Page 43 of There’s a Way (Mythic Beast #2)

Will

What do you do when your girlfriend turns into a huge fucking bear? You hold your boyfriend’s hand and tell the bear how pretty she is.

Or, that’s the best I could do. Turns out, Davy was better at this part than me.

“Master is right,” Davy told her. “You’re beautiful. Can I see how your paws and claws work? Are they like a cat’s, or a dog’s?”

She sat in front of us and offered a paw, and Davy let go of my hand to grasp the entire paw and fiddle with the claws, totally trusting. “Oh, so more like a dog’s. Why did I think they would retract? Can I sit on your leg and be hugged by my very own Micca bear?”

Micca opened her arms in invitation, and Davy somehow managed to sit on her leg and lean against her. The bear gently put one arm around him and looked at me, clearly pleased with Davy’s response and wondering about how I might be dealing with her.

“I don’t know what to say. You’re beautiful, and much bigger than I expected.

I guess this explains the huge numbers on the wall and the great big cushion in your living room.

Do you really watch television in this form?

Should we…” I shook my head. “That conversation can wait until you have a voice box again.”

She made some vocal bear noises that I suppose was her telling me she has a voice box now, and I grinned at her. “Okay. Point. I adore you, Micca. In all your forms.” I touched her foot, and then realized I was making this awkward.

“I’m sorry I’m being a dork.”

The bear moved her arm in slow motion until the pads of her hand — foot? — touched my cheek, and I put my hand on the outside of her paw — oh, it’s a paw, right? Not a hand or foot.

“Do you want to show off for us? Can you, like, rip trees out of the ground?”

She sighed, oh-so-gently moved Davy off her, stood, ambled about fifteen yards from us, and then poofed back to human.

“Rip trees out of the ground? Really? Why would I destroy a perfectly good tree just to show off?”

She sounded genuinely upset, and I tried to figure out what the problem was. Meanwhile, she’d changed back to human beside her clothes, and she started putting them back on.

“He’s an action guy, right?” Davy told her. “You were just sitting there, which was fine because I loved being held by you, but he wanted to see you in action, is all. It’s one of the reasons he’s so successful — he sees something and fully explores it, if it interests him.”

She sighed. “I’m a very efficient killer. I can also have fun, especially in the water, but mostly, I’m built to kill anything in my environment so I can eat it. Trees don’t make good food. I could probably push some of them over, but why would I?”

She finished putting her clothes on, and Ranger walked to us. “First priority with shifters after a change is to feed us.”

Davy immediately walked to the picnic basket and said, “Looks like a bucket of fried chicken and a stack of roast beef sandwiches.”

“I’ll eat with ya’ll now,” Nathan said, “and then Mira and Panda can eat in the chopper.”

“And I shall take my leave,” Jupiter said, and then he was gone.

* * * *

Davy

It took forever to fly home, and I was itchy the whole way.

Nearly a week of being Master’s partner instead of his slave had me all out of sorts.

We put our phones on airplane mode on the plane, but before we landed in Atlanta, I had a text all ready to go, and I sent it as soon as I turned airplane mode off.

I’m supposed to tell you of my needs, so I am. I don’t want it to sound like a demand, but a notification, so I hope it’s okay for me to tell my Master that I need a physical reminder of who we are to each other.

I don’t think my text was the first he read, though I can’t be sure. At any rate, it was several minutes after he looked at his phone before he looked at me and said, “I know.”

What did that mean? Was he going to do something to reassert our relationship? Was he going to make me wait a week? Was he going to make me clean the pool and bathrooms and then work out as soon as we got home?

He’d made me work out with him while we were at my grandparents.

We’d actually helped them with some projects around the house, repairing the chicken coop area inside the barn, adding more insulation, painting the barn, and a few other things.

Malcolm hadn’t expected us to, but once we saw the supplies that had come in with us, we all kind of insisted.

We’d have been doing push-ups and pull-ups and running sprints and all kinds of other stuff if we hadn’t put our muscles into real work.

I hadn’t had an orgasm the entire trip, though I’d given Master plenty. I didn’t think Micca had any orgasms, either, though that was totally her choice.

I hadn’t been allowed to touch myself, and no one had touched me, so — no orgasms for Davy. I guess that in itself was a reminder of my station, but I needed more .

When the SUV finally pulled onto the property, Master had them let me out before we got to the garage.

“Go to the pool, strip to your boxer briefs, and deal with the pool. Angie has been adding chlorine, and she shocked it yesterday, but you’ll need to check everything else and add chemicals if something’s off.

Clean the robot’s filter and get it going, then go in through the garage, strip, and follow the written instructions. ”

So many things went through my head. Disappointment, anger, relief, and finally, acceptance. I’d told him I needed a reminder, and this wasn’t what I had in mind, but it absolutely did the job.

“Yes, Master.”

The water needed a slight PH adjustment but was otherwise okay. I used the hose to clean the robot’s filter, and then put the robot into the water on a setting to clean the entire pool twice, and finally gathered my clothes and made my way to the garage.

I recognized Master’s handwriting on the sticky note.

You know what to do with the butt plug. Don an apron in the kitchen and get your chicken taco soup going in the slow cooker. Go to the weight room and work your core, arms, and legs.

The butt plug was a little hard to get in because nothing had been in my ass for days, but also comforting, once inserted.

It was like I was finally home. It took about fifteen minutes to get the taco soup going, another couple of minutes to clean up, and then I headed downstairs to the weight room.

I heard unfamiliar music coming from above when I hit the staircase, which told me Will had some ideas he needed to put to music.

Usually, he writes things out and then gets Hailey to help him put it to music, but sometimes he does the whole thing from the start.

I think views from the top of the turret must help give him inspiration during the writing process.

He doesn’t always go there, but often enough, I knew where he was without having to go look.

Hours later, I was nearly finished with my workout when Micca came into the room looking sleepy.

“I needed a nap. I’ve never been a fan of flying, and my bear is even less pleased with being trapped in a tube. It’s stressful. Wears me out. How close are you to being finished?”

“Maybe twenty minutes? Master wanted me to do everything in one day, so I’ve been in here a while. The soup won’t be ready yet. I can make a tuna salad, or a couple of hamburgers to tide you over, Sir.” And if she told me to do it, I could stop working out now rather than later.

She shook her head. “I’m capable of cooking a few burgers. Finish up, get a shower, and then let’s spend some time together while Will does his music thing.”

“Yes, Sir.”

Her smile told me how happy she was with me, and I finished the rest of my workout with the memory of how she’d looked at me.

* * * *

Davy

Micca was waiting for me on Will’s bed when I came out of the bathroom after my shower, and I stepped to the bed to wait for instructions.

“Good boy. Climb up and hold me. I want to be a girl for a little while, so you get to hold me while you tell me where you’re at with the fact you have family who cares for you.”

I climbed onto the bed, pulled the light throw blanket over us, and snuggled Micca into my body.

To be honest, I’ve always preferred to be the one snuggled into a man’s body, but I’ve come to appreciate the feel of Micca’s strong but feminine body curled into mine.

I still consider myself gay because I’m not even a tiny bit attracted to other women, but I’m getting used to sex with Micca.

More than just used to it — it’s normal, now. It’s who we are to each other.

“I don’t know where I’m at with the whole grandparents thing.

I mean, my everyday life isn’t going to change, right?

And I could be mad because I could’ve grown up with people who actually cared about me, but what good would that do?

Also, would I even want to change that? I like my life now, and maybe I wouldn’t like my life this much if I’d grown up in bumfuck Alaska. ”

“At first, I thought meeting Will was kinda like winning the lottery,” she said.

“Oh, it’s definitely like that, but you have to take the pain-in-the-ass stuff with the good.”

She snickered. “You mean the butt plugs?”

I smiled and kissed the top of her head. “No, I mean the security people, and the fans, and the disguises.”