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  He didn’t respond, just came closer.

  Her face heated instantly, and she licked her lips, feeling embarrassed. “Yeah, ugh.” She shook her head, not even finishing what she had said. Lucas was so close now that she couldn’t breathe.

  “It was a long time ago, but I still think about that night, even if I’ve … been with you since then.” He took one more step forward. “I regret a lot of shit, Tarren, a lot of shit.”

  She licked her lips. “Me, too, Lucas.”

  “Can we talk?” he asked in a low voice.

  “I’m working.” She was so damn nervous, and she didn’t know why. It was like she couldn’t control her emotions around Lucas.

  He looked around, clearly noticing the empty cafe. He had several days’ worth of growth on his cheeks, and the dark hair looked so rugged and handsome on him. Here she was, using sappy freaking lingo when all she felt inside was this deep-rooted heat.

  “Tarren, you hauled ass out of the clubhouse like you couldn’t get away from me fast enough. Please, come out from behind the counter, and just talk to me.”

  She stared into his blue eyes for a second, forced her libido to calm the hell down, and moved out from behind the coffee counter. She stood a foot from him now, and he took a step back. When she moved a little closer, she realized her hands were shaking from her arousal, nervousness, and need for him. And then he moved closer to her, caged her in with his hands on the counter on either side of her, and she braced her palms behind her to steady herself.

  “What are you doing?” Tarren said softly, searching his face with her gaze. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move, and was locked in this intense connection right now with the male she had been in love with for years, but where fate hadn’t allowed them to be together. It was on both of them, still was in fact, but right now Lucas looked at her as if he wanted to devour her, and Tarren wanted to be consumed by the male.

  “I’m looking at you, remembering what you smell like.” He closed his eyes for a second and inhaled deeply. A growl left him, purely animalistic, and bear-like. “I’m memorizing the exact shade of your eyes.” He leaned in one more inch. They were so close now, his face mere centimeters from hers, and their breath mingling as one. He smelled of cinnamon, spicy, sweet, hot. “My bear is trying not to come out right now, rip all of your clothes off, and finish what we started all those years ago, what we did just six months ago, Tarren.” Lucas was looking at her lips, his eyelids at half-mast, and his voice this husky pitch. That stupid music still played overhead, but was now switched to something slower. The air seemed hotter even. Anyone could come in and see this intimate exchange, and although that should worry Tarren, she couldn’t think about anything else but this male in front of her.

  And to be honest thinking of someone coming in, walking by the windows even and seeing this very sexually charged encounter had her so damn wet her panties were already soaked through.

  Lucas inhaled again, stared right in her eyes, and then cocked his head to the side so he could whisper in her ear. “Things shouldn’t have gone down like that, and I should have said a lot of shit to you sooner. But I know you’re too good for an asshole like me.” He held her gaze with his own until her heart skipped a beat, and then he started speaking again. “Compared to you I am the shit on the bottom of a boot.”

  She wanted to disagree with him, because he wasn’t anything of the sort. He was rugged, fierce and strong, and even if his reputation was filled with a lot of random sex, and had a temper toward men that fucked with him or the club, he was soft and gentle to the people he loved. Tarren shook her head, opened her mouth to tell him that that wasn’t true, but he placed his lips on hers before she could get a word out.

  He cupped the side of her head, tilted it to the side, and deepened the kiss. When he stroked his tongue along the seam of her lips, she opened for him without hesitation. She was weak when it came to Lucas Landon, so weak that here she was surrendering to this male after years of tension, sex, and strain in their relationship. But she hadn’t tried hard enough to make it work between them, and right now she just wanted to bask in the fact that she was here with him, and that Lucas had come looking for her.

  He pulled his mouth away from hers, his hand still on the side of her head, and his breathing a little increased from their kissing. “I shouldn’t have left you, and I should have done fought harder to show you that I wanted more than just the sex, Tarren.” He looked at her mouth again. “I care about you, have for a very long time, and it has nothing to do with the fact that we have known each other all our lives and I count you as a person I trust my life with.” When he stared at her again there was this definite vulnerability she had never seen in him before.

  She looked at his cut, traced the Grizzly MC logo that was on the right hand upper side, and breathed out slowly. He was patched in, a member for life now, and this club would always be in his blood. She knew enough about the club to know that although they lived for and worshipped their women, their club was important, too. The women had to be strong if they were going to be with a member of The Grizzly MC. Was she strong enough? Was she ready to deal with the aftereffects of her father going ape-shit over the fact she was with Lucas? Her dad might love him like a brother, a son even, because of how close everyone was, but that didn’t mean Dallas had ever wanted her to be with another club member. Her whole life he had told her that the lifestyle they were in was too hard for her, too dangerous, and he didn’t want that for her or Tawny. It wasn’t Dallas’s decision though, and although she was an adult and would ultimately follow her heart, she also loved her father and knew this would send him over the edge.

  “Talk to me, Tarren,” Lucas said deeply, softly. Lucas tilted her head back so she was looking at him again. “Just talk to me, not here, but later tonight. Just you and me, alone, with no one stopping us.”

  She nodded, knowing that she wanted this, even if the end result might bite her in the ass and leave her with a broken heart.

  ****

  Lucas had wanted to wait for her at the coffee shop, to take her on his bike to the pond where they had sat and talked all those years ago, but he didn’t push her. He had just come back into Tarren’s life for good now, thrust this on her that he wanted more, and he didn’t know if she was ready to be with him in the way he wanted. Yes, he had left, been in Arizona off and on for several years, but he was back now, and wanting to try this out with her, and hoping she felt the same way. He had smelled the desire on her, the emotions that were as thick as his were. She wanted him, but did she want him for good, to be his old lady and never have to worry about a male wanting her, loving her again?

  He had come back six months ago for a short window of time. They had eaten dinner together, and then fucked. He had left the next day for Arizona again, and the awkward goodbye with her had torn out his fucking heart. He had been a stupid bastard for keeping her back, for thinking maybe he’d be able to watch her live her life with some other male. No other male would have her, because she was the only one for him. Tarren had deserved so much more than what he had given, but a selfish part of him had wanted to say screw it all and ride back to her so many times. He hadn’t though, not so much because of Dallas’s warning, but because he told himself that she was better than him, and that in the end he might fuck up royally and ruin anything that they had. That scared him, terrified him in fact, and there hadn’t been anything on this planet that had been able to put fear in Lucas. Nothing except a little blonde that drove him insane with need and lust.

  He grabbed the smokes from the inside of his cut, grabbed a cigarette and lighter, and brought the small flame to the tip. He didn’t smoke, not really, but the stress he was feeling drove him to have a nicotine fix. He inhaled, kept the smoke in for a moment, and then exhaled. The nasty fucking taste in his mouth had him only taking one more hit before snubbing the cigarette off on the boulder he sat on. The moon had risen an hour ago, and although Tarren had gotten off work a couple of h
ours ago, she had asked to meet him here because she wanted to get cleaned up at her place.

  He stared at the pond, watching the water gently lap at the shore, and thought about what in the hell he was supposed to say to Tarren when she got here. A run could probably do him some good, especially if he was in his bear form and could let the bastard out for a moment to get rid of the wild energy inside of him. He looked at his cell, knew she wouldn’t be here for another half hour or so, and decided he’d just shift and hope that when she got here he wasn’t feeling so damn itchy.

  Lucas stood, stripped out of his clothes, and set them on the rock. It only took a few seconds for him to shift into his grizzly bear. His skin tore open, his muscles stretched, his bones cracked and realigned, and then he was standing in his animal form. He stood to his full ten feet height, shook his massive body, and felt his skin and fur move over his muscles and bones. He roared out, gave one look around the forest, and then fell back onto all four legs. He took off running, instantly feeling his bear’s energy leaving his body. The freedom was like nothing he would ever feel unless he was a bear, nothing he would ever feel in his human form. It was untamed, primal, and purely male. It was exhilarating.

  He ran for twenty minutes, not caring about anything but being free. His lungs burned from the run, and his body felt alive. He finally went back to the boulder just as he saw the headlights from Tarren’s car. After shifting back to his human self, and getting dressed, he sat down and faced the lake. It only took him a few moments to collect himself before he heard her feet crunching over the dry leaves on the ground.

  And then she was standing beside him, and he inhaled the floral scent of her. The situation took him back all those years ago when she had been the one sitting on the rock and he had been beside her, smelling this exact aroma from her.

  “I’m sorry I kept you waiting,” she said softly. He moved over for her to sit, and when she did he kept himself from reaching out, wrapping his arms around her waist, and pulling her toward him.

  “It’s okay, really. It gave me a moment to shift and get some of this energy out of me.” The scent of soap also came through from her, and he inhaled deeply, but tried not to seem like some kind of fucking creep for doing so. He just couldn’t help it. Lucas wasn’t going to drag this out. He turned, faced her fully, and took her hands in his. He stared down at them, ran his fingers over her smooth, creamy flesh, and then told himself this shouldn’t be this fucking hard.

  “I was a bastard, am a bastard, Tarren.” He stared at her. “I let my life keep me away from you, let the words your old man told me keep me away, and I thought that staying away was the best thing.”

  “Staying away was my fault, too, Lucas.” She stared at the water. The seconds ticked by, and then finally she faced him again. “I love you.” The silence moved between them, not uncomfortable, but a little strange and pressurized. “I am in love with you, have been for a long time and being with you all those years ago made it better and worse, if that makes sense.” She looked down, but he didn’t want to have her breaking what was going on between them.

  He lifted her head with his finger under her chin, and leaned in to kiss her softly. He wasn’t trying to divert the situation into something sexual. All he wanted was to show her that he was right here with her. “I am not going anywhere anymore, Tarren. I thought about it a lot while I was gone, and even before that. It’s not an excuse, baby. God, it’s not an excuse, but I want you to know.” He pulled back, kept his finger under her chin, and hoped she knew how genuine he was. “I wouldn’t blame you if you just wanted to be friends, Tarren, but I wanted you to know how I felt regardless. I wasted too much time as it is.”

  She didn’t answer at first, just stared at him, and then she slowly licked her lips, and he had to force himself not to groan at the sight. “Can we start over?” she said in a soft voice, and then lifted just her gaze to him. “Can we just be you and me, and focus on right now?”

  He smiled, smoothed his finger along her cheek, and didn’t stop himself from kissing her again. It was a soft, nice kiss, nothing overly erotic, but with enough heat that he hoped she could feel how much he wanted her. “I love you, too, Tarren. Christ, I love you so fucking much.” He kissed her harder this time, and murmured against her mouth, “I am an asshole, a stupid fucking asshole for leaving you, and for thinking I could even stop what is going on between us.”

  He couldn’t take back the shit he had done, couldn’t go back in time and make things right, but he could show her from this moment forward that she was his, and he’d treat her like the damned queen she was.

  And then she suspired him by reaching up and taking hold of his head with her hands, holding each side, and staring right at him. “I love you, but I also will not put up with any shit, Lucas, you know that.” She sounded fierce. “You have known me since before we could even walk, know that I can be just as strong as you boys, but if we do this, I don’t want my heart broken, Lucas.”

  “I won’t break your heart. I’d rather fucking shoot myself than hurt you, Tarren.” Her smile could have lit up the entire damn lake. He kissed her again, and again, and when she was breathless he pulled back. “Your dad will definitely have my balls, but I am not leaving you, Tarren, not again, and not fucking ever.” And then he pulled her in close, hauled her onto his lap, and held her until she started to fall asleep. It was the best fucking feeling in the world.

  Chapter Ten

  “You have got to be fucking kidding me,” Dallas all but roared out, but neither Tarren nor Lucas appeared affected.

  “Dallas, you don’t need to swear,” Hope, his old lady and the love of his life, said right beside him.

  He stared at his daughter, his little girl that wasn’t really little anymore, but that would always be his baby, and tried to control himself. Hope stood beside him, her hand on his forearm, and the scent of her happiness and trepidation filling the air.

  “This is my life, my decision, Dad,” Tarren said softly, and reached out to take Lucas’s hand. She swallowed, let go of the other male, and stood. “I know you sent Lucas away all of those years ago because you were looking out for me, and because you love me.” She moved closer, and Dallas wanted to make her happy, to make everything she ever dreamed about come true. He was her father. The first time he had looked into Tarren’s little face when she was born, was the first time he had realized that losing his son and ex in a car accident decades ago hadn’t meant the end of his world. He had found Hope, realized that he could love once more, and when she had given him two beautiful little girls, his life had meant even more.

  “I love her, Dallas. I’d kill for her, and lay down my life for Tarren. The last few years were screwed up, and I wish I had done things differently. I want to blame it on immaturity, and maybe it was a little bit of that, too.” Lucas stared right in his eyes, refusing to back down, and Dallas had to give the male credit for having some balls of steel and standing up to him in his own fucking house.

  He wanted to curse at Lucas, beat him into the ground and tell both of them that this wasn’t right, and wasn’t going to happen on his watch. Although Lucas had calmed down in the last few years, and didn’t have the same reputation concerning the female population as he had before, that didn’t mean Dallas wanted Tarren to be involved with him. He lived a dangerous life, one that Dallas also led, and he knew the strain it could put on the woman he loved. But Lucas was saying he loved Tarren, would die for her, and if he was being honest with himself wasn’t that what Dallas wanted from a male who was with one of his daughters?

  “It’s not like we think you’ll be okay with this right away, Dad.” Tarren grabbed his hands, and he stared down at his little girl. “But I want you to be happy for me. I want you to trust me that I can make my own decisions and know what I want in my life.”

  He wanted to wrap her up in a steel house and stand guard with the biggest damn gun he owned. But she was right, even if it pained him to admit that. She was a smart,
bright girl, knew what she wanted in life, and could kick any of the Grizzly boys’ asses when they crossed her. She was tough, and he wanted to give her room, but he was protective of what was his, and his little girls and wife were just that. His.

  “I trust you, baby girl.” He pulled Tarren into a hug, stared at Lucas over the top of her head, and told him with just a look that he’d better not fuck this up. Lucas nodded, clearly understanding what he meant. Dallas kissed the crown of Tarren’s head and pulled back. “But if he breaks your heart I’ll break his bones,” he said in all seriousness, and she smiled.

  “I know, Daddy, but remember I can do some damage, too, and I don’t think Lucas would hurt me.”

  “Never,” Lucas said from behind her now.

  “Dallas, come on, let’s let them have some time, because you need some as well,” Hope said from beside him.

  He nodded, not wanting to leave his daughter with any male, let alone a patched in member that could kill a man with his bare hands, but he told himself wasn’t he the same? He needed to let his daughter learn and grow, decide what she wanted, and if there was a mistake made and Lucas messed with her, then he knew where to find him. A Grizzly that found his female was a dangerous one, but a protective papa bear was a force to be reckoned with.

  ****

  Eight months later

  Lucas: Have dinner with me 2nite, baby.

  Tarren smiled down at her cell. She read the text again, and typed out her response.

  Do I get 2 pick this time, or is it another burger and fries night? ;)

  Lucas: U liked the burger and fries, especially when I got U 2 get off before we even made it through the drive through.

  She thought about the time he was referring to, when they had stopped by the local burger fast food joint. Lucas had placed his hand between her thighs, right up her skirt, while he ordered their food, and had her coming before they even made it to the window.