Lumberman Werebear (Saw Bears Book 7) (8 page)

“We’re not having sex right now,” Haydan said, trailing kisses down her neck as he squared up to her. Wrapping his arms around her, he hugged her close. So close, she had trouble pushing him away.

“But you said missionary. I agree to that. I want that.”

“Not now, Cas. It won’t help, and I’m not enabling you to avoid dealing with your past. Tell me.”

“I told you I can’t! I can’t, Haydan!” She shoved him hard and glared at him. He’d betrayed her. Teased her with release.

She marched off in the direction of the trailer park. Tears burned her eyes and blurred her vision, but she wiped them with the backs of her hands as she stooped to pick up her clothes.

She was angry, confused, and trying desperately not to think about the Menagerie and Jake and all the others IESA had hunted down one by one.

“Brighton and Denison were hurt, too, Cas, and you know what helped them?” he called from behind her. “Talking about it to someone. One person. Pick one and share it. Get that shit out of you. Because this, what you’re doing now, will never fix you. It’ll never help. It’ll only mask the pain.”

“I’m going into town, and I’m taking your Jeep. Don’t you try to stop me. I need time alone, away from here where I’ve got so mixed up.”

Haydan was on her like a shot. He spun her around and hugged her painfully tight. “I know why you’re going into town, Cas. You’re going to find what I won’t give you, but know this. I love you.”

“Don’t say that.”

“I do,” he gritted out right next to her ear. “I fucking love you so much that I won’t hurt you with sex. When we’re intimate, I want it to mean something more than an escape. I love you, Cas, and if you do this, it’ll
hurt
me.”

Twin tears tracked down her cheeks as she pulled away from him. Miserably, she shrugged one shoulder up to her ear and dropped her gaze to his shoes, unable to look him in the eye when she whispered, “I’m sorry.”

As she turned away and left him there in the woods, her heart broke the rest of the way because, after tonight, there would be no redemption for a monster like her.

Cassie brushed her fingertips absently over her lips where Haydan had kissed her so thoroughly. She’d had time to settle on the drive to Sammy’s, and all of her big plans to ruin her life hadn’t seemed so worthwhile by the time she’d walked through the doors of the old bar.

Haydan loved her.

And what baffled her even more—she felt the same. She was capable of love. Capable of feeling emotions like other shifters. Capable of making him happy if only she could be brave enough to give him all of herself.

He hadn’t been using sex as a weapon like she’d thought. He just cared enough to not enable her as Jake had done. Haydan was taking the hard road. The one where he had to deny the woman he loved, even when she begged him to take the pain away. Not because he wanted to see her hurting, but because he wanted to see her get stronger.

Her emotions had been running high when he’d kissed her, but now his lips were hard to stop thinking about. That curious, fuzzy feeling filled her stomach every time she imagined how connected she’d felt to him when his lips had touched hers. With that kiss, he had shown her he loved her before he had told her he did.

And she’d threatened to throw it away.

Level-headed man that he was, Haydan had let her go. Whether she was foolish enough to find a bedmate to give her that fix she craved, or strong enough to deny the urge and come back to him, he was trusting her to make the decision on her own. Why? Because he couldn’t fix her if she didn’t want to be fixed.

Haydan had done this before, of that she was sure. With his father, perhaps. He’d looked tortured when she’d been begging him for release in the woods, but he’d stood his ground. And she was damn proud of him for it.

Haydan was too good for her by a lot, but maybe if she tried hard enough, for long enough, she could be okay for him. She could be okay for her.

“Hey there, pretty lady,” a man in a backward baseball cap with glossed over eyes said in a slur as he leaned onto her booth in the corner. “Can I buy you a drink?”

She looked him up and down. He was an easy mark, but the urge to be with anyone other than Haydan didn’t exist anymore. “I already have one,” she said, gesturing to the cranberry vodka she’d been nursing for half an hour.

“Well, is this seat taken?”

“Yeah.”

The man’s face fell into a frown as he looked at the empty bench across from her. “Well—”

“Get lost, dipshit.” A giant of a man yanked the guy back by his collar, then slid into the empty seat with a humorless grin.

“I’m not interested in whatever you’re selling,” she said, taking another sip of her watered down cocktail.

“Good. Makes my job easier. I’m Kong.”

She smelled it then. Fur. And when she looked up into his eyes, they were churning an eerie light green color. Shifter. “Kong?” she asked, cocking her head. “Gorilla?”

The corner of his mouth curved up in a smile as he leaned back against the wall and stretched his legs out across the seat. He plucked a pair of aviator sunglasses from where they rested on his dark hair and slid them over his eyes. There. Now he looked more human.

“I know Haydan,” he said in a gruff voice as he traced the woodgrain in the table.

“How? You aren’t Ashe Crew.”

“Ah, see, from what I hear, you came from one of those backwoods crews. The messed up ones where the alphas don’t play by the same rules as the rest of us. Pity, but that ain’t the way things have to be. Crews around here get along. Ashe Crew, Gray Backs, Boarlanders…” He placed his hand on his chest. “Lowlanders. We’re all registering to the public, and numbers keep us safer in case any of those IESA mother fuckers are still lingering about, rebuilding their little government agency. But you know all about that, don’t you?”

Kong knew an awful lot about an awful lot. Cassie narrowed her eyes. “Where are you getting all your information?”

“Outside of my crew, Matt’s one of my best friends.”

“And he’s talked about me?”

The smile drifted from his lips as he nodded once.

Fantastic. “Do all gorilla shifters gossip, or is it just you?”

“Ah,” he said, batting away the sting of her insult. “It ain’t gossiping if you’re listening to a friend.”

“So, Matt talks to you then?” She lowered her voice and leaned forward. “About what happened to us?”

Kong sighed and nodded. “As he should. Keeping that kind of grit inside will kill a man. Or a woman.” He cocked an eyebrow and rocked up out of the booth. “Don’t hurt my boy, Haydan, yeah?”

He clapped Matt on the shoulder as he passed. Cassie hadn’t even noticed him standing there.

“Let me guess,” she said as her brother sat down across from her. “You called Kong to keep me out of trouble until you could get here.”

“Yep. Haydan called me, but I was out a ways. He sounded like shit, by the way. Impressive that you demolished a dominant grizzly shifter in two days. I’d pat you on the back if I weren’t so pissed.”

“Yeah, well, you didn’t need to send Kong because I wasn’t going after anyone. I just needed some time to think. Matt?”

“Yeah?”

“Did you know? Did you know you were sending me to a crew with the two boys who released us from the Menagerie?”

Matt swallowed audibly and dropped his gaze to her folded hands on the table. “I did. I recognized them the first time I saw them, but I don’t think they knew me. They killed Reynolds, you know? I was there. IESA came after their crew, and we all came together and ended them. And then Brighton and Denison dragged Reynolds off into the trees. They took an ax to him.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I tried, Cassie. You shut me down anytime I tried to talk about any of that stuff. You’ve never once let me even mention the Menagerie. When I did, you hung up the phone on me.”

“Why did you want Haydan for me? I know you said for safety, but Carl won’t ever be any threat—not really. Why the Ashe Crew, and why him?”

“Because I know how broken you are, and the only way you’re going to get better is if you stop your spiral. And to do that, you need motivation. Haydan’s good. I mean, down to his bones good. He’s strong and able to protect a mate, yeah, but you need more than that. You need someone to call you on your shit.”

Cas huffed a laugh and ripped up the corner of her drink napkin. “Well, he’s plenty capable of that.”

“I watched the women in the Ashe Crew join their mates, one by one, and you know what I saw? Strong women being made into stronger women. The Red Claws were idiots. They didn’t know how to treat you, and they fucked it all up. Jake especially. I thought he’d be good for you because he knew where you came from, but he wasn’t. He was poison, and I hated that I couldn’t pull you away from that crew sooner. When I heard Carl had killed him in that challenge, I was so relieved, Cas. Relieved. And scared I wouldn’t be able to get to you before you gave into Carl. I knew if you had any shot at being okay, it would be with the Ashe Crew, and with Haydan.”

“And what about you, Matt. Are you going to be okay?”

His smile didn’t reach his piercing blue eyes. He shook his head slightly. “Out of the two of us, you have the best shot. I’ve been on a bender, looking for a mate, but my bear doesn’t choose anyone. I know it’s because of what happened in the Menagerie, and I was afraid you would end up the same as me, but you haven’t.” He lifted his chin. “You bonded to Haydan, didn’t you?”

Cassie brushed her damp lashes on her shoulder. “Yeah, I think so. I just didn’t know what it was until I got here tonight and realized betraying him would be like taking a knife and gutting myself. I can’t do it. And I get all these fuzzy, fluttery feelings when I’m around him, and when he hugs me I feel…
okay
. Like I’m going to be okay.”

An emotional smile took Matt’s face as he relaxed back into his seat. “You will be. You stick with your crew, and you do right by Haydan, and you will be. You’ll see.”

As Cassie passed under the Asheland Mobile Park sign, the Jeep’s high beams ghosted over Haydan who sat on the stairs in front of his trailer, his head down and hands linked behind his neck. When he looked up, the worry and hurt in his blazing silver eyes curdled her stomach.

She’d done that.

He stood slowly while she parked the Jeep.

“I know why you didn’t come after me,” she said out of the open window.

“Because you took my fuckin’ Jeep.” He sounded exhausted, but there was a tiny smile in his voice.

She opened the door and slid out, then approached him carefully since his bear was riled up and had her arm hair standing on end.

“No, you didn’t come after me because you were giving me the choice. Did I want to get better or not? Sink or swim. Save myself or dig my hole deeper. That’s why you stayed here, isn’t it?”

“I wanted to come after you. Dammit, Cas, I had to Change just to keep from taking Drew’s truck and peeling out of here to chase you. I’ve done this with my dad, though, coddled him, and it didn’t help.”

“Drugs?”

“Alcohol. I know what I can and can’t take because I grew up like this, always worried, always wishing I could do something, wishing I was better, but I learned something at the end of his life. His actions were because
he
made those decisions. It had nothing to do with me.”

“But my decision has everything to do with you.”

Haydan swallowed hard, as if he expected a blow. “And what decision is that?”

“That you’re it for me. I was so focused on keeping things the way they were. On keeping emotion out of our relationship so I wouldn’t ever have to talk about my past or deal with anything I’d been through. But you deserve more than that.”

“Are you leaving me?”

“No.” She stepped closer and wrapped her arms around his taut waist, resting her cheek against his drumming heart, the sound that had become so precious to her. “I’m telling you I’m in this. I’m going to put in the work to become the woman I see reflected in your eyes. You look at me like I’m beautiful. I’m not there yet, but someday, I will be.” Her voice dipped to a whisper. “I didn’t mess up after I left here. I couldn’t. All I could think about was you, and our kiss, and the way you said you love me.”

A slow, hopeful smile took his face. “Really?”

“Yeah. Recognizing Brighton and Denison threw me for a loop.”

Haydan snorted. “I could tell.”

Screwing up her face, she said, “About that. I’m really sorry for earlier in the woods. I wasn’t thinking straight.”

“You were panicking and hurt. Don’t waste an apology on something like that. Do you want to take a walk?”

“It’s the middle of the night.”

“And I want to get to know you. Brighton has struggled with what happened at that place…that Menagerie…for a long time. He didn’t start dealing with it at all until he met Everly. He was in that place for a few days. How long were you there for?”

It was scary admitting the depth of what had happened, especially to Haydan. She wanted him to continue to care for her, not pity her. But if she was going to commit to this—to healing and becoming the mate he deserved—she needed to be honest with him.

“Six years.”

“Shit,” Haydan said on a sigh. He pulled her against his side and led them toward a gate in the rickety fence that surrounded the trailer park. “I know it hurts to talk about, Cas. But I want to know everything.”

“Everything?” Her voice came out an octave too high and fearful.

Haydan leaned down and pressed his lips against hers. It was a soft kiss, a healing one. One that settled her panic and dumped warmth into her system. One that stilled her fidgeting and made her feel adored and taken care of. His mouth moved languidly against hers.

With a sigh, she wrapped her arms around his neck and melted against him. She’d always thought affection like this was for the weak, but she’d been wrong. Haydan was making her feel stronger.

He pulled away, but lifted his chin and sipped her lips again, and again. “I want to know you,” he murmured low. “Tell me everything.”

And so she did.

She told him about the Menagerie. Of how she’d been picked up when she was four and had grown up in an oversize cage, used for testing along with an array of other shifters. She told him of her frustration that she couldn’t remember her parents, and that’s why she was so attached to her last name, Belle. Her name was the only thing Reynolds let her keep from her old life.

She told him about how proud she was of her scars because Matt had always instilled in her that their scars were a reminder they were survivors. And then she’d told him about the day Brighton and Denison had come in. It was always saddest when new shifters were added to the Menagerie. More lives ruined and futureless. But Brighton and Denison had done something Matt, the only grizzly shifter in there, had been trying to for years. They Changed despite the medicines to subdue them and tore that place down one staff member at a time.

She told Haydan about the day they’d escaped with the others. How Matt, as the oldest, had raised them in an old abandoned RV out in the wilderness. He’d lied about his age, got a few jobs in town, and worked day and night to keep them fed. He’d even ordered homeschool books and made sure she and the eight other shifter kids continued their studies they’d begun in the Menagerie. And when they’d grown old enough, they started drifting away looking for groups of shifters with the same animals as them. She and Jake were both black bears, so it had been natural to go with him and find a safe place. A year after she’d joined the Red Claws, however, Matt had called and told her Tim was dead—Reynolds had tracked him down. Martin and Glen were next, and then Brady. One by one, her friends had been hunted until there was only her, Jake, and Matt remaining.

She’d waited for IESA to find her, but then the killing had stopped a couple years ago. That must’ve been when Brighton and Denison had killed Reynolds. They’d saved her a second time and hadn’t even known it.

Cassie told Haydan about her time with the Red Claws, the unfair rules, and her desperation to keep steady enough not to feel anything. Not the fear of being hunted or the memories of the tests that were run on her at the Menagerie. She didn’t even want to feel how much Jake had grown to resent her. He hadn’t loved her when he’d claimed her. It was just the natural way of things. He was broken, like Cassie and Matt were, and the only suitable mate would be someone who wouldn’t dig too deep and rile up his inner animal. Survival meant looking normal on the outside and keeping the inside as numb as possible.

“I wanted to hate you,” she said as the breeze lifted her long hair. “I wanted to feel nothing but disdain for you when Matt chose you for me, because that’s what had kept me even with Jake. I wanted the same claim I had with him. But then you became the most important part of my life instead.”

Haydan had been quiet the entire time she’d poured out her soul. It had taken hours, and now gray streaks of the coming dawn were peeking over the mountains.

“And how do you feel now?” he asked in a hoarse voice.

“Now, I feel everything. And it hurts, and I’m scared every minute, and I second guess every decision and every emotion, but maybe that’s okay. It’s better than feeling nothing at all.” She turned to him, stopping their walk along the deer path they’d found. “I could never hate you like I’d planned. You made me love you instead.”

“Say it again.”

She laughed thickly and looked him in the eyes so he could see the honesty of her words. “I love you, Haydan Walker.”

“Again.”

“I love you.”

A smile had transformed his face, and the inhuman silver color had faded from his eyes, leaving them a soft chocolate brown. The way he looked at her made her feel coveted and precious. “I’ve been waiting for you to say that.” He nodded his chin as a wicked glint sparked in his eyes. “Take your shirt off.”

Her eyes went round as she laughed. “What?”

“I’m gonna reward you with some boring-ass sex, princess. Now take that shirt off so I can admire those scars you earned.”

A soft squeal left her lips as she pulled her sweater over her hair. Oh, she knew it looked rough. Zebra stripe scars all over her body. Brighton’s, at least, were evenly marked and looked like body art down his one side, but her tissue samples had been done over six years, and now there wasn’t an un-marred strip of flesh left on her torso.

A soft rumble emanated from Haydan’s chest as he dropped to his knees in front of her. Even like this, his head was still to her chest. His hands slid around her waist as he studied her pale skin, crisscrossed with silver, aged scars. He didn’t look at her with pity or disdain, so she didn’t spare a blush for her mate who saw for the first time the history that had been etched into her skin.

“No one in the world looks like you,” he said on a breath. Leaning forward, he brushed his lips against a long stripe that covered her middle. “You’re beautiful.”

She inhaled deeply and raked her fingertips through his short, thick hair. “So are you.”

He reached around and unfastened her bra with a quiet snap. And now her nerves were kicking in, because she’d never actually invited someone to enjoy her intimate parts. She’d only wanted to be ravaged in the dark and then left alone. But Haydan was different, and feeling vulnerable in front of him felt right. He wouldn’t hurt her. He loved her.

She shrugged out of her bra and tossed it to the ground by her shirt. Without missing a beat, Haydan pulled one of her nipples into his mouth and sucked until her bud had tightened. Warmth flooded her middle, pooling between her legs as he moved to the other. Tongue laving, he adored her slowly, savoring her and taking his time to get to know her body.

Desperate to touch his skin, she pulled his sweater over his head and traced the curving shapes of his tattoo with her fingers as he trailed kisses over her scars.

Hot AF Haydan, but he was so much more than that.

A long, shaky breath left her as he pulled her boots off, then her jeans, then her panties, but never rushing, never taking his eyes off her skin.

The breeze was cold, and he ran his hands over the gooseflesh that appeared on her arms. Without a word, he wrapped his oversize sweater around her shoulders and pulled her down. Hooking her knees on each side of his hips, she kissed him. Feeling bold, she brushed her tongue past his lips and tasted him. The soft growl in his throat came back. God, he was perfect.

Hugging his neck, she pressed her chest against his, relishing in the feel of his warm skin touching hers. Haydan’s hips jerked under her, as if his control had slipped momentarily.

With a grin, she kissed him again and snuggled closer. His hips rolled slowly, the seam of his jeans brushing against her sex. “I want to feel you,” she said.

Haydan nodded and gripped the back of her neck with one hand as he kissed her deeply. With his other hand, he unfastened his jeans and shifted his weight, then pushed them down, unsheathing his long, thick erection.

Flooded with the need to be closer to him, she brushed up his length with her slick folds until the swollen head of his cock brushed her clit. Haydan’s breath came out in a quick pant, and his heart pounded against the palm of her hand when she placed it on his chest to see if he was as affected as she was. Rolling against him again, a soft moan escaped her lips. How could this feel so good? He wasn’t even inside of her yet.

Lifting off his lap, she pulled the head of his shaft to her entrance and settled down an inch, then lifted off him.

“Fuuck, princess,” he gritted out in a helpless voice.

Damn, this man empowered her. He didn’t care about her scars or her past. He didn’t care she’d wept for the last several hours as she’d opened up. None of that was a deal breaker for him.

He cared about her. She wasn’t just some hole to stick his dick in. She was his mate, and he wanted her because of the connection they shared. Because of their immovable bond that they’d somehow formed despite her many faults.

She slid onto him and groaned with how good he felt inside of her. She twitched up fast, then took him slow again. She loved not rushing. Sex with Haydan wasn’t something to get through so she could feel okay at the end. It was beautiful right now. Every moment with him held meaning.

Haydan grasped her waist and pulled her down harder, rolling his hips with the motion. His abs flexed as his powerful core worked to fill her over and over again.

Pressure expanded in her as the pleasure increased. “Haydan, Haydan,” she chanted in a whisper as she buried her face against his neck. She was so close.

“No,” he gritted out. “Look at me, Cas. I want you to see what you’re doing to me.” He lifted her and settled her on her back against the soft earth, covering her body with his as he drove into her again.

Bowing back against the leaves, she looked into his eyes. He was straining, muscles tensed like hers, close to release.

“Come with me,” he growled as his hips bucked faster.

He was so big, filling her, stretching her, hitting her sensitive spot just right. Unable to speak, she nodded and fought the urge to throw her head back and scream his name. So close. He slid into her again. Pressure, pressure, pressure. Tingling. Out of her, then back in. So good.