The Mating Season: A Paranormal Shifter Romance (13 page)

“We can’t stay long, eh? I have one bitch of a mound of paperwork to fill out because of the fire. Most of it is for Rusty and Betty’s insurance agent. But the RCMP wants their copies. as well.” Tony sighed. It seemed as if his days of being the police chief of a sleepy town were behind him. With Smiley running around as the prime suspect, he had to do as much as he could to keep his community safe. He failed once, he wouldn’t fail again.

As they got in the truck, Keith noticed that his cousin seemed deeply troubled. “Hey, what’s up?” he asked as Tony turned the ignition.

Tony closed his eyes, his narrow face marked with pain. “I fucked up at my job today,” he said through gritted teeth. He was furious with himself. “I forgot to charge my phone and when the town needed me I wasn’t there.”

“Hey, it could have happened to anyone,” Keith consoled his cousin as he pulled out of the driveway. “I forget to charge my phone all the time. Boy, does it piss off my clients sometimes.”

“That’s different. People don’t die when websites go down.”

Keith couldn’t argue with that. He looked out the window and took in the snow-capped peaks of the Canadian Rockies that cut into the dark blue sky of summer and spent the rest of the 45 minute drive in silence, as Tony took them towards St. George in his beat up old pickup. He hoped Kim wasn’t too badly injured after Junior tackled her when the building erupted in flames. That kid didn’t know his own strength half the time, but in that instance, it saved Kim’s life. She didn’t need to know about the shards of glass and wood that narrowly missed impaling her as the store’s windows exploded.

*

Kim woke up in the uncomfortable hospital bed with a splitting headache. The astringent smell of the facility caused her to gag. She grabbed for the kidney shaped dish on the table next to her and retched into it. She reached for the nurse call button to let them know she was awake.

A short, matronly nurse entered her room. Her mousey brown hair was greying and she was somewhat chubby. “How are you feeling now, dear?” she asked.

“Head hurts like a motherfucker,” Kim replied, “And I puked again.”

“Oh, I’ll get rid of that,” the nurse said as she grabbed the vile dish and took it to the small bathroom. “There we go,” she said after she exited the privy. “Now let me take your vitals, and a neurologist will be in to see you soon to check on you. You might need a CT scan just to see if there’s any real damage done to that noggin of yours.”

Kim nodded, wincing with the motion. The nurse took her blood pressure and oxygen levels, while drawing blood from Kim’s other arm. “Oh, can I get something for this headache?” she asked. “I don’t want to wake up puking again.”

“That’s not a problem, dear. I’ll go nag the neurologist to see you right away. He doesn’t like doing evaluations on people under medication for some reason, and there’s no reason for you to suffer.”

“Thanks,” Kim replied. She lay back down in bed, hoping to get a little more sleep, but the throbbing in her head made that nearly impossible. She also had to go to the bathroom really badly.

“Umm, before you go, can you help me to the bathroom?” she asked.

The nurse smiled and nodded. “Actually, you aren’t allowed out of bed but I can grab a bed pan for you, hang on.”

Kim was mortified that she had to use a bedpan, but it made sense since they didn’t know how bad her concussion was.

The nurse instructed her on how to use the medical device, then left her to it. The nurse handed Kim a washcloth to clean herself after relieving herself and took the full receptacle and emptied it in the toilet. “Now, you try to get some rest, I’ll see if the neurologist can make it down here in the next few minutes or so.”

“Thanks,” Kim replied, closing her eyes. “Can you turn the lights off, too, please? It makes everything ten times worse.”

“Not a problem, dear,” the nurse said solicitously as she turned the lights off and closed the door to the spartan hospital room.

Kim tried not to cry as she remembered the flash of fire that erupted at the exact moment she was tackled to the ground. She knew the general store was long gone, probably nothing left except a pile of ash and cinders. She cursed Tony for not having his phone on, he could have done something if his phone wasn’t dead at the time.

She was startled out of her thoughts by a soft knock at the door. A crack of light appeared and a stocky Middle Eastern Man popped in. “I’m Doctor Ahmed, may I come in? I’m the neurologist.”

“Sure,” Kim replied, “Is this going to take long? I really need something for the pain.”

“Don’t worry, I just want to check if you need to go up for a CT scan. If you just have a minor concussion, we can give you pain medication and send you home and have someone observe you for a few days.”

Kim nodded as the neurologist began his examination of her. He poked her feet, made her grip his hands and other tests to check her motor skills. He then shone a light in her eyes and made her track it. The bright light felt like an ice pick entering her brain. She tried not to wince but he had to repeat it a few more times because of her pain reaction.

The doctor finished his examination and checked Kim’s medical file. “Your X-rays show no fractures so you’re okay on that end. Seems that you only have a mild concussion, luckily enough. You’ll still need to be observed, especially after we give you pain medication. You’ll stay here overnight until the pain goes away and you’ll be good to go,” he stated brusquely as he left Kim’s room, closing the door behind him.

Kim sunk back down onto the hard hospital mattress and tried to snooze. Sleep was hard to come by until the nurse came in and injected something into her IV line. Her headache faded and she closed her eyes and fell asleep.

Two hours later, she was roused by the nurse to do a wellness check. She did a rudimentary neurological exam to check how cognizant she was, and checked her vitals. “So, you have some visitors, do you feel up to see them?”

“Sure.” She had a feeling it was either Tony or Keith along with Rusty. She secretly hoped it wasn’t Tony, since she wasn’t exactly thrilled with him right now. Sure, mistakes can happen but this one almost cost people their lives; it most definitely cost them their livelihoods.

She was surprised to see both Keith and Tony shuffle into her hospital room. Keith was carrying a bouquet of roses, and Tony had a Mylar balloon with a picture of a teddy bear and well wishes on it.

Keith cleared his throat. “Hey, how are you feeling?” he asked as he placed the vase of roses on the table next to her bed.

“Like shit. Can you tell me what the fuck happened? Who knocked me down?”

“Junior did,” Keith replied. “The glass exploded and would have hit you if you kept going forward. He didn’t get too badly hurt, just some of his fur got singed.”

“That’s good, and thank him for me, please,” Kim said, her speech was slightly slurred due to the pain medication to keep her headache at bay.

“Smiley got away, and the store was a write off, I’m afraid,” Tony filled her in. “But don’t worry, I’ll catch that son of a bitch if it’s the last thing I do.” Tony’s voice was filled with restrained anger; he still hadn’t stopped kicking himself over what had transpired that day. “Look, I’m sorry, I thought I had my phone plugged in, but I guess I didn’t. Sometimes on my days off I have a few beers. Guess I had one too many last night.”

Kim looked at him and noticed tears swimming in his dark eyes. “It happens to everyone.” She felt better, knowing he was being harder on himself than she would have been if she were in her right mind.

Tony nodded glumly. He’d be kicking himself for a long time over this. “Anyway, how long do you think you’ll be in here?”

“Doctors want to observe me overnight and then I can go home. Has to do with the medication and the concussion. The whole sleepy thing.”

Keith nodded. “It makes sense. My truck should be out of the shop by tomorrow so I can come pick you up, if that’s okay with you.”

“Yeah, I think it’s a good idea. Tony you drove down, right? Don’t want you using any more gas than you have to,” Kim said

Tony had to agree. As much as he was smitten by Kim, he needed to keep his truck tanked up for emergencies.

The nurse popped her head into the room. “Visiting hours are almost finished, you should start getting a move on now. She’ll be here in the morning.”

The two men looked at each other awkwardly. Then they both bent down and gave Kim a kiss on the top of her raven hair. “We’ll see you tomorrow,” Tony said as he started out the door, emotion showing on his chiseled face. “And I’m sorry for what happened. It won’t happen again, I promise.” He turned on his heel and waited in the hallway for Keith to say his piece.

“Hey, don’t be too hard on Tony. He’s really kicking himself over the general store thing.” Keith felt a need to defend his cousin, for some strange reason. “Really, you need to get some rest, and I’ll come pick you up in the morning. Rusty and Betty are fine, so is Junior. Insurance will cover the cost to rebuild the store so you’ll have a job in a few months, tops. We’re all pitching in on it.”

Kim perked up a little bit, since she had been mourning the fate of the little general store. Those kinds of stores were a dying breed in general, usually replaced by big box stores in short order, but the companies didn’t bother sending a box store up to Predator Springs, it was too small, sleepy and remote. It wasn’t worth the investment. Luckily, the fire happened in the summer so everything could be fixed as quickly as possible, in time for the youngling’s first transformation, not to mention the mating ceremony. Poor Rusty and Betty had quite a bit on their plates before the fire, now it was just adding more stress to their twilight years.

Keith touched her hand before he left the room. His soft face shone with love for the injured woman. He sincerely hoped she would pick him over Tony. Either way, she had to pick or they both would turn into their animal forms forever.

Kim lay back down on the hospital bed, exhausted from the combination of the medication and the visit. She wanted to keep her composure around both men, and after they had left, she lost it. She began crying hysterically as the day’s events finally hit her.

The nurse heard her sobbing and came in the room. “Are you okay? Did those men say or do anything to you?”

Kim blew her nose into a Kleenex that she had pulled from the box next to her bed. “No, neither one said or did anything to make me cry. It’s just... everything that happened today started to hit me.”

The nurse sat down on the side of Kim’s bed. “Musta been one hell of a day. Wanna tell me what happened?”

“Well my crazy psycho ex decided to try to kill me, or fuck with my head, one or the other. He killed my family a few months back... he still hasn’t been caught.” Kim explained to the matronly nurse. “He hasn’t been caught by the cops yet. Anyway, he showed up at the store the other day, threatened to kill me but my co-worker kept it from happening. My ex fled before the cops could arrive. He is slipperier than an eel, I swear. Then today, I guess he didn’t know we were closed Sundays, so he burnt the general store down, hoping to either kill me or someone close to me.”

The nurse’s eyes widened. “That’s one hell of a day,” she said, in awe. “If I were you I’d be doing a lot more than just crying, but I guess you can’t with the painkillers for that headache and all.”

“No shit, eh?” Kim replied sardonically.

The nurse stood up, “I’ll let you get some sleep. You’re gonna need it. Tomorrow you’ll be allowed out if that headache gets better. You sleep well.”

Kim grunted in response, rolled over, closed her eyes, and sunk into the dreamless sleep that painkillers can give.

CHAPTER EIGHT

The next day, Keith showed up to take Kim home from the hospital. He wheeled her out to his truck in an old squeaky wheelchair. Kim rose unsteadily from the chair and climbed into the cab of the dark blue truck with Keith’s help. She was still disoriented from her concussion and the pain medication she was on for the headache it caused, but the neurologist had determined there was no serious damage, so she could go home, as long as someone stayed with her to observe her.

Keith closed the passenger door and brought the wheelchair back to the hospital entrance where a tired looking security guard took it and put it back to its original place. Keith then opened up the driver’s side door, hopped in and buckled up.

They drove back to Predator Springs in silence. Kim placed her hand on Keith’s leg in a gesture of affection. Her head swam in a haze of injury and drugs from the fall.

Keith kept looking at her with concern out of the corner of his eye. “You know, the doctor said you needed to have someone with you,” he said.

“Mmhmm,” Kim replied drowsily, her speech slurred. “You wanna be that person?”

“I would very much like to be. Tony is busy with the arson investigation, so he can’t do it. We kinda agreed on it last night that it should be me,” Keith said as he drove the winding Rocky Mountain roads.

Kim nodded. “I’m glad. You know, I wish I could help more around the town. All my shit’s been causing everyone problems. I...”

“It’s okay. We’ll catch him. Once we do, everything will get back to normal,” Keith assured her. “Betty came over and finished canning your stuff, by the way.”

“Wow. That was nice of her.”

“Yeah, she said she needed something to take her mind off of what happened, so she puttered around in your garden and kitchen all day yesterday.”

Kim looked at Keith. The fog in her brain was slowly fading for some reason. Maybe the medication was beginning to wear off, who knew.

“Umm, Keith,” she began; the fog might not be there, but for some reason her verbal impulse control went out the window.

“Yeah?”

“I have a bit of a question, I know we’ve slept together a few times already, but you don’t want me to see your dick or anything.” She was careful not to mention that Tony didn’t want her seeing his, either.

“Oh, yeah...umm, it’s complicated.” Keith tried to evade the line of questioning.

“It’s not like you’re small, because it certainly doesn’t feel that way when we’re fucking.”

“No, that’s not it...” Keith began.

“I’m not scared of uncut dicks.”

“Not that either...”

“Then what is it?” Kim pressed.

Keith let out a huge sigh. “Well, since you’re going to be mated to either Tony or myself, I figure I’ll break it to you gently when we get home, how’s that?”

“Sounds like a plan,” Kim said with a grin. “I might make your show and tell pretty fun, if you let me.”

Keith let out a strained smile. Their anatomy looked like the normal male anatomy when flaccid. It was when arousal kicked in, that’s when the appearance began to differ.

Kim dozed off during the long drive back to the sleepy little town. It had seen more excitement since she arrived than they’d had since the band moved from Central Canada to the Rockies long ago, and she felt bad for shaking their little world to its foundation.

Keith placed a warm, sensitive hand gently on her leg to rouse her from her doze. “Hey, we’re home,” he gently whispered.

Kim mumbled and wiped a bit of drool from her chin. Totally not sexy, she thought, but right now she didn’t feel particularly sexy, anyway. She just wanted to sleep this blasted head injury off, despite doctor’s orders to stay as alert as she could.

Keith helped her into her house. Kim noticed it was absolutely immaculate, better than when she left it when she was unceremoniously dumped into the hospital with a closed head injury. He noticed her appreciating the tidied house. “Yeah, Betty and I cleaned it up a bit.”

“Thanks, I was going to get to that but...” she trailed off. But Smiley. But being with Keith. But being with Tony. All sorts of “buts” got in the way of her having a decently normal life right now. Heck, she promised Betty she would sit in and take in the lessons the two young shifter girls have to go through, not to mention the preparations for the mating ceremony. Yeah, she’ll need to go through some kind of ritual for that, probably. That might be covered in the girl’s coming of age prep. Who knows?

While Kim was channel surfing on the couch, Keith darted over to his house to pick up his Xbox. He didn’t want to be sitting at Kim’s house with not much to do, so he figured he could hook his games up to her TV and play a bit while she recovered. He really had no plans on having sex with her while she was recovering from her concussion.

Kim, on the other hand, had her curiosity piqued when Keith was trying to evade the direct questions regarding his anatomy. With her impulse control temporarily gone due to the head injury, she was feeling bolder than ever.

When he returned, she smiled warmly at him; it almost felt natural to have him there. She leaned back on the futon and flicked through the channels, hoping to find something worthwhile for her to watch so she could stay conscious and alert.

Keith took the remote out of her hand and placed it on the table. “Hey, I brought something that might help you a bit better than the idiot box,” he coaxed.

“Hmm?” she asked, looking around.

“Yeah, I went over to grab my Xbox. Figured gaming would help keep you from crashing.” He bent over to plug it into the television.

“Sweet, thanks,” Kim said as she appreciated the view of Keith’s posterior as he busied himself with sorting out which wires went into which plugs. She made the decision that she was going to see his junk come hell or high water. Hell, if she was going to be with at least him or Tony for the rest of her life, she might as well see the goods.

After he was finished, he switched the console on and sat down, grabbing a controller on the way. He sat close to Kim, allowing their hips to touch. He wanted to be close to her that day. The loss of the general store hurt, but the thought of almost losing her hurt way more. If Junior hadn’t acted when he did, Kim most certainly would be dead.

He handed the controller to Kim. “If you have a Microsoft account you can log in and play on your own file.”

“Sweet. I hope I can remember it.” She wouldn’t let him try to distract her from what she really wanted to do. She loaded up a game and began to play through the story.

After about an hour, the battery to the wireless controller began to die. “Well, looks like this is done for right now,” Kim said as she put the controller on the table. “It was pretty fun.”

She yawned, “But I think this is all I can handle for right now. I really need to sleep, my head is killing me.” She lied.

Keith looked concerned as she stood up. “Are you sure it’s smart to sleep on your own?” he asked. “Like, I can go in and...”

“I was kinda hoping for that, to be honest.” Kim said with a sly grin.

“No, no, not to have sex, you’re still injured.”

“Bah,” Kim scoffed. “My head is what was knocked, not anything else, but if that’s what you feel, who am I to argue. It’s not every day a guy actually shows a bit of respect and turns down a sick woman’s advances.”

Keith laughed. “Yeah, you’re right, it’s just that it wouldn’t feel right.”

“I know. C’mon, cuddle bug, let’s go to the room and have some sleep. I know it’s like only four o’clock, but damn, I can’t handle being awake another second.”

Keith nodded with a grin on his soft face as he followed Kim into the master bedroom. Kim took off her clothes and lay down in the bed, nude.

Keith took in the sight with appreciative eyes. Maybe he was foolish for turning down her offer. Nah, not really, she wasn’t in her full mind, so it would feel wrong to him. What if she regretted it afterward? What if it meant she would pick Tony instead because of him raping her? That’s what it would feel like to him, anyway.

Keith took off his shirt and jeans, leaving his boxers on, and laid down in bed next to Kim, wrapping his strong arms around her. He buried his face in her raven tresses and took a deep breath, inhaling her sweet scent.

“Keith?” Kim asked. “Where do your clothes go when you shift?” She was genuinely curious, and Keith seemed to be the only one out of both him and Tony willing to actually talk about shifting and all the stuff that went along with it.

“Well,” he began, “it’s part of the magic, I guess. It goes into some kind of quantum state. It’s there, but it’s not. It’s called 'between' if you want to know what we call it. It sure has prevented some embarrassing situations, that’s for sure.”

Even science-minded Keith couldn’t understand where the clothes went when they shifted into the form of the great mountain lion spirit. “Honestly, I think they just get phase-shifted with our physical bodies. We haven’t figured out how the shifting procedure works, to be honest, not on a scientific level. It’s just magic for now.”

Kim dropped off to sleep as Keith was trying to figure out for himself the long lasting mystery behind the shifting community. He nuzzled her neck and settled in for a bit of a cat nap himself. He would cook her some dinner when they woke up.

A few hours later, Kim roused herself from a deep slumber, feeling somewhat refreshed. She looked at the clock and noticed it was around eight in the evening. Keith was still passed out cold next to her. She looked down and noticed he had an erection and got an idea.

She moved her hand into his boxers and felt his warm, fleshy manhood. She felt the foreskin move under her hand as she pulled up towards the glans, but as she moved her hand down, it was stopped by what felt like rigid barbs. Not sharp, but enough to give her hand some resistance as she jerked him off slowly in his sleep.

Keith mumbled in his sleep and rolled over onto his back, giving Kim full access to pull down his dark blue boxer shorts.

She gingerly tugged the waistband down and freed Keith’s manhood from its confinement. She took a good look at the engorged sex organ and gasped.

Keith’s sex was roughly eight and a half inches long, fully erect. It was tan, just like he was, except for the glans, when exposed by pulling back the foreskin, was a deep reddish-purple. What made her gasp however wasn’t the size of the member, but the fleshy protrusions on the shaft. When stroked one way, her hand glided along the hot shaft without a problem. When she pushed down, however, her hand caught on them, making it difficult to give him a hand job without fear of hurting him.

She looked up and noticed he was still asleep. She smiled to herself and was feeling rather naughty, which caused her to feel this was an extreme turn-on. She lowered her head, and enveloped Keith’s cock in her warm, moist mouth.

Keith’s eyes flew open as he felt Kim’s mouth encase his manhood. He groaned as he tried to pull her head away from him. He was overwhelmed with a surge of desire as he felt her hot tongue dart around his sensitive glans.

Kim had to adjust her technique due to the anatomical differences of Keith’s manhood, and she definitely didn’t want him cumming in her mouth. As educational as it would be to witness the whole thing in action, she really didn’t want to go back to the emergency room, with Keith firmly lodged in her mouth. That would be incredibly awkward to explain to the staff.

She decided to stay near the head while giving Keith pleasure. He was groaning and trying not to buck his hips. He observed Kim through hooded eyes as she gently sucked and teased his erect cock.

Kim’s sex was throbbing and wet. She needed to feel Keith inside her soon. He wasn’t the type to be selfish in bed, so she knew she would also get her turn. Who knows, he was young and virile enough that she might be able to get two rounds out of him before the night was through.

She pulled her mouth off of Keith’s rock hard manhood and rested her head on his soft belly. She played with his sex with her hands for a bit, observing how the skin moved and how the barbs flared out a little bit with each downwards stroke. She was fascinated, not in a humiliating way, but in a way to learn to accept the differences.

Keith’s chest flooded with love as Kim unquestioningly accepted him in all ways. As her mouth closed around his hot cock once again, he let out a loud moan. “Oh god, Kim, I told you I didn’t want you to...”

“Shh...It’s okay, really,” she said after briefly pulling his cock out of her mouth. “I want to. I wanted to see, and I want to do this. You’ve done so much for me, it’s the least I can do. I know you won’t leave me hanging anyway.” She winked at him.

Keith laughed and lay back down. “Alright then, have it your way. Just try not to go too deep. I don’t know how it’ll work if you do.”

Kim smiled as she continued with the blowjob. Her tongue swirled around the head of Keith’s penis; she sucked on it, stroked it and concentrated just on the tip.

Keith was in ecstasy. He held her raven tresses up off her face so he could watch her full lips embrace him in the most intimate and accepting manner. With his other hand, he tried to nudge her bottom towards his own head.