Free Bears & Beauties - Complete by Terra Wolf, Mercy May

should.
    Bellowing out another huge roar, Grayson dove into the garage with a grace that seemed unnatural for a beast as massive as him. The men didn’t even have the time to react as he reached his first victim, the man with a rope burn across his throat. Grayson grabbed him with his massive paws, lifted him from the floor, and threw him out into the street. The man skipped across the pavement a few times before coming to a rest against the sidewalk, unconscious and suffering from various contusions.
    The stench of fear only increased as the other men realized the reality of what was happening. Oddly, though, that same fear seemed to recede from Amber. In fact, she seemed to grow more comfortable and confident the longer that Grayson was there. Good.
    Realizing that he needed to make a move, the man who had been clasping onto Amber released her, dropping her to her rear on the ground, then turned to run toward the opening. He was fast, but the bear was even faster. Before the man could make the opening, Grayson was on him, tearing into him with his claws and throwing him to the ground outside.
    Grayson turned his attention to the final man, the one with the broken nose, and stared directly into the man’s eyes. The man, at first seemingly frozen in fear, made a last ditch effort to defend himself. He jerked a small handgun from behind his back and leveled with Grayson’s head.
    “Come get me,” the man snarled, his finger tightening on the trigger. Before he could fire off a shot, however, something slammed into the back of the man’s skull, immediately dropping him to the floor. Behind where the man had been standing, Amber, her mouth gagged with a belt, stood with a shovel in her hands, tears of relief beginning to roll down her face.
    Grayson let out a sigh of relief then, acknowledging that all three men were unconscious, and shifted back into his human form. He stood there for a long moment, naked from the initial shift into a bear, and stared longingly at Amber.
    Without a word, Amber strode over to Grayson, wrapped her arms around his neck, and wept.

 
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    7
     
    Amber curled up under a blanket as she sat on the black leather couch in Grayson’s penthouse. She was dressed in nothing more than a tee-shirt three times her size, her other clothes having been ruined during the events of the night. A gas-lit fireplace burned a few feet away from her and she did her best to soak up the warmth. Outside the penthouse, the storm still raged on. Lightning flared and thunder crashed as the wind and rain howled down upon the midnight city. Gazing out the window at the city skyline, Amber did her best to clear her mind.
    The night had been one to remember, for sure, and one that she knew she’d never forget. Not only had she been kidnapped, assaulted, and nearly much worse, she had also been rescued by a massive billionaire-turned-grizzly bear. Part of her wondered if she’d lost her mind somewhere along the way, but deep down, she knew it was only the beginning of her new reality.
    Something had changed tonight. The world had shifted on its axis. The stars had aligned. Fate had come knocking, and she’d answered the door.
    She’d known that something was going on the first moment she laid eyes on Grayson Days back at the party. She’d known that something was at work, that her fate was unwinding. She’d chosen to ignore it, to dismiss it, and to run from it. That action - or, rather, her inaction - had only served to further validate her initial feelings. Somehow, some way, for some reason, she’d been fated to meet Grayson. One way or another, Fate had been determined to make that meeting last.
    Grayson had done his best to fill in the blanks during the trip to his penthouse. He’d invited her in, offered her a shower, and sent someone out to pick up some new clothes for her. He’d told her all about his family, told her about the shifter society, and even told her that he