Page 12 of Spies without a Face
Go to her, my bear urged.
No. We can’t smother her.
The lure of having her right next door was far too potent to ignore.
I paced in front of my sofa in my barebones living room, wrestling with feelings I never thought I’d have. I thought puberty was confusing. Discovering I was part bear and could shift into one was worse. It blew my mind. But now? It seemed like both collided on a crash course. It felt like bear shifter hormones amped to epic levels. My bear was convinced she was the perfect partner. Just by her scent?
How was that possible? It didn’t make sense. We’d only just met!
What I needed was a cold shower to knock some sense into me. After stepping into my tiny, pink-tile bathroom that looked like it hadn’t been updated much since the 1970s, I stared at myself in the mirror.
Get a grip on yourself.I lightly slapped myself on the face.You can’t go over there blubbering things you don’t even understand. What do you think would happen if you went over to her and confessed that your bear thinks she’s our mate?
Easy answer—she’d tell me I was out of my mind and ask me to leave her alone.
I stripped out of my clothes. When I spotted white frosting on my black pants, I groaned—yet another reminder of my awkwardness that night.
Why had I been such a lumbering oaf, anyway? I wasn’t typically clumsy. I suspected it had a lot to do with my bear’s reaction to Pandora and my mind-bending confusion around it.
No, there was nothing to suspect—that pretty much summed it up.
I took a shower with the water cool enough to distract me from my new inner turmoil. The briskness against my skin meant I wouldn’t linger there with my thoughts. After quickly soaping up, I rinsed off under the unwelcome stream. I dried off and put on blue plaid sleep shorts.
Once in my bedroom, my bear released a mournful moan inside of me. One of the bedroom windows looked out onto Pandora’s house, making forgetting her an even more monumental task.
I walked over to close my shades but couldn’t resist a peek. When I saw the figure on her deck, my eyes bulged, and my heart rammed against my ribs.
Who the fuck was out there?
My eyes adjusted to the silhouette of a man. He wore all black and had dark hair, making him difficult to see in the shadows. If I didn’t have shifter blood, I likely wouldn’t have noticed him.
My bear rumbled at the threat.Protect her.
No kidding.I reached for a pair of jeans and tugged them on so I could go over there and confront him. Once I fastened them, I glanced outside again. Pandora stood outside talking to him.
Had she expected him?
When they entered her house, my heart felt like it fell through the floorboards, crashing against the cold, unforgiving cement in the basement.
Ouch.
My bear rumbled with a possessive fury.
She’s not ours, I warned.
That was the sad truth. As I tormented myself by picturing what was going on next door, it messed with my mind. I covered my head with the pillow but couldn’t escape the intrusive images of Pandora with someone else.
What could I do if the woman who was supposedly my “mate” already had a lover?
PANDORA
My ex-fiancé stood beneath the moonlight, green eyes twinkling at me with appreciation. Age had treated him well, and he looked even better with the gray streaks in his dark hair in his early forties than he did in his mid-twenties. He was tall, not as much as Austin and not as burly, but he’d still loom over most people.
Marius gave me a seductive smile one that slowly reached his eyes, capturing me in them. “You’re looking quite succulent yourself, Pandora.”
I ignored the ripple of heat that tingled inside in response to how his gaze raked over me. How was it after all these years he could affect me that way?
Disgusted by my reaction, I demanded, “What do you want?”
