Page 23 of Cuddles for the Bear
A chuckle seemed to run from his head to his toes.It got the point across.Just as he did earlier, it was as though his animal side was talking to him, but the voice was inside his head.
Although what point the chameleon was making, Wren wasn’t sure. He’d spent the whole time focused on Devon, barely paying any attention to Flint, Calvin, Levi, or even Python. Would Devon’s friends respect him now?I guess I’ll have to wait and see.
Speaking of Devon, Wren didn’t want to worry him.I think I’ve done that enough.He hurried back into the bedroom and climbed onto the bed, resting his back against a pile of pillows. Devon was waiting for him and handed him a plate piled high with sandwiches before sitting back in his chair and reaching for a smaller plate with a single sandwich. “I have juice here for you when you’re ready, too.”
“That’s kind of you, thank you.” The moment he bit into that first sandwich, Wren forgot about everything else. He couldn’t get the food down his throat fast enough. Levi’s meat cooking skills were incredible – all the men raved about it, and Calvin’s, too.But in that moment, Wren had never tasted anything so good. The bread was fresh, probably picked up from the bakery that day, and the combination made a sandwich that hit the spot. He quickly cleared the plate, washing the meat and bread down with a large glass of juice. He rubbed his belly with a sigh when he’d finished.
“You’re right,” he said, letting out a long breath. “I feel so much better after that.”
“You’ll probably find yourself eating larger meals and more often, now you’ve shifted for the first time.” Devon put his own empty plate and glass back on the bedside cabinet. “It takes a lot of energy to shift – you’re effectively changing every cell in your body. In your case, because you shift within a shift, so to speak, you will likely be impacted by the need to eat even more. We’ll make a point of having plenty of food around for when you do shift.
“You’ll probably notice some changes to your human side as well, now that you’ve gone through your first shift. Your eyesight will be sharper, your hearing is going to be more acute, you will likely get physically stronger and move faster as well.”
“Yes. Yes.” Wren nodded eagerly. “Some of those things have happened already, even before today. I thought I was hearing things when I overheard Levi and Calvin the other day when they were in the workshop, and I was sure I could hear Pax yesterday talking to Storm, and they were in their house with the doors closed.”
“You’ll get used to it. Over time your brain will learn to shut out things you don’t need to hear. Or smell.” Devon chuckled. “Your sense of smell will really intensify now you’ve shifted, and while that can be good if it’s a lovely scent of Gwen’s baking, sometimes in public spaces… Ugh.” Devon shuddered. “That’snot so easy to block out. What is important is that we all learn how to control our reaction to things non-paras might not be aware of. They would think we were being weird if we were reacting to something they can’t see or hear. It’s part of why I work so hard to blend in…” He trailed off. “Sorry. You probably don’t want to hear about that.”
Wren immediately felt bad. He had upset his Bear, and yes, he kept thinking of him as Bear even though he knew his name was Devon. “I didn’t mean to run off the way I did,” he said quietly. “That was childish and silly. I just got so…so…so angry… But I was really upset, too, and I didn’t know how to handle my feelings.
“It’s like… I’d been asking you about the claiming, for example, and you kept telling me not to worry about it. But what I couldn’t seem to explain to you was the more you kept saying we could talk about itlater,the more worried I got.”
“I never meant to worry you. I was trying to give you some space to adjust to living away from Michael.” Devon frowned. “Why did that worry you?”
“I thought you didn’t want to claim me.” Wren couldn’t understand why Devon didn’t see that. “In my head, you didn’t think I was good enough to claim as a mate, or maybe I was too frail, or too ill, or too stressed, or too whatever, I don’t know what it was that was holding you back.
“It was you who’d said that when we were claimed we’d never be without each other again. Something I wanted with all my heart. But no matter how many times I asked, you wouldn’t tell me how we could get to that point. Can’t you see? It was like I was being tested, but I didn’t know the rules of the game.”
Devon winced. “I genuinely thought I was doing the right thing in letting you adjust to life away from captivity first. I didn’trealize…” Letting out a long sigh, he added. “We can talk about it now. I promised you that, and we can. But before we do please know I have wanted to claim you from the moment you climbed back in from that damn ledge. Now, I have to think for a minute. I’ve never explained the concept of claiming…”
Devon was clearly choosing his words carefully, which was puzzling. The man had been a bear shifter his whole life. How hard was it to explain the claiming concepts to someone else? But even as he was thinking that, Wren noticed something else. Bear’s scent. It was something he’d smelled every day, to the point he took it for granted. It was a wonderful smell reminding Wren of forests and warm spices with a hint of sweet berries.
But now his chameleon had made his debut, Devon’s scent seemed stronger somehow. There was a sweet tinge that seemed to get stronger the longer the silence between them stretched out.
“You promised cuddling when we were out in the forest,” Wren blurted out before Devon could say anything else. He wanted to get closer to that scent, and while he didn’t totally understand why his cock was hardening and his whole body seemed more aware of the other man, he needed Devon to be closer to him. “We can’t cuddle while you’re in your chair.”
“I’m sure you also heard me mention I was having trouble controlling myself around you. The Fates ensure we’re highly sexually attracted to our mates, which can be both a blessing and a curse, depending on the circumstances,” Devon said. “Didn’t you shift into an elephant, just so you could show you were listening to me?”
Maybe.Wren had no idea why his chameleon thought an elephant was a good form to take, but he was pleased when Devon climbed onto the mattress. Seconds later, Wren’s headwas resting on his mate’s shoulder, and Devon’s arm was warm against his back. Wren inhaled, feeling his body relaxing into Devon’s strength. Well, most of his body. His dick was still hard.
“Let’s try this again,” Devon said, although he took in a deep breath, too.
I wonder what I smell like to him?
“Basic shifter claiming 101. Three things are required for a shifter to claim their mate – an exchange of saliva, usually through kissing, spunk exchanged through an orgasm during sex, and blood, which is shared when shifters bite each other. That bite leaves a scar which will never fade, signaling to other paranormals that the individual is a claimed mate.”
“Pax has one, and I think I saw Cyrus’s one the other night.” Wren nodded, and he tapped the side of his neck. “Right here.”
“Exactly.” Devon glanced down, his eyes lingering on where Wren’s finger was pointing, before he quickly looked away. “At the risk of upsetting you again, I’m going to assume you’ve never had sex before.”
Wren shook his head.
“Have you ever had an orgasm? By yourself in the shower or something like that?”
“No.” Wren wiggled his butt on the mattress. “But going on my instincts here, I could be due to have one in about two minutes,” he said. “Is that when your body gets all tight, your cock’s hard, and your balls seem to tighten up as if they’re going to pop?”
“Yep.” Devon made a noise that sounded like a strangled whimper.
Great. We’re finally getting somewhere.“All right. So what do we need to do for the sex part of things? I’m guessing people can orgasm on their own because of what you just said aboutthe shower thing. And you haven’t even seen my dick yet, but I feel all tingly down there, like I need to do something. Or you, maybe.”
