Snowbound (Arctic Station Bears Book 1) (8 page)

On the ground, Liam started to growl. “You…motherfucker. Ollie. I’ll kill…you.”

“What’s that, fearless leader? You won’t kill anything. Well, me, anyway. I can’t say the same for Allie though. See, I injected you with a new strain of TPV. Calder created it. Having had time to examine it, I can tell you that it’s beautiful. It’s made me strong. Look at what I did just a few minutes ago. Pheromones, can you believe it? I’m the alpha now, but the virus is going to awaken your full potential, Liam. You’re going to lose the battle of man versus beast. And then Allie is going to lose the battle of woman versus beast. You’re going to tear her apart with your teeth and claws, Liam.” He turned to leave.

“Ollie, you’re a fucking asshole. If Liam doesn’t kill you, I will.”

“Speaking of,” Ollie said. He took a thin black case out of his wallet. “The needle had some company in here.” He pulled out a piece of metal and tossed it toward me. It skittered across the floor. It was one of the silver scalpels. “I already used all of the silver nitrate in the lab injecting myself to buy Calder some time. You’ll have to make due with that. There’s still a few seconds to jam it into Liam’s heart before he shifts and kills you. Best of luck.” He left, and I heard the sound of something heavy being placed against the door.

I crawled over toward Liam. He was fighting the shift.

“Allie,” he said. “I can’t stop it. You’ve…got to get away. I don’t know what I’ll do.”

“I’m not afraid, Liam. I’ve dealt with worse than this. I dated Ollie’s stupid ass for a long time.”

He laughed. It must have hurt like hell.

Then he started to shift. His back and arms cracked and reshaped. Liam screamed in pain.

I held his head in my hands. His eyes, which were a piercing blue, were now brown. “You can beat this, Liam. You’re a fucking
alpha
. Your blood is stronger than his.”

Liam screamed again as bones in his legs cracked and reformed. “Tr — trying,” he said.

“Try harder, dammit! I can’t lose you.”

“The…scalpel.”

Tears streamed down my face. I didn’t even realize I’d been holding it.

“You have to…in my heart, Allie. Please. I…don’t want to hurt…you.”

And then in an instant, I knew who I was. I knew what I had been running from. I unbuttoned my pants and ripped them down. I could feel Liam changing underneath my hands when I put them on his chest and sat astride him. I reached behind me and gripped his cock. It responded, and I gently stroked him until he was fully hard.

“Al…Allie,” Liam said. “What are…you doing?”

“Look at me,” I said, and took him into the deepest part of myself in more ways than one. Our eyes locked as I began to move. Fated mates. I’d read all about the idea, but never thought for a moment that I could be one myself. An ancient source of power for both alpha and his mate. I could feel him behind my eyes. In my soul. Deep in my sex. It was terrifying. It was heartbreaking. It was exhilarating.

“Allie.” Liam’s eyes had begun to clear. He gripped my ass with powerful hands and began to match my rhythm. His hands ran up my back to my hair. He pulled my face to his. Our kiss was like nothing I’d ever felt before. If it was possible, it was even better than his cock inside me. Our tongues touched. Gently at first. Then with more hunger. Then with absolute
need
.

Liam wrapped his hands around my back and pulled my close. He pushed deeper inside me than I thought was possible and held it there, just slightly moving his hips. He was stirring me up, and I ground my clit against his pelvis. I cried out as I lost myself in an orgasm. He growled deeply and happily in my ear. Then he started to move again and I thought I would die from the pleasure. My breasts pressed against his chest as he held me. I never wanted to leave this spot. I never wanted to move.

“Allie,” Liam said. His voice was gravel and power. I pressed my hands against his chest to steady myself and met his gaze. His eyes were completely clear. The shift that had begun had reversed. He was rock hard inside me. I knew he was getting close. There was nothing that I wanted more than to feel him cum inside me.

He suddenly grabbed my ass and arched his back. I could feel his warm seed fill me, but he would not stop. He pulled his length nearly all the way out of me, then back inside. Shallow at first, then deeper. I knew I was coming to cum again. His thumb pressed against my clit as he moved his cock in me.
How is he still so hard?
. Then my own orgasm hit me like a caressing punch, and suddenly I was afraid. I lost myself for a moment and crying out his name was the only tether keeping me from unravelling completely. I nearly sobbed at the intensity of the joy.

Liam pulled me close and I slowly came back to myself. So dizzy. So different. Everything was so different now. There was something about this man. The thought of getting up and breaking contact with him filled me with sadness so sweet that I felt tears well up. Every gasp of breath brought a new picture of a future together. A fantasy of what might be.
What the hell is wrong with me?
I was losing my mind. I was
happy
being alone. Thrilled, even. I loved my life. And yet my skin on his told me that my old life was over and I would never be alone again.

We held each other for what seemed like a long time. An eternity. But was probably just a few seconds.

He stroked my back. “Are you okay?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I said. “Something…happened just now. I…”
What? What was it?
My instincts told me I was in love, but I don’t fall in love. And definitely not with some dude I’ve known less than a week. It felt like fate.

Oh shit. I pushed myself up on my hands and looked into his smiling face. Some deep part of me threw a tantrum as my skin pulled away from his.

“It feels like fate,” I said. I didn’t think it was possible, but Liam’s smile grew wider.

“Thank God,” he said. “I thought I was the only one.”

My mind was racing. My
heart
was racing. “And it’s okay? I feel like I’m going crazy.”

“You’re not going crazy. You know shifters have mates—”

“I know
of
it.”

“I think you might be mine.” He brushed the hair out of my eyes.

God, my hair must be a mess, I thought
.

“Relax. You look beautiful,” he said. “I just…wasn’t expecting to ever meet my fated mate. I just thought it was a thing shifters told themselves to keep from feeling alone.”

I smiled. “I’ve only read about it in books, so you know more about it than I do. I don’t think either of us is alone anymore.” Just saying the words out loud terrified me and calmed me at the same time. I guess I couldn’t discount insanity just yet.

I stood up, trying to hold in his seed. I wasn’t ready to let him go completely just yet. Our clothes were all over the place, and I found mine in a nearly useless order. Socks. Sweater. Pants. Bra. Where the hell were my panties? Liam was slow to dress, not that I minded, and we didn’t talk much. We just stared at each other a few times until we both started to giggle from the awkwardness.

“Aren’t you going to get dressed?” I asked.

Liam walked to the door and pressed on it with all of his strength. The way the muscles in his back and ass flexed made me wish I was slower to dress as well.

“Nothing,” Liam said. “We’re trapped in here.”

“Is there any other way out?”

“Just the drains in the floor. We’re not getting out that way.”

“So what do we do? Can you force the door? What if we pushed it together?”

The cold steel of the door was like a wet blanket after touching his warm chest. Even the two of us combined couldn’t budge the door.

“We’ve got to warn the others,” he said. For a second, I thought he was talking to the door, like he was trying to reason with it.

“What are you thinking?”

“I think you need to stand back. I’m going to shift and I don’t really know what is going to happen.”

“I think that if you shift and lose control I’m pretty fucked anyway. I’ll just stay here.”

“At least pick up the scalpel.”

I conceded the argument. We didn’t have time for debate. I clutched the scalpel and came back to stand by him.

“Here we go,” he said. He did not step out of his skin like I was expecting, but rather started to shift like Calder. His bones cracked and reformed. Fur sprang from his flesh. Claws erupted from the tips of his fingers and toes.

“Hurts,” he said. His voice was strange. More guttural. He fell to his hands and knees and completed the shift. A gigantic polar bear now stood in front of me. I could not help myself. I reached my hand out and touched his fur. So warm.
Did you really expect a polar bear to be cold?
Shut up, brain.

He turned and looked at me with deep brown eyes. When he took a step toward me, I almost held out the scalpel like a deterrent. Compared to the size of the bear, I might as well have been holding a toothpick, anyway. He nuzzled me with his giant head. I stroked his fur. Then he sort of…I don’t know. Herded me? He pushed me with his nose, again and again, moving me away from the door. Then a lightbulb came on.
You want me to move away from the door. Right.
I got underneath a table on the other side of the room and away from any of the aquariums should anything go wrong.

Liam roared and charged at the door, slamming his massive weight against it. It cracked open a few inches. Liam stood and shook his head.

“That’s it!” I said. “One more time, Liam.”

The bear crossed the room and rushed the door again. This time the door didn’t just give a few inches. It fucking
exploded
. As in came off of its hinges. The
metal!
table that had been propped in front of the door handles was a twisted mess.

Liam sat down, content with himself, like the only thing he needed to do was get the door open. As I walked over, he started to shift again. Fur and claws receded. His bones cracked and reshaped. In a few moments he was human again.

“You know,” he said. “It
does
hurt more, especially if you fight it, but I could get used to not having to eat my own skin.” I helped him to his feet. “I was also able to think as the bear, which I’ve never been able to do before.”

I brought him his clothes and he dressed. When I handed him his shirt, he grabbed my wrist. “Allie, wait. I just wanted to say…thank you. My fated mate. I totally have no idea what to expect now. I didn’t even know someone like you was even out there.”

“I know,” I said. “I don’t know where this is going, but I’m excited.”

“You brought me back. I thought I was going to lose control. I was so afraid that I was going to hurt you.”

“You didn’t know that my pussy is fucking magical?” I said. “Now let’s go get that asshole.”

T
he bear proved to be a disappointment after all. Letting his personal feelings get in the way of the plan. The female was not to be harmed. No matter. The bear had failed to injure either of them anyway. Calder considered killing the alpha now, but he didn’t want to chance fighting fated mates at the same time. The female may not recognize her power yet, and the alpha may not recognize the extent of his, but it was better not to leave things to chance. Calder watched both the alpha and the female as they ran back to the common area.

Calder carried an axe down the hall in the opposite direction. The bears may have decided against contacting anyone in the outside world, but Calder would ensure that they wouldn’t be disturbed once the games began. He opened the door marked “Comms” and proceeded to smash all of the important components. He cut wires and sparks flew. Destroying the equipment was actually therapeutic, since what he really wanted to do was take the axe to his agent for forcing him to alter his plan. It wouldn’t kill him, but it would definitely hurt.

Calder had left quite a few surprises for the bears as well. There would be no escape and no one would be coming to help them. He had waited too long for an opportunity like this. He’d crossed the span of time and been given another chance. He wouldn’t let it go to waste.