as it fell, like it clamored to escape the plunging vessel. A spray of thick drops above the lolling orange tongue reaching above the high rim.

Bernhard watched as the heavy base hit the stone floor and bounce. Intact and rising up to catch the errant juice, the glass rapidly flipped over and fell, bursting into fragments. Gobs and drops of juice sprayed out in arcs.

I was still looking at Bernhard. My mouth must have been wide open. He leaned forward, “Are you okay?” his voice seemed to carry genuine concern.

“I’m…” how was I? Was I okay? I really didn’t know. Just to stall him, I said, “Yes. I’m fine.” When I heard it, I knew that I wasn’t fine. Whatever I was, ‘fine’ didn’t get near it.

“Did it get on your dress?”

Automatically I said, “It doesn’t matter.”

“Really, I can get it cleaned…”

“I AM NOT TAKING MY DRESS OFF!”

Okay, that may have been a little over the top, but I was feeling hemmed in at that point. There were a whole lot of things I needed to process right then, and whether there were spots of orange juice on my dress was not among the top fifteen.

Whether my dress was wet on the outside couldn’t have mattered much less right then. I was bothered about how wet I was on the inside of it. I was particularly squirmy in my panties, which were drenched.

The door opened and Benjy’s head poked round. I said, “It’s okay, Benjy. I dropped a glass.”

Bernhard stared at me, his mouth open. “What?” I looked around and Benjy was staring at me too. I got up. The featureless walls were making me feel penned in.

Benjy said, “You can tell us apart.”

“Sure,” I said, puzzled, “It’s easy.”

“Only for someone who’s tuned in to us, who’s intuitive, instinctively receptive to us.”

“But it’s obvious.”

Glass crunched under my foot. I stepped back quickly. Benjy came closer and I held up a hand. He stopped.

He asked me, “How?”

“You’re, I don’t know, younger somehow. Mischa is more thoughtful. More mature.”

“And Bernhard?”

“Bernhard is the live wire. He’s the brains.”

Bernhard stood, “You’ve got us exactly.”

Benjy laughed, “On the nose. Three bullseyes.”

“But,” Bernhard spoke softly, “You can’t see any of that. It’s all in how we act and how we speak.”

“Well, sure, but so what?”

“So,” said Benjy, “for one thing, hardly anyone can do that. At least not with us they can’t.”

Bernhard came nearer. “Even researchers who work with twins and triplets. They always say we look too alike.”

Benjy grinned, “I bet you couldn’t do it if we stood still in a line.”

I looked at him for a moment. “I think I could. I can tell from your eyes.”

Bernhard and Benjy turned to each other, their eye wide. Looking back at me, Bernhard said, “Then you really are intuiting. Empathizing.”

“She’s ours, Bernhard, she’s our mate.” And he looked at me imploring, His eyes drifted down over my curves. Slowly. Then flicked back up to mine, “You’ve got to be.”

My heart pounded. It was an absurd idea. And I couldn’t consider doing it. Obviously. I wasn’t considering it then, I refused to. In particular I did not muse over the great swinging heft of Mischa’s gigantic cock. Nuh-uh.

Benjy fetched a cloth and a brush to clear up the juice and the glass. My dress was feeling constricting and my breathing was labored. My hand went to my throat. Feeling hot, I dragged my hands up through my hair.

I asked Bernhard, “In this huge glass house, isn’t there a deck, or at least room with a window where we could talk?”

We sat, the four of us, in a room two stories up. One wall was all curved glass and gave a panoramic view of the whole green scoop of the valley. Around a pine table, we discussed how and why the three billionaires needed me. Me and nobody else. And why they needed me so very badly.

Mischa told me, “We are the last of a line. There are no females in our clan. There hasn’t been a female cub in a very long time.”

Bernhard said, “Not in our generation, nor the one before. And now only we three remain.”

“Thousands of years of heritage,” Mischa mourned, “dwindle down to us.”

“And,” Bernhard continued, “If we don’t find a way to reproduce, we’ll snuff out like candles.”

I asked him, “Is that why you need to raise money?”

Benjy said, “Exactly, of course!”

I said, “It’s a shame one of the three of you didn’t study genetics.”

Benjy made a face, “Do you have any idea what that would have been like?”

Bernhard told me, “We tried.”

Benjy’s head shook, “Life science students are so gregarious and sociable,” and he shuddered, “Unbearable.”

Benjy’s was comical and I couldn’t resist a tiny chuckle. I thought it might relieve the tension but Mischa said, “I’m glad that our plight amuses you.”

And Bernhard added, “Yes, we’re going to be extinct, but at least we gave someone a laugh.”

Benjy joined in, “A lovely little student who’s not even a real journalist.”

“Benjy,”

Mischa rebuked him, but he went on, “Not even a journalism major.”

Bernhard was firm and a tight not of anger propelled his voice, “Al
right
Benjy. That’s enough.”

Benjy said, “Some genetic research is headed in the right direction, but it’s making very slow progress. It won’t be ready soon enough to help us.”

“That’s the reason for the IPO,” Mischa chipped in, “And why we want it so urgently. The money will be used to fund more research.”

“We know that the chances of it working out in time for us are slender,” Bernhard’s voice was quiet. “And, major pharma companies are not motivated to find gene therapies for a clan of three shifters.”

“A mate would be our ideal solution.” Mischa leaned over the table, “But we never found one who’s compatible with us.”

“Not until now,” said Benjy.

“But it couldn’t work.” I said, “What happened when I touched Benjy, my fingernail barely made contact with his skin…”

“It is said there is a way,” Bernhard looked very deep into my eyes, “When a mate is truly compatible.” The other two men nodded.

Hearing that there was a way, I was thrilled and I was terrified. The possibilities of what these huge men could be about to propose made my heart swell and my breath caught as my throat thickened.

My mind recoiled, afraid and appalled. Way down inside at the very same time, my body was thrilled. Would I want to be the mate for three huge, gorgeous billionaires? The
mate?
For billionaires who happened to turn into bears now and then? Yes, obviously.
No!
Ob
viously not.

A tremble rose in my chest as I looked from one of the men to the next. The looks of eager excitement illuminating their eyes took me to the edge of panic. I wanted to ask how it could work, but I was terrified of hearing whatever their answer would be. Their faces lit with a hungry anticipation.

Bernhard’s eyes were softer, kinder than I had seen them all day, “We don’t know if it can work, Benjy.”

“It’s true,” Mischa said quietly, “You remember the last time we tried.”

“What happened?” I was hardly able to keep my voice still enough to be understandable, my chest shook so much. Bernhard’s head shook slowly. Benjy looked down.

“It didn’t work.” Said Mischa.

“The girl was not a true mate for us.” Benjy said, his eyes still cast down.

“We assume that,” Mischa said, “But there’s no way to really know.”

“Like we said,” Bernhard added, “gene science and therapy doesn’t concern itself too much with the problems of shifters.”

Mischa made a thin smile, “We aren’t a very big market.”

“So,” I managed to say, “There was a girl?”

Now they all looked at the table. It was a moment before Bernhard spoke.

“There was.”

“What happened?”

Again they were all quiet. Eventually Mischa said, “Maxi has a right to know, Bernhard.”

Bernhard nodded slowly. He looked into my eyes and said, “There’s an old, old story, passed down through generations, that if a human can be our mate, is suitable for us, then there’s a way that we can be in physical contact without it triggering a shift.”

After a pause he said, with obvious discomfort, “We found a girl who seemed to be suitable.” I thought,
Just like they think that I am
, with alarm mounting in my breast, “It didn’t work.”

“But,” Benjy said, “She must not have
been
suitable.”

“You don’t know that for sure,” Mischa’s voice was soft, “The legend may just be that. A legend.”

“But,” my voice rose in panic, “What happened to her?”

There was another pause before Mischa spoke. “The shift came on us.”

“On all three of us,” said Bernhard.

“And the girl?” I was almost shouting now.

Mischa said, “We had tried to prepare her. We told her what could happen.”

“And we warned her,” said Bernhard, “that if we did succeed in mating with her, it would be pretty rough.”

“But she panicked,” said Benjy.

“She did,” Bernhard said. “We took the protective measure,” his eyes were hollow, “We had prepared her as much as we possibly could. But, as we’ve said, it didn’t work. As soon as we touched her, the shift was triggered. Immediately and in all of us.”

Benjy said, “She screamed. She tried to run, to get away.”

“It was understandable really,” Mischa’s head was low, “But even if she could have got out of the house, where could she have gone? There’s no way to escape from here. Not unless you’re a very experienced woodsman.”

“So,” I couldn’t control the tremble in my voice, “Where is she?”

Their heads all shook sadly.

It was Bernhard who spoke at last. “She is in a place now where she won’t ever be disturbed.”

“The money it cost,” Benjy whispered.

Bernhard went on, “A place where we’re sure she won’t ever reveal our secrets.”

“
Where?
” I shouted.

Mischa rubbed his temple. Sadness curled the edge of his voice and he looked up to the heavens. He pressed his lips together before he said, “Thailand.”

“We had to buy an island,” Bernhard said, “A whole island. We built a bar and we keep her funded.”

“She drinks the profits,” Benjy said bitterly.

“But,” said Mischa, “At least if she
did
ever tell her story, no-one would believe her.”