Bear Arms (Alpha Werebear Shapeshifter Romance) (Mating Call Dating Agency Book 4) (12 page)

“Well, you might not want to be doing anything when I read this, because it’s kind of amazing.”

“Eve always manages, doesn’t she?”

“So it would seem. What’s it say?”

“Not a whole lot,” Lexie said. “But what’s there is pretty heart wrenching.”

Blake took a deep breath. “Good heart wrenching or bad?”

Lexie shrugged and just started reading. “
Sometimes, plans seem to come together out of nowhere. Other times, they seem like an uphill battle you’re never going to win, so you dig in your heels and fight until the last breath. That’s pretty dramatic, but there it is. I’m not paid to be reasonable.
”

They both laughed as Lexie read the last line. She continued. “
But usually the battles are worth it, the wars hurt and they leave us battered, bruised and scarred. It’s what comes next that matters most, though. I’ve had your file for about a year, Lexie,
” Lexie read, and smiled as she pointed to herself,
“but when Blake’s friend forced him to come in and talk to me, I realized why I’d never matched you with anyone. I never found the right person. Well, as I was talking to the enormous bear who is no doubt sitting right beside you, I saw you in him. I saw your passion, your fierceness for life
.

That’s about the time Lexie began to tear up—for real this time, no little drops on her cheeks—and Blake squeezed her hand harder. She kept on. “
Most of my matches work, yeah, but not like this. Not this perfectly and this obviously. You’ve both scraped out hard lives and made the best of them, and now you can share a life that won’t be easy, but will certainly be easier for having each other.
”

“She
is
psychic,” Blake said with a note of disbelief in his increasingly husky voice. “How’d she know all that? Just from talking to me for five minutes and reading your application a year ago?”

Lexie just shrugged. Blake had been right, she realized just then. Thinking sometimes just gets in the way of the good stuff. She wiped away a tear, and read some more. “
I figured the double date thing wouldn’t work out for a variety of reasons, most of which come down to me finally getting over my fear of love, and a whole ton of other things. That’s why it was a double, after all, because I was scared. But now I know there’s no reason to be, and there’s no reason to hold on to old pains and old wounds, no matter how deep they were
.”

“Psychic or not, she’s goddamn right about that,” Blake said. “Some things just never seem to go away until you let them, you know?”

Lexie nodded. She looked over at her bear, and wiped a tear that had come down
his
cheek away. For a moment, she just watched his face, stared into his eyes. He was so raw, so vulnerable with her, that she could hardly believe he wasn’t like this with everyone else. She knew better though; she was just the same. When it came to this unlikely bear, she laid her heart open from the beginning, and she
never
did that, so she understood.

“
Anyway, I’m getting all emotional and philosophical. Point is, you two are perfect together, and there’s something folded up in this letter that Blake will understand. I can’t wait to see the two of you together. Maybe sometime soon you two, Moe and I can go actually have a double, after we’ve all closed up our wounds?
”

“Mine closed the first time I saw you, Lexie,” Blake said.

“I forgot I had any,” she said, “and trust me, I’ve got plenty.”

The left side of Blake’s mouth curled in a smile. “What’s that?” he asked, pointing at a slip of paper which had fallen from the letter and onto Lexie’s lap. “Looks like coordinates.”

She shrugged, and handed the paper to Blake. “She said you’d know. Some kind of Army thing?”

“Oh my God,” he drew a whistling breath between his teeth. “I mean, yeah I guess. Army or Boy Scouts, either way. I haven’t done any real, hardcore, numbers on a sheet of paper orienteering since bootcamp.”

“Really? How do you guys get around?”

Blake tapped the screen of his phone, which was mounted on the dash by a plastic doohickey. “GPS,” he said with a grin. “Like any sane person. Anyway, is there a map in there? Can’t make much sense out of a bunch of coordinates without a map to go with them.”

“Can’t find one,” she said. “At least—wait, what’s that?” she pointed to a folded bunch of paper that had at some point been wedged underneath Blake’s windshield wiper. “That wasn’t there before, was it?”

“I hope it’s not a Chinese menu,” he grumbled. “Or some weird religious tract. Nothing against those folks, but damn do I hate it when those things smudge my glass.”

“If smudges on your windshield are the worst of your problems, life must be pretty all right,” Lexie said as she craned herself out of the car and plucked the paper from the wiper. “Here.”

Blake let out a loud
ha!
as he opened it. “Ask and ye shall receive, I guess. It’s a map, that much is sure. Of what, though, I’m not entirely—” he broke off with another laugh. “She
does
think of everything.”

“What is it?”

“It’s of here. I mean, not the Fun Pit, but the first coordinate is right here, exactly where we’re parked. This is some seriously spooky shit. I feel like I’m in the middle of a lost episode of, well,
Lost
.”

“If it starts here, then...?”

Blake got a look on his face that was part mischief, part excitement and all gorgeous. “Well then I guess we get out of this truck and see where we end up.”

Lexie pushed her door open with her foot, and gathered up the blanket from the floorboard. “Hey, one more thing,” she said.

“Yeah?”

“Do the Crocket slide again. And this time I’m going to film it. I think this should be the first part of that damn DVD my agent wants. The beginning of a new life, a new adventure. And what better way to celebrate it than sliding over a truck hood?”

To her surprise, Blake just smiled back. “Somehow, I don’t even care if I bust my ass again. I’m just glad you want me along on your ride.”

“Get after it cowboy,” she goaded him. “Slide or fall, we’re in this together.”

It took him a minute to work up the courage to take another gander at the slide. The whole time he was backing up, getting in a football ready position, hoofing the ground like a bull ready to charge, Lexie was just watching him and thinking.
You’re in it with me. I’m in it with you. I don’t care how many times I fall from here on out, I’ll always have you to catch me
.

“Here I go,” Blake said, and then resumed pawing the ground.

As he started to run, Lexie realized that for the first time since she’d started her crazy life as an internet pseudo-celebrity, she wasn’t worried about ad revenue, blog visits, or book deals. She wasn’t thinking about any of that stuff; she was just watching this bear charge his own pickup truck.

It was like every weight she’d been carrying for years lifted off her shoulders all at once. If she could have somehow been in Blake’s head, she would have known that as his feet left the ground, he was thinking exactly the same thing.

He jumped.

She broke out into a smile that stretched her lips so far it hurt. She didn’t know what was going to happen next, and for maybe the first time in her life, she honestly didn’t care. It was the moment. It was the here and now.

His ass met the hood, and he slid, rivets in his jeans thumping across the lines.

Lexie gritted her teeth, bracing for him to hitch on the car again and end up in a heap.

If she could see into Blake’s head right then, she’d know that
he
knew he wasn’t gonna fall. Not this time, and not ever again. But he was also thinking that even if he did, she’d be there to pick him up.

For the first time in
his
life, he didn’t care if he ate asphalt or landed the coolest stunt from 1980s television drama with flawless perfection.

His first foot hit the pavement, Lexie cheered and grabbed ahold of him, never wanting to let go.

He fell, but it wasn’t from screwing up the stunt. She fell too, and when they ended up in a heap on the pavement, neither cared about the scraped knees or slightly frayed shirt backs. They had each other, and that was better than
any
stunt.

––––––––

“I
t’s dark out here,” Lexie said.

They’d been in the woods for a hair over half an hour, and had made it approximately halfway through Eve’s list of coordinates. More than once, Blake had attempted to teach Lexie the finer points of orienteering, but she was too enthralled with the wild songs of night birds, and with dodging overhanging branches to pay much attention.

Well, that, and she kept watching the way Blake’s ass moved in his jeans. Truth be told, if he wanted to give her a lesson in orienteering, or hell, in knitting coasters, she’d listen to anything he had to say if she could watch his ass.

“Look out!” he called, and reached back quickly. He caught her head just in time, forcing it downward as a branch whipped past with enough force that she felt the wind. “Sorry,” he said, “didn’t expect that one to have quite so much spring to it.”

“Oh, it’s fine,” Lexie said. “I was so entranced watching your ass that I probably wouldn’t have noticed if it
had
hit me.”

“Shut up,” Blake said, laughing a little. “You know, you really should pay attention to how I’m doing this. You’ll never know when you’re gonna need to know how to follow map coordinates.”

“Right,” Lexie answered. “Next time I’m hopelessly lost in the middle of town, going back and forth between my kitchen, my office, and where I keep my wine, I’m going to really wish I had intimate knowledge of how maps work.”

Blake’s shoulders were shaking with laughter. “Yeah, okay maybe not so important. But still, you never know when it’ll come in handy.”

“We can talk about other things that might come in handy,” Lexie said, “but I think if I start in with all that, my clothes are gonna come off and so are yours, and we’re gonna end up really dirty. And we’ll both have leaves in places leaves have no business being.”

“Nothing ventured, nothing gained,” Blake said, spinning on his heel and pulling Lexie against his muscled chest. “Although I guess you’re right... if we’re gonna end up in some starlit clearing we probably should keep our pants on. It’s hard though,” he grinned. “Real hard.”

“Uh, yeah,” Lexie said with a glance downward and a brush of her hand. “Yeah, I can certainly tell. I’m actually a little afraid of what’s going to happen when you decide you can’t take any more waiting. I’ve never been broken in half before, but—”

“Trust me,” he said, “I’ll go so slow you’ll be begging me for more.”

A hot flush ran down Lexie’s neck, disappearing beneath the collar of her shirt. “I,” she stammered, “uh, I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone say anything that caused me to literally freeze in place.”

For a moment, Blake just watched her face. “How do you like it?” he asked. “Because the way you make me feel, I’ve got about a thousand more things I could say that’ll make you blush.”

“Oh shut up,” Lexie said, laughing as she cupped her big bear’s neck with her hand. “Just shut up and kiss me again.”

He did. Oh God did he ever. Her head went backwards with the force of his lips pressing against hers. She quivered as he lifted one of her knees, bringing her sex closer to where he was pulsing under his jeans. Through hers, she could feel Blake’s heat against her, and with each kiss she seemed to beg him harder and harder for more of what he promised.

His tongue swept against hers, then hooked inside her lip, exploring every nook of her. She shivered as his hands painted a hot track up her back, sliding under her shirt.

“What about the map?” she asked when she finally pulled away, but refused to unlatch completely. “I feel like she went to so much trouble that we oughta at least see where it leads.”

“And I,” Blake said, interrupting himself with another quick kiss, “feel like I don’t give a shit. I could bend you over that tree stump if you wanted.”

“What was it we were saying about leaves in places leaves shouldn’t be?” Lexie chuckled under her breath. “Besides, we have all these oysters and this huge blanket. And anyway, I’m kind of enjoying our little adventure.”

“It
is
romantic being lost out here in the woods with you. I can’t think of anywhere, or with any
one
, I’d rather be.”

“Lost? I thought you were some kind of map wizard? Don’t tell me you’re—”

“Joking, my dear,” Blake said with a smile. He swept Lexie in a slow turn, as though they were dancing a slow dance in the middle of the floor while everyone around watched and waited for their turn in the spotlight. After a few turns, Lexie let out a soft, trailing sigh, and relaxed her head against Blake’s chest.

“What on earth did I do to find you?” she asked, softly, as though she was speaking to herself as much as to him.

With a gentle shrug, he moved his hand softly under her chin and lifted her face to gaze into his eyes. “Whatever you did, I’m glad for it. I keep thinking that if one little thing in this long series of things had happened just a little differently, I might be the one drinking beer with Eve, and Morales would be out here with you.”

She thought about that for a second. “I don’t think so,” she finally said. “I think somehow, this is just how the universe decided to work. And don’t take that as me being all weird about fate or whatever, but... well, I guess maybe I shouldn’t be so quick to discount things I don’t understand.”

He set her back to her feet, never letting his gaze leave her. “Yeah,” he finally said, “I think that’s a good idea for me, too.”

After another short moment of just watching her and smiling, Blake let her go. “Well, we have those oysters to think about. And all that trouble Eve went to, I think you’re right. We should probably finish our little trek.”

As they held hands, walking through the woods and changing direction every few minutes, Lexie just kind of breathed. She let herself be swept along, let herself be taken along, without resisting at all. For her, that was huge. It was so huge, in fact, that when she realized what she was doing, it was hard for her to actually accept it all at once.