ROMANCE: Mason (Bad Boy Alpha Male Stepbrother Romance Boxset) (New Adult Contemporary Stepbrother Romance Collection) (231 page)

There were sounds in the night, too. Sound of wild animals, but they were far away. But then she heard something else, and it wasn’t far. In fact, it was very close. And the pull she felt drew her to it. Whatever it was, it drew her, and like an idiot she put one step in front of the other and kept moving forward through the trees, into the darkness.

She hadn’t been this far into the trees at the back of the village. Never in her life. It was dangerous. There were wild animals everywhere and it was never safe to stray away from the village lights that kept the animals away.

There was a grunt up ahead, a breathy growl, like something was breathing hard. As she stepped through the trees she saw a large shadow. She moved more, and then she froze.

It was a bear, the biggest grizzly she’d ever seen. She should turn around and run, she knew that. But it was also the bear that was magnetic. She couldn’t ignore the terrible pull.

She fought it, tried to convince herself to turn and run. She wasn’t safe. If something happened to her here no one would be there in time to save her, even if they heard it. She was too far away from the cabins.

She’d grown up in the mountains, and she was being stupid going so far away from civilization.

But she still couldn’t make herself turn around and get away. Something held her there, and the atmosphere around her was so loaded with… something, that she found it hard to breathe. She was sure that if she cupped her hands together she would be able to grab onto whatever it was she felt.

The sky changed, and she noticed the coloring of the trees around her. Even though it was still dark it got a different quality, the kind of the night that was starting to lose the battle against the imminent arrival of the sun.

It was later than she’d thought it was. Daylight was on its way. Now, with the morning so close, it was a good time to leave. The bear wasn’t going to stay there forever.

As she thought it, it got up, stood on all fours and swung its head from side to side, sniffing. Jenna took note of the wind, relieved it blew toward her. The bear wouldn’t smell her, at least.

When it moved its head toward her side she noticed the muzzle, darker with blood. The fur was matter and dread flowed through her. The bear had just fed. Seeing the blood on the fur made her want to run, and she was just about to turn when the bear sat down again. It was facing her now, but it didn’t see her, somehow.

It had its eyes closed and she couldn’t figure out what it was doing. The atmosphere around her changed again, loaded with something she’d felt before but couldn’t place. It was like heat and cold at the same time and the only way she could describe it was magic. But that was ridiculous.

As she watched the bear, it started changing. Slowly at first, so slow she wasn’t sure what she was seeing. It looked like it was getting smaller. Not all of it, because it’s fur started bunching up. But a moment later she was sure it was shrinking. Not only did it shrink, but it was like the bones were moving under all that fur. It was bizarre, watching the animal collapse in on itself.

Jenna had never seen or heard of anything like this in her life. The power in the air was so strong it held her, but she wouldn’t have left even if she could. She couldn’t turn her eyes away from what surreal event that was happening in front of her.

The bear slowly starting taking the characteristics of a man, the fur retreating to leave bare skin. The hands pushed out into five digits that molded themselves into fingers, and the legs elongated until it looked humanoid.

The face was last to change, with the muzzle shrinking back and the eyes changing. There was a moment that she couldn’t make out what was happening, where everything seemed like a blur. And then the bear was a man, sitting in the mulch, breathing hard.

He had dark hair, and broad shoulders as he sat hunched between the trees. Then he stood up, rolling himself up like the shape he was in now was foreign, and then he lifted his head.

His eyes fell on her the same moment she realized who it was.

“Bruce?” she asked, her voice ringing in the clear air.

Chapter 3

Oh. Shit. The moment Bruce looked up, still trying to figure out which way was up because the earth felt like it was tilting, Jenna stood in front of him. The look on her face was a mix between terror and confusion.

“Jenna,” he said and his voice was hoarse. The change, for some reason, had been rough this time round. But she shook her head from side to side in fast movements and held her hands out, palms toward him defense. Her body language was translating what she was feeling.

Bruce held up his own hands and took a step closer. Jenna took a step back, keeping distance between them. Two more steps for both of them and Jenna stumbled. Bruce fought the urge to rush to her. Instead he stopped moving, because it was just going to drive her further and further away from him.

“Jenna,” he said again and he was aware of how pleading his voice was. Why was she out here? He’d never had people come this far into the forest. He’d never had to watch his back in this part of the woods, at least not for humans. How had she found him?

He wanted to say something to her that would make it better, but what could he say? She’d just found out in the worst way that he was a shape shifter, that his animal was one of the most terrifying on the scale of shape shifters. They hadn’t even been married yet for twenty four hours.

But the mating ritual had been done. She was his mate now whether she liked it or not, and even if she turned her back on him and insisted on divorce, in the preternatural world she was tied to him.

Before he could decide what to do, she turned and ran. The animal inside of him had just had blood and he could feel its strength. The feeding was supposed to give him control, but he was just out of the change, and the animal was still there. And Jenna running made him want to chase her.

He closed his eyes and focused on himself, taking deep breaths to try and stay calm. As soon as she was far enough he could relax. The fear and the running was a catalyst. He listened to her footfall on the mulch. It was dimming but he could still hear it. He felt a growl push up in his throat, but he held his breath and tried to suppress it. Growling now wouldn’t only scare her to death, but it would also let the waking village know there was danger.

He didn’t need more trouble.

When he couldn’t hear her footsteps anymore, he let out the breath he’d been holding. He pushed his hands into his hair and walked in a tight circle. This was a disaster.

He knew that keeping this kind of secret could ruin him. But he hadn’t thought she was going to find him so soon. He hadn’t thought she was going to find him, ever. And now, not only was their relationship crashing before it had even really started, but she was in danger now. More than before.

Now she knew. Any Assassin’s psychic in the area could pick up on her fear, her disbelief, her unnatural thread of knowledge. They were both in danger, and the stakes had just been upped. A lot.

This was exactly what he’d feared. He hadn’t expected it to happen so soon. He’d hoped it wouldn’t happen at all. A thought dawned on him and he set off running, heading in the same direction she’d gone.

If she didn’t just go home, but ran into the village instead and started talking about what she’d seen, all hell would break loose. It could go one of two ways – either they would believe her and then they would all be endangered, or they wouldn’t believe her. If they didn’t believe her she would be in more trouble, because if something did come up where her life was in danger, they wouldn’t be there for her.

Disbelief bred disloyalty in situations like these.

As he ran he focused on her, tried to find her. He wanted to send out feelers like he’d always done, sweep the village to find her. But it wasn’t necessary. There was something magnetic, drawing him to her. He knew exactly where she was, and his body drew to her, taking the path she had even though by the time she’d hit this part of the woods she’d already been out of sight.

The bonding, he realized. The fact that she was his mate. That was what let him find her. He was drawn to her like her very essence pulled him, tugged on his and he couldn’t do anything but follow.

That must have been what had happened with her, how she’d found him. She must have woken up and noticed he was gone, and the pull had led her right to him. He swore under his breath as he ran. He really had to start going into things with his eyes open. If he was more informed before he made choices maybe nothing would come to something this dramatic.

He hadn’t known what was going to happen when he’d agreed to be Tara’s mate, either. And look how that had worked out for him. But there had been no sex with her, and no ceremony. Just a verbal agreement, and her power had done the rest.

He shuddered to think what kind of trouble he would have been in in if he’d gone all the way with Tara. Maybe that was why he’d never felt drawn to her the way he felt drawn to Jenna now.

Or maybe it was because he could never love Tara.

When the cabin came into view Bruce breathed a sigh of relief. She hadn’t gone into the village to gather an angry mob. No one would come after him with rifles and bibles to drive away this curse like he’d read about. Jenna had run straight home, her old cabin instead of his, and locked herself inside.

He stood outside the door, trying to catch his breath.

“Jenna?” he asked and knocked on the door. He tried the handle but it was locked.

“Jenna, honey, we just need to talk. I’ll explain everything,” he said. There was no reply from the other side of the door. He strained his ears and heard crying. It drove him crazy, standing on the outside of a locked door, the love of his life on the other side crying, and he had been the one that had hurt her.

Some of the villagers were up and about, and they looked at him. He’d just been married and now he wasn’t allowed into his wife’s home. He smiled like nothing was wrong and then knocked again.

“Please open up,” he said.

“Go away,” came the answer, but her voice was thin, like she wasn’t sure if she meant it. He looked over his shoulder again. More people walked past. He pulled down the handle and opened the door, breaking the lock out of the frame. It wasn’t hard to do at all, he only had to let go of the face he always put up in front of people, pretending that he wasn’t that strong.

He walked into the house and closed the door behind him, only dimly registering the splintered wood and the hole in the door post. He turned around.

Jenna sat on the floor in the corner between the two couches, curled in a ball like she was trying to make herself impossibly small. Her cheeks were wet with tears and her eyes were wide, the irises the darkest green he’d ever seen them. The fear in her face cut him deep. He felt it all the way to the bone, and he could smell it in the air, too, sour and it stung his nose.

“Jenna, please,” he said softly, “just let me explain.”

She looked at him with the same terrified expression. She didn’t say anything, didn’t move. Bruce took a deep breath and sat down on the nearest chair, the armchair that was furthest from Jenna.

She relaxed, but only slightly.

“I’m sorry,” he started. “I’m sorry that you had to find out that way. And I’m sorry I’m not the man you thought I was.”

She looked at him for a long time. He almost started talking again just to fill up the awkward silence, when she finally spoke.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked. He was surprised that that was her first question, and also not surprised at all. Her reaction wasn’t that of someone who didn’t believe in magic and things unseen. It was like she knew it was possible, and she just hadn’t thought it would happen in her life.

“I didn’t know how,” he answered. “It isn’t the kind of thing you just bring up in a conversation, you know?”

“But we’ve been friends for years. How can there never have been a chance for you to tell me that you’re… different?”

The way she said ‘different’ made Bruce flinch, but he let it go. It was true, he was different. No way around that.

He took a deep breath.

“I didn’t want to put you in danger. There are too many things that can go wrong when a human knows. And it is forbidden. The others would have forced me to leave, and I couldn’t leave Williamsburg.” He took another deep breath and looked her in the eye. “I couldn’t leave you.”

Jenna’s eyes widened and she tucked herself tighter into her little ball.

“There are others?” she asked.

Bruce nodded and silently cursed himself. He shouldn’t have said anything. But there have been so many lies, it was hard to keep up with them. And Jenna needed truth now. If he wanted to hold onto her at all, which he wasn’t sure he was going to be able to do, anyway.

“You don’t seem surprised that this is possible at all,” Bruce said after a moment of silence. He was looking at his hands, scared to look at her face. Her eyes held her emotions and he was scared to see contempt in them.

“I’m not,” she said. “A part of me always knew that there was something out there. I can feel it, sometimes.”

She said it so easily now, and Bruce thought back to the times she’d said things that had seemed out of place for her, but normal to him. She took another breath.