Pierce

Why is she being so kind to me?

Despite her current attempts to hide it and act like there wasn’t, it was clear there was an intense chemistry between the two of them. It was so powerful at times Pierce thought he could see it. He certainly felt it, especially when he went a long time without touching her. His entire hand had gone numb after they had shaken this morning, the first contact of any sort they’d had since the night before.

He’d never felt anything like it. No woman had ever made his body sing with such burning desire. Pierce would give up just about anything to have her, to be with her, to be hers. He would give her the world, and destroy anyone who tried to tear her down, or heaven forbid, harm her. Mila Chaire was his goddess, and she would know it in time.

Hopefully

There’s that little bit where right now she’s terrified of you, and terrified of how she feels about you. So keep yourself relaxed, and act like nothing happened. Pretend like you’re just that stranger she met, and things will hopefully work out okay. Drawing attention to the best blowjob you’ve ever gotten will not help you out, trust me.

Pierce killed the shower water and pulled the curtain open, once again regarding the bathroom. It was…odd, to say the least. He reached over and pulled the towel off the hook from the wall.

Except it wasn’t a hook, but actually the horn of a unicorn, the front of its head attached to the wall. The light switch was unicorn-themed. The towel had a huge unicorn on it. Her soap dispenser was—yup—a unicorn horn. Hoofprints decorated a very unicorny-colored purple bath mat.

The wallpaper—who the hell still used wallpaper in a bathroom these days?—was a unicorn pattern. She had a unicorn statue on the tank of her toilet, and a sticker in the bottom right of the mirror.

As a bear shifter, Pierce had never felt more awkward before in his entire life. Mila had more than an obsession with unicorns. She was addicted to them. There was no getting around it.

She concealed it well though, he thought. There had been absolutely no indication of her addiction downstairs, or in the basement. No, wait, that wasn’t entirely true. He recalled seeing a pillow on one of the couches that had an image of a unicorn on it, but it was subdued and blended into a forest, if he recalled correctly. Just a nice overall image. That was the lone indicator.

Finished drying, he threw his clothes back on, hanging the towel back up over the unicorn horn, trying his best not to laugh. Although he succeeded, it was clear as he came back down that Mila was searching his face for any sign that he had reacted to the bathroom décor.

“Ready?” he asked, not planning on giving her the satisfaction of explaining herself…yet.

“Uh, yeah,” she said, clearly caught off guard by his lack of comment. “Are you?”

Pierce steeled himself, and reached for the door handle. “As I’ll ever be, I think.”

He tugged on the brass knob, preparing himself for the wash of pressure that he knew would hit him like a tornado. His shoulders bunched and his free hand curled into a fist. Muscles in his legs twitched and readied themselves for anything, while his brain strengthened the defenses around his bear, just in case.

The door didn’t move.

“What the?”

Mila leaned forward and flicked something. “You need to unlock it first,” she said mildly.

He nodded, feeling rather silly for having steeled himself so hard for what might happen, and then not even remembering to unlock the door.

Get it together. Your brothers need you at your finest.

Right. His brothers.

I swear to the nine Hells of Hades.

The line echoed through his head once more, providing a distraction as the door opened and he stepped out into the city. Hatred welled up in him, providing an anchor for his bear, a focal point for it to latch onto. His upper lip peeled back in a silent growl. When Pierce finally tracked down whoever was behind his brothers’ abduction, he was going to take great pleasure in killing them.

Nobody fucked with the Koche brothers. None who lived to tell the tale.

Mila closed the door behind them and then hurried to catch up to his side as he walked alone to the sidewalk near the foot of her driveway. He stood there for several seconds, trembling in rage, not fear. He was going to kill them. Pierce couldn’t wait.

“Hey, are you okay?” Mila asked, pressing her hand gently against one of his flexed arms.

Almost immediately his anger subsided, deflating faster than a popped balloon. Pierce nearly staggered as his hatred and desire for revenge quite literally evaporated.

“Yeah,” he said, looking down at where she was touching him, and wondering if it was just a coincidence.

“You don’t look like it,” Mila pressed, her fingers still casually wrapped around his forearm.

“It’s…harder than it looks for me to be out here,” he said, grimacing as he flinched at a passing car. “So much… stuff.”

Mila smiled. “We can drive if you want,” she said, pointing back at the SUV in the driveway.

“I know. But I think this is something that I have to do. If I’m going to search for my brothers in…this,” he said, pointing at the sea of human creation and artificiality, “then I need to be able to adapt to it. Hard as it may be.”

“Okay, well, let’s go then. The hair salon is this way,” she said, heading to the left.

The instant her fingers left his skin, the anger returned in a wave, rushing through his system. Anxiety and fear rolled over him at the same time, the trio of emotions rushing around and around within him like a tornado, wreaking havoc on his mental well-being.

“Wait,” he called through gritted teeth, and with a horrific mental effort, forced his legs into action, sending him jogging after Mila, who by then was a half dozen steps away.

“Pierce?” she asked cautiously the instant she saw his face. “What’s wrong?”

“Hand,” he said, forcing himself to keep walking next to her.

“What?” Mila looked completely confused, looking down at his hand.

“I need it,” he said.

“You have your hand?”

He shook his head. “Not mine.” Deep breath. “Yours.”

Mila’s eyebrows rose as she lifted the hand that hung between the two of them. “What about my hand?”

Pierce held up his own. “Please,” he gasped.

“You want to hold hands?” she asked skeptically.

Nodding, he felt his shoulders hunch as they bowed under the pressure.

“Need it,” he repeated. “Please.”

He was pleading, but the weight of the city was too much. Pierce had thought himself ready for it, but he had been, so, so wrong. His bear was going insane in his head, bashing itself against his walls without any thought for its own safety.

“Why?” Mila asked.

“Helps,” he replied, barely able to speak with more than one word at a time.

Mila considered it, pausing in her walk as she looked him up and down, clearly seeing how hard it all was on him.

“Okay,” she said tentatively. “But only because it’s going to help you cope. Not because we’re a couple. Got it?”

At that point, Pierce would have agreed to any stipulations she made, as long as it got him what he had realized he needed. Her. Contact with her. His original plan to play it aloof, to act as if nothing had happened. That was not going to work anymore. Restraining himself from trying to sleep with her was still something he could—hopefully—do. But pretending that he didn’t feel some sort of absurd, strong connection with her?

No, he couldn’t push that by the wayside anymore. There were limits to even his strength, and that was one of them. Pierce would follow as many human customs as it took to get her to realize that they had something going on. Pierce wasn’t sure what, but all he knew just then was that he not only wanted Mila, but he needed her, in a very literal sense.

Cool relief rushed through his system as she slipped her hand into his huge mitt. Pierce swore he could feel his anger being sucked out of him. As his focus returned he looked into Mila’s eyes, trying to see if she could feel anything.

“What?” she asked. “Don’t get all weird on me, okay? I know things happened last night, but they shouldn’t have. This,” she said, holding up their joined hands, “is not going to change that. Okay? I’m not normally that type of woman.”

Pierce nodded hastily, refraining from telling her that he had never once thought of her as “that type of woman.” The idea had never once even entered his mind. But, Pierce was no idiot. He knew that, no matter how honest he tried to be with her over that subject, he was not going to convince her otherwise. Not at that point in time. So, best bet was, shut his mouth and just go along with whatever she said.

That wasn’t why he’d been looking at her though, and his curiosity couldn’t be sated.

“Do you…feel any different now?” he asked, looking at their hands to indicate he was referring to that, and not what had happened the night before.

“I told you—” she began angrily, opening her hand to try and free it from him.

“Wait wait wait,” he protested, squeezing just hard enough to keep contact. “That’s not what I meant.”

Mila’s look was easily interpreted to mean that she didn’t believe him.

Pierce sighed. “When I’m touching you like this,” he explained. “I feel normal. But when I do this,” he let go, bracing himself against the onslaught of emotion and pressure. “I don’t.”

He quickly gripped her hand again, focusing on the way she seemed to suck all the bad out of him, keeping him grounded and—

That was it, he realized. That was how it felt. Like she was grounding him, just like electricity.

“You don’t feel any angrier, or more stressed, or anything like that, when you take my hand?” he asked.

Mila frowned. “I mean, maybe a little, but that’s just because I don’t want to see anyone I know and have to explain who you are, stuff like that. And also you’re making me a little bit uncomfortable right now by not really explaining what the hell you’re talking about.”

“Okay, this is weird,” he said. “But when I take your hand, I literally feel my anger, my stress, anxiety, flowing down my arm and into your hand.” He shook his head, not understanding it all. “I felt it earlier when you put your hand on my arm. It just…evaporated.”

“You feel it leaving you?” she asked.

He nodded quickly. “I’m not making it up. It’s like it’s sucked from me wherever you touch me. The instant you let go,” he did so again, and it all came crashing back, “and it all manifests once more.” He gripped her hand again. “And now it’s leaving.”

Mila shook her head. “I don’t feel anything entering me,” she said.

“I don’t get it either,” he told her honestly. “It doesn’t really make sense. But it’s too abrupt and powerful for me to ignore either. It’s like you’re grounding me, just letting it all sink into the ground and dissipate.”

A smile teased the edge of her cheeks.

“You know,” Mila said. “This has to be one of the most elaborate setups I’ve ever encountered, just so someone could hold my hand.”

Pierce sputtered in denial. “That is not what I’m trying to do!” he insisted.

Mila shrugged. “Whatever you say. You’ve got your wish though,” she said, tightening her fingers around him as best she could despite the size difference. “So, let’s go.”

He shrugged helplessly and trailed along after her, resolutely ignoring the fact that he slightly resembled a puppy on a leash as she walked confidently down the sidewalk.

A two-thousand-pound puppy, perhaps.

So he walked next to her, hand in hand, eyes wide as he took in the city life humans had built for themselves. He was free of the crazed press of his bear, which was sleeping peacefully within him, content as long as he was in contact with Mila.

It made no sense at all, but Pierce knew two things. One, that he could never get out and survive looking for his brothers without her, not in the city itself. And two, that despite the fact they weren’t actively looking for his brothers, he knew that following Mila’s advice was the right thing to do. It was completely at odds with what he thought he should be doing, but that didn’t really seem to matter.

No wonder people say women are complicated.