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To be doing so with Laura must have been a result of head trauma.
“Come on. Let’s get you back into bed.”
He opened his mouth to say something funny and inappropriate just to rattle her, but she slapped a hand over his mouth. “Alone.”
He chuckled.
Her expression eased. “Gerald, I’m worried. The raptors weren’t messing around. They’re not trying to scare you. They’re trying to kill you.”
He let her put him back to bed, content beyond measure when a waft of her scent hit. He inhaled deeply and whispered her name.
“Yes?” She leaned closer. “Gerald?”
He gave her the whisper of a kiss, the taste of her bursting on his lips like warm cherries, ripe and sweet. “Thanks.”
Then he closed his eyes and slept, healing, trusting that Laura would protect him until he was well enough to protect her right back. His fox settled in his mind’s eye, wrapped around a grizzly, dreaming in a state of peace.
Chapter Five
Laura kept touching her lips, not sure what the hell that sly fox had done. In sleep he’d managed to outwit her. Somehow. Because for the past two hours, she’d done little but think about that kiss and how it had stirred the animal spirit inside her.
For years, Laura had secretly dreamed about finding a mate, settling down, and having a few cubs. She was no different from half the Ac-taw in town. Shifter or human, bear or other, she just wanted a special someone to call her own.
But Laura had always been different, and that made finding a mate difficult.
She didn’t cater to what a man wanted. She didn’t try to make herself pretty or pretend to be something she wasn’t. And she wasn’t the norm—what men typically wanted.
Laura had always been on the big side. Taller, not obese, but thick. And yeah, so she had some padding around that muscle, as a bear and a human. She loved her grizzly, a large sow who protected those in her clan.
Her alpha considered her an asset, and her boss always knew he could count on her. Heck, the sheriff was more like family, especially since his mate was Laura’s best friend.
And they happened to both be foxes and friendly with Gerald.
Yet another tie Laura had with the sexy attorney. It seemed like everywhere she turned, she’d find him there. At a party. At a small dinner for mutual friends. At work.
Always at work, making her life miserable by throwing legal jargon her way and demanding rights for his bonehead clients. And yes, most of them were citizens letting off steam. Drunk and disorderly, the occasional brawl, some petty misconduct.
Cougar Falls didn’t see serious crime. Or at least, it hadn’t until the raptors had lost their gosh-darn minds.
She loathed Roberta McKay and always had. Roberta had been a terrible person before marrying Glen, another tyrant who catered to her. Roberta ran the clan now, along with her puppet, Glen, and a small group of enforcers who acted like glorified bullies. Roberta ascribed to the idea that whatever she wanted she must have, and she didn’t understand the word “no.”
She also used to tease Laura for being a big girl all through elementary school. Until finally Laura had had enough and bit through some of the girl’s tail feathers at recess. Then that had been that.
Now Roberta made problems for those in her clan. She and her sycophants had been acting out more, trying to take over those weaker families who wanted to simply coexist.
Laura wasn’t having it.
Neither was Gerald, apparently. She’d told him not to take on her cousin’s case, which had only been the icing on top of ousting Roberta. Her cousin had witnessed Roberta’s son harassing an eagle and tried to stop it, which turned into Kyle getting into a fight with Roberta’s bratty kid and four other raptors.
Gerald got the charges against Kyle dropped, charges against Roberta’s son filed, and a petition to remove the McKays from leadership while the council could review new charges filed against them for abusing power and harming clan members.
Personally, Laura would have handed Kyle’s case to her own clan lawyers. Gerald and his firm weren’t the only game in town, though truth be told, they were the best.
She knew one brown bear, part of her clan, who dressed like a slob but had a decent head for law. He would have gotten Kyle off. And backed by the bears, he wouldn’t have given Roberta any reason to attack.
But no. Gerald had to do his high and mighty “protect all the people” schtick, and now he had a bullet wound and concussion and was stuck with her while they rode out the storm.
Maker-willing, he didn’t have any internal injuries that wouldn’t heal.
