Her Bear Protector [The Protectors 1] (Siren Publishing Classic) Read online

  His bear grumbled at the flimsy fabric that covered her skin and stopped him from tasting, while the man marveled at the soft flesh under his fingertips, where he held onto her hips. Only a thin strip of lacy fabric lay under his digits, and despite the pain and the impossibility of their situation, Ronan smiled at the thought that his Tina wore racy underwear under her cleaning attire.

  His bear growled his approval at Ronan’s thought processes, and Ronan inhaled deeply against his human’s rounded belly, before he pushed her away.

  Tina yelped and stumbled, and she looked all set to make a lunge for him again, but Ronan stopped her with one clawed hand held up in the air. Her eyes widened at the emergence of his bear, but she didn’t run away in terror as he would have expected her to do, as he grew several inches.

  “Run, while you still can.” His voice came out distorted, already more animal than human, and he was dimly aware of Tina shaking her head with enough force to have the raven mass of her hair escape its ponytail.

  His bear roared and Ronan gave himself up to the change, as he dropped down on all fours. Bones cracked and rearranged, nails lengthened to claws that sliced through the wooden floorboards, and fur covered his body. Transformation complete, Ronan roared with enough force to shake the foundations of the little cottage, and to let anyone in the vicinity know that this protector was still very much alive.

  Adrenaline raced through his system, and healed the last of his injuries. Ronan shook his massive frame, and turned slowly, mindful of the confined space and the rapid heartbeat of the terrified human who had watched his transformation.

  Only it wasn’t terror he sensed from her. Awe, stunned fascination, and worry for him, those he got loud and clear, and he sat back on his haunches and regarded her thoughtfully. Damn it, she was so fucking beautiful.

  Perhaps not in the traditional sense, and certainly not in the flawless beauty sense that shifter females had, but to him right now, she was the most beautiful creature on this whole damn planet. Her expressive green eyes were as wide as saucers, a delightful blush stole across her pale features and her full, slightly upturned lips quivered as though she tried to hold in a scream.

  His damn bear near salivated at the sight of her full breasts rising up and down in rapid succession, as she struggled to breathe, and her fingers held onto the now bloodied apron still clutched in her hands as though her life depended on it.

  One of the buttons on her dress had come undone, and his gaze zoomed in on the tantalizing glimpses of a white lacy bra.

  Tina swallowed hard and cleared her throat repeatedly before she finally whispered just one word.

  “Wow.”

  Ronan’s bear huffed his amusement, and bowing his head, he moved slowly toward her. Tina paled, and slid to the floor, as though her legs could not support her anymore. When he was close enough to touch, she reached out to run her fingertips lightly across his ears.

  His deep rumble of appreciation seemed to make her bolder and using both hands now she caressed his fur. She stopped at the blood-matted stain where his deep neck cut had been and frowned, and Ronan nuzzled into her in an effort to reassure her.

  She startled and sought his gaze.

  “How is this even possible? It’s really you, isn’t it, Ronan?” she asked and he flashed her a toothy smile and nodded.

  A renewed tinge of red stained her cheeks, and she let go of his fur and shook her head. “No, it can’t be. I’m still in bed, having another crazy ass dream about you. Jesus, wake up, woman. This obsession is not healthy.”

  She closed her eyes, screwed up her little button nose, and murmured to herself.

  “There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home. There’s no place…”

  Ronan stepped back and shifted back into his human self. He couldn’t quite stop his grunt of pain, and Tina’s chanting stopped. Her eyes flew open and widened anew when she took in his naked and very aroused form.

  His body still hurt like a fucking bitch, but it seemed his bear had only one thing on his mind, if his throbbing cock was anything to go by. Like a beacon of lust it pointed straight at Tina, and she didn’t seem to tear her gaze away from it. The urge to fist himself, to demand that she suck him off while he thrust into the moist depths of her mouth, her lips stretched around the thick girth of his dick, was like a living entity that coursed through his veins.

  This human was his, had been from the moment he first scented her, and Ronan wanted to claim her so badly it hurt, but he couldn’t do that. Not now, not when he owed her an explanation, not when he would be taking advantage of her confusion. That she would be ready for him, of that there was no doubt. Waves of her lust hit him straight in the gut with so much force it winded him. Ronan was no stranger to human females’ reaction to him. They reacted to the pheromones he gave out without even trying, and when he chose to release them he could have any bit of human pussy he wanted.

  This was Tina, however, not some random bit of willing female company and he was on his home turf. The elders would have his pelt to hang on the village green for all to see, if he messed this up. Tina was off limits.

  So, instead of acting on the filthy images bombarding the insides of his skull, images that would help him heal fully, were he to at least taste the wetness between her legs, Ronan groaned, sat back down on the bed, and used a cushion to cover his groin.

  He couldn’t help but tease her a little though.

  “That only works in The Wizard of Oz, babe. You’re no Dorothy and I’m no Wizard. I’m glad to hear you dream of me though.”

  He winked at her, and she blinked and shook her head.

  “No, you’re just a fucking bear. What the hell, Ronan?” With considerable effort on her part she struggled to her feet, kicked the bloody apron away in seeming disgust, and started to pace, muttering to herself.

  When she spun back round to face him, her green eyes blazed in fury, and Ronan’s balls tightened in answer. He’d never really seen her truly angry before. Tina was always helpful, and quietly efficient, but fuck him if the fire in her eyes didn’t turn him on even more. It spoke of her passionate nature, and renewed images of the two of them in a sweaty heap bombarded his brain. Her submission would be ten times sweeter, because she would choose to give it to him.

  “All this time, all this fucking time, the things I’ve seen, I’ve heard, I thought I was going mad. How many of you are there, and what the hell happened here, damn it. Stop smirking at me like that, Ronan Bernhard, or I’ll, I’ll—”

  “You’ll what, Tina?” He couldn’t help it. Ronan laughed, as he interrupted her. She was too adorable like that.

  Tina stomped her foot and growled in frustration. His bear answered her and some of her fury went out of her. She went so pale Ronan thought she might faint. Sure enough she swayed slightly on her feet, and Ronan grabbed her before she could fall, and laid her down on the bed.

  “You’re a fucking bear.” The whispered words made him smile, before her eyes rolled back in her head, and she fainted.

  Chapter Three

  Tina drifted back into consciousness to the sounds of hammering and fresh wood. Her head pounded in tune with the hammer banging against the side of the cottage, and she groaned and curled into a ball. What the hell was going on? Ronan’s scent was everywhere, and she was laying in his bed in her underwear…her underwear?

  Tina sat up with a start, as the full terror of her situation came back to her. How long had she been out cold for? Long enough for Ronan to undress her and tidy up, it seemed. He’d even changed the sheets on the bed, and he must have cleaned her, too, because her hands weren’t blood-stained anymore. Bile rose in her throat and she made a dash for the adjacent bathroom, where she relieved herself of the entire contents of her stomach. By the time the heaving finally stopped, her tummy hurt and Tina swiped tears off of her face.

  Somehow she managed to struggle to her feet, and wash her face in the sink. The wide-eyed pale woman staring back at her from the
mirror seemed a stranger to her. Were it not for the fact that she was stood in Ronan Bernhard’s bathroom dressed in nothing but her lacy underwear, she’d have thought she’d imagined the whole thing. Bernhard. Even his name gave away his heritage, for fuck’s sake.

  How could she have been so stupid? She’d known there was something strange about this village when she’d first arrived here from London, hadn’t she? The whole thing had been bizarre. From finding out her father’s death had left her saddled with his gambling debts, which had meant she’d had to sell the house she’d grown up in to get the loan sharks off her back, to the impromptu drive that had led her to this village. There had been an advert in the café window, advertising the local cleaning business up for sale.

  On another impulse she’d rung the number, which had led her to Mrs. Hastings. After a long afternoon tea, during which she’d been stuffed full of home baked goodies, and had looked at countless pictures of Mrs. Hastings’s daughter’s wedding, she’d left as the new owner of the family’s cleaning business.

  It had taken the last of her savings, but the business came with free room and board in Mrs. Hastings’s converted barn, and had been too good an offer to refuse.

  Annoying sheep notwithstanding, life in Cumbria had been what Tina had needed. A fresh start, and with an established client base the business would not make her rich, but it meant she could live comfortably.

  Most of her clients were old dears like Mrs. Hastings, and increasingly second homeowners who needed her to look after their place while they struggled away during the week in the rat race that was the corporate world. Holiday cottages made up another percentage of her work, and then, of course, there was Ronan.

  Too late she noticed the hammering had been replaced by pounding on her bathroom door. She shrieked when the door burst open, and Ronan filled the space with his overwhelming presence. She made a grab for one of the bath towels to cover herself up with and Ronan’s eyes bled to the deep amber of his bear’s. Heat rolled over her skin at the slow perusal of his intense gaze. By the time he reached her face, Tina was so turned on she clamped her thighs together to relieve the throbbing ache between her legs. The feminine part of her rejoiced at his interest, at the way he inhaled and took several steps toward her, before he shook his head, fisted his hands and stepped back to lean against the wall.

  Tina swallowed nervously and licked her dry lips. A rumble rose from Ronan’s deep chest, and she hitched the towel higher. It was a ridiculous notion, considering he had already seen all of her, and again that feminine part of her rejoiced at the impulse that had made her put on her prettiest lingerie set this morning. At the time she hadn’t dared to examine her motif for doing so too closely, and the itty bitty thong certainly provided no protection against the rush of her feminine arousal that threatened to spill out of her soaked underwear.

  She ought to be mortified at this whole situation. He was a shifter, and if the naughty books she liked to read were to be believed that meant he would have advanced senses and would be able to smell how wet she was for him.

  A whimper of feminine need escaped her at the thought, and sure enough his nostrils flared and he groaned, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. Guess the books were right then. The thought of what else they might be right about made breathing difficult. Ronan looked as though he knew his way around a woman’s body, and even a blind person would have noticed the long, thick outline of his hard cock straining the zipper of his jeans. Sex had never been a huge deal in Tina’s life, and not for lack of trying. She’d had her fair share of fun at Uni, but try as she might, there had always been something missing, and it certainly had never been as explosive as the books made it out to be. That was just fantasy, wasn’t it?

  Tina ignored the little devil sat on her shoulder. The one that whispered that the books had been right about the existence of shifters, that she herself had never been as wet for any other man. Lord help her. He hadn’t even touched her, and her breasts felt heavy, her nipples were little hard nubs of need, and any minute now her juices would trickle down the inside of her thigh. Tina might self-combust if he ever acted on the promise in those ever-darkening eyes that seemed to pull her further under his spell.

  Not sure what to do now, she simply stared at him and allowed her gaze to feast on the hard contours of his body. He must have showered while she was out cold, because there was no sign of any previous injury or blood on his body. There was only the fine sheen of fresh sweat that brought with it the virile scent of man, and turned her on even more. His black vest top was speckled in sawdust, as were his worn denim jeans. They clung lovingly to his thick thighs and hugged the heavy bulge in his groin. Clearly he had been fixing his broken gateways into the cottage, to keep out whatever had attacked him last night. A cold shiver went down her spine at the thought what else might be lurking out there. What could have done such damage to the impossibly tall and brawny grizzly bear he shifted into?

  The tension skyrocketed between them, as they continued to stare at each other, until finally, Ronan cleared his throat, and gestured to the cupboard under the sink.

  “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have barged in like this, but you didn’t answer me, and when I heard you being…well, I was worried, okay? There’s a fresh toothbrush under there, in case you want to freshen up, and I’ll go rustle us up something to eat, if you can think you can stomach it.” At her tight nod he smiled. “And a coffee, I should think?” His smile deepened at her involuntary groan in response.

  “That’s my girl.”

  A thrill went through her as his voice dropped an octave and he took a step toward her again. If only she was his girl. Instead of voicing that out loud, however, she said the first inane thing that came into her mind.

  “Where’s my dress?”

  Ronan looked uncomfortable for all of one nanosecond before he shrugged his shoulders and turned to leave the bathroom. “It was covered in blood, I’m afraid. I’ve thrown it out.”

  “How dare you?”

  He turned back around and grinned, once again the super confident alpha male she was used to.

  “I’ll buy you a new one, Tina. This one was ruined. For now I’ll put one of my shirts on my bed. It should do for a dress of sorts and will have the added bonus of showing off those great pins you like to hide.”

  His gaze rested briefly on her legs, and with another sinful smirk that made her curl her bare toes under, he was gone.

  Tina released the breath she hadn’t even been aware of holding, and clutched the sink for support. It seemed his almost getting himself killed, and she now knowing his secret, had changed things between them, or maybe they had been hurtling down that path all along.

  She hadn’t missed the way he’d never once touched her again after that initial meeting. At the time she’d thought she wasn’t his type, or he just wanted to maintain a professional distance. Now she wasn’t so sure, and she had no idea how she felt being thrust into this strange world he seemed to occupy.

  Only she had been occupying it all along, too, hadn’t she? Albeit unknowingly. It was too much to even try and get her head wrapped around, so she simply brushed her teeth, and after having used the toilet, and washed her hands, she went in search of that shirt.

  True to his word, the long dress shirt hung over the bed and when she’d draped it over her head, rolled up the sleeves and buttoned it up, it could indeed pass for a mini dress of some sort. At least she was covered—sort of. The sheer fabric would be rendered transparent by any light, and Tina mused whether that hadn’t been his intention. He’d clearly never worn this shirt before. It smelled new and still had the creases from being in its packaging, but it would have to do. It might help her to regain some of her equilibrium. Had he picked one of the shirts he usually wore, she would have no doubt swooned at his scent surrounding her completely. The man smelled so good, it was ridiculous. She had never noticed it this much before, but then again, she had never been thrust into such an intimate and
compromising situation before.

  The aroma of brewing coffee greeted her when she opened the bedroom door, followed by the sizzle of bacon, and her stomach rumbled loudly. As much as she would love to simply make a dash out of the now fixed front door and escape back to her cozy little converted flat, she knew this wasn’t an option. Not in a village the size they lived in, and besides, strange things that went bump in the night would not drive her out of her home and the life she’d built here. She was made from sterner stuff than that. All she had to do was not give into her screaming hormones and jump Ronan the minute she saw him. Easy as pie…

  Chapter Four

  Ronan took a deep breath and grew hard as nails, when Tina stepped into the kitchen and his bear near damn salivated when he turned around. She looked good enough to eat, swamped as she was by his shirt. He had to suppress a grin at the way she’d buttoned it all the way up, and tried to pull the shirt further down her thighs, while fidgeting from foot to foot.

  Any other woman he knew would have pressed her advantage, left that shirt unbuttoned down to her lacy bra, and would even now be sauntering over to him. His Tina did none of that. In fact, a man could get jealous at the sheer look of longing with which she gazed at the pot of coffee brewing.

  “Sit down, and I’ll get you a cuppa.” The words came out more of a growl than his usual tone, as he finished off the full English breakfast and turned off the hob. Tina jumped and hastily sat down, only to shoot back up again with a little squeal.

  Ronan laughed and threw her a tea towel.

  “Sit on that. I know the chairs are cold.”

  “Thanks.” Tina mumbled the word and once she’d draped the towel over the high stool sat back down at the breakfast bar. Ronan slid a full cup of coffee across to her, and she wrapped her hands around it with a grateful smile in his direction.