Her Grizzly Outlaw (6 page)

“You always follow people when
they want to be alone?”
Tarren
asked but didn’t turn
round. She inhaled again, and then held her hand out, offering him the joint.
She was focused on the pond, and a chilly breeze picked up at that moment,
moving her long blonde hair across her shoulders. He remembered the smell of
those strands when he had been sitting on the tailgate of his truck. She had
smelled slightly fruity, and it had been a pretty incredible scent. His cock
was starting to get hard just thinking about it.

He moved closer to her, grabbed
the joint, and placed it between his lips. He sat down beside her, and for the
next several minutes they sat there, side-by-side, finishing off the joint
together, and saying nothing. But it wasn’t the comfortable silence that they
had always had, but an awkward one that made him uncomfortable. He turned his
head and looked at her. Despite the fact it was dark out, the moon was pretty
high in the sky and bright. He couldn’t see her eyes, but he knew every part of
her as if it were his own. That was what happened when someone grew up around
another person, learned their habits, their routines, and even knew if they had
a birthmark on their belly. He knew everything about
Tarren
,
about all of the Grizzly kids in fact, but there was always something about her
that made him even more curious.

She turned and looked at him, her
blue eyes bright, but looking darker now because of the shadows.
Tarren
also looked fucked up, and he was feeling pretty
high himself. “Why’d you follow me up here?”

He shrugged and glanced at the
pond again. He knew why, but felt like some pussy asshole for tapping into his
sensitive side. He was a grizzly bear shifter, and the son of Jagger, the
president of The Grizzly MC, for fuck’s sake. He shouldn’t have any emotional
triggers, but he realized that when it came to
Tarren
,
or any of the Grizzlies he grew up with, he was protective. “You looked really
fucking upset back at the party.” He looked at her again. “And I care about
you,
Tarren
. I don’t want to see you upset.”

She smiled and then glanced at
her lap. “I am just feeling funky right now I guess.”

He nodded, but she wasn’t even
looking at him.
“Because of the sex, right?”

When she looked at him there was
this shocked expression on her face before she masked it.
“The
sex?
You mean when we fucked last night?”

If Lucas had been the type of guy
to embarrass easily he might have felt that way at
Tarren’s
crass language. It wasn’t so much that she had said it, because
Tarren
was known to have an outgoing personality and speak
her mind. No, it was a little bit bold because of the way she said it, and the
fact it concerned both of them personally.

She shook her head and cursed. “I
wish I had another joint.” She seemed to be speaking to the water now.

“It doesn’t have to be weird,
Tarren
.” He might be saying that, but the truth was it
was
a little weird. Ever since it had
happened he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about her. He had always found
Tarren
beautiful and loved her personality. She didn’t take
shit from anyone, didn’t fuck around if something needed to be done, and had
always held her own. He admired that about her, loved that she was not a
girly-girl.

But things could never happen
between them, not anything more than what they had done last night. For one
thing her father would string him up by the balls if he even found out the
filthy fucking thoughts he had had about
Tarren
before they even did anything. But now, now that Lucas had been in her tight,
hot, and wet fucking body, yeah, Dallas would definitely take pleasure in
beating his ass to the ground.

“Yeah, it does have to be that
way, Lucas, because it already is that way.” She stared at him, and he swore
that her expression broke his damn heart, She looked sad, and that had him
feeling like the worst piece of shit in the world.

“We are still just as close as
ever,
Tarren
. I don’t want things to change.”
Even though they already
have.

“Yeah.”

She said that, but he could hear
in her voice that she didn’t really believe that.

“You should have stopped the
fight from escalating, Lucas.”

He stared at her, felt his brows
knit, and then shook his head at the complete one-
eighty
in conversation. “What? How in the hell did we get on this?”

Tarren
glanced at him, her eyes
red-rimmed and glossy from the pot. “I don’t know. I’m sorry. I’m just really
high right now.”

He stared at her for several
seconds, and then before he could think about what he was doing he cupped the
back of her head and leaned in to kiss her. For a moment she grew tense, but
then softened for him. Her lips worked over his, and when he stroked his tongue
along hers she made this breathy little moan. But before he could deepen the
kiss she was placing her hands on his chest and pushing him away.

“Last night was it, Lucas. If we
really want to try to have this be like it was before all this weirdness
crashed own, then I think we shouldn’t do this.” She touched her lips with her
fingers, turned away from him, and then brought her knees up on the boulder and
wrapped her arms around them.

“You want a ride home?” Lucas
didn’t like this, didn’t like that she was distant now, and that all of this
shit had gone down because he hadn’t been able to keep his dick in his pants.
And he couldn’t even say he had been drunk. Buzzed, yes, but he had been
conscious enough that when he had looked at
Tarren
last night, he hadn’t seen the girl he had grown up with, but the woman she had
become. She was all curves, thick and round in all the right places. He
remembered girls from high school calling her fat, thick and overweight, but to
Lucas she was all lush and soft, and her wide hips had him picturing gripping
onto them while he fucked her. He knew she didn’t think of herself as fat or
thick, not in the bad way. She loved the way she looked, had told them enough
times that if she were stick thin like the girls in their high school then she
would be on a strict high-calorie diet until she looked healthy. They had
laughed at her when she had said those things, but now, knowing what she looked
like, had him realizing that thick was good ... really fucking good.

“No, that’s okay. I called my dad
and said I’d just be sleeping at the cabin tonight.”

“You want me to stay with you?”
The way she looked at him was an “are you serious right now” kind of
expression. “Hey, I just meant so you’re not alone, not that I wanted to, well,
you know.” He shrugged.

“I know.” She started chuckling,
looked over at him, and gave him this smile that had him thinking that maybe
the fact he couldn’t control his desire hadn’t ruined anything. “You can walk
me back to the Cabin?”

He nodded, stood, and held his
hand out to her. She took it, and together they walked down the path toward the
cabin. She stopped at the front door, but held onto his hand as she stared at
the darkened, shadowed building.

“Maybe we can hang out for a
little while longer?”
Tarren
looked at him. “You’re
high, and driving home probably isn’t safe.” They stared at each other for
several long minutes, and although he could have driven the few miles down the
mountain to his father’s place, hell, he could have even walked it, the truth
was he wanted to spend this time with
Tarren
, because
a part of him knew that things wouldn’t be the same.

“Yeah, okay,
Tarren
.”
He gave her hand a squeeze. They walked up the steps, and she got her keys out
to unlock the door. Inside the scent of age and of the interior being closed
off from the fresh air assaulted him. The furniture that was still in the house
was covered with sheets, and dust covered the once white material.

Tarren
pulled him toward the couch, let
go of his hand, and pulled the sheet off. Dust flew into the air. They both
coughed, and then they started chuckling. When
Tarren
sat down and pulled him close to her, he didn’t resist. He wanted to be next to
her, wanted to be close to her. He watched as she looked down at her hand that
covered his, smoothed her fingers along his, and he wanted to ask her what was
on her mind. Lucas hadn’t ever felt these things for another person, let alone
a girl. He had always been one to spend a few hours between the sheets during
high school, using his reputation, and anything else, to his advantage to have
the girls falling for him. And it was easy. They were easy. But
Tarren
was so different from any other female, so special
to him. It was strange to look at her and wish things could be different, wish
he could just tell her that he wanted more with her. But he couldn’t, because
of many different factors. It was easier this way, easier to just push things
aside, go back to the way they were, and hope with time things smoothed out.
Her father being overly protective of her, Lucas’s reputation, and the sweetness
that was
Tarren
was not a combination that made a
good relationship.

He sat back, kept her hand in
his, and closed his eyes. “Everything will be okay,
Tarren
,”
he said, and then let himself relax into the couch. But what he really wanted
to do was kiss her, remove their clothing, and be with her again like he had
last night.

Chapter Four

One year later

Tarren
shoved her book in her backpack,
grabbed it off the ground, and headed out of the community college in Steel
Corner. Her phone buzzed. She grabbed it and saw it was Alexis saying she’d be
home this weekend, and a smile spread out across her face. But it was the sound
of a Harley close by that had her glancing up and seeing the gleaming metal
flash under the sunlight. And then she saw Lucas sitting on it, pulling close
to the curb, only a few feet from her, and her heart started racing.

For the last year she had been
keeping herself busy with school, and although she really didn’t have an idea
of what she wanted to do in terms of a degree, because she was just taking
courses here and there, she still felt like she was being productive. She and
Lucas hadn’t spoken as much as they used to after they had spent the night at
her father’s cabin last year. He had been working off and on for the past year
at other charters, and when they did see each other they hadn’t even kissed,
let alone had sex. She felt like there was now this brick wall between them. It
was for the best though, or so she kept telling herself, because getting
involved with Lucas wasn’t good for either of them. For one thing, she knew he
had been with more women than she could probably count, and she hadn’t been
with anyone since him. It was a sad
combination,
and
better if they just stayed friends.

She smiled when he came to a stop
and glanced up at her. Even when he was just sitting on the bike his frame was
massive. He wasn’t even twenty, yet he was nearing six and a half feet tall,
with muscle definition that rivaled any male she had ever seen.

He wore a skullcap helmet with
the decal of a brain exposed plastered to the top. His shades were of the
aviator variety, and her reflection shone back at her through them. He had a
few days’ worth of scruff on his cheeks, making him seem even more masculine
than usual.
Tarren
moved closer to him, adjusted her
backpack, and her smile widened when the corner of his mouth kicked up.

“Damn, you make going to school
look good.” His smirk turned into a full-blown grin.

“Still with the
remarks and definite cockiness going on.”
She chuckled, eyed his bike, and whistled low. “I
guess spending time at those other charters for the last year has made you
big-time now, huh?”

He took off his helmet and
sunglasses, and eyed her up and down. Of course her body heated immediately.
Even one year after she had slept with Lucas, and the weirdness that she still
felt every time she saw him, there was the love she felt, and of course the
arousal that simmered beneath the surface.

“Well, my pops wanted me to get a
feel for all of the charters in the area, and see how things are run.” He
shrugged, glanced at the main office behind her, and then looked back at her
face. “So you decided to go with the whole college thing, huh?”

Tarren
nodded.
“Yeah.
What else was I going to do in Steel Corner?” She shifted on her feet, feeling
like she hadn’t seen Lucas in forever even though they had seen each other off
and on for the last year. It felt like she was on a date or something, talking
to a guy for the first time, and reliving the mortification that he knew what
she looked like naked. He didn’t respond right away, just stared at her, and
making her feel like she was under a microscope. Licking her lips, and trying
to call upon that hard edge she lived by, she gave him a cocky smile of her
own. “So, playing with the big boys now with the club?”