Mail-Order Bear: BBW Bear Shifter Paranormal Romance (BRIDES fur BEARS Book 5) (6 page)

She mustn't freak out now.
She had to go through with this. She might even be married tomorrow,
and the Dire Wolves would have no reason to harass her and Eddie.
They just needed to get two witnesses and sign the marriage register.
She was almost there. They were almost free.

Keep calm
, she
repeated the mantra in her mind.
Keep calm, and make love.

It was only natural that Reid
wanted to make love to his bride-to-be. If he wanted her, it was a
good sign, right? He was attracted to her, that was for sure. Every
time he looked at her, her panties almost melted right off. She had
caught him reaching out to hold her hand as they walked along the
street, only to see him jerk his hand back and ball it into a hard
fist at the last minute.

Lauren's first instinct was
to cover her breasts when she felt Reid pull her bra from her body.
She heard Reid's sharp intake of breath as her generous breasts
spilled out. “So beautiful,” he hissed.

Reid kissed down her throat
and took one breast into his mouth. Lauren moaned when he swirled
his tongue around her erect nipple and suckled her. What he was
doing to her felt so good. No man had ever touched her like this,
and she didn't know it could feel so amazing.

Reid kept kissing her, his
mouth moving from her lips to her breasts. She tensed when Reid
began tugging her jeans and panties down her hips.

“I want to see you,
Lauren,” he growled. “All of you.”

She took a deep, shuddering
breath and nodded. He had a right to see his bride.

Lauren squeezed her eyes shut
as Reid spread her legs. His rough, calloused hands kneaded her
thighs and grabbed her hips.

Reid flung his towel away and
knelt between her legs. Her eyes rounded when she saw his cock.
There was no way she could take him into her body. It was going to
hurt, a lot. She blinked rapidly, hoping that he wouldn't see her
tears.

CHAPTER
SIXTEEN

Reid pressed the head of his
cock against Lauren's sensitive clit and massaged her engorged nub
with slow, circular strokes. She was wet, but not wet enough. And
she seemed painfully shy to have her body exposed to him.

Granted, he was still a
stranger to her. But what did she expect? She had signed up to be a
mail-order bride. She had come to him, fully prepared to marry him
on the spot and be his wife. Whatever her motives, she would have
known what being a wife entailed.

Reid moved his cock up and
down her slick, pink folds. She was breathing hard, and he could
feel her heart beating frantically.

Reid tightened his grip on
her luscious thighs possessively. Lauren didn't strike him as a
flirtatious, sultry woman. When they were in town, she kept her eyes
on Eddie and didn't even crack a smile when some guys whistled at
her.

Reid smirked. He would make
this good for her. He hadn't had a female in eons, and he had to
reign in his lust and take her slowly. He wanted to throw her legs
over his shoulders and rut like an animal, but Lauren seemed shy
and...scared.

Lauren groaned as he rolled
her nipples between his fingers. He pushed the tip of his throbbing
cock into her tight slit and waited.

If she resisted him, he would
stop. His cock and his bear wouldn’t be happy, but he would
never take her against her will.

But Lauren dug her nails
resolutely into his biceps and pulled him down. Her eyes were still
closed, and she had turned her face away from him.

Reid spread her legs wider
and began to inch into her body. She was so damn tight. Reid
growled and reached for the lubricant in the drawer of his bedside
table. He spread the lubricant over his cock and rubbed some over
her clit and pussy lips.

Lauren writhed and her juices
squirted out as he rubbed her swollen clit. She was wet enough for
him to penetrate her.

Reid held her and took a deep
breath. She was still so tight, but he had done all he could. It
was hard to believe that she had given birth to a baby.

In one forceful thrust, Reid
buried himself fully inside her. Lauren cried out and her eyes flew
wide open. He saw pain and terror in her eyes.

“What the hell,
Lauren!”

She shook her head quickly
and reached for him before he could withdraw from her.

“Reid, make love to
me,” she begged. “Please...”

He stared into her eyes for a
long moment. She clung to him and began to sob, “Please,
Reid...”

Slowly, he moved his hips.
He closed his eyes in agony, as lust overwhelmed his senses. He
stroked into her, his veins bulging from his neck and temples. His
release was hard and fast, and hollow.

Reid pulled out of her and
stared at the blood on the sheets.

He was her first.

She hadn't had any male
before him.

Lauren was a virgin.

But—she was also a
liar.

Reid turned and saw that
Lauren had curled up into a ball, hugging a pillow to her chest. She
had a hand pressed over her eyes, no doubt to hide her tears from
him.

“Lauren...”

She sniffed. “Y-yes.”

“Look at me, Lauren.
We need to talk.”

CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN

Lauren lowered the pillow
from her face slowly and turned around. She felt sore and tender
between her legs, but the pain wasn't unbearable. She had felt a
sharp stab of pain when Reid entered her but her body had adjusted
quickly to his girth and the pain had turned to pleasure.

She'd hoped to conceal her
shock and fear so that Reid wouldn't notice how inexperienced she
was. But she couldn't help her tears. The experience of having sex
for the first time was overwhelming.

Lauren took a deep breath and
lifted her eyes to Reid. He was staring at her intently, his mouth
set in a tight line.

Lauren winced and grabbed the
pillow again. What she hoped to accomplish with the pillow she had
no idea, but it acted as a shield, a buffer between her and Reid.

“Eddie is not your
son,” Reid said.

Lauren gulped and looked
down. She had tried to fake it, but the game was up. He knew.

“He's my nephew.”

Reid nodded. “Why did
you answer the ad?”

“I...”

“Just tell me the
truth,” Reid said wearily.

She twisted the corner of the
pillow and swallowed repeatedly. The truth. He wanted the truth.

Lauren jerked her head up and
looked Reid straight in the eye. “I'll tell you the truth,”
she said. “And I'll understand if you don't want me as your
mail-order bride after this. I didn't tell you the truth of our
situation in my letters. I was afraid you wouldn't even want to meet
me, if I'd told you the truth. Which man in his right mind would
want to bring the Dire Wolves to his doorstep?” She let out a
bitter laugh.

“The Dire Wolves?”
Reid frowned.

Lauren nodded and took a deep
breath. In a steady, impassive voice, she told him everything.

“I saw the ad and
figured that being a mail-order bride was the way out for us. I have
to protect Eddie,” she finished quietly. “We'll leave in
the morning. You won't hear from us again. I...I'll pack now.”

She began to move from the
bed but Reid caught her arm. “You're not leaving.”

“Wha…?”

“I didn't put that ad
in the paper, Lauren. And I didn't write you those letters,”
Reid said.

“I don't understand.”

“My cousin, Damien,
pretended to be me and answered your letters. He was the one who put
up the ad.”

“Oh.” Lauren
didn't know whether to feel relieved or disappointed. “So that
means you don't want a bride. But why did you open your door and let
us stay in your house? You could have told me straight away...”

Reid sighed. “I just
couldn't turn you away. I...don't want a bride, but I don't want you
to go either.”

Lauren frowned, then glared
at him. “You just want to take me to bed.” She let out
a harsh laugh. “I came out here to marry a man I had never
met. What did I expect?”

“Why didn't you tell me
that you're a virgin?”

“What difference would
that have made?” she sneered.

“It would have made all
the difference!” Reid exploded. “I...”

“You wouldn't have
slept with me?” Lauren smirked. “Oh come on. I saw the
way you looked at me. You wanted to get in my pants first chance you
got.”

“Yes, I want you,
Lauren. But you want me too,” Reid said and leaned in. “I
can see the desire in your eyes and smell your arousal.”

“How dare you...”
Lauren clenched her fists and bit back an expletive.

“I'm not sorry I had
sex with you, Lauren,” Reid went on, tilting her chin up. “I'm
only sorry we were not honest with each other before. From now on,
we keep nothing from each other. Understand?”

Lauren unclenched her fists
and jaw when she realized what Reid was saying.

“You...you're not going
to turn us out?” she whispered.

Reid smiled grimly. “You're
my mail-order bride. We'll get married as soon as possible. I'll go
down to the marriage registry tomorrow and get the first available
date. You'll no longer be Lauren Sanchez. You'll be Mrs Lauren Ken,
and the Dire Wolves will have no cause to bother you any more.”

CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN

Reid sat across from Lauren
at the lawyer's office and frowned at the piece of paper in front of
him. It was Lauren's idea to sign a prenup. And Reid was surprised
at his own ambivalent feelings regarding the whole thing. Hadn't he
told himself that he would never let a woman get her dainty but
dishonest hands on his assets again?

He had told Lauren about his
failed marriage. It was only fair for her to know about his past.

Lauren had been very calm as
she listened to him. He had told her how he met Shelly and how he
had fallen for her in a very short time. Shelly was a witch, and he
suspected but never mentioned to anyone that she had used witchcraft
to attract him. During their brief marriage, he did his best to be a
good husband to her, but she fooled around. And when they divorced,
she got an exorbitant amount in the divorce settlement. Reid had to
sell almost everything he owned and worked so hard for in order to
pay her off. His business, his house, his car.

He could hear his own anger
and bitterness in his voice as he spoke about his divorce, but Lauren
was unfazed. When he finished, she stood up and said, “Let's
go. We'll go to the lawyer's office and get a prenup. After the
contract is signed, we'll get married.”

The prenuptial agreement was
simple. If they divorced, everything that Reid owned before marrying
Lauren would remain his. There was a similar clause for Lauren, but
she'd laughed when she read it. “I have a few hundred dollars
in my savings account. That's it. And I withdrew some money before
I came to Shadow Point, so the amount is even less now.”

Reid stared at Lauren as she
picked up a pen and signed at the bottom of the agreement. She slid
the papers over to him and waited.

Reid knew that she was making
a point. She didn't want his money. She wasn't a gold-digger and
she wasn't his ex-wife. She was just marrying him to protect herself
and her nephew from the wolves.

With a heavy sigh, Reid
scrawled his signature beside hers. He signed the agreement in
duplicate and handed the papers back to the lawyer.

Reid walked out of the
lawyer's office with Lauren by his side and the agreement in his
hand. This was what he wanted, wasn't it? So why did he hate what
he was doing?

Damien had dropped by and
taken Eddie to the playground while Reid went with Lauren to the
lawyer's office. Eddie had been happy to go with Damien. The boy
definitely preferred Uncle Busybody to “sir”.

Damien had given him a
disapproving, disgusted look when he heard where they were going but
for once, he kept his opinions to himself. He knew what Shelly did
to Reid, and he knew Reid was still bitter about losing everything he
had worked so hard for.

“I'm happy you're
getting married,” Damien had told Reid before they left the
house. “Heck, I'm the one who got you your bride. But I don't
like what you're doing to her.”

“What am I doing to
her?” Reid had snapped. “She's the one who came up with
the idea...”

“No. She's doing this
for you.” With that, Damien had turned his back on him and
stalked off with Eddie.

Lauren was completely silent
as Reid made the appointment at the marriage registry. They would be
getting married the following day. They just had to turn up with two
witnesses, and that was it. Lauren wouldn't even be wearing a
wedding dress. She said she had packed a plain white dress and she
would wear that for the ceremony.