PROLOGUE
SAMANTHA
Nine months ago, if a giant grizzly bear had meandered its way across my back field and into my barn just before midnight, my reaction then would probably have been a whole lot different than it is now.
For one, I wouldn’t have remained sitting on this old bench swing, with my boots propped atop the wooden railing on the back porch. I probably wouldn’t have run screaming into the house—or I like to think that I wouldn’t have—but I’d have made sure my feet were flat on the ground so that I could run.
Two, I’d have stopped dicking around with Animal Crossing on my phone and started taking a video. Because a bear coming up from the river and onto my farm would have made a hell of a story, but not a single person I know would have believed me without evidence. There are bears around in this part of Oregon. Black bears only, though. There sure aren’t any giant fucking grizzly bears.
Three, seeing the bear wouldn’t have started a hot little ache down low. Wouldn’t have made me bite my lip as I watched him. Wouldn’t have made me so damn aware of every inch of my skin.
At least, I don’t think so. After all, I’ve always thought Belle got a shitty deal when her animated Beast turned back into a prince. So, I don’t know. It’s hard to say how I’d have felt when a bear crossed my path—except that I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have been even a bit horny for him.
That was before the whole world went sideways, though. Before my sister and I went on a vacation into the Colorado mountains last winter, where a werewolf attacked Alicia under a full moon and infected her with the same curse. Before Travis Ranger showed up here in town, already in love with Alicia, and announced that Hey, I’m a werewolf, too, and I can help you control your beast. Then he tacked on a Here’s my brother, Brandon, who’s a berserker. Which is just a fancy term for a raging warrior in a grizzly bear suit.
Or, whenever Brandon feels like it—just a grizzly bear. One who’s more likely to roll around in a field of wildflowers and laze in the afternoon sun scratching his furry belly than bust into raging warrior mode.
Also more likely to irritate the hell out of me…then make me laugh until I cry.
Bear or not, Brandon’s a good friend to have.
Which is why I put away that tingly pussy nonsense before he comes out of the barn. Or I try to. Because he strips off his clothes in there before shapeshifting into a bear and ambling around. Then he puts them back on before coming into the house.
Except he doesn’t put them all on in the barn. Nuh-uh. Instead he strides out into the moonlight, six feet seven inches of solid, heavy flesh in nothing but a pair of low slung jeans and with his shirt dangling from his hand. Like he got distracted in the middle of putting clothes on and just walked out like that. Or he’s in a hurry, so he decided to finish dressing as he went.
But one thing I know about Brandon: he’s never in a hurry. So this whole show, with the Oops, I guess Samantha just got an eyeful of my massive hairy chest and shoulders broad enough to support a bulldozer, not to mention the happy trail that runs straight down to the bulge behind my zipper that suggests what’s behind there will grow into a damn hefty piece of equipment—it’s no mistake. Brandon wants me to see him.
Then he wants to get naked and nasty with me. If it wouldn’t mean saying bye-bye to our friendship, I’d want it, too.
A fuck just isn’t worth it, though. Even a really amazing fuck. So I do my best to put that tingly shit away.
Halfway across the back yard, Brandon finally drags his shirt on over his head. His brown hair is cut military-short even though he’s been out of the service for a few months. I’m not sure what he’s doing next. He’ll get around to figuring it out in his own sweet time, I guess. For now, he’s living here at the farmhouse with me—an arrangement that came about when Ranger came down from Alaska with Brandon tagging along…mostly to bug the fuck out of Ranger, he told me. But when they found Alicia suffering from her curse, Ranger promptly moved in. Since Brandon was here, we invited him to stay, too. And it worked out for everyone, because with Ranger and Brandon living with us, for the first time Alicia began to see herself as something other than a monster. Ranger and Brandon were just people. People who could pop out claws and teeth and superpowers, true—but experiencing everyday life with them showed Alicia that the beast inside her was nothing to fear.

I will love them both forever for giving that to her.
Of course, with Alicia no longer worried the beast inside her would murder everyone she loved, Ranger nailed her down quick. Their wedding was two weeks ago, and between moving her stuff, sprucing up the farmhouse and yard so we could hold the ceremony here, my mom and stepdad flying in to help and staying here after for a short vacation—along with Ranger’s family, who were also in town and visiting the farmhouse all the time—it’s only in the past day or two that things have settled down.
So now it’s just Brandon and me. Until he goes.
But I’m not in a hurry to see him gone. I’ve got other friends, people who I’ve known for longer than I’ve known Brandon, but none that I’ve clicked with so fast and so hard. I don’t want to give that up.
Lucky for me, he also doesn’t seem in a hurry to leave.
For a big man, he’s quiet on his bare feet. He hardly makes a sound coming up the porch steps, his gaze running over me and settling on the beer bottle I’m holding casually against my upper thigh.
He waggles his brows. “Someone’s happy to see me.”
“Beer dicks aren’t exactly picky,” I say dryly. “And even if they were, it doesn’t take a whole lot to make me happy. Just this morning, I got excited when a bendy straw came with my iced coffee.”
“Aw heck, Sergeant Sam,” he says in his deep and rumbling voice, and with a grin that shows all his teeth. “I can give you a—”
“Nope.” I cut him off and point my bottle dick at him. “You’re going to say that your straw is only bendy when you’re not excited, or that you can give me something to suck on. Just keep those lips zippered up.”
“As long as I can unzip—”
“Nope.”
An exasperated breath gusts out of him and he drops into the oversize recliner that we dragged out here after I’d noped him for another comment, and he’d replied that the only reason I always knew what he intended to say is because my mind is as filthy as his.
Which, okay.
True.
But then he’d done the same heavy flop onto this bench swing and snapped the chains, tipping both our asses into a tangled heap on the porch.
I’d laughed until my sides hurt. Then he’d fixed the swing.
That was the day I knew we could only be friends, because I never wanted to lose him.
“I’ll try to keep it zipped,” he tells me, reaching over and snagging my beer. “Even though it’ll be very, very…hard.”
I glare at him but let it go. Mostly because I’m internally snickering too much to tell him nope again.
He sniffs my beer, then hands it back without taking a drink.
“Not up to your lofty ursine standards?” I ask.
“It’s honey mead or nothing for me.”
“Really?” Alcohol doesn’t have an effect on werewolves or berserkers, so I’ve never seen him drink any at all. Now I’m wondering if I should stock some. “Where do you even find honey mead?”
His feet go up next to mine on the railing. Huge feet. “Renaissance faires, maybe.”
“Maybe?” I’m still distracted by the size of his feet next to my boots.
“Or Viking halls.” He scratches his belly. “What day is today?”
“August nineteenth.”
“But what day?”
“Wednesday.”

“You usually work Wednesday nights. Did your shift change?”
I shake my head. “I always take August nineteenth off.”
“Oh?” His gaze is on me. I can feel it, though I’m looking out over the yard. No, I’m looking further than that—about twenty years into the past. “What’s today?”
“My dad’s birthday.”
“Ah.” That soft reply is all he makes.
I’m not going to spill my guts. I’m not. Maybe he already knows, though. “Did Alicia ever tell you what happened?”
“Only that he died. Not how or when.”
“I was eight. And he was with the sheriff’s department, too. Same job as me, though higher up the chain by then. He pulled over a vehicle on a routine traffic stop, got sideswiped by an asshole in a semi.” I purse my lips. “He’s one of the reasons there’s that law now about slowing down or changing lanes while passing emergency vehicles.”
“I have no fucking idea what to say. Except that I’m sorry he was taken from you. From your family.”
Not much else to say. I nod and bottoms-up my beer.
He’s still watching me. “Is this the first year your mom and Alicia are both living somewhere else?”
“Yep.” My mom’s in Florida with her new husband, and my sister is in town with Ranger. “But I had dinner with Alicia. And talked to Mom.”
“That’s good.”
“Yeah.” Just so I don’t have to look at him while I’m a bit wobbly on the inside, I concentrate on picking at the edge of the beer label. My nails are short. With Alicia’s claws, I could probably just peel the fucker right off. Or Ranger’s claws. Or Brandon’s. “Would it hurt you at all—getting hit by a truck?”

“Not much.” His foot nudges my boot. “Are worried that you’ll be hit while on patrol?”
“Not specifically. I mean, not obsessing about it or anything. Though of course there’s a whole lot of shit that could happen while I’m on duty.”
“A whole lot of shit can happen to any human.”
“True.” I sigh and finally glance over at him. Whether it’s the bear or the moonlight, I don’t know, but at times his dark brown eyes take on an amber glow, like a flashlight shining through a jar of honey. Alicia’s shine bright green when she’s emotional or when her beast comes out to play. “I was just thinking there are benefits to being a superhero.”
“Then ask my brother to bite you.”
That surprises a laugh from me. “Yeah, no thanks. That”—I point to the nearly full moon overhead—“is why it would be a really bad idea. I saw what happened to Alicia while she was cursed.”
When she had no control over her transformation into a werewolf, which was utterly fucking horrifying. Bones splitting, flesh ripping—and Alicia screaming in agony. I’ll never forget that, or what happened after. She never had any memory of what she did the nights of the full moon. Sometimes she’d run hundreds of miles and wake up naked and covered in blood…and I was the one who tracked her and came after her. Who found her in the morning and tried to help her through her terror and despair. But there was no way of helping her, not really.
Not until Ranger showed up and helped her tame the beast inside herself. But that’s the thing. There’s only one way to break that curse: to love someone—and be loved and accepted in return. Completely accepted, for everything you are.
Yeah, so. Obviously not an option for me.
But I’d rather not dwell on how quick every guy I’ve been with has run away. “Besides, I’d rather be a happy, rolly bear. It’s too bad berserkers are only born.”
A familiar glint shines in his eyes. “I—”
“Nope.”
Not sure if that was going to be an offer to try biting me all over to see if something would happen, or an offer to show me how baby berserkers are made. Either way, the answer has to be the same.
He just grins, and my stomach does a hot little flip. It’s stupid how much I like his face. His brother is all raw, jagged intensity—and maybe that’s the werewolf in Ranger, I don’t know. Because his and Brandon’s features aren’t much different, bold and rugged, with heavy brows and dark eyes. Side by side, there’s no question that they’re brothers. But Brandon doesn’t have so many sharp edges.
At least, no sharp edges that I’ve seen. But there must be some. I doubt he spent his time in the military baking cakes and picking flowers.
And like a werewolf, bears have a curse of sorts, too. It just isn’t controlled by a full moon. “Have you ever gone berserk?”
“I have,” he says in that easy, rumbling way of his. Then doesn’t say anything else until a few seconds later, when he asks, “You all right with me staying here now that your folks and Alicia are gone?”
“Of course I’m all right with it.” I don’t mistake the deliberate change of subject. So he doesn’t want to talk about any time he went berserk. Fair enough. A raging warrior isn’t likely to hulk out when everything around him is all sunshine and roses. Probably pain and blood, instead.
“I don’t see how ‘of course’ comes in.”
“You’re a friend. And family, now. Plus you don’t leave your shit everywhere and I haven’t had to mow the lawn or cook a meal since you moved in. So, yeah. I’m good with you staying here.”
“But we should talk about rent—”
“Nope.” The house has been paid off for years, and I make more than enough to cover insurance and taxes. “No mortgage, no need.”
“Then I’ll pay the utilit— Nope,” he stops me before I can stop him, the expression on his face one I’m not used to seeing. Hard as stone, deadly serious. “I will go live in the motherfucking woods before I take advantage of a friend or family. I’ve got plenty of money saved up. I barely had any expenses while the Army was shuttling me around. So you will let me share the costs here.”
“All right.”
He blinks. “That was easy.”
“Well, I figured that I was doing you a favor, knowing how much your grocery bill must be.” Because I know how much Alicia’s was after she was cursed, and Brandon’s must triple hers. At least. “But if you’re so loaded that you can pay for both food and electricity, then by all means.”
“All right. Good.” His easygoing expression returns. “And if I run out of groceries in the fridge, I can always eat—”