Dalton, Tymber - Doggy Tales [Doggy Tales] (Siren Publishing Classic) (12 page)

“Leave her alone.” Through pain-teared eyes, Genna looked at the door and saw Bruin standing there, his fists clenched.

Lester raised the gun. “Good. Now I can take care of both of you. Saves me time and trouble.”

Behind Lester, the front door exploded in a snarling, swirling mass of black fur. Lester turned, swearing.

“Jesus Christ!”

“You wish,” Bruin growled, suddenly shifting into the brown dog, his clothes falling away.

Genna shrank away from him as he leapt over her toward Lester. The man turned, screaming as Bruin struck, his jaws on the man’s throat. Lester’s startled shout immediately changed to a strangled, pained cry.

Ivan grabbed Lester’s wrist, the one holding his gun. She heard bones crunch as Ivan bit down, the gun falling to the carpet.

A red haze clouded her vision as she watched the two massive dogs hold Lester down. His heels beat against the carpet, a staccato tempo she thought would drive her totally over the brink of insanity until it eventually stopped with one last, gurgled gasp.

When it was apparent Lester was dead, the two dogs released him and turned to her. Ivan shifted back first. He crouched there, naked.

“Are you okay?” he asked her.

Bruin shifted to human form, wiping a hand across his bloodied mouth and spitting on the carpet.

“Genna, honey, are you…”

The red haze over her vision transformed to purple, then black.

* * * *

Oh, she longed for the good ole days, the simplicity of the hot, sexy Jeremy Bruin dreams, where he simply fucked her brains out before leaving for the night and didn’t rip her convicted ex-boyfriend’s throat out in her new living room.

Will I get my security deposit back if the bloodstains don’t come out?

Genna refused to open her eyes. She hurt. All over. Pain contradicted the firm version of reality she wanted to maintain her stranglehold on—crap, horrible choice of word. Death grip? Hmm, not so much either.

She sensed a presence outside her closed eyelids and tried to keep her breathing steady. She wasn’t lying on her bed. She knew that. She didn’t think she was back in Bruin’s office.

Men did not turn into large fucking dogs. This did
not
fucking happen. None of this happened.

Maybe she really
was
dead. Perhaps Lester had killed her before the trial and this was some funky version of Purgatory.

Yeah, that’s the ticket. That makes sense.

She moved and moaned. Nope, it was real. Her body hurt like hell where Lester had punched and kicked her.

A large, gentle hand slipped around hers, and she tightly gripped it for no other reason than she hurt and didn’t want to scream.

“Genna, honey, please wake up.”

Bruin’s soft, pleading voice.

Reluctantly she opened her eyes. He’d washed his face and changed clothes, but she didn’t know where she was, didn’t recognize the room.

In response to her unasked question he said, “We’re at my house.
Our
house. Ivan and Lindsey are outside.”

She would pull away from him, but it hurt too much to even think about doing that.

“What. The fuck. Is going. On?”

“We need to talk.”

* * * *

They talked most of the night. Lindsey and Ivan brought food and pain medicine and ice packs for Genna. Genna repeatedly asked many of the same questions, unable to grasp the reality, thinking it was the medicine or a psychotic break.

Jeremy shifted back and forth from large dog to man as many times as she asked, sometimes while holding her hand, each time taking her breath away.

“I’m so sorry, Genna,” he said again. He wouldn’t stop apologizing to her. “I thought you knew what Lester was. I didn’t know you really were innocent. I didn’t expect to fall in love with you. I should have been more careful not to let them find you.”

She was calling him Jeremy now, and his anguish-filled amber eyes ripped her heart with as much pain as her body had endured.

Despite that, she still felt pissed. “You used me.”

“I didn’t realize he had your place bugged. I was so mad at Lester, I hoped he had people watching you and word would get back to him that you were working for me, but I didn’t want to hurt you. I never meant to hurt you. I’m sorry. I do love you. I realized I loved you after I met you, but it took me by surprise. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how to tell you the truth. But I did fall in love with you, I swear.” He’d said that a lot, too. Said it over and over again, repeating it as if his very life depended on it.

Saying that he loved her.

She fell silent and stared at him. He sat, motionless, holding her hand, waiting for her.

“Shape-shifter?”

He nodded.

“So I’ll turn into…”

He shook his head. “No. But as my…as my mate, certain things will happen to you.”

Maybe the pain meds were helping. Irritation had filtered in past shock and pain. “You never fucking asked me if I wanted that.” Not that she was complaining. Or at least, wouldn’t complain once her anger wore off.

“I know. I’m sorry.” He closed his eyes as if to compose his thoughts for a moment before looking at her again. “Bill was like a brother to me. We grew up together. He was my best friend. I wanted revenge so much and never figured I’d have a way to get to Lester personally. And I never dreamed you weren’t willingly with someone like him. I also didn’t expect to fall in love with you.”

“I’ll wake up tomorrow and this will be a horrible dream, right?”

“No. No more bad dreams. I will spend the rest of our life together making this up to you, I swear.”

“Is he dead?” she whispered. The idea of that partly horrified her.

And more than partly relieved her. That was one question she hadn’t asked yet, although she suspected she knew the answer already.

“Yes. We took care of it. He won’t ever bother you again.”

“Won’t the police suspect me?”

“No. They’ll never find his body. And I paid off his attorney. He’s going to tell the parole board Lester left the country against the advice of counsel. He doesn’t want anything else to do with Lester, or Lester’s associates, either.”

“What if the authorities question me?”

“Then I’ll tell them the truth, that I was with you all night. And Ivan and Lindsey will testify they saw us together.”

He cautiously reached out and tenderly stroked her forehead, brushing a stray hair away from her face. “I don’t expect you to forgive me now or maybe ever for not telling you the truth in the beginning. But I swear I will try—”

“Okay,” she whispered.

He froze. “What?”

“I forgive you. Because I’ll wake up and this will be a dream. And I love my Dream Jeremy.” That was the safest way to think. She closed her eyes. “Curl up next to me.”

He did, carefully cradling her. When she awoke, her pain was still there. But so was Jeremy.

“This isn’t a dream, is it?” she asked.

He tenderly kissed the back of her neck. “No.”

“I’m scared of dogs.”

“I’ll spend my life helping you get over that.”

She laughed, and it hurt, but she couldn’t help it.

“What’s so funny?” he asked, puzzled.

She tipped her head back. “I never thought doing it doggy style would be so much fun.”

He smiled and gently nuzzled her. “I think I’ll enjoy working my way out of the doghouse with you.”

In the Doghouse

Genna lay in the king-sized bed and stared at the TV, remote in hand. Three days had passed since surviving the attack by her ex-boyfriend, Lester. While she still bore faint bruises, she couldn’t believe the worst of the pain and injuries had already faded.

Perk of being a shape-shifter’s mate, I guess.
Not that she was complaining about that. Have Jeremy Bruin as her husband for life?

Um, yes, please.

They had some issues to work out, however.

Massive ones.

Like the fact that the reason he hired her in the first place, which led him to taking her to be his mate, was to get revenge on Lester after his conviction for killing Jeremy’s cousin.

Jeremy stuck his head in the bedroom door. “Are you okay?” he cautiously asked.

She nodded and put the remote down. “Yeah.”

He stepped inside, looking sheepish. Sometimes, she wanted him right next to her.

Sometimes, she couldn’t stand to look at him.

Lindsey Biendino, Ivan’s mate and wife, had spent a few hours with her that morning, explaining the basics of shape-shifter 101 to her. Lindsey met Ivan in his wolf form when he saved her from an attack while she was out jogging. Their mating had gone without a hitch.

“Do you want to talk?” he asked.

She nodded and patted the bed next to her. He quickly and fluidly climbed onto the bed without jarring her. When he settled into position, she looked at him. “How am I supposed to trust you?”

He looked even more abashed. “I know, Genna. I’m so sorry. I’ll do whatever it takes to earn your forgiveness.”

She studied him. She’d thought about this for a while after her talk with Lindsey that morning. “I want us to go to a counselor.”

He nodded. “Okay.”

“No problem with that?”

“Well, I think we need to leave out the part about the shape-shifting, but I mean it. I’ll do whatever it takes to make this up to you.”

She nodded and carefully cuddled up next to him. No matter how conflicted she felt in some ways about how they got together, she wasn’t too proud to admit he was a handsome hunk of man flesh. She wasn’t about to turn away an opportunity to snuggle with him.

Genna had to hand it to him. He didn’t try to grope her, either. He protectively curled his arms around her and held her, even though she felt his cock harden against her thigh through his shorts.

His scent filled her lungs. He smelled good, earthy, sensual. She loved that about him. She wasn’t afraid to admit she loved him, either.

Trusting him, on the other hand, might take her a while. Well, she didn’t doubt the part about taking care of her. He and Ivan killed Lester after Lester attacked her while out on bail. She knew Jeremy would protect her. She knew he would take care of her and provide for her and try to make things up to her for what happened.

And the conflict of her heart-melting attraction to him before all the shit hit the fan, versus finding out the truth about why he first started this relationship, understandably had put her through the ultimate mind fuck.

“If it’s any consolation,” he said, “Ivan is giving me holy hell every chance he can get.”

“It is.” She couldn’t believe she’d gone from being terrified of dogs to enjoying Ivan’s company whether he was in dog or man form. Technically, Ivan had been the one to spill the beans about the shape-shifting in the first place.