Hers (3 page)

Sammy chewed on her lip as she stared up at him. She
looked over at Slater.

“Come on, Sammy. Brock has a great idea for a first
date. It’s in the day, and it doesn’t have to be very long as both Brock and I
have work tomorrow night.”

Brock could see Sammy warring with
herself
. He needed to help convince her. Not giving her the
time to react he pulled her to him, lifted her up, and captured her mouth with his.
Peaches and honey filled his mouth, and the same scent surrounded him. He ate
her up, sucking on her lips, and as she gasped he slipped his tongue in to
tangle with hers.

Sammy moaned, and Brock felt her hands slowly sneak
up and run through his hair.
 
The peaches
and honey smell intensified, and his bear hounded at him to be set free and mate-mark
her. Knowing if he kept going he would give into his bear, he reluctantly
pulled his mouth from Sammy’s and handed her to Slater, who stood next to
him.
 
Sammy’s groan at the loss of him
was cut off by Slater’s mouth.

Brock took satisfaction in the fact that Sammy had
given a disappointed groan at the loss of him. While Slater helped convince
Sammy, he calmed his bear and explained that they needed to take their time
with their mate and earn her trust.

When Slater pulled away, Brock could see his eyes
flashing bear, and his fist clenched holding his bear in as Slater held Sammy’s
back. Brock could see the dazed, lust-filled bliss settle over Sammy and knew
now was the time to ask again.

“Tomorrow at noon we’ll come and pick you up and
take you to lunch. It’ll be our first date.”

Sammy looked from him to Slater and sighed. “Okay.
Lunch tomorrow.”

Brock felt the grin spread over his face. He knew
how he would get his mate to agree in the future, and he didn’t mind the method
at all. Brock studied his mate, and his heart beat faster as he watched Sammy’s
eyes flash with warmth as she smiled at Slater, then him.
 
She surprised him when she reached for his
hand and held Slater’s hand with her other.

“Thanks, guys. I needed that. I needed to feel
irresistible and attractive.”
 
She closed
her eyes for a moment before she opened them and turned towards the door
tugging them. “Come on. I think we’ve been out here long enough. I’m ready now
to play some baby shower games, if I haven’t missed them all.”

Brock’s bear lay down content and relaxed for the
first time in months at the sight of their mate holding their hand and dragging
them into a place full of people who
 
would know that Sammy was ready to finally admit to the world what she
was them.

****

Slater watched as Sammy laughed and played games
with her friends. He hadn’t been going to come tonight because it was getting
too hard to be around Sammy and not claim her or hold her. Slater and his bear
craved her touch. He was so glad he did come. Sammy sat between him and Brock
on a big sofa.

At first she sat still holding their hands and
watched everything going on. A peg game was being played, where you held a baby
doll in one arm and tried to get as many pegs as you could off a line one-handed.
Six women had a turn before they stopped when Susie said she would sit and open
presents. Susie came and sat in a big padded armchair. She turned to his
cousins, Brian and Blake.

“One of you can get me the presents. The other can
write what I got and who I got it off.”

Blake pushed his brother toward the kitchen while he
walked to the presents. “Brian, paper and pen is in the top right drawer in the
kitchen.”

Slater couldn’t help chuckling at the glare Brian
gave Blake as he went off to get the paper and pen. He glanced over at Brock to
see a smirk on his face.
 
Slater wondered
how they would handle stuff like this when it happened. They’d only just
stopped fighting and agreed to share Sammy three or so months ago.

At first he and Brock had fought all the time. Their
bears attacked each other over Sammy, trying to kill each other to see who was
the stronger. After months of fighting and being drained because of what was
going on in the shifter world and the situation their mate was in, they’d
decided if Brock’s two younger brothers could share and be happy and content,
then so could they.
 

They’d bought a large five bedroom house, with two
huge living areas, a massive kitchen, four bathrooms, and big verandas. The
house was close to Brian, Susie, and Blake’s place. They’d hoped that Sammy
would love it and be happy to move in with them. They hadn’t decorated much, as
Brock’s sister had told them that if Sammy ever let them claim her she would
want to decorate the house herself.

“Thank you, Brock, Sammy, and Slater. These will
come in real handy with the babies.”

Slater gave a mental shake and smiled at Susie as
she looked at the two baby swings boxes. Susie gasped as she opened the present
Sammy brought. Handmade knitted booties, bonnets, and cardigans, three in blue
and three in yellow all different styles and sizes. That wasn’t all. Tears ran
down Susie’s cheeks as she pulled out one blue-and-white and one yellow-and-white
blanket. The work that would have gone into making these would have been hours,
and taken months.

“Sammy, these are beautiful. They must have taken
you forever. How did you get them all done in so little time?”

Sammy turned bright red and shrank back into the
seat. “I have no life anymore, so I have a lot of time on my hands. I also find
knitting therapeutic.”

Susie tried to get up, but Blake stopped her. “Let
me go, Blake. I’m getting up to hug and thank Sammy.”

“Sweetheart, I think it’s best you stay seated.
Sammy can come to you. She’s not eight months pregnant with twins.”

Sammy let go of his hand, and Slater watched as she
got up, walked over to her friend, leaned down and hugged Susie.
    

His little mate was talented. You could tell by one
look at the baby knitted stuff that Sammy had put a lot of love and time into
them.

“I’m happy you like them, Susie. I wanted to do
something extra special after what you did for me.”

Slater would be forever in debt to Susie for helping
his mate stay safe and protecting her when he didn’t even know her.

Sammy kissed Susie’s cheek, and Slater could see the
love that shone from her face for her friend. Slater wanted Sammy to love him.
He wanted her to feel and know he would never hurt her and that she could count
on him.
 

Going slow was going to be hard, but if Sammy looked
at him with love the way she was currently looking at Susie he knew it would be
worth it.

Chapter
Two

What do you wear to a lunch with bear shifters who
think you’re their mate? Sammy had no idea. She’d been staring at her closet
for the last ten minutes unsure. She didn’t have anything sexy to wear,
anything with cleavage, or clothes that showed too much skin. Greg had made her
get rid of anything that he’d thought too provocative. Not for the first time
Sammy wished she could kill him for what he’d done to her.

Not only had Greg beaten her, made her uncomfortable
with herself and how she looked and acted, but he’d gotten ridden most of her
clothes. He told her all the time, “Women your size shouldn’t wear what you’re
wearing.
 
No one wants to know how big
your gut is or how large your breasts and arse are.”

Before Greg, she’d been a clothes hoarder. She was a
huge op-shopper. She loved her curves, and she knew how to flaunt them to her
best advantage. Her mother had always told her that most men liked women with a
bit of meat on them, women with curves.
Women with good child-bearing
hips.
She would always tell Sammy to never change for anyone. To always
be
herself
, and that if anyone didn’t like that then
they weren’t worth it. They weren’t the right people for her to even bother
with.

God, Sammy wished she’d listened to her mother’s
advice when Greg came along.
 
The last
couple of months she’d convinced herself that she hadn’t listened because she
was angry with her mother dying on her. She was angry at her mother for leaving
her alone in the world. Angry because she would never be at her wedding, or be
there when Sammy got pregnant, see her first grandchild and so on.

Sammy could admit that she was pissed at her mum. If
her mother had been alive she wouldn’t have met Greg. She would never have been
with him. She would never be staring now at an almost empty closet.
 
Sammy knew she was being selfish blaming her
mum, but she was still mad at her, at the world for the cards she’d been dealt.

Grabbing her black pants and her long sleeved plain
pink top, she shoved them on and went to her bag, got out her mobile and called
Slater. He answered on the second ring.

“Hey, beautiful, you’re not ringing to cancel?”

“Maybe.
It
depends on you and Brock. I need clothes. I have decided that I’m not going to
go another day without clothes that I like. No one gets to tell me what I can
wear and what I can’t. I’m even going to treat myself to new clothes and not
op-shop ones. You and Brock may come with me, or you can see me tomorrow. It’s
up to you.”

Sammy slipped into her shoes and grabbed some
hair-ties for her hair. She felt better already knowing that she would treat
herself and go shopping.

“Of course we’ll go with you. Are you driving, or do
you need me to come and pick you up?”

Sammy only had her learner’s permit. She’d meant to
go and have lessons, but when her mum got sick she put everything on hold. She
caught the bus to work, and any spare money she had went on her mother to help
her stay comfortable and to have the better brand of medicine and so on. Her
mother had wanted to go get a loan on the house, but Sammy wouldn’t let her.
Her mother had looked after her all her
life,
and
Sammy felt she could do it for her mother for the time she had left.

“I can catch a bus. I don’t drive. I’m only on my
learner’s.”

“I can come and pick you up now. I’d also be happy
to help teach you to drive. We’ll pick a time, and I’ll clear it. I know you
need hours built up to go for your P’s.”

“If you’re okay with me dragging you around clothes
shopping then by all means come and pick me up.”

“As long as I get to spend time with you I’m happy
to do anything.”

Sammy rolled her eyes. She highly doubted Slater
meant what he said, and after going shopping with her today he might regret
saying it. “Sure. See you when you get here.”

“I’ll be at your place in fifteen, twenty minutes.”

Sammy hung up and finished getting ready. She
brushed her hair again and did her teeth, put lip gloss on. It was the only
makeup Greg had let her keep.
Asshole
.
Today she would get makeup also. By the end of
today she promised she would be her old self again.

Sammy tidied up the already immaculate house as she
waited for Slater to come and pick her up. She would take Slater up on his
offer. She would learn to drive. Sammy remembered Greg telling her that females
shouldn’t be on the road because they were nuisances, and he liked that she
couldn’t drive. Sammy now knew that her not driving was another control thing.

Her front doorbell rang, and she opened it to see
Slater standing there and Brock opening her gate and walking to the door.

Slater was clean shaven, and with his short, curly, dirty-blond
hair and deep sea green eyes and tall, muscular build it was no wonder her body
lit up at the sight of him. He was gorgeous. He looked like he belonged on a
magazine. He was so yummy.

Brock had a nice five o’clock shadow going on, and
his hair sat in a messy curly array on his head. His piercing blue eyes never
missed anything, and his body was to die for. He was dark and menacing and sent
wicked shivers through her every time he was close.

The both together were deadly. They were
irresistible.
 
Sammy knew if she hadn’t
gone through what she had in the last year, she would have jumped their bones
as soon as they’d told her what she was to them.

Sammy hoped she could handle Slater and Brock.
 
Before Greg she’d been full of energy and
knew that she could have handled both men, or at least tried.
 
The old Sammy might have been embarrassed
about being with two men, but she would have tried.
 
She wanted to be her old self again. Today
she was determined to be what she was like before Greg.
 

Shutting the door behind her she hitched her bag
strap over her shoulder and patted the side of the bag to check she had her
keys. She walked down to Brock as he came to them.
 
Two big four wheel drives sat out in front of
her house, one white, the other black. She knew without even asking which car
belonged to whom. She reached for Slater’s hand, held it, and walked to the
white one.