Planet Bear Read online

  Finn shouted something back, and then he rocked me in his arms. After I stopped trying to get away, it was sort of soothing.

  Rylan came to the side of us and put his hand on my cheek. Were there tears in his eyes? There shouldn’t be. They didn’t cry in my dreams. They were free. Running as bears. No more nonsense.

  No more war.

  Then Cole was back, still holding that injection. I closed my eyes. I was through fighting the inevitable. Okay, he was going to hurt me. There was going to be a pounding right in my arm. But he was gentle. It pinched, and then it was over. A coolness passed through my arm. Whatever he put in me didn’t hurt like the way the abusive drugs did.

  I wasn’t out cold. It didn’t knock me on my rear. More like. . .I crawled against Finn. Letting him hold me closer. Cole touched my ear, and it didn’t hurt. That was weird. Anytime anyone came anywhere near it, I hollered in pain. He shined a light in it, and I could hear his voice as he spoke to Finn and Rylan. I couldn’t understand him, but that close to my ear, I could hear him.

  This was starting to feel very real.

  “Dreams shouldn’t be this real. That makes them harder to leave.”

  Rylan stroked the top of my head. To make matters even stranger, my brother came through the door.

  “What’s the prognosis?” I could understand him just fine.

  I sat up a little, and Cole put his hand on me to stop me. He answered Cal, but I couldn’t understand him.

  “Okay, then. See you in a bit, Jess. Love you.”

  Love me? He didn’t love me. No one loved me.

  All three of my mates spoke. Maybe I’d said that last part aloud.

  “Can you understand me and hear me?” Cole brushed my hair off my forehead. I sweated badly. It was hot in here. Or maybe it was just the furnace that was Finn holding me.

  “I can.” I squirmed, and Finn let me up just a little. He still had his arm around me. “How is this happening?”

  Rylan scooted over from where he’d been leaning by the wall. “Fuck, yes.”

  I rubbed at my eyes. “I don’t understand.”

  Cole grinned at me for a second before his head fell down like his neck couldn’t support the weight. He took a deep breath and lifted it. “Your translator was damaged. No one fixed it. A side effect of a damaged translator left in the ear is that it makes the person hard of hearing. Worse and worse. I simply had to change it out. Not a big deal. I’m sorry they didn’t do it for you. They were all of them butchers and. . .” He didn’t finish whatever he was going to say. He rubbed his eyes.

  They’d all lost weight since I last saw them, and I had a million questions.

  “How is this possible?”

  Rylan sat down on the edge of the table. “After we found out you weren’t dead, we tracked down McDermott. You’d been gone three days. He’s not breathing air anymore. Neither are any of the Derbys.”

  I swallowed that information and found it didn’t bother me at all. “Okay.” I pointed to my ear. “Their leader is the one who hurt me with the translator.”

  Finn snarled. “I wish I could kill him again.”

  “We got ahold of our cousin, and he came and got us. We were on our way to Earth, working out a plan on how to get to you, not even knowing where you were, when we got a message from your brother. Well, he found us. Turned out he knew our cousin. Nefarious personalities run in crowds.” Rylan smiled at the memory. “He knew where you were. Was planning on getting you and wanted to know if we wanted in. He knew who we were, thanks to our cousin.”

  This all made sense. I hadn’t hallucinated seeing Cal. “I. . .I never thought.” I choked on a sob and then tugged it back in. They all made varying degrees of growls and whimpers. “I thought that was that. I’d never see you again.”

  Finn sucked in a long breath. “We failed you.” He hit the ground on his knees, his head lowered. “We can’t make it right. There isn’t fixing this. There is only what can come next. Do you want a future with us? We cannot live in the world if you aren’t okay, but if we know you are okay, we will leave you alone. If that is what you wish.”

  Is that what I wished? “I have wanted nothing but you for. . .” I didn’t know how long it had been. “How long since we saw each other?”

  Cole sighed. “A year and one day. We were hoping to get you yesterday, but things aren’t moving as fast as we keep trying to make them. We’re a bit of a slow moving cog.”

  “Why?” My ears were working, and suddenly the sound of the ship we flew on overwhelmed my senses. It had been such a long time since I’d been in space, and I used to spend almost every waking moment there. My trip to the asylum didn’t matter. I’d been knocked out for most of it. This was a large ship. This was. . .

  “Are we on a freighter? Why is this ship so big?”

  Rylan put out his hand. “Before we left, Finn gave the people a choice. They could stay where they were and live a completely isolationist life, potentially never finding their mates or they could come with us. It would be a long time until we found a new home, but they could come.”

  Finn got to his feet, hugging me to him. I could hear his heartbeat. Both of those facts—his heartbeat being near me and that I could hear it—were large miracles.

  “I thought maybe Mark would show up with his mate and brothers. We had a larger group than we initially thought. Hence the large ship. There are actually four ships.”

  Goosebumps broke out on my arms, and I rubbed them away. “That’s huge. You guys don’t like to leave home, mostly. Where are we going?”

  “We’ve been focused on getting to you. But your brother helped some of the others find a planet he knew about. Terraformed fifty years ago. Apparently, there are all kinds of people there. Shifters, and others who prefer to simply be left alone. We’re going to go there now.”

  My planet on the edge of the universe. Yes, sure, Cal knew about it. I’d talked about it a million times. That’s where I was supposed to be going when I got him out of jail.

  I nodded. “You had to change your entire planet to be with me. I don’t know if I can ever live up to expectations.”

  Rylan kissed my hand. “No expectations. Just you. Just us. We’re not even going to try to lead once we’re there. We’re just going to be. Just family.”

  Tears streamed from my eyes. “And can we have a house where the chairs are too big? And the bed is too big? And the fridge has some items I can’t identify in it?”

  “Maybe we can make some of that furniture just right.” Rylan put his nose on my neck, like he breathed me in. Cole kissed my cheek while Finn pressed our foreheads together. That was just what I needed. So we stayed like that. For a very long time.

  One year later

  I watched in amusement as the third bear shifter of the morning arrived to ask my mates for advice. Their idea about not leading had been ridiculous. Everyone wanted to know what they thought all the time about all sorts of matters.

  This one had to do with the distribution of crops. I wasn’t sure that Cole exactly knew that, but he was answering just the same.

  I put my hand on my stomach to feel the baby move. We only took up such a small portion of the planet, not wanting to cause issues with our neighbors. Rylan estimated it was maybe an eighth of the place. But with all the babies that were going to be born in the next year, that was bound to increase a bit.

  Finn walked over and sat down next to me on our big bench. It had sort of become a joke. We made everything just slightly too big for me. Rylan arrived a second later. They’d seen me watch the suns set on this planet every day since we got here like it was my job.

  “There’s been something I’ve wanted to ask you guys since day one.”

  Cole ran over and sat on the edge of the bench. “Go. I’m here. Ask.”

  Rylan rolled his eyes. “I bet we could have answered it without you.”

  “Yes, I’m sure, but not as well as I’m going to answer it.”

  Finn nudged me. “Ask. T
hey’ll do it all night.”

  “Why did the wolves shoot at me that day? Why did they do that when I wasn’t off the set path?”

  Finn shrugged. “Who knows with wolves? They’re such miserable creatures. Not like the bear. The loyal, understandable, trustworthy bear.”

  I held back my laugh. He might sound like he was kidding, but he wasn’t. If I laughed, he’d try to prove his point, and then we’d be talking about bears for the rest of the night.

  Cole nodded. “Never could trust a wolf.”

  Rylan drummed his hand on the bench. “Besides, if they hadn’t done that, you’d never have fallen from the sky and into my lap.”

  Every time he talked about my crash landing, he added something to it to make the whole thing sound much more romantic than it was.

  “That poor ship Goldie. She got me down safely.”

  Finn played with a stand of my golden hair. “We can tell the kids stories about her someday. That’s what life is, right? A retelling of beautiful stories over and over? I can’t think of any I like more than the time Jessica arrived on Planet Bear.”

  I wasn’t getting away without hearing about bears tonight. I leaned back on my bench and watched the orange redness of the sky. Finn started talking. Cole would be next. Rylan would finish. I was Jessica, and these were my three bears.

  * * *

  THE END

  Also by Rebecca Royce

  Wings of Artemis

  Kidnapped By Her Husbands

  Rescued by Their Wife

  Crashing Into Destiny

  Meeting Them

  Reclaiming Their Love

  Loving Them

  Ship Called Malice (found in the Married. Wait! What? Anthology)

  Saving Them (October 2017)

  Dark Demise (coming soon)

  * * *

  Last Hope

  Tradition Be Damned

  Past Be Damned

  Destiny Be Damned (September 2017)

  Compassion Be Damned (coming soon)

  * * *

  Dragon Wars

  Forever

  Eternal

  Always

  Evermore

  Endless (coming November 2017)

  * * *

  Wards and Wands

  Hexed and Vexed (December 2017)

  Curse Reversed (coming soon)

  * * *

  Safe Haven

  Everywhere and Nowhere

  More coming soon….

  * * *

  Soul Bound

  Prisoner of the Dragons

  More coming soon….

  * * *

  Shadow Promised

  Strange Days

  Weird Nights

  Bizarre Years

  More coming soon…

  * * *

  The Warrior

  Initiation

  Driven

  Subversive

  Redemption

  Justice

  * * *

  Warrior World

  Deacon

  Micah (coming soon)

  * * *

  The Westervelt Wolves

  Her Wolf

  Summer’s Wolf

  Wolf Reborn

  Wolf’s Valentine

  Wolf’s Magic

  Alpha Wolf

  Angel’s Wolf

  Darkest Wolf

  Lone Wolf

  * * *

  Fallen Alpha

  Alpha Rising

  Alpha’s Strength

  Alpha’s Sacrifice

  Alpha’s Truth

  Alpha Enticing

  Hidden Alpha (coming soon)

  * * *

  The Capes

  Seductive Powers

  Adrenaline Rush

  Last Ascension

  * * *

  The Conditioned

  Eye Contact

  Embraced

  More coming soon…

  * * *

  The Outsiders

  Love Beyond Time

  Love Beyond Sanity

  Love Beyond Loyalty

  Love Beyond Sight

  Love Beyond Expectations

  Love Beyond Oceans

  Love Beyond Flames

  Love Beyond Lies (coming soon)

  * * *

  Cascade

  Haunted Redemption

  Phoenix Everlasting

  Fragility Unearthed

  Persuasion Enraptured

  * * *

  Under The Lights

  No Quitting Allowed

  Mr. Wrong

  Bite Marks

  Bitten Surrender

  The Vampire and The Virgin

  Demon Within

  About the Author

  As a teenager, I would hide in my room to read my favorite romance novels when I was supposed to be doing my homework. I hope, these days, that my parents think it was worth it.

  I am the mother of three adorable boys and I am fortunate to be married to my best friend. I live in Austin Texas where I am determined to eat all the barbecue in town.

  I am in love with science fiction, fantasy, and the paranormal and try to use all of these elements in my writing. I've been told I'm a little bloodthirsty so I hope that when you read my work you'll enjoy the action packed ride that always ends in romance. I love to write series because I love to see characters develop over time and it always makes me happy to see my favorite characters make guest appearances in other books.

  In my world anything is possible, anything can happen, and you should suspect that it will.

  * * *

  Follow Rebecca on Social Media

  www.rebeccaroyce.com

  www.twitter.com/rebeccaroyce

  https://www.facebook.com/authorrebeccaroyce/?fref=ts

  Note From the Publisher

  Thank you for reading the Planet Bear. If you liked the stories, please leave a review. Reviews help the authors more than you know.

  If you’d like to know more about After Glows, check out our website or email us at [email protected].

  To stay current with upcoming titles, new releases, and other publishing news from After Glows subscribe to our MAILING LIST.

  Also, join our Facebook Reader’s Group to interact with our authors and other readers.

  Thank you again for purchasing and reading Planet Bear.