Free Chance Fur Hire (Bears Fur Hire 6) by T. S. Joyce Page A

Vega blood. You did what your father and uncle and all the Hell Hunters before you failed to do. You really looked at us, and you made your own choice. You bucked that awful tradition. The Hell Hunters end with you.” He jammed his finger at the book lying on the table. “We can write you your own fucking page in our history book because today is the day you ended the plague on our people. No more hanging trees, no more burning houses.” Chance cupped her face. “You’re better than all of them, Emily.”
    She could see it there in his eyes and hear it in the inflection of every syllable. He believed the words he was saying, and a huge part of her wanted to believe in her goodness, too. She didn’t, but she wanted to.
    Chance was absolving her of everything.
    “I know I haven’t earned your trust yet,” she whispered, holding his palms against her cheeks just to keep his warmth there. “But I will. If it takes my whole life, I’ll make up for what my father did to your pack. I’ll protect you.”
    A slow smile spread across his face and filled his eyes. “Truth.”

Chapter Nine
     
    Chance skimmed through the last few pages of text of the biggest werewolf history book. He was still a little dumbfounded on how the Hell Hunters had come to possess it, and also, how they’d managed to provide such a detailed account of shifter history. He snickered at the second to last page and spun it around on the table, showing Em a pen and ink drawing of the genital structure of a “real werewolf.” It looked like every other dude’s dick. So interesting.
    Her eyes went round, and the lingering smile dropped from her pretty lips. “That’s lewd.” She jammed her finger at the other page, a drawing of a wolf-man hybrid standing over a sleeping woman with his huge dick pointed at her butt like he was about to impale her. “Please tell me it’s not really like that!”
    “What, a monster about to fuck an unknowing human in her sleep? You’ve seen my wolf. I look nothing like this, and sex in animal form is taboo for my people. This is the evil imaginings of a fanatic. Sex with an actual werewolf would bore the shit out of you if this gets your vagina shop open.”
    Her cheeks were flushed with a pretty pink color he’d seen on flowers at a store once. So fucking beautiful. “You don’t like me talking like that.”
    “Or maybe I do,” she said, arching her delicate brows primly.
    “Mmmm,” he said through a satisfied growl.
    Clearing her throat, she cuddled her steaming mug of coffee closer to her chest and crossed her legs under the table, brushing his shin in the process and just about driving him mad. Pheromones and flowers—his new favorite scent combination. Did she realize she was putting out a smell meant to draw him to her? Humans didn’t have the senses he did. Pity for the males who couldn’t smell when a woman was aroused.
    “I have plans for today.”
    “Oh, yeah? You kicking me out?”
    “No.” She blushed again. “I was going to invite you to go for a walk on my dad’s land.”
    God damn, his boner was never going to go down. “You mean your land?”
    A tiny frown took her brows, and she sipped her coffee, a stall tactic. “I guess it is my land now, huh? Dad isn’t here, and I’m paying for it.”
    “His belongings are turning to ash in the yard. Too close to the house, by the way. Next time you go building a bonfire like that, push it out farther, and don’t make it where you’ll have to see that burn mark on the grass and think about the reasons they’re there for months to come.”
    “I did that on purpose.”
    “To torture yourself?”
    “No, to deal with it. Finding out how close I came to losing all of the good in me is something I need to accept. It hurts…thinking about all the lies my dad and uncle told me, but it’ll hurt me worse if I don’t deal with my feelings and drag everything out for the rest of my life.”
    “Poison,” he murmured.
    She twitched her