ROMANCE: Lion Protector (Paranormal Shifter BBW Military Romance) (Shapeshifter Alpha Male Short Stories Book 2) (50 page)

“Christ almighty,” I mumbled to myself, as I got up and made my way toward him.

“Here,” I said. “Let me help you.” I knelt down beside his dark form, but I still couldn’t see well enough to tell where I should even try to grab to help him up. “Actually, you know what? Hold on.”

I got up and began searching for a lantern. I found one not far from us, managed to light it, and made my way back to him. I knelt beside him again. He seemed to be…asleep.

“Hey,” I said, shaking his shoulder. “Hey.”

“Oh, hey,” he said blearily, opening his eyes. “I dreamed you kicked me.”

I stared at him as he broke out into a grin. “Right…”

“Ok, well,” he said with a shrug, still grinning, “Let’s get Winchester and Jasper saddled up.”

“Yeah, no,” I said. “You need to go to bed.”

“Oh. Oh, but…Ruth has the bed. I can’t take the bed. Ruth has it. Ruth has the bed. Can’t take it,” he said, shaking his head vigorously.

“Right…well, you still need to lay down. Let’s get you to the house.”

I managed to somehow get him hauled up and get my shoulder under his arm.

“Come on,” I said, hauling toward the doors of the stable.

“Wait,” he said. “Wait, wait. I needed to tell you something.”

“It can wait,” I said, trying to pull him closer to the doors.

“No,” he said, as he pulled away from me. “It can’t wait.”

I was afraid that he was going to fall, but instead he stumbled to a post and leaned against it.

“Come here,” he said. “Please.”

I walked over to him and waited, not sure what to expect. And then he wrapped me in his arms. Pretty much the
last
thing I would have expected. He held me for a long moment before whispering, “Charlie…I need you.”

I remained still, unsure of what to say or do. After a brief moment, he pulled away, and I thought that he was done. Until he grasped my face in his hands and kissed me right on the mouth. And I couldn’t help but to kiss him back with abandon. It was over all too soon.

“I just needed you to know that,” he said, pulling away. He tried to walk off toward the house, but he kept stumbling and almost falling.

“Here,” I said, putting my shoulder back under his arm. “Let me help.”

I helped him up the front steps. Thankfully, the door was unlocked. I didn’t know where his keys were, but my guess was that they were probably with his truck. More than likely he had left it at the bar and gotten a ride home.

I helped him inside, laid him on the couch, and covered him with an afghan that was lying across the back of the couch. Then I let myself out and saddled up Winchester. I still had a job to do.

Once I’d fed the cattle on the back forty, I rode around the perimeter looking for places where the fence needed mending. Not all of the perimeter, mind you. That would have taken days on horseback. But I did as much as I could before the sun started to set. I did not allow myself to think about the events of the morning.

When I made it back to the stable, no one was around. Buck’s pickup wasn’t in the drive. Either he hadn’t gotten it back yet, or he’d gone out again. I decided it was none of my business. I hopped in my truck and headed home.

When I got to my house, I hung my keys by the door and headed to the bathroom to start a bath in the claw foot tub. I needed to unwind. I left it running while I went to the kitchen and grabbed myself a beer. I set it on the vanity next to the tub as I pulled off my boots, undressed, and unbraided my hair. Some people say I have beautiful hair. It’s naturally red and hangs down to my waist. Sometimes I agree with them. Other times I just think it’s a pain in the ass.

I climbed into the tub and leaned back into the welcoming warm water. I savored it as I scrubbed away the day’s dirt from my skin. But the one thing I couldn’t scrub away was the feeling of his kiss. I touched my fingers to my lips and closed my eyes.

*****

The next few months at work felt like something from the twilight zone. I don’t know if he didn’t remember what had happened that day, or if he pretended not to, but neither of us mentioned it. There were times I could swear I felt his eyes on me, but when I looked he would be absorbed in something else entirely. I wasn’t sure how to feel about that. I was torn.

I didn’t know what he and Ruth fought about, but I knew that he loved her and I knew that whatever it was, it broke his heart. So in that way, I was glad that he ignored anything that there might be between us. I wished that they could work out whatever it was and be happy.

But on the other hand, there was a part of me that longed for him to acknowledge it, just once. For him to take me in his arms again, kiss me again…or at the very least admit that he once had. I knew that part of me was selfish, and I told it to shut up every time it came around. But I still couldn’t help feeling that way. I decided that I had to keep it to myself, no matter what.

And for those few months, life went on, more or less, as always.

It was in January that everything changed. We had to go out to the north perimeter to mend the fence. Buck had just bought a new four-wheeler back in November, so there was no point in dragging the horses out all that way in the cold. We made it up there fine, but the snowstorm hit when we were halfway through with mending the fence. We finished as quickly as we could and headed back to the four-wheeler. My heart sank as I listened to it cough and sputter as Buck tried to start it. I held my breath as he tried it again and again. But it still didn’t start. Buck swore as he stood and kicked one of the tires.

There was no way we could hike all the way back to the house. We’d more than likely freeze before we even made it close. I could already feel the bite of the cold growing sharper through my clothes and gloves. I rubbed my hands together in a futile effort to generate warmth while Buck continued to swear under his breath. Finally he managed to compose himself with what I could tell was a great deal of effort.

“Come on,” he said, as he trudged away from the fence and toward the woods that dominated the northern side of the property. “We’ll have to head for the cabin.”

I struggled to keep up as I tried to figure out what he was talking about. After a moment it came to me. He’d shown me the place when I had first come to work here, but truth be told, I had forgotten it existed. I didn’t think I’d ever been back there since that first tour of the property. It was a dump of place, and I’m pretty sure it only managed to remain standing out of sheer stubbornness. But as they say, any port in a storm. It beat the hell out of freezing to death.

We trudged through the snow wordlessly for a while before I finally asked, “How much farther?”

“I dunno,” he panted, his breath coming out in a white plume. “Maybe a mile. It’s hard to say.”

“Damn,” I said. Neither of us said another word as we continued to make our way through the storm.

Finally, after several minutes, I could make out the outline of the cabin through the snow.

“About damn time,” I said, my teeth clicking together.

“You said it,” he replied. His teeth were chattering just as badly as mine were.

As soon as we had shut the door against the storm Buck went to work coaxing a fire to life in the fireplace. I took stock of the place as he went about his work. It was in even worse repair than I remembered. But it was still standing and that was all that mattered. I still couldn’t stop shivering. The inside of the cabin was just as brutally cold as the storm outside.

On the bright side, Buck had finally gotten the fire built up into a healthy blaze.

“Here, come here,” he said. He had dragged what appeared to be every blanket in the place in front of the fire and he had them all draped across his shoulders as he held one side of the blankets open, inviting me in. I hesitated. I knew I needed the warmth, but…

He seemed to sense my hesitation and lowered his arm, turning with a shrug to look into the fire. He looked almost hurt, but I told myself that was stupid. And I was being stupid, I realized. I needed the warmth. We both did. Not a damn thing wrong with trying to survive. I stripped off my coat, boots, and gloves as he had done and nestled my way under the blanket with him.

I don’t know what I expected. Maybe that my feelings for him would have the decency to put themselves on hold, given our situation. Well, let me tell you, that is
not
what happened. The minute his arm was around me, it seemed like I was feeling about a thousand things at once. But for the first time in months I wasn’t the least bit conflicted. I wanted him to wrap his arms around me and kiss the hell out of me, and I wanted him to do it
now
.

What I wouldn’t have given to be able to know what he was thinking right then. His arm tightened around me just the slightest bit and I tensed. I couldn’t take much more of this. I tilted my head up to look at him and found him staring at me intently and my breath caught in my throat. We locked eyes and suddenly not a single place in me felt even the slightest bit cold.

I’m not even sure who kissed who. I just know that in an instant my lips were pressed against his and everything else was instantly a thousand miles away. Nothing else mattered. The kiss lasted forever, and it still wasn’t long enough. I was trembling by the time he pulled away, and it didn’t have a damn thing to do with the cold.

His eyes were almost feverish. He opened his mouth as if to speak, but said nothing. Instead he kissed me again, wrapping his fingers through my hair as he did. And I kissed him back for everything I was worth. My fingers seemed to work of their own accord, undoing the buttons of his shirt.

His fingers were clearly not as patient as mine. Buttons popped off and skittered across the room as he ripped my shirt open. I took it the rest of the way off and unsnapped my bra for him. He pulled it off and flung it carelessly aside before pulling his own shirt off.

He laid me down on the floor, resting between my legs as he cupped one breast in his hand and kissed the other one. I couldn’t help the little moan that escaped me. And I couldn’t ignore the effect it had had on him. Suddenly I could feel the hardness of him through his jeans. The thought of it sent waves of heat coursing through me.

I fumbled with the button of his jeans as he did the same with mine. Before I knew it, we were both completely naked. He stopped for a moment, his arms around my shoulders, the length of him resting against the inside of my thigh. He looked into my eyes for a long moment, as if asking some unspoken question. The flames played across his face and in that moment I knew, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that I was his. I knew I would never love anyone else the way that I loved him.

Whatever it was that he saw in my eyes, it seemed to satisfy him. He kissed me again, more gently this time, as he pushed inside me. Slowly at first, rhythmically, but gaining speed with every passing minute. I could feel the pressure building in me with each thrust. Not a bad pressure. It was something of light and heat and passion.

I felt him throbbing inside me as he reached climax, and it was the last straw. I cried out as I climaxed with him, as his thrusts slowed, and we rested in each other’s arms. He kissed me again and it was salty with our sweat. I sighed contentedly as he rolled onto his side, pulling me closer into his arms. Sleep crept up on me.

As if in a dream I heard him whisper, “I really do need you, Charlie.” He tucked a strand of my hair behind my ear and I fell asleep with a smile on my face.

*****

It was two more days before we were able to leave the cabin. Luckily there were enough canned goods there to feed an army through the apocalypse. They tasted terrible, the mattress could have passed as a medieval torture device…and it was the happiest damn two days of my life. For those two days, the rest of the world did not exist for us. We spent them wrapped up in each other, both literally and physically by turns.

But all good things must end. On the third day there was a knock at the door. It was Sheriff Graff. Apparently Ruth had called them to come out looking for us when we didn’t come back. And just like that, I was back to feeling conflicted. Except now I felt conflicted
and
I felt like a homewrecker. Each time the sheriff looked my way I felt like he was judging me. It probably wasn’t entirely imagined, either. I was, after all, holding my obviously button-less shirt closed with my hands as he spoke to us.

It was almost a relief to get my coat back on. Covered my shirt at least. As we rode back down with the sheriff I couldn’t help but wonder why it had taken Ruth two days to finally call the sheriff. When we got back to the house I asked Buck about it. It seemed to bother him when I mentioned her. Not that I could blame him. Hell, it bothered
me
. It was like the two of us talking about her made what we had done worse somehow.

He said that they’d fought just before we’d left, and that it wasn’t that unusual for her to kick him out for days at a time after a fight. I felt a cold worse than any storm take root in me as he told me that. So, I was what exactly? His way to blow off steam when he and the wife fought? I felt dirty.

“I see,” I said. I could feel the blood rushing to my cheeks, but there was nothing I could do to stop it. He must have noticed because he reached for my hand.