Curves & Alphas: A Paranormal Box Set: (BBW Paranormal Shape Shifter Romance) (7 page)

“That was beyond amazing, finally getting to be with you,” he exclaimed.

“Finally? We only met a few hours ago,” I laughed.

Yet, something in the way he felt safe and familiar nagged at me. Even now, being this intimate with this stranger, I continued to wonder if I had met him before. But, that was ridiculous. I’d not have forgotten such a face, such a body. And, if he had spoken, his deep raspy voice or the wonderful words he’d had to have uttered.

“Finally?” I asked again and then held my breath.

“I don’t know why I said it that way except that I have been imagining this moment since I first laid eyes on you.”

“You are a smooth talker, Lex Roberts. And, I don’t mean that in a bad way.”

“You have anywhere you need to be tomorrow?” He asked, looking down at me like he was ready to go again.

“No. You?”

“No. Good. I want to lay here and hear more about you.”

“There isn’t much to tell,” I stated honestly. “I think I’ve already confessed enough.”

“No, not nearly enough,” he rebutted.

He slid off of me then. On his side, with his hand propping up his head, he used his other hand to sweep over my body. I turned on my side to mimic him, but had the first truly terrifying bout of self-consciousness in his presence. I felt my stomach suck in as his hand glided over it.

“Don’t do that,” he softly scolded. “You are perfect. I love every one of your curves. You are what a woman should look like rather than those stick figure models the media tries to sell us as the definition of beauty. I want a woman I can hold onto. In fact, I can remember looking at paintings with my mother of the baroque master, Peter Paul Rubens. You are the image of beauty that he painted.”

I blushed, unable to find a response appropriate to tell him how his words had affected me, how deeply he’d touched me.

“I don’t mean to embarrass you,” he soothed, his hand now moving up my arm with a feather touch. “I just feel so comfortable with you, like I can tell you anything.”

“I feel the same,” I confessed. “Obviously, or I wouldn’t have shared with you my biggest secret.”

“So, share with me then your feelings on other subjects,” he pushed.

“Like what?”

“What do you believe in about death?”

“Well, now there’s a light subject,” I scoffed.

“No, really, I want to know,” he insisted.

“Okay. Well, I’m not sure really... with the death of each of my parents, I never came to an answer that I liked, that brought me comfort. If I looked at the religious ways of thinking, like the church I grew up in’s belief that we are asleep until the rapture, then my mother isn’t up there watching over me. She’d have missed all I’ve done. On the other hand, if she was up in some sort of Heaven watching me, wouldn’t she feel sad at what she was missing? How could that be the peaceful and perfect afterlife that some Bible promises awaits us if we do X, Y, and Z? So, honestly, I don’t know. I know for myself that I have often talked to her, but that’s more for me, to bring myself comfort.”

I paused then, searching my mind for anything I might have left out. The ease of the conversation left me a bit unsettled in some odd irony. Besides, who could talk, the way he stared, the way he continued to touch me...

I added, “What about you?”

“Guess I don’t have a good answer either, hence the reason I asked you.”

“Hence, huh?” I teased. “Sometimes you talk like you’re not from this time period, like you stepped out of some Victorian era book I’ve read. I thought the same with some of the phrasings in your songs. Artistic style, I guess. I have to admit, though, with the wisdom in your music, I expected more in depth of an answer.”

I winked then, offering him my biggest smile so he’d know I was teasing him. He smiled back, thankfully.

“I can’t know it all, and on some subjects I struggle. I’ve even voiced some of those struggles in my music. Moving on, if you don’t mind, what are your beliefs in the paranormal then? If you are unsure about death, do you believe in ghosts?”

“I’ve never experienced one, myself. Though, there were years there when I was a teen, with a mostly drunken father who did his best but couldn’t answer my personal questions like a mother could, that I wished for the ghost of my mother. Unfortunately, she never appeared. What I have gotten, though, was this sense that I have a wolf spirit guide.... Wow, I can’t believe I just said that!” I exclaimed.

“No, I want to hear more,” he said excitedly, sitting up and for the first time taking his hands from me.

I sat up as well and offered a stunned, “Okay.” I didn’t get the excitement. In fact, I rather thought he ought to be running out of the room, thinking me crazy.

“Sorry, I’m just fascinated,” he apologized. “Please, I want to hear more.”

I crinkled my brow.

“Please. I’m really interested in the paranormal. I’ve done a lot of reading, and even attended a few metaphysical expos to hear people speak on different topics. I want to hear more. Why do you think you have a wolf spirit guide?” He asked.

“Well, I guess I never really had a name for it until I was a teenager. I’d read a book, fiction, written by a Native American author. When the protagonist in the story described her wolf spirit guide, it rang true of some of my own unexplainable experiences. So, I did some research, and came to believe that I had the same. Though, I have not an ounce of Native American blood in me.”

“Details!” He hounded me like a child asking the why questions, though not annoying at all.

In fact, I found comfort in his questions, his interest. My shoulders relaxed, moving further away from my ears. Finally producing saliva again, I could wet my dry lips. I even, to my surprise, looked up into his eyes as I formed what I’d say next in my mind. Him running his hands down the outsides of my arms, pulling me closer, made me realize that I’d even leaned away from him.

“You’re in a safe zone, here. No judgment. No criticism. Just pure interest in what you have to say,” he added.

“Okay,” I agreed. “Well, once my mother died, maybe a few years after, in times of depression or trial, maybe when I felt alone the most, I would have this reoccurring dream of a wolf. I didn’t talk to him in the dream. Just his presence brought me comfort. As the dream progressed, I would even curl up with the wolf, sleep in its arms like a baby would its mother’s. As the years passed, I started to see eyes, golden ones, peering at me through the night. I don’t think there was ever anything there, and I didn’t check it out, but it happened often.”

I stopped then, realizing the similarity of my spirit guide’s eyes and the wolf I’d seen in the alley. Of course, the wolf of my dreams had been wolf size. The one in the alley that attacked the man had been much larger. I’d tried to push away this line of thinking before, but the coincidence of it all became suddenly undeniable.

“You okay? You suddenly went silent and pale. Where’d you go off to?”

“Ah, nowhere. Um, anyway, sorry, where was I? Right, the girl in the book I read had said the same thing about the eyes, how they’d shone gold in the night. There were even times, and I connected later that these were my lowest moments, that I could feel the hot breath of a wolf on my neck. If I turned around, nothing would be there, of course. In the book I read, the girl interacted with hers. I’ve never had such luck. Of course, I guess I could have freaked out just the same.”

“What did you learn when you researched?” He inquired further.

“You sure you want to hear all of this? When do I get to learn about you?” I mused.

“You heard me talk, or sing, for hours. I’m pretty close to an open book in my music. It’s only fair that I now get to listen to you. Besides, I’m dying to know more.”

He leaned in to kiss me then. Soft, reassuring, he cupped my cheeks again and kissed my mouth. His lips pulled from mine a few times, but came back again before I could even open my eyes.

“Didn’t mean to interrupt. I just can’t get enough of tasting you.”

“Never apologize for that!” I exclaimed.

“Continue. Please,” he asked.

“Well, in researching, the knowledge of what a wolf spirit guide means became even more profound in regards to me and what I had needed each of the times he had appeared to me, either in a dream or otherwise. First, it said that they appeared to those who have strong instincts and intelligence. I always knew that if I had nothing else, that I loved to read and to think. My father was always praising me on my intelligence.

Second, it said those with a wolf guide yearn for freedom. And, I did. The more I missed my mom, the more I wanted to run. Not from anything in particular, and I had no destination in mind, but I wanted freedom, one undefinable, from the life I’d been given. I wanted an emotionally available father who spoiled his little girl rather than one who just most days managed to do the best he could for me. And, obviously, I felt cheated out of a mother.”

“I’m sorry,” he soothed, and then placed a kiss on my forehead.

His lips lingered there a few seconds longer than they typically would, before he pulled me into a strong embrace. Tears stung my eyes, and this time I let them fall. I didn’t break down into sobs, but they fell, draining me figuratively.

“Go on,” he whispered in my ear as he brought my head to his chest.

The thump of his heart seemed irregular, but surely a man in such physical shape couldn’t be unhealthy. I took in a deep breath, thought about where I’d been in my admission, and began again.

“The books also said that the wolf appears when you feel threatened, whether you don’t trust yourself or someone else. I never let anyone get close to me except Chloe, who I’ve been friends with since preschool. I even closed her out for years at a time, but she never left. She stuck by me. So did my wolf.”

“Why didn’t you trust?” He inquired, rubbing his big hand over the fall of my hair over my back.

“I thought anyone I dared love would go away. So, I remained a lone soul. It felt safer. But, the wolf, or even just the sensation of a big, strong animal near me, remained. Do you think I’m crazy?”

“Absolutely not. I think the story sad, but amazing. What a gift,” he said.

“Yeah,” I offered, my mind back to the night of the attack.

Could that have been the first appearance of my spirit guide, the first actual full manifestation? I searched my mind to recall the one good look at it I’d gotten, the one I’d tried to write off as a stress-induced hallucination. I let it come now, wondering how I’d managed to prevent the connection of the two before. I guess in my dreams, the wolf had been smaller, more realistic to the normal wolves of nature than the beast who had so savagely torn my attacker apart. Could the gentle giant who had been with me for so many years have been capable of such violence?

I shuddered.

“What is it?” He asked and kissed the top of my head.

“Nothing.”

“Please don’t lie to me now,” he huffed, as if deeply offended. He pulled me down to the bed and placed my head on his chest again. Grabbing for the blanket no longer folded neatly at the bottom of my bed, he covered us and snuggled me in close.

“Sorry,” was all I got out. as I luxuriated in the feeling of warmth, of love I felt in this practical stranger’s, outside of sex that is, arms.

He lifted me enough to kiss me before rolling me over. Pinned underneath him, I enjoyed the feel of him ravishing my face, my neck, and my breasts again. I moaned to welcome both his touch and the distraction.

“What did you think of your wolf,” he breathed into my ear.

I flashed between the one I’d always thought my guide and the one I’d seen a week ago. I couldn’t mesh the two together completely, but the logic of it all set me off kilter.