Page 13 of Her Beary Spicy Valentine (Welcome to Bear Mountain #2)

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ready or not

holly

K oda wasn’t ready for me. And I most definitely wasn’t ready for him.

But I said, “Okay,” anyway.

“Okay?” He cupped my face, his dark eyes somber as he asked, “Are you sure?”

“No.” The need coursing through me like a runaway train made my words come out shaky and desperate. Practically a sob. “But okay, anyway—at least until this weird bear estrus lets me think straight again.”

His gaze searched mine. For what felt like an eternity. Then he finally said, “Okay,” too.

Keeping our eyes locked, he lifted me into his arms like something out of a cheesy romance film. If romance films ever featured Mountie bear shifters with raging hard-ons. Agreeing to service you because you were both caught up in some weird ovulation thrall.

Okay, actually, nothing like a cheesy romance film.

Nonetheless, my heart couldn’t help but thrill at the obvious rush he was in as he ferried me up the narrow totem-den-lined road into…

Whoa. My eyes widened when he carried me across the threshold of a cave home that I could only describe as the exact opposite of my sister’s cozy Flintstone’s setup.

A bright red carpet anchored a space that seemed to be designed to answer one specific question: How many death traps can I fit into one den?

To one side, a near-Olympic-sized swimming pool loomed ominously, with no guardrails, no warning signs like the ones lining the village roads—hell, not even a raised lip to stop a toddler from wandering in.

The staircase he carried me down descended in a steep drop from the front door. It was a floating, sharp-edged work of art with no banisters on either side. None. Just a gleaming K-Horror-level dare, lying in wait for some unfortunate side character to misstep and plummet to the stone floor below.

If that wasn’t enough, a floating spiral staircase in the middle of the front room led to a second floor with a balcony-free ledge jutting out above. Basically, a visual advertisement for accidental childhood deaths: Want to make sure your toddler snaps their neck if they fall? Have we got the death cliff for you!

Also, every single piece of furniture was white.

This place was the opposite of baby-proofed. The only thing missing was a neon sign declaring: No children wanted here.

This was where Koda lived?

It confirmed what I’d already suspected: even if he managed to get me pregnant, I’d be raising the baby alone. Back in Vancouver.

Which was fine. Exactly what I’d been planning prior to my arrival—minus the bear shifter part.

I shoved down the weird ache of disappointment in my chest. I didn’t need him. I’d be fine.

Just fine.

“I don’t really live here. You can have the den after your estrus is done,” Koda said suddenly, cutting into my thoughts, which must have been written all over my face. “I’ll fix this. All of this.”

With that promise, he stepped down from the final floating stair, his expression resolute. “But first, we need to deal with your estrus. Here…”

He set me down in a pile of pillows and blankets I hadn’t even noticed while I was cataloging the hazards of his hedonistic bachelor pad.

I wasn’t sure what to make of being placed onto a large pallet as opposed to a normal bed.

But my bear’s response was ecstatic.

Nest! she cried out, seeming to forget all about the rest of the space’s death-trap décor.

So that’s what this was.

The makeshift bed wasn’t nearly as formal as the one I’d found Noelle and her mates in, but it didn’t appear to matter.

Nest! My bear thrilled inside me, and though the estrus cramps didn’t entirely disappear, they ebbed, softening into a suggestive ache instead of a relentless biological imperative.

Warmth spread through me, as comforting as the softest blanket.

Here. My bear let out a happy sigh. Here is where we belong.

“I’m glad your bear approves.”

I looked up to find Koda watching me from just outside the nest’s border. As if he knew exactly what my bear was thinking.

“May I join you?” His tone was stiff and formal, but his eyes gleamed with a dark heat.

My thighs pressed together at the thought of him inside the nest—inside of me . But there was one problem.

“Could you…?” I wrinkled my nose.

I wanted him. With a pride-killing desperation. But I couldn’t stand the cloying marshmallow scent that clung to him, laced into what should have only been the rich warmth of hazelnuts.

“Could you take off your clothes first?”

Surprise flickered across his face, but it quickly softened. “You want me and only me,” he said, understanding my request without explanation.

He stepped back from the nest’s border. “Give me a minute,” he murmured, disappearing behind one of the alcoved walls of his perilous home.

Moments later, the marshmallow smell was replaced by the sound of running water, followed by the quiet hum of a dryer.

Then Koda returned, wearing nothing but the carved planes of his marble-statue body.

My breath hitched. How had his bear possibly chosen me ?

Yet the hunger in his gaze left no doubt.

“Now?” he asked, his voice rough with restraint. “May I join you?”

I nodded wordlessly, the tension in the air crackling between us. His desire—well, at least his bear’s—was palpable as he settled onto the blankets beside me.

His dark eyes roamed over me, lingering. I wondered if he’d ask me to take off the shirt and flannel I’d borrowed from the Viking. I didn’t want to for reasons I couldn’t quite name, but I’d do it if it meant moving this possible baby-making show along.

Instead, he said, “Please present in the standard position for a claim.”

Another request that turned out to be a command. Before I could ask what he meant, he flipped me onto my stomach and pulled my hips back, positioning me on my hands and knees.

Presenting.

His meaning became crystal clear as I dripped estrus, waiting for what came next.

“You’re drenched,” he observed, his tone devoid of inflection.

The mushroom tip of his cock pressed into, but didn’t quite penetrate, the entrance of my core. “Are you sure? Sure you want this?”

Technically, he was verifying my enthusiastic consent. But it felt like teasing—a cruel reminder of how very clearly I did want him. Wanted this .

“Yes!” I whined, too far gone to care about pride.

Did I say my estrus had ebbed? It reignited back with a vengeance, a wave of desperate heat flooding me as I shamelessly rocked my hips, trying to draw him inside.

“Yes, please, please give it to me,” I begged.

Panic clawed my chest, primal and irrational. My body trembled, and my heart hammered like I might actually die if this bear shifter didn’t take me right now.

“Please!” I cried again when he didn’t move.

Unfortunately, Koda didn’t seem to share my sense of urgency.

He trailed a hand down my shoulder blade before reaching underneath me to cup my breast over the Viking’s borrowed flannel. Like he was considering the ripeness and weight of a covered melon.

Regret joined the panic. Why had I kept the shirt on? I arched my back with a whine, desperate for the feel of his skin on mine. But he only said, “Patience, Holly.”

But his hand trailed lower, sliding beneath the shirt’s hem to grip the crease where my leg met my stomach. Giving me the skin-to-skin contact I’d been aching for. My body quaked at the rough warmth of his palm.

“You’re sure you’re ready, Holly?” he asked, nonetheless. “You wouldn’t lie to me about that… Like you lied about going home.”

“I didn’t lie,” I snapped, disliking him immensely even as I squirmed beneath him, desperate for more. “I just didn’t do what you commanded. Is that why you’re torturing me instead of helping me, like you said you would?”

“This isn’t helping?” he asked, faux innocence seeping into his monotone. “Only one thing will do for the female who turned my life upside down?”

He rocked his hips against me, the thick heat of his hard length sliding along my folds but not inside them.

“Now?” I groaned, frustration spilling over into a growl. “ Now is when you decide to show me you’ve got a sense of humor?”

“Where’s the joke?”

He moved his hand away to line himself up—but instead of entering me, he pressed the tip of his cock against my clit, sending an electric jolt of pleasure through me. But it wasn’t enough. And he knew it.

“Jerk!” I hissed, not holding back the venom in my tone. “Cruel, mean, jerkity jerk.”

He didn’t respond, but I felt the bite mark on my arm pulse. Somehow, I could sense the laughter he wasn’t letting out, silent and maddening behind me.

He was pissing me off.

So, I turned my head and nipped his arm—not hard, just enough to send a message.

Hurry. The. Hell. Up.

But instead of moving faster, he froze behind me, going completely still. It was so sudden, I worried I’d done something wrong.

“Koda?”

No answer. No movement.

Had I gone too far? Maybe the bite had been too much, a boundary line unintentionally crossed.

“Koda, I didn’t mean to?—”

Before I could apologize, he thrust into me, driving deep with one powerful motion that took my breath away.

Holy stuffing—in more ways than one.

His cock… his cock was even larger than Hawk’s. The sheer size of him was a total invasion, stretching my wet pussy to a razor-thin point between pleasure and pain.

I collapsed onto my forearms under his sudden thrust, and he followed me down, his broad chest blanketing my back.

“Is this what you wanted, Holly?” he growled, his stubbled cheek pressing against mine as he pushed deeper into the space straining to accommodate him.

Was it?

I didn’t know! My hands bunched in the blanket, and my feet flutter-kicked uselessly on either side of his thighs. But even as my mind spun, my body betrayed me, instinctively pushing back, wanting more.

“Impatient Holly,” he murmured, his voice rough with accusation.

One of his hands slipped beneath the Viking’s waffle shirt, cupping my aching breast. He seized the pebbled bud he found there and squeezed it with a cruel, hard twist. I cried out with… what? Pain? Pleasure? The line was so blurred now, I couldn’t tell anymore.

“Never can just do as you’re told,” he growled in my ear, punishing my nipple with another twist. “First you run. And now you’re making me teach you what happens to naughty little vixens who dare to bite a bear.”

With that declaration, he began to move, his hips slamming into mine with a relentless, punishing rhythm. My bear cried out inside me, ecstatic, even as my knees buckled under the onslaught.

Had I thought him robotic before? Dispassionate? No.

This wasn’t a machine. This was wild . Overwhelming.

We sank fully to the floor, his large hand still clutching my breast as he took me, withdrawing, then filling me again with each demanding thrust.

“This is your fault,” he growled, his voice rough and accusing. “I tried—tried to be kind. Tried to take it slow. But you didn’t let me. So now you get the animal. This is your fault. All your fault. ”

His words were fire, scorching me even as they drove me higher. Then he captured my mouth in a fierce, all-consuming kiss, his tongue plunging deep before I could even think to defend myself against his accusation.

Having him inside both my body and my mouth—the sensations were unbelievable. I moaned into his kiss as sparks of electric pleasure coursed through me, and the air filled with the intoxicating scent of chocolate and hazelnuts.

I’d been blamed for so many things in my life.

Births that hadn’t gone as planned. The demise of my marriage. Ruining a certain Mountie’s life.

But this…

This was the first time I was happy to be blamed. Happy to be punished.

Despite my submissive position beneath this out-of-control Mountie, something powerful swelled within me, rising alongside the orgasm that was about to crash over me.

“Oh, oh, I’m coming!” I gasped, pulling away from his kiss as the pleasure overtook me. This time, I didn’t fight it. I let it sweep me away, reveling in the male claiming me with such ferocity.

“Ahhh! You’re gripping me so tight—Vixen! You’re killing me! Stop… no!”

Koda’s words tumbled out in a harsh spray of accusations, commands, and then—suddenly—something raw and broken.

“I can’t… I can’t hold on—ahhh!!!”

Hot cum flooded into me, filling me completely and finally satisfying the bear that had driven me to this point.

This .

This was what my bear wanted. It rolled inside me, happy and sated.

Until Koda abruptly pulled out and rose to his feet.

I barely had time to turn my collapsed body over before he was on the other side of the nest, disappearing behind the alcove wall.

“Where are you going?” I demanded when he returned, fully clothed. He no longer smelled of marshmallows, but still…

“There are rules, Holly.”

Holly. No more Vixen. The stony Mountie was back, along with my government name.

“Protocols must be followed for both forming a maul and attending to an estrus cycle on Bear Mountain. We’ve already broken three tribal rules—not to mention the fuzzy human ethics of this situation.”

“Boo, ethics,” I mumbled with a wide yawn. Sleep tugged at me like an anchor, heavier than anything I’d felt before. Not even the time I attended a triplet mom through a vaginal home birth had left me this drained.

Still, I managed to say, “Come back. If you’re right about this estrus stuff, my bear’s going to want to do that again.”

“She knows you need to rest,” he assured me, his tone softer. “She’ll let you sleep first… before attending to the last member of our maul.”

“Maul?” I mumbled, groggy, the word barely registering.

“Sleep, Holly,” he insisted, irritation creeping back into his voice. “I’ll rein in this chaos, then explain everything when I return with…”

His words faded as sleep pulled me under.

Then, I woke to the smell of bacon.

And eggs. And something sweet and starchy—pancakes? The aroma filled the air, like the Sunday breakfasts my mom used to make for Noelle and me after my stepdad had been an insufferable butthole all week. Along with the rich smell of maple.

A smile tugged at my lips as my eyes fluttered open.

Only to find myself face-to-face with a massive, bright yellow grizzly bear.

He blinked at me.

I blinked at him.

And then, like any formerly all-human woman who suddenly found herself in the middle of a cheesy Christmas/horror/paranormal-shifter movie, I screamed.