Very Bearly Mated by Rebel Carter

Chapter 3

“Put me down!”

“No.”

Rosie swung her hands and tried to smack at his shoulders, but it did nothing. She sighed and raised her hands, preparing to cast on her mate. What spell it would be, she didn’t know, but something. She had to get out of here she thought in a panic before he moved. He swung her down in front of him, her thighs parting and going to either side of his waist.

“You don't do that. You know that.”

She blinked in surprise at her changed position but cleared her throat, forcing her attention to the words he’d spoken and not on the fact that his big hands were now cupping her ass and holding her to him.

“Do what?”

“Cast on me. I could feel it.”

That was surprising. She hadn’t even decided on a spell, but he could feel the intention. It had to be because they were mates. “Really?”

He gave a jerky nod. “Yes. Now cut it out.”

“Why? You won’t cut out this whole kidnapping thing,” she said, but she lowered her hands all the same. He was right, casting on her mate was kind of...bleh. He gave a satisfied nod when she lowered her hands and just like that he was throwing her right back where she’d been on his shoulder.

She gritted her teeth in frustration. “I’m really not liking how you’re just carrying me around, mister.”

“Name’s Eric.”

“Just Eric? What are you, Madonna?”

He chuckled but kept walking. The familiar streets and storefronts of Oak Fast passing her by, right alongside the familiar faces of the town’s residents. Rosie turned, burying her face in his shoulder. This might be a magical town, but it was still a small town and news about her being carried over a bear shifter’s shoulder would travel fast. She was going to have a lot of questions to answer, she knew it.

“My name’s Eric Waites.”

She’d heard that name before. It was familiar even if she’d only been in town for a few months. “Waites? I know that name.”

“Probably because you’ve been in my bar.”

“Bar? Your bar?” She snapped her fingers. “Wildin’ Waites is your bar?”

“Sure is.”

The bar in question was nice. He was right, she had been there before. Not many times, but enough. It was small and cozy with dark hardwood floors, small tables, and a bar top that spanned one wall. The bar’s walls were full of framed photos, some new and some old, some definitely antique. Rosie was certain the older photos went right back to Oak Fast’s founding. The offerings of Wildin’ Waites were a step above the normal fare offered in Oak Fast. It was a place she knew she could get a dirty martini made perfectly, or a lovely decanted red that made her think of summer even as Fall settled down around them. If they were in a city, it would be at home as a trendy date spot, but in Oak Fast, it stood out as a star destination reserved for special occasions which tracked exactly with how Eric looked. He was a man that looked like he lived his life as one massive special occasion.

“It’s, ah, it’s nice,” she finally offered.

“Thank you. It’s been in the family for a hundred years.”

Her eyes went wide. “Your family has been here that long?”

“Longer, that’s just when we got our shit together to open a bar.”

“Oh.” She'd been right about bears and deep roots. Over a hundred years in one place? That sounded like a bear’s happily-ever-after. Rosie was impressed with her ability to stay put and not get itchy feet for the road during the three months she’d lived in Oak Fast. But a hundred years? She knew the Fey-Queen-In-Training wanted her to trust this. To trust her new status as one half of a fated mate pair, but how were they going to make this work?

Eric stopped walking and the jingle of keys broke into Rosie’s thoughts. She lifted her head from where she’d still been tucked close to his back and saw they were standing in front of said hundred year old bar now. He unlocked the door and entered without so much as a word to her. He reached back when the door was closed behind them and locked it.

“Hey, why are you locking that?” she asked, giving his back a push.

“I don’t want anyone to interrupt us. Not with what we have to talk about.”

“We, uh, really don’t have a lot to talk about, right? Like I said, I need more time and-”

“We have plenty to talk about petal, and I’m done giving you time.”

“You gave me maybe an hour, tops. And remember the brooding and staring? That really cut into that hour, so we’re talking like maybe 15 minutes really.”

He sighed, the rise and fall of it lifting Rosie right with it and she squeezed her thighs together hating how fucking much she liked it.

“Rosie.”

“Eric,” she shot back, trying to sound imperious from her perch on his shoulder but knowing she failed when he turned his head, nose to the side of her hip and inhaled deeply.

“God, you smell amazing.”

“Stop that!”

He took another inhale and chuckled. “Doesn’t really smell like you want me to stop, petal. You want me. I can practically taste it.”

She blushed hot. Of course if she was starting to get turned on he was going to know it. Even if he wasn’t her mate he could smell it. “That’s pretty impolite and ungentlemanly,” she told him.

“Never said I was a gentleman, said I was your mate.” He moved, bringing her down off his shoulder to stand in front of him. Rosie’s nipples hardened at the slide down Eric’s body and she cleared her throat, trying to step away from him but only succeeding in walking right back into the bar top behind her. Eric leaned forward, a hand going to either side of her body as he came clear into her space. Rosie was stuck between her mate and the bar top with nowhere to go. She glared up at Eric, but he didn’t seem bothered in the least. He smiled at her, but it wasn’t a smile so much as a smirk.

“Shut up,” she blurted out which then had him truly smiling.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“Yes, you did. Your smirk is coming in loud and clear.”

Eric rolled his eyes, yes, outright rolled them at her and leaned in closer. For a nanosecond Rosie thought he was going to kiss her and she closed her eyes, lips parting in anticipation of the kiss that she was sure to come, except...except that he didn’t kiss her. Eric went right on leaning and moved past her, his weight shifting to the hand braced against the bar beside her.

“Good, because it was meant to little witch.” His lips grazed her ear when he spoke, and she didn’t know whether to feel aroused or annoyed at the bear. Eric exhaled and his warm breath puffed against her skin, making her shiver and her breath catch. He moved, lips following the shell of Rosie’s ear and she bit back a moan. Her eyes closed and she knew the light show that announced their fated mate status was going off around them. The light and shadow of it danced across her closed eyelids. Rosie knew it would be filling the room, the colored light turning their world into a rainbow of color and hue. It would be beautiful, and dazzling, and just so much.

It would be just right.

Rosie let out the breath she hadn’t known she was holding when Eric moved away from her without warning. She opened her eyes to see him watching her, his arms crossed over his broad chest, and that fucking smirk still on his handsome face.

She suddenly knew which feeling to pick. She was going with annoyed. Definitely annoyed.

“You’re such a jerk,” she told him, crossing her arms over in a mirror of his.

He rubbed a hand across his jaw and lifted a shoulder in a shrug. “Sure, I am. But I’m your jerk, petal.”

“Stop calling me petal!”

He gave a shake of his head. “Don’t think I will, because even if you’re all thorns right now, I know,” he lowered his voice, eyes hot on her body, “that you can be soft and sweet for me. Can’t you, petal?”

Rosie’s mouth pulled into a frown. What the fuck was she supposed to say to that? Eric was being impossible, and the worst thing of all was that she was attracted to it. What was going on? She turned away from him when her brain refused to give her words to speak. “You have a nice selection of liquor,” she finally settled on, eyes on the bottles lining the back of the bar. A mirror ran the length of the bar and the lights hitting the bottle’s contents bounced off it, reflecting back to Rosie in poor imitation of what she knew it was like when Eric touched her.

Goddess, she wanted him to touch her. She wanted it so much. And the wild thing was the more he ran his mouth, the more she craved his touch. She wanted him to use that mouth on her. Rosie pressed her hands, palms flat to the counter when Eric appeared at her side and forced her eyes to stay on the colored bottles.

“You’re beautiful, Rosie,” he said, reaching out to twirl a thick lock of her hair around his finger. “Never seen another woman like you.”

“That’s because I’m not a woman.”

He smiled, just a flash of teeth she caught sight of in the mirror that made Rosie think of wolves and not at all what she had figured a bear to be. “You’re going to say you’re a witch, aren’t you?” he asked.

She nodded, the gesture tugging her hair from his fingers. “Bingo, buddy.”

“Eric,” he corrected her. He turned, leaning an elbow against the bar and Rosie kept her eyes forward even as she felt his gaze move over her. “I want you to say my name, Rosie.”

“Why?”

Again he shrugged. “I like the way my name sounds coming out of your mouth.” His hand was beside hers now, and he tapped a finger against the side of her hand. “I know you like saying it, so why are you fighting me?”

She jerked her hand away from his touch but not before a spark flashed and lit the space between them. “Why are you so focused on getting under my skin?” she asked, turning to face him. Eric didn’t move from his relaxed pose against the bar. He was utterly at home here. She supposed that was normal given it was his bar. This was his world. The closest place she could think of outside of his actual home where the bear would feel in power. Even though it was only a business, after a hundred years, the essence of a family, of the people that worked it and loved it sank right into the very foundation of a place.

Rosie was at a disadvantage and they both knew it. Didn’t mean she had to accept it though.

“Well, are you going to answer me or is this yet another step in your plan to drive me out of my mind?” she pushed.

“I like getting under your skin since you seem so hell bent on proving you don’t want me.”

She hadn’t expected that kind of honesty. “Um…”

Eric leaned towards her, his hand reaching for and finding hers again. “We belong to each other. You know that, even if you don’t want it to be true. No one is going to be able to understand you like I do, Rosie.”

“And what? You’re going to show me that by annoying the shit out of me?”

“If I have to, then yes.” Eric’s words ended on a near shout and Rosie drew back with a gasp.

“Eric, look-”

“No, you look. You’re my mate. My fated mate. Do you get that?” Eric reached out, catching her arm and pulling her close to him as Rosie’s hands came to his chest. “This is bigger than us. You know that.”

Rosie felt her heart leap into her throat. She felt full to the brim, overflowing with Eric’s need for her, with her own want of him. He was right. It was bigger than them, but that wasn’t because of a choice either of them had made. It was because of Fey magic.

“It’s not fair,” she whispered, surprising them both. She hadn’t realized her brain had come back online but here she was speaking. Eric leaned back, looking like he was up for listening, so she kept going, “We didn’t pick this, Eric. The Fey did this. You know that. We never got to decide who we wanted or when we wanted it, or even where it would take us.”

“Rosie…”

“And Eric, I have got to tell you, I’ve lived a lot of places, but I really didn’t think Oak Fast was going to be the place I ended up calling home. This can’t be it,” she told him, moving forward when he seemed to fall back a step, the swagger of the big bear seeming to vanish in front of her, “this just can’t be it. I wanted-I wanted-”

“What did you want?”

“To not have a mate. To be my own woman.” Rosie swallowed hard, the words not stopping now that they were coming. She didn’t have a prayer of heading any of it off now that she was on a roll. “I never wanted any of this. I wanted to make my own choices, and a mate was never a part of it.” She moved away, pulling her hand out from under his. “What is it that you want, Eric? Because I’m pretty sure that after a hundred years in this town your ancestors cannot be thrilled that you’ve been paired with a wandering witch. They just can’t.” Rosie sucked in a deep breath, her little rant effectively stealing her breath. There wasn’t a sound in the room, just her breathing, and for a moment she thought she had gotten through to the bear.

He didn’t look as sure as he had, his carefully curated facade all but smashed. There was doubt in his blue eyes. Rosie really didn’t like that she had put that there. But then like a switch being flipped Eric recovered and said the last thing Rosie expected him to say.

“I don’t care what they want. I want you.”