AJ sat up straight in her bed, her eyes half closed and her hair like a haystack all over the place. She was annoyed with herself for having that dream again. Her dream about the day she’d met Anton.
Well, really she’d met all the Malashoviks that day. Anton had brought her home to his family where they’d fed her, fixed her up, and explained as gently as they could, in their thick Belarusian accents, that Anton WAS the grizzly bear that had rescued her.
Never in her life would AJ have guessed that the new neighbors who had moved in were four Belarusian bear shifter brothers and their parents.
Yet. Here she was. More than a decade later and they were more of a family to her than her own relatives.
Her father had resurfaced this year. Hung up the keys to his rig and started spending a lot more time around Spokane. But even so, AJ considered Katya and Ilya Malashovik to be her parents.
Just as she considered the brothers, Maxim, Emin, Anton, and Danil to be her brothers. Well. Sort of. Maxim, Emin and Danil she had no problem thinking of as brothers. Anton, however, was a different story.
Yeah. Anton pretty much soaked her panties through just by being in the same room as her. Crass. But true. She had it bad for the man. And she had for the last decade.
Annoyed with herself at her line of thought, AJ yanked herself out of bed and toward the shower. She was gonna be late for classes at cosmetology school if she didn’t get a move on.
She had better things to think about than men who didn’t see her as a woman. Or who barely saw her at all. The way Anton did. As if she were just an annoying family friend that was often around too much. She didn’t need to dwell on him, no matter how she secretly felt on the inside. She had a life and school and friends and - oh crap! Her friends! Dora, Glory, and Ivy, AJ’s three best friends (and wives of three of the Malashovik boys) had told her they were coming over to have breakfast with her that morning.
AJ glanced at her wall clock. That meant she only had - eep! Ten minutes before they’d be there. Well, considering her shower took at least five minutes to warm up, it looked like AJ was gonna get a real nice jolt to the system.
Dora Katsaros stood in AJ’s living room, one ear cocked. “Okay, good. She just jumped in the shower, which means we have a few minutes to pow wow.” She raked a hand through her glossy, stylish haircut that she was currently growing out. It immediately flipped back into her eyes. She hated it.
“What’s this all about?” Ivy asked, flopping down on the couch as if she lived there. Her turquoise green hair fanned out around her as her standard V-neck and jeans strained around her audacious curves. She’d left her husband, Maxim, and their newly six-year-old son, Linc, at home just now. All to meet up before work for whatever mysterious thing Dora had planned. And Ivy wasn’t altogether thrilled about it. Sometimes after Linc got on the bus for school, she and Maxim had themselves a little nookie party. And missing out on that possibility wasn’t high on Ivy’s to-do list. But she loved Dora. Hell, she loved all these ladies. And if they called, she came.
Glory, a stunning redhead, damn near six feet tall, and just starting to show, cupped her pregnant belly and slid gratefully into the armchair. None of them had any problem making themselves comfortable at AJ’s house.
Katya and Ilya’s house, the parents of the Malashovik boys, was just a five-minute walk from AJ’s. But it was a very male-dominated space. The brothers took control of that area. AJ’s house was very much the ladies’ headquarters. And over the last year they’d made good use out of it.
“Well, to put it bluntly,” Dora began as she popped the cap off an orange juice and took a giant swig, “I’m sick and tired of dancing around this whole AJ/Anton thing.”
“Wow,” Ivy said, raising her eyebrows. “That is blunt. And kind of not our business.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Dora waved one hand in the air. “I figure they made it our business by mooning over one another for so long. Anybody can see how they feel about each other.”
“Um,” Glory squeaked, notably pink in the cheeks. “I’m pretty sure they are just friends.” She spoke mechanically, as if repeating something she’d memorized.
“Glory, baby,” Dora said. “We all know that you and Anton are really good friends, even before you were brother and sister-in-law. I’m sure he’s probably confided some deep dark secret about his feelings for AJ. And I don’t wanna make you betray that confidence. But, seriously.” She put her booted feet up on the coffee table. “I think it’s our duty as AJ’s friends to just give it a little nudge.”
“I think ‘duty’ might be a heavy choice of words,” Ivy said, reaching over for Dora’s orange juice. “But she does seem pretty miserable without him.”
Glory pressed her lips together. She really didn’t want to tell anybody’s secrets. She knew how important it was to keep them. Well. Not personally, because she didn’t really have any secrets to keep. A tiger shifter herself, she’d been raised in the wild. So human traits, like lying or keeping secrets, didn’t come naturally at all. All she knew was that when Anton had told her how he felt about AJ, he’d seemed so sad. And so certain he’d never be able to have her. And she really didn’t want him to be so sad anymore.
“What do you mean by ‘nudge’?” Glory eventually asked, twirling some of her coppery hair around one of her fingers.
“Now we’re talking!” Dora scrubbed her hands together. “I don’t think we do anything too intense. Nothing that would really expose their feelings for one another or anything like that. I think we just…”
The women huddled together, speaking quietly. Which was exactly how AJ found them five minutes later when she stepped out of her bathroom, cinching her bathrobe around her waist.
“Um. Hi, guys.”
All three of them jumped, as if they were caught gambling on a street corner. Okay, that was kind of weird, AJ thought. Almost as weird as the three blinding grins her friends were shoving her way.
“What’s going on?” AJ asked, sliding around them and picking up one of the bagels they’d brought for breakfast.
“Nothing!” Dora’s voice was suspiciously bright. “We were just talking about you. And, uh, a thought we had.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah,” Ivy leaned back on the couch. “We were thinking about that dude, Mark.”
“Mark?”
“The guy you mentioned from school? The one who works in the cafeteria? Who you think is really cute?” Glory prodded her.
“Oh,” AJ said, shaking her head to clear it. Random. “Why were you talking about him?”
“We think you should ask him out today,” Dora said, dropping her words down like a bag of rocks.
“I - you - what?” AJ was shocked. As close as they all were, they never really meddled in one another’s love lives. Well, that could be because the three of them were all happily married to Malashovik boys and their love lives needed zero meddling.
“Look, AJ, we’re not trying to be too pushy,” Glory started, which was true. Except for Dora, of course, who loved being pushy. “But you’ve seemed really sad lately. And we just thought that maybe we could pick an outfit for you and doll you up with some makeup and that it might be fun to go on a date after class.”
“Well,” AJ pushed her hair out of her eyes. “I guess I can’t really think of a reason to say no.” Not one she could say out loud anyways. She could never tell them that she didn’t date because she was devastatingly in love with their brother-in-law. They would all be so shocked and uncomfortable. It might really hurt her relationship with them. And she would never risk that.
All three of them lit up so fast at her agreement that AJ was actually glad she’d said yes. They were so stoked.
“Okay!” Dora clapped her hands together. “I’m on makeup. Glory’s on hair. And Ivy’s on clothes. Raid that closet!”
AJ basically held her breath for an entire 20 minutes while she was poked and prodded, brushed, painted, blow-dried, and had the occasional bite of bagel jammed in her mouth.
“Do we need to go over the plan again?” Dora asked her as she added the last swipes of lip gloss to AJ’s mouth.
“No, good God, Dora. I get it. It’s not rocket science. After class this afternoon, I head over to the cafeteria and ask him if wants to go have dinner. We leave together. The end.”
“Yeah, but you’re forgetting the part where I’ve dropped off your truck in the parking lot for you so that you can drive him to your date,” Dora needled her.
“I still don’t understand why that’s necessary?”
“Because nobody wants to start a date on a bus. And you’re taking the bus there because you promised Glory could take your car to her ultrasound appointment,” Ivy chimed in, snapping her fingers. “Keep up, kid!”
“Right.” AJ was tempted to rub at the pain that was forming behind one of her eyes, but they’d just spent so much time on her makeup, she refrained. “One loophole to this genius matchmaking scheme.”
Well. Besides the fact that she was in love with someone else and would never be happy with Mark the cafeteria guy.
“What’s that?” Dora asked.
“How do we even know this guy is gonna say yes to the date?”
The three other women looked at each other and laughed. Glory lunged forward and took AJ by the hand, leading her toward the floor length mirror in the other room.
“Trust me,” she told AJ. “He’s gonna say yes.”
AJ’s mouth fell open as she surveyed herself. Yeah, she was in cosmetology school. And yeah, she often messed around with her own makeup for practice. But Jesus. These ladies knew what they were doing. Her eyes were smoky and sexy, her lips were like raspberries. Her dirty blonde, blunt haircut cascaded in shiny waves to her shoulders and fell across one eye. And they’d squeezed her into a midnight blue sweater dress the exact same color as her eyes. She hadn’t worn it in years. Not since these curves came in.
“Damn.” There really wasn’t another word for it. She didn’t usually brag. But damn.
She had the fleeting, momentary pain at the thought that even if Anton saw her dolled up like this, he would still look right through her.
But the three women behind her surveyed their hard work and grinned, high-fiving. The joy of it brought a smile to AJ’s face. It was just gonna have to be enough.
***
Anton Malashovik grinned as he pounded through the forest at full speed. Well, it didn’t really count as a grin when you were a grizzly bear. It looked more like a baring of teeth, he was sure. But it didn’t matter. His muscles screamed with exertion, the fresh, piney air whipped into his lungs, and there was nothing but silence in his ears.
He needed this. Once a day at least. He needed the forest. Especially in the winter. In the crisp cool. The humid chill in the air right before it snowed. God. He loved it. Truly. With his whole heart. It was the one and only thing he indulged himself with. His daily runs through the forest in his bear form.
His only indulgence.
Every other part of his life was kept on a viciously short leash. Restrained and bottled and kept far away from anyone who could possibly get hurt by it.
He was too dangerous to be close to anybody. Even his brothers he kept a certain distance from. They loved him unconditionally, he knew, as did his parents. But none of them knew what lived inside him.
Anton pushed himself into a harder run and he felt the scars on his back stretch and strain, reminding him they were there. Constantly reminding him.
In a way he relished the reminder. They were a physical representation of the pain and horror that lurked inside him. What Navuka had done to him.
Navuka was an organization that targeted shifters. They hunted them, captured them, and tortured them into being soldiers. Weapons. Anton had been captured by them at age 18. That was back when his family still lived in Belarus.
He’d been tortured at their hands for a year. The monster had been brought to life inside him. His brothers had laid siege to the lab that held him and freed Anton. They’d fled the country all together and come to America a decade ago. But he never had been able to completely flee what Navuka had done to him.
Memories of the torture still woke him in a cold sweat. And whenever he was angry, or frightened, or frustrated, he could feel the beast inside him grumble, shift, clang at the bars of its cage.
And what was worse, it wasn’t just when he was angry. It was also when he was aroused.
Which was why, he thought as he came to a screeching halt at the jutting outcropping of rock where he’d first seen her, this was the closest he ever let himself get to her. He ignored the bite of pain and shifted to his human form, buck naked in the chilly air. He laid himself out over the same place where he’d seen her lying 11 years ago. He’d done this same thing a thousand times since that day with the mountain lion.
This place was almost sacred to him. It was his and AJ’s place. Even if she didn’t know it. It was the only place on earth where he could lie still and love her as much as his heart demanded. Because when he stood up, when he shifted back to bear form and headed back to his family, those feelings went right back into the cage he’d had to make of his heart.
It was the only way to keep her safe from him.
A little while later, Anton ambled back down the mountain toward his mother’s house. He supposed that it was technically his house as well, since he kept a room there. But he was just as often sleeping on one of his brother’s couches, or sleeping in bear form in the woods, as he was in his bedroom in the old rickety house.
Once in the backyard, which was lined by thick trees on three sides, he shifted back into his human form and yanked on the pants he’d left for himself on the back deck. He wouldn’t normally come home quite so early in the afternoon; he preferred to be in bear form for longer. But his sister-in-law, Glory, had called him that morning. Asked him to meet her at home for a favor.
As tough as Anton seemed on the outside, with his huge shoulders and 6’3” frame, his ash brown hair and dark, dark eyes, he was really a softie for his sisters-in-law. And for his nephew, Linc. Anton would have cut off his hands for those people.
He tugged a t-shirt over his head and strode into the kitchen, surprised when he saw all three of his sisters-in law-instead of just Glory.
His eyes fell straight to Glory’s stomach.
“You show!” he exclaimed in his thick Belarusian accent. He had no idea that the giddy excitement on his usually sober face had all three of those happily married women inwardly sighing.
He really was something to look at.
“Yeah!” Glory met his enthusiasm and raised it. She grabbed his hand and pressed it to her belly.
“Whoa,” he murmured, his eyes widening as he slid his hand back into his pocket. Glory didn’t know that she was the only person in his life who really touched him. His brothers often slung an arm over his shoulder or wrestled with him, but he knew they did it to make a point, not because it came naturally. People could sense something dark within him and they instinctually shied away from it.
Not Glorious Glory, though. He figured it was because they had both been held by Navuka. They’d both been tortured and experimented on. Maybe she was immune to his darkness.
She was a good match for his brooding, artsy brother, Emin. They were both so passionate. And she was bright enough to light up any room. Anton had been thrilled when they’d gotten married. In a way, he felt that he finally had a family member who wasn’t a little bit scared of him. It felt good.
“This is the favor I need,” Glory said, pointing to her belly and munching on a handful of pretzels.
“You need me to deliver baby,” Anton said, deadpan. “Okay. I go google it.”
Glory laughed in delight while Dora and Ivy goggled at him.
“Anton, did you just make a joke?” Dora asked, whipping out her phone. “Hold on, say it again. I need to record it.”
He scowled at Dora and tugged her forward so she came gently tumbling down off the countertop she’d been sitting on.
“No sitting on counter in Katya’s kitchen,” he reminded her, turning his attention back to Glory.
“Never knew you were such a stickler for the rules,” Dora mumbled, hip checking him to one side.
“Okay, you two,” Ivy regulated in her best mom voice. “Glory still needs a favor.”
“Yes,” Glory tumbled on. “I am using AJ’s car to go to my ultrasound later.”
Anton immediately cut her off. “You drive yourself?”
Glory waved her hand through the air. “Emin is in Coeur D’Alene for the day dealing with some art dealer. So-”
“So, I will drive you.” Anton patted his chest as if he considered the matter final.
“Well, okay. I guess I could use the company, but that’s not the favor I need. After the appointments, I’m usually really tired. But I need to pick up AJ from her classes at 5:00. So I was hoping you could pick her up.”
Anton adopted the completely neutral, semi-scowl that he always did whenever AJ came up in conversation. Or was around. “AJ can take bus, no?”
Glory’s face fell instantly. “Oh.”
“Oh, you know what?” Dora swooped in effortlessly. “I just remembered that she said her boyfriend could give her a ride home. I can’t believe I forgot! So, no worries. All this for nothing.”
Anton knew that he hadn’t swallowed razorblades. But he sure as hell felt like a whole pack of them were fighting their way up his stomach right now. He carefully let his hands fall from where they were clenched into fists on the countertop. Damp moisture fogged over where they’d just been and gave away his internal temperature. Just that one word and he instantly felt his beast turn over and wake up inside him.
Boyfriend.
The word echoed through him. Like a spell. Like a curse.
Boyfriend.
He felt sick and furious and out of control. Which was the only excuse he would later give himself for why he said it. He wasn’t in his right mind. “I will take car and get her from school. To make sure she has ride.”
“Great!” Glory immediately burst out, sunshine practically exploding out of her smile.
Anton’s head was still ducked, so he didn’t see Ivy mouthing for Glory to take it down a notch. But even if he had seen it, nothing could make it through the pulsing thought in his head right now.
Boyfriend.
Hours later, after Glory’s appointment, which had actually been pretty cool, Anton gripped the steering wheel of AJ’s truck and tore up the highway toward her school.
He was such an idiot. He knew this. He should have prepared himself for this moment. Of course she was going to have a boyfriend at some point.
She was the sweetest person he’d ever met in his life. All thoughtful and helpful. There wasn’t a day that went by that she wasn’t doing the shopping for Katya, or baking something that smelled like cinnamon sin. Or running errands with Ilya. Babysitting Linc. Setting up a romantic night for her father, who was still getting used to his new girlfriend, Serena, who also happened to be Glory’s mom.
She was just so… good. All things kind and sweet. And then when you factored in that face. God.
Big, sleepy, midnight blue eyes that always looked halfway between satisfied and pleasured. Blonde, arching eyebrows that he always wanted to trace with the pads of his thumbs. A swooping little nose, and again with the thumb thing. And her lips. Jesus Holy Mother, her lips. They were small, but plump. And always so smudgy. Almost bruised. Like she’d just been kissed to within an inch of her life, or she’d just come up off somebody’s cock.
Which he knew was never the case. There were never any dudes sniffing around her. Not that he made sure of it. He made a point to let her have her private life. And, as she occasionally went to parties and used to go to summer camp, he assumed she’d been touched a little bit. The thought would drive him insane, so he usually chose not to think about it at all. But if there had been any real person in her life, he sure as hell would have noticed it.
Until now.
Anton took a deep breath and let it out, but it didn’t help a lick. How long had she been seeing this asshole? How long had he been pawing at her, feeling her, touching that perfect, surprisingly curvy body?
Anton remembered seeing her in a bathing suit over the summer. It had been the first time he’d seen her that scantily clad since her curves had come in and it had been murder. Just absolute murder. She dressed so flowy that he’d never known she had that chest or that absolutely perfect ass underneath her clothes.
And now, whoever this piece of shit boyfriend was, he had front row seats. Probably sneaking his greasy hand up her sweater after class. Had she brought him home? Anton growled and his knuckles whitened on the steering wheel.
Had he gone in her bedroom?
Fucked her on her bed?
He couldn’t stop the rage that was bubbling in his throat. In all the years that he’d known her, he’d only been in her bedroom once. It had been an absolute assault on his defenses. Walls painted a sky blue and pictures of his family scattered all over had lent a nice, homey feeling. But her scent had been everywhere. Light, coconutty, sexy as fuck. And her bed had been rumpled from sleep. She had been in the kitchen, pouring bowls of cereal for the two of them and he’d stopped off in her room for just a second on his way back from the bathroom.
Anton grimaced as he remembered what he’d done next. Traced his hand over her pillow, over her sheets. They’d still been warm from her body.
He’d left before she was done pouring the cereal.
God. Why was he doing this? He couldn’t handle this. He was losing his mind and he wasn’t even sharing the truck with her yet. What if her boyfriend needed a ride too? Was Anton just supposed to chauffeur their date? This was the dumbest thing he’d ever agreed to do. He hadn’t thought it through in the least.
Would she even care if he intruded on her date this way? He had no idea. She was often shy, but she had no reason to be embarrassed to date in front of him. She had no idea of his feelings. Except for the washing machine incident.
Anton ripped a hand through his hair, it was a little long these days. Annoyed, he painfully shoved it back from his brow. The washing machine incident. Over a year ago now. When he’d sat her up on a washing machine in his mother’s laundry room, leaned in, almost kissed the living breath out of her. And she’d looked at him like he was an escaped convict from the loony bin.
She’d literally trembled with fear.
Did she ever think about that? Would she think about it if she was sitting on the bench seat of the truck, sandwiched between him and her boyfriend?
Anton pulled into the parking lot of her school, switched off the car and reached for his sanity.
He was going to have to be calm. He was going to have to be neutral. He couldn’t have her. He’d decided that a long time ago. So this was just day one of getting used to her with somebody who wasn’t a monster.