Page 68 of Mated to the Mountain Bear

“Much,” she squeaks.

I rub a hand over my bare chest. When you come from a family of shifters, and you don’t spend much time around humans, it’s easy to forget how uptight they are about nudity.

“It’s normal for shifters to be naked.” I reassure her.

“That is not normal,” she mutters, staring at the tent in my blanket for a second, which grows bigger and bigger under her scrutiny.

“Can we focus now?”

Huffing at her less than enthusiastic reaction, I wait for her to pull herself together.

“Not really.” She swallows hard, but at least she faces me.

It’s clearly taking an immense amount of effort for her to look me in the eye, and her cheeks are still burning. When I look down at her hands, they’re resting on each knee, and her pointer fingers are extended about a foot apart, like she’s measuring something.

“Zara?”

She gives herself a little shake and snaps out of it, curling her fingers into fists and burying them under her thighs.

“Ben, I don’t know what is going on here. This is all too weird for me. Things have gotten seriously freaky.” She clears her throat, and I frown as she presses her lips together. “But one thing I know is that ifheis here, I need not to be.”

Which might make sense if you don’t understand why he’s chasing her. But I do, and I know he won’t stop.

“Fine,” I say, despite it being anything but fine. My bear is furious that I’d even consider letting her leave. But if that’s what she wants, that’s what we’ll do. “But if you’re leaving the mountain, it’s after I explain all this to you, so you know exactly who and what you’re dealing with.”

26

ZARA

“You’ll let me go?”

Ben frowns, unhappy but resigned.

“I’m not going to hold you here against your will, Zara.” He’s determined to hold a sensible, adult conversation, but I can’t think about anything other than his broad chest, huge pecs, and the smattering of dark hair that’s travelling down his bulging abs and disappears under the blanket... shit.

Blinking hard, I give myself a mental slap and vow to pull it together. This is serious.

“Can’t you explain to me en route to... anywhere... what all of this means? My brain is about to explode.”

My stalker is here. He tracked me all the way from my home to this tiny cabin in the middle of fucking nowhere. I can’t stay. If he broke into my apartment, with its buzzers and deadbolts, he’ll be able to get in here.

“He’ll just keep following you. He thinks you’re his.”

I bristle at hearing those words. He wrote it in the messages he slipped under my door.

“I haven’t given him any encouragement.”

“You didn’t need to. He’s imprinted on you and thinks you’re his mate.”

When I stare at him blankly, Ben pauses, choosing his words carefully. “Like a soulmate, except much, much stronger. Mates are obsessed with each other. It’s fate, and nothing will keep them apart.”

Fate.

That’s the word he used when he explained what was happening with us.

“But I don’t know him.” I argue weakly, not understanding any of this.

Ben’s expression softens. He crouches down in front of me and takes my hands, my fingers, tiny, wrapped up in his.