The Baby Shift- Nebraska Read online

  Jack made a noncommittal noise, and Sadie looked up to find him walking toward her with a hot water bottle.

  “Which part of you is most sore?” he said, the bottle covered in what looked like a hand-knitted cover.

  “Uh.” Sadie’s ass was the most sore. Her ass, and her lower back. But that wasn’t exactly something you said to someone you’d known for less than an hour, usually. But again, desperate times called for desperate measures.

  “My ass,” she said, leveling Jack with a look that dared him to balk. He didn’t. In fact, when she said it, he smiled, a big grin that lit up his handsome face and made her whole-body ooze with a thirst for him.

  “Excellent. Get on your belly and I’ll get this right on it,” he said, shaking the bottle in his hand.

  “Um. Okay. Sure,” Sadie said, keeping her cool as she stood up and climbed onto the couch, baring her spandex-covered behind for all the world, or in this case, cabin, to see.

  The minute the hot water bottle hit her, she let out an involuntary groan, because damn, that felt good.

  “Do you…do you want me to rub your back a bit?” Jack asked, hesitation coloring his words. But Sadie didn’t hesitate in her response. She just said yes. Who could refuse a hot guy offering to rub her troubles away? No one.

  Chapter 4

  Jack had asked Sadie that question knowing she was perfectly within her rights to shoo him away from her. After all, they barely knew each other. All she knew about him was that he wrote romances. She didn’t know he was a bear, she didn’t know that the second she’d walked in his house, his shifter senses had gone haywire because holy shit, this was her. His mate. The woman he’d spent his whole life waiting for.

  * * *

  And Jack didn’t want to tell her. Not yet. He didn’t want to ruin this perfect moment, the moment when his hands had connected with her skin and every cell in his body had come alive and sung, because the feel of her skin, covered only in sheer cotton, under his hands was pure, unadulterated bliss.

  * * *

  He could feel the heat pouring out of her, feel her warmth under his palms as he began kneading the tension out of her. Her back was lean and muscled under his hands, but there were knots scattered here and there, and he slowly dug his thumbs into them, rotating them in circles, deeper and deeper. Sadie growled in response, a primal sound coming from her that made him nearly twitch with excitement.

  * * *

  He loved it when women growled for him. It hadn’t happened in a long time, not since his last relationship, but the sound never failed to set him on fire.

  * * *

  “Mm, that feels good,” she mumbled as he moved his hands higher, rubbing up and around the column of her spine. He wanted to dip his hands under her t-shirt, to feel her soft skin against his, but he didn’t want to overstep any boundaries.

  * * *

  Thankfully, Sadie was forthright, and when his hands skimmed back down to the hemline of her shirt, she whispered, “Go under.” It was all the permission he needed to dive his fingers beneath the cotton and feel the full impact of her skin on his.

  * * *

  And if he hadn’t been sure she was the woman for him, he sure as hell was now, because even lightly grazing his fingers down her back set off a shudder through him, a shudder that told Jack it wasn’t just his sexual self that loved this, but his bear self, the part of him that knew everything, because it acted not based on rationality or logic, but on instinct and primal need. Jack needed Sadie like he needed water and air, and he had to figure out a way to show her that, to show this woman he’d only just met that she was the One. The Only. His Mate.

  * * *

  ---

  Sadie was lost in the bliss of Jack’s hands on her when she felt the stirring inside her. She hadn’t felt it in a while. For the last few months, she’d been taking care of business herself. She hadn’t had time to date while she was finishing her research, and men who were willing to uphold the bargain of the friend in friends-with-benefits arrangements were surprisingly thin on the ground. So, it had been up to her, some feminist porn and her trusty Rapid Rabbit to fulfill her sexual needs.

  * * *

  But what Jack was doing with his hands right now was making her wet. And needy. For him. For his hands, moving in places north and south along her body, feeling her everywhere, sating her need for him, for that lean form bent over her at this very moment.

  * * *

  “Jack,” she whispered, her face resting on her forearm as he did delicious things to her lower back that made it feel like he had eight hands, not two.

  * * *

  “Yeah?” he whispered, and she was glad to hear he sounded just as affected as she did. Just as needy and warm for her form as she was for his. Good. At least this is mutual.

  * * *

  “Could you…I think you should take off my shirt. And yours. And flip me over. Now,” she said. There wasn’t time for playing around. That desperate need was building in her, looking for a release, and she was powerless to fight against it.

  * * *

  “Yeah,” he laughed. “I can do that.” Sadie smiled, and nearly purred like a cat when his hands began to slide the soft cotton of her favorite workout shirt above her ribcage. Sadie scooted back until her ass met her feet, lifting herself onto her knees so he could rip the shirt over her head. She turned around, her chin balanced on her shoulder, to see Jack peeling his own t-shirt off, revealing beautiful abdominals inch by agonizing inch.

  * * *

  He was cut, but not in the way bodybuilders or gym rats were. His strength was a natural one, born of working outside and maybe doing some calisthenics on rainy days. She couldn’t help the little moan of appreciation that escaped her mouth when their eyes met and his tongue ran over his lips like he was looking forward to tasting her. Her mind hadn’t quite gone there yet, but she wouldn’t be opposed. Not one bit.

  * * *

  And when Jack pulled her roughly against him, her smooth back to his hairy front, she also didn’t mind. Nor did she protest when he threw her on her back against the sofa, which suddenly didn’t seem so lumpy and bumpy at all. She watched Jack crawl toward her, the tip of his nose brushing against her stomach as his body came toward hers with aching slowness, and she growled, because she knew what was coming, who was coming, and she knew she was going to like it. A lot.

  Chapter 5

  Jack’s inner bear took over his human brain, acting on instinct as he nosed his way up Sadie’s stomach, filling his nostrils with her sweet scent of honeysuckle and cinnamon sugar. His heart was going a mile a minute, and he was so hot he could have stood naked in arctic tundra and still sweat from head to toe, but he didn’t care.

  He was lost in Sadie, lost in the way even just the presence of her body under his was making him feel. He looked down at her face below him, her tongue flicking out of her mouth to wet her lips, leaving a tantalizing sheen he wanted to lick off. His eyes roamed up her face, noticing the small freckles dotting her cheeks and nose, oddly cute additions to such a sultry face, and then he saw her eyes, which were filled with trust. And he crumbled.

  He growled as he dipped his head toward her, taking her lips as his own personal conquest. Sadie moaned immediately, relaxing into the sofa and opening herself to him, her thighs stretched wide so he could saddle himself perfectly between them and press down onto her, letting their body heat comingle into a fiery blaze that threatened to engulf them both.

  Sadie’s thighs pressed against his hips, and he could feel the heat radiating from her core as he dragged a hand down her side, feeling the curve of her waist, the extra-soft skin there like raw silk beneath the pads of his fingers.

  Sadie traced her tongue along the line that separated his top and lower lip, asking for an entrance that he immediately granted her, and sweet lord, the taste of her in his mouth was perfect. She was sweet and a little bitter, like the most satisfying gin and tonic, and Jack supped from her again and again, his hand reach
ing back up to join his other in cupping her face and angling her just so he could explore the whole of her.

  Jack tore his mouth from hers, loving the desperate look she pulled when his lips left hers, but that look quickly faded when he started kissing her cheeks, her ears, her neck down to her sports bra, brushing his lips against the taut fabric, tasting the dried sweat on her skin and loving every salty lick of it, because he was nothing if not an animal.

  Sadie curled her hands around his head, running her fingers across his buzz cut and making a satisfying scratching sound as he ran his tongue along the band of her bra. “Take it off,” she whispered. “Please,” she added, and who was Jack to say no to a woman asking a man to strip her and show off what he knew would be perfect breasts and luscious nipples just waiting to be lavished by his tongue?

  Jack leaned back so he could get a better grip on the bra, and he was just beginning to tug it upward, showing the barest hint of a luscious curve when he felt it. Not an orgasm, though in truth, he wasn’t all that far away from one. No, he felt himself starting to shift.

  “I…uh…I’ll be right back,” he said, trying and failing to gracefully climb off Sadie before running to the bathroom, his cock achingly stiff in his boxers. He slammed the bathroom door shut and yanked on the string that turned the light bulb on, which buzzed, letting him know that it needed changing soon.

  Jack looked in the mirror and confirmed that yes, he was shifting. Or starting to. Hair was sprouting in places where normally there was a minimal amount, his back was beginning to arch, and his nose resembled a snout far more than the usual aquiline nasal cartilage that usually graced his face.

  “Fuck,” he muttered, turning this way and that and realizing that his back was covered in a full layer of fur. Most of the time, he really didn’t mind being a bear shifter. Sure, he’d dealt with the normal amounts of prejudice that people of his kind were subjected to, but out here, in the park, he was so far removed from that it was easy to forget about it. There were rarely times he wished he was anything other than himself, except for right now, when he really, really wished he was just a normal human with no ursine tendencies.

  Jack tried to focus. From his experience, to calm down and return to his fully human form, he needed at least five minutes. Ten, if he was feeling extra riled up, which he was. His cock, his dilated pupils, and his racing heart made that very, very clear.

  But what was he going to do about Sadie, the beautiful girl in the next room who had probably just had a heart attack because the guy who was about to take her bra off had just gone full bear on her? He needed to tell her what he was, but first, he needed to shift back. He didn’t want her to see him like this. Again.

  He took some of those deep, soothing breaths his sister was always going on about, saying the “restorative power of inhales and exhales” was something that could not be dismissed. He wasn’t sure if that was yoga teacher speak or not, but at this moment, he’d try anything. He needed to be normal when he went back out to talk to her, needed to be his human self if he had any hope of continuing what they’d started. She was his mate. He was sure of it. He couldn’t lose her, not so soon after finding her. His kind sometimes waited their whole lives to find their life partner. He couldn’t fuck this up.

  Jack was on his third exhale when a knock sounded on his bathroom door, and Sadie’s voice said, “Jack? Are you in there? I think we should talk.”

  Chapter 6

  Sadie had read enough paranormal romance to know what was going on. She should have realized it sooner, in fact. All that growling, those perfect golden-amber eyes, the searing hot skin—they were all signs that pointed toward the man whose lips had only moments ago been locked on hers was a shifter.

  And honestly, Sadie didn’t care. She’d never, ever felt like that with anyone, never been with anyone who made her feel so sexy and alive and adored, and if Jack just so happened to shift into an animal every now and then, well, she’d roll with it. After all, how often did she meet sexy male romance authors who knew about the history of the Oregon Trail, the real history? Answer: never. No way was she passing that up.

  “Jack?” she said, knocking on the bathroom door again. “Jack, I’m not freaked out. Just come out, okay, and we can talk.”

  She heard him heave a deep sigh, and then the door cracked open and out walked Jack.

  The look on his face melted her insides. He looked so penitent, his eyes cast downward, his shoulders hunched like he was preparing for rejection. Sadie couldn’t help it—she walked forward and wrapped her arms around him, squeezing him tight and trying to let him know with her touch that everything was going to be okay.

  But Jack stayed stiff as a board, even when Sadie’s hands moved lower down his back, rubbing soft, soothing circles over the fur that covered the skin there. It was a little bristly, like a beard at the very beginning of its growing stages, and Sadie found she liked the slight roughness beneath her fingers. But when her hand dove deeper into the fur, Jack jerked back and out of her arms.

  “You don’t have to do that,” he muttered, backing towards the bathroom door. “I know it’s weird.”

  Sadie shrugged. “No weirder than any other guy with copious amounts of back hair. And at least yours serves a purpose. It keeps you warm. And…well, I can imagine it keeping me pretty warm, too,” she said, winking at Jack to show she was okay with all this.

  Jack saw her wink but stayed weary, and so Sadie reached out and took his hand and led him back to the sofa. He followed stiffly, sitting on the very edge of the cushion, as far away from her as his small, two-seater couch would let him.

  “Talk to me. Tell me what you’re feeling,” she implored. She tried not to wince when Jack tore his hand away and moved as far away from her as possible. She imagined he was used to rejection, to people viewing him as more of a freak than a being deserving of respect. She knew the feeling. You didn’t grow up mixed race in the middle of America without dealing with prejudice and ignorant assholes.

  “I’m a bear,” he whispered, his voice harsh as he spat out the words. “A werebear. That’s why…this,” he said, motioning to the fur covering his front and back, his slightly stooped back, the claws that had replaced his fingernails.

  Sadie shrugged. “Okay. I figured you were some kind of shifter, but I assumed wolf, I guess because bear shifters aren’t really mentioned much in the news, or in romance. Which is where most of my shifter knowledge comes from,” she added.

  Jack nodded, still looking pointedly forward. “Yeah. Bears aren’t sexy like wolves, so we don’t get as much attention. But we’re out there. We’re just a little more reclusive. We don’t hibernate, but we do like to hide out for most of the year. It’s like being an introvert, but on steroids,” he said, laughing self-consciously.

  “Are you in a clan?” Sadie asked. Most shifters she’d read about, in and out of romance, were in either an adoptive or hereditary clan that gave them the sense of family and community essential to surviving in a world that didn’t exactly celebrate their existence. She’d read about some of the more well-known clans, but again, they had been mostly wolf clans. Bear-shifters didn’t get much press.

  “Yeah. Me and a bunch of guys I met before and during college. We’re kind of spread across the country now, but we still keep in touch. A lot of them are park rangers, too, actually,” he said, laughing softly. He seemed a bit less stiff when he mentioned the clan, so Sadie kept asking questions, hoping he’d see that she wasn’t afraid, that she wanted to know more about him. That she wasn’t going anywhere.

  “Why do you think that is, that so many of you are rangers? Is it the proximity to the outdoors, or the freedom?”

  Jack nodded. “A bit of both. We crave time outside, exploring on our own, and that’s hard to do with normal office jobs. My friend Joel manages it—he’s a professor in Kansas, but he goes on a lot of “research trips,” he said, using air quotes, “so he can get the exercise and bear time he needs.”

  “I
s that why you took the job as well?” she asked, hoping he’d keep opening up to her. He looked less uncomfortable—he’d scooted back into the couch cushions and was no longer digging his claws into his palms, so Sadie figured this was a subject he didn’t mind talking about.

  Jack nodded. “Yeah, plus it fits in well with writing. The park here isn’t one of the most visited in the states, so I can usually spend a few hours each day on my book.” Jack sighed and turned to look at her, angling his body toward hers.

  Finally, Sadie thought. She’d hated how distant he felt, all the way on the other side of the couch.

  But her relief was short-lived. “Look, you don’t have to do this,” Jack said, scratching the back of his neck and looking away from her. “You don’t have to pretend to be interested in me. You can go. I’ll understand.” She noticed how pained he looked saying this, like he didn’t want her to go, but was resigned to the inevitable.

  “What makes you think I’m pretending?” Sadie asked, a little offended. Did Jack really think she was faking all these questions, faking the way her eyes lit up when he spoke? It wasn’t faking. She did it because she found him really fucking interesting.

  Jack sighed and rubbed his hands over his face. “Because you’re a beautiful woman and I’m a reclusive werebear. One of these things is not like the other. You definitely didn’t lean into that kiss expecting that the person you were making out with was going to shift into a grizzly monster. I’ll understand if you want to get out of here. Or,” he said, lifting his head and looking at her, “I’ll leave. I’ll take the tent outside, and you take the couch. I don’t have a car, so I can’t drive you anywhere, but I can call my boss at first light and get him to take you wherever you need to go.”