Page 31 of Coveted By the Bear

I held my breath as my heart hammered against my ribcage.

He was going to kiss me.

****

Caleb

Mira’s eyes drifted closed, her dark lashes brushing her cheeks. Her lips looked so damned delicious I could barely think of anything but tasting them. How could I be thinking about kissing her like this? Like I was claiming her? She was this exotic wounded bird, and I was a freaking grizzly bear. A monster. Was I even human enough to have any kind of relationship with her, or was what we’d just done all wrong?

She wasn’t in any place to get attached to a man like me. How, after everything she’d been through, would she be able to survive me and what I’d become?

My goals were simple. I had to help her, not ruin her. Helping her was the only thing that kept my mind on the edge of hell instead of rolling in the flames. I had to leave her better than I found her.

I couldn’t let myself be the fire that burned her up.

Chapter Eleven

Mira

I closed my eyes in anticipation of the softness of Caleb’s lips against mine, but it didn’t happen. When I opened them, I saw a slight frown flit across his features before he set me back in the passenger’s seat and pulled my dress back over my legs. Maybe I had misjudged him. My inexperience with men would back that theory.

He threw the truck in drive and turned the radio up until the noise level was almost uncomfortable. I had done something wrong, that much was clear. I just didn’t have a guess as to what. He didn’t put his arm across the back of the bench seat as he often did, and I stayed firmly mushed up against the window, drowning in my confusion.

I leaned forward and turned the radio off completely. “What did I do wrong?”

Caleb rubbed his lip with the back of his hand until the rasp of his scruff could be heard. “I found a journal.”

Utterly confused, I asked, “What journal?”

“I wanted answers about what I am, so I searched the old house at the back of my property for anything that would help me. Eli used to live there, so I thought maybe he would’ve left some clues or literature or something. All I found was a journal. Half the time I couldn’t read his damned writing, but the other half told me enough to scare me off wanting a relationship with anyone. Do you understand?”

“You regret what we just did?”

“Yes.”

The word felt like a slap to my face. “That was my first time…” I sighed and tried again. “That was the first time I had intimacy with a man, Caleb. And now you’re taking it back?”

“I shouldn’t have been your first anything.”

“Why not?”

He hunched like the volume of my words were painful to his ears, but so what? He was breaking me apart right now.

“I can’t have kids, Mira. I can’t do it. They would be like me. You deserve better than a dead end relationship with a monster, okay?”

“I don’t care about that—”

“You will. Someday, if I were to let this go, you’d want a babe at your breast, and I can’t give you that. Not ever.”

My heart was shattering. Was he right? If I let myself love him, really love him, someday I might want a baby who looked like him. Maybe he was smart to cut us off before we began. I didn’t know. All I knew was right now his pushing me away was breaking my heart in two. “Caleb,” I whispered as a warm tear slipped down my cheek.

He leaned forward and turned on the radio again.

****

Clint McCreedy lived just outside of town in the opposite direction of Castle de Fletcher, which gave me just enough time to collect myself and put my game face back on. Sure, my entire world had turned upside down, but I wasn’t about to let Caleb’s decision to dump me back into the friend zone ruin my life. If he didn’t want me like that, I wasn’t going to beg for his affection.

As we pulled up to the sprawling, Victorian style home, I tried my best not to gawk. It was light green with white trim and a porch that wrapped around the entirety of the giant home, complete with rocking chairs and an old dog lying on its back with four furry paws flopped into the air.