Mated to Four Werebears_A Paranormal Reverse Harem Romance Page 9

  “That is so dumb.” Diana shook her head as she returned to her work. “Ever since I decided that I’m staying on the island, everything has gotten so much more complicated. I thought it’d get easier, not harder.”

  Bobby helped her straighten the top sheet, then reached across the bed to capture her. He pulled her onto it and rolled over her. Diana laughed and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. He burned with desire for her, gently grinding himself against her. Her fingers ran down his spine.

  “Maybe it only seems more complicated,” he said, trying to ignore his growing desire. Being near her was only more intense now that they had made love. He was glad that she had enjoyed it as much as he had. “It might be because you’re more emotionally invested now. The small cracks . . . they seem bigger.”

  Diana shook her head. “There is nothing small about the crack between Ricky and Kurtis. And now I’m angry at both of them, but I keep trying to pull Ricky in closer and push Kurtis away. I don’t know what I’m doing.”

  He pressed his lips lightly to hers. It was a mistake — it almost made him forget what he had been about to say. He rolled off her and gave her an apologetic smile. “Hey, it’s okay. You don’t know what you’re doing, I don’t know what I’m doing . . . None of us know what we’re doing, but we’re working at it. It’s not going to be easy. We’re trying to change the way things have been done for generations,” he added. “It’s not going to get better overnight.”

  “You’re right . . . I just wish I could see progress.”

  Bobby ran his hands up her sides. Before he could reassure her that there was progress, though, she jumped up suddenly. “Shit! I’m supposed to meet Ruby and go shopping. I’m already late. Shit!”

  Bobby had to laugh at that. For some reason, hearing her swear was possibly the funniest thing he’d ever heard.

  He promised to put her bed together and wash the other sheets while she ran around to get ready. She was gone within a few moments. He finished taking care of her room and then started the load of laundry. There wasn’t anything for him to do with his clan at the moment, so he retreated to his room.

  The necklace he was making for her was one that he had been trying to get right for weeks. He had finally made the pendant just right. It was a tiny hourglass with black sands from his beach, set into delicate gold filigree. He had planned to have it just on a chain, but it didn’t look quite right. So he was making a new gold chain with two loose chains hanging from it to look like a collar. He didn’t want to go too fancy but didn’t want it to be too plain, either.

  He hoped that she’d wear it when they married.

  As he was crimping two chains together, the door was flung open. Kurtis stomped in. Bobby blinked in surprise, then stood to greet the other alpha.

  “What can I do for you?”

  “What are you doing here?”

  Bobby rose a brow. “Excuse me?”

  “What are you doing here?” Kurtis repeated. He poked Bobby in the chest. “You don’t belong here. You’re not an alpha. You don’t belong here.”

  The hair on the back of Bobby’s neck rose and his bear growled. He kept himself calm, though. “I am an alpha. I was elected to lead my clan, which makes me an alpha. Just because I didn’t inherit the position and just because we’ve made our own clan doesn’t make us any less a clan of this island than the rest of you. Now, as I already asked, what can I do for you?”

  Kurtis sneered. He brought a bottle to his lips and Bobby smelled beer. Not enough to get a bear really drunk, but if it was one of Kurtis’ special brews, it could get him pretty tipsy. Anger rolled off of him like a storm coming off the ocean. “If you were a real alpha, you’d be defending yourself, but you’re not.” He poked him again. “You just back down like the weak spineless shit you are. You don’t stand your ground for anything, do you?”

  “Kurtis, I understand that you are upset. Diana is angry with you and that’s hard to deal with. Especially since she refuses to talk to you.” Bobby kept his voice calm, even though his bear was snarling at him to attack. “But coming after me isn’t going to make you feel better. I’m not the reason she’s angry with you.”

  Kurtis snorted. “Oooh, look at that. Mr. ‘Talk Them Down.’ What do I care about your psychoanalysis? You’re weak. Pathetic. If you weren’t afraid of me, you’d have already taken a swing.”

  Bobby rolled his eyes. “I don’t have to go around trying to bully people in order to prove myself a man. Don’t think that I don’t know why you came to me, Kurtis. You think I’m weak. That’s why you are trying to provoke me so that you can beat me up and prove yourself to yourself. It’s only making you weaker. Now, if you’ll excuse me—”

  “You little shit!”

  Kurtis swung at him. Bobby ducked. Then he brought his feet in an uppercut to Kurtis’ jaw. As the other alpha reeled, Bobby flung himself around Kurtis’ waist and drove him back like a football player grappling with his opponent.

  Just because he didn’t rise to the bait didn’t mean he wouldn’t defend himself.

  With a shout, Kurtis dropped his bottle of beer. He brought his elbow down into Bobby’s back. Pain exploded from him and Bobby was forced to release his grasp on the other alpha. Kurtis made to punch him in the stomach as he pulled back, but Bobby spun out of the way and jabbed two stiffened fingers into Kurtis’ throat. Kurtis choked, reached for him — Bobby sunk one fist into his stomach, then pulled back and punched the other in.

  Kurtis hunched over, wheezing. Bobby backed off a few feet and watched him. His bear snarled and growled, but he kept himself under control.

  “You think you’re clever?” Kurtis gasped out. “I’m going to put you in your place.”

  He came at Bobby again. Bobby punched him in the face, but this time it didn’t do much; Kurtis’ eyes were black, fur coating his body, hands turned to claws, though the rest of him remained human. Clawed hands grabbed Bobby’s arms and he drove his face into Bobby’s. Bobby felt something crack and he tried to stumble away, but Kurtis held him too tight, then punched him in the stomach over and over again—

  “Stop that!”

  The blows stopped and Bobby stumbled into the wall. He sagged against it, gasping for breath. Ricky wrestled Kurtis away from him. Kurtis turned on him, punching him hard in the face, but then Noel was there. He yanked Kurtis’ hands behind his back and threw him to the ground. Between Ricky and Noel, Kurtis was pinned to the ground. He thrashed and growled, but eventually grew still. His chest heaved. He was all human again.

  Bobby shook his head. Was this the only way he knew how to deal with his emotions? Not for the first time, Bobby was glad he wasn’t raised as an alpha. It seemed to be a very unhealthy way to live.

  “What is going on here?” Noel sounded positively delighted. “Was that Robert Frazier fighting? Damn, Kurtis. What did you say? Did you insult some of his jewelry?”

  Bobby rolled his eyes. “Seriously? You’d think I would fight over something that stupid? He attacked me, I defended myself. That’s all there is to it. Just because I don’t look for an excuse to fight doesn’t mean I won’t when the situation calls for it.”

  Kurtis hissed and spat, seemingly too incensed for words.

  “And I feel obligated to point out that this sort of behavior is going to drive Diana away,” Bobby added. “Listen . . . this is new for all of us, but we have to work together.”

  “I don’t have to do anything,” Kurtis hissed. “I make my own choices.”

  “But you do want this to work, don’t you?” Bobby narrowed his eyes. Kurtis looked away, as did Ricky and Noel. A chill ran down his spine. “What, am I the only one who told Diana the truth? I want this to work. I want her to be happy. It’s not going to happen until we all work together and put aside our differences.”

  Ricky released Kurtis. Noel pulled him to his feet. The three ignored Bobby as they all went their own ways, Kurtis whacking him with his shoulder as he passed. Bobby’s hands clenched, but he remained
calm.

  Well, if he was the only one who really cared about Diana, he’d at least make sure she was safe and happy. Even if the others didn’t.

  Chapter Fourteen – Noel

  Is this what I want? Noel frowned as he parked his motorcycle in the garage. When he suggested this whole thing, he had thought that they’d unite the clan under Diana and that he’d get her pregnant so his bloodline would control the full island. But when he thought about it now, the plan left him unsatisfied.

  When Noel had sex with Diana while Kurtis and Ricky were in attendance, he’d felt no jealousy. A bit nervous, perhaps, having never done the group thing before, but it had been a pleasant experience that he had enjoyed. Then, he started getting to know her better. She had decided to stay for certain and they had made love, just the two of them. It was more than sex . . .

  And now? He didn’t know what he felt. He still burned for her. He wanted to hold her and kiss her and keep her in his bed, but there was something else going on . . . What if they joined the clans only for him to fall in love? That would be a disaster, especially if one of the others got her pregnant before he could . . .

  He headed up the stairs to his room, needing to check on the sea lion pup. To his surprise, the object of his musings was there. Diana pet the pup’s head, singing softly. It looked more relaxed than it had since he had brought it back. It was getting fatter by the day and was, by some miracle, thriving.

  Diana jumped when he bent over her to kiss the top of her head, then she smiled at him. “He’s doing really well, isn’t he?”

  Noel nodded in agreement. “Yes, it is. It’ll be nice and fat for the wedding.”

  “Wedding?”

  Shit. They hadn’t talked about this. Not to mention that it was a conversation the other alphas needed to be part of. He shoved his hands into his pockets and shrugged. “There’s no rush, of course. It probably needs to grow a bit more in order to feed the five of us, anyway.”

  Diana sprang to her feet. “You want to eat him?!”

  The horror in her voice made him stare. “Well, of course. Why else would I keep it around? If I wasn’t planning on eating it, it’d be kinder to the poor thing to just kill it now. It can’t go back to the ocean, not mangled like that.”

  She shook her head. “Why would you eat a sea lion?”

  Ah. He knew what this was about. He put his hands on Diana’s shoulders, giving her a soft smile. “It’s a California Sea Lion. They’re not endangered – not even threatened. They’re a protected species, but we have special permission from the government to cull in local populations —”

  Diana pulled away from him. “What difference does that make? You raise cows and pigs and other animals on this island. Why do you need to eat sea lions? Wait . . . You hunt them, don’t you?” Her fair skin turned a shade green. “Oh, my god! Have I eaten sea lion?”

  He shook his head. “They’re not in season.”

  “Not in season!”

  Noel ran a hand through his hair and shook his head. Maybe he didn’t know what this was about after all. Diana stared at him as though he had been talking about tossing puppies into the ocean and laughing as they were chomped on by sharks. They hunted sea lions. The hunts were strictly regulated. What was the big fuss about?

  “The livestock has to be kept at a very small number, given the size of the island,” Noel continued, wanting her to understand the reasoning at least. “Sea lions have a lot of meat and fat that is necessary for us to thrive. We’re bears. We require a lot of calories and—”

  “You can buy meat from the mainland.”

  Noel shook his head. “At those prices? Not even Kurtis can afford to have meat shipped in quantities that will be necessary for our bodies, let alone the children who are still growing.”

  “I’m not going to eat him.”

  The pup apparently picked up on the tension in the room and started to make distressed noises. Noel wrapped it a little more snugly in its blanket and led Diana out of the room. Tears glinted in her eyes and her arms wrapped tightly around her waist. Had she gotten emotionally attached? Perhaps it would be better if he took it back to his place near the sea so that Diana wouldn’t get even more attached to it.

  “During a wedding, it’s tradition in the Fjord clan to eat certain parts of a sea lion’s body as a prayer for good luck in the future. The rest is given back to the ocean. I didn’t want to have to kill a healthy animal for it. This animal isn’t going to survive on its own. What else are we supposed to do with it?”

  “Build a tank. They make prosthetics for humans. Why not for a sea lion?”

  “What would be the point?”

  Diana’s lip trembled again, then her eyes hardened. She lifted her chin and her arms dropped to her sides. Her hands clenched into fists. “This is utterly barbaric. If I’m going to be your queen, then hunting sea lions is going to stop. We can figure out how to bring more money in so that we can buy meat from the mainland.”

  His bear growled at the insult. He was surprised. His bear had never gotten angry with a woman before. But then again, it had also never wanted to spend all of its time with a woman before. He had never felt this way before, like every moment away from her was a moment wasted.

  Her comment, though, made his hands clench. He breathed deeply. “I am barbaric for hunting sea lions?”

  “Yes!”

  “And how is it more barbaric than a feedlot? Shoving dozens, maybe even hundreds, of animals into such a small space that they are walking through their own muck and the smell travels for miles? Or having cages of chickens in such cramped quarters that their beaks have to be cut off to stop them from fighting one another? How is going out in the salt and spray and hunting a sea lion the way sharks and whales do more barbaric than forcing animals to live in miserable conditions their whole lives just to die? This animal,” he pointed at the bathroom door, “would already be dead if I hadn’t intervened. I want to prevent the necessity of killing a healthy animal. How is that barbaric?”

  Diana stared at him silently.

  Noel tried to loosen his tight shoulders. He turned away from her and shook his head. He ought to have guessed something like this would come up. Diana hadn’t known bear shifters existed until she got to the island. He couldn’t expect that she would understand their customs.

  “Look.” He tried to soften his voice. “I know that this isn’t what you’re used to, but this isn’t a simple matter of getting more money so we can buy animals killed out of sight.” Okay, so that had been a low blow. “This is also culture and tradition. The pup can’t be kept as a pet. It can’t be returned to the wild. Maybe if it had been found by some wildlife rehab program that had an aquarium to keep animals that were unable to be returned to the wild . . . but it doesn’t stand a chance. Not at having any quality of life.”

  Diana continued to be silent. Noel glanced at her, hoping to find her considering the situation — or at least trying to understand. Instead, he found an obstinate, angry look on her face. She raised her chin at him again, and he had a sinking feeling that he wasn’t going to like whatever she was going to have to say.

  “Okay, then. So you plan to kill the pup for the wedding feast, no matter what I say?”

  “Yes.”

  “But it’ll live until then?”

  Noel nodded again. A frown came over his face. What was she thinking?

  A smirk spread across her face and she nodded as though quite satisfied with herself. “That settles it, then.” She flipped her hair over her shoulder. “We’ll just never get married.”

  Noel’s jaw dropped. He hadn’t been expecting that. She gave him another smile, this one even more victorious — and dare he say, snooty — than it had been before. She gave a little flick of her hair and started away, bouncing on her feet. There was just something insufferable about the way she was doing this . . . It pushed him over the edge.

  “Don’t act as though I am inferior to you because of this,” he spat. She continued
to walk away, so he strode forward and grabbed her arm. He’d make her understand. He’d—

  SMACK!

  Her open hand flew across his face. The resounding noise it made from its collision echoed in his ears. Noel stumbled back, more surprised than anything. His cheek stung. When he looked at Diana, her eyes were wide, her mouth slightly open. She moved back several steps, arms wrapped around her middle. Shoulders hunched. Shivering.

  “Don’t you ever grab me like that again. Never!”

  Noel wasn’t certain what to say or do . . . He had been wrong to grab her, but he hadn’t hurt her . . . Had he? He tried to remember how tightly he’d gripped her arm, but couldn’t. He stepped forward, opening his mouth to apologize.

  She flinched away from him. Her gaze was wary and frightened. What sort of past did she have that slapping him was her first reaction? But then, if he was having words with someone and they grabbed him, what would he do?

  They continued to stare at each other until Noel couldn’t stand it anymore. He turned on his heels and marched away. His whole body trembled from the violence of the encounter. Not to mention the fear with which she had looked at him. She didn’t trust him. That was the long and short of it. And he had acted poorly, he knew that, but he’d never hurt her . . .

  Except maybe he had. Maybe she had struck him because he had hurt her. His hands burned. His bear paced and nudged him back to Diana, but he ignored it. Going back now, of all times, would be a bad idea. They both needed space to calm down. He needed time to sort out his thoughts.

  And Bobby’s question kept rattling around in his brain. Do you want this to work? Did he want a relationship in which they fought dirty like that? Did he want to be with a woman who wouldn’t listen to him? His traditions were important to him. She didn’t even care about that, didn’t ask him why it was done the way it was or anything. Just stated that it wasn’t happening. Called it barbaric. Just because it was something that didn’t fit into her worldview.