Julie shrugged. “I didn’t do anything. I just talked to her.” Then she quieted before looking oddly at him. “I listened.”
“And she sang?”
“Yeah. I could tell that she wanted me to get comfortable with the whole bear thing. And I wanted to know the real her. So…” She gestured at an empty glass. “I made her margarita triple strength, dared her to drink it, and then started sharing stuff about my childhood.”
He blinked. “Like what?”
“Doesn’t matter. Embarrassing stuff. She had to reciprocate, so she sang.”
Of course she did. Just like Mark had sung as well. Not literally, but certainly he’d spilled his guts to Julie more than he had to anyone else. They’d reconnected barely more than twenty-four hours ago, and yet by this morning, he’d confessed so much about his feelings for her. About his adolescent needs and the way their one night as teenagers still haunted him. He’d told her all that simply because she’d listened. And because she was Julie.
And while he mulled over that, Julie held up her phone with a grin.
“Plus, I never told her I was recording it.”
Holy shit! “She’ll probably shoot your phone when she finds out.”
Julie grinned. “I won’t tell. I like to keep my blackmail material secret until I really need it.”
“Very wise,” he said. Then he fell silent, as did she.
Ticks of the clock grew louder as he looked at her. Just this morning, so many things had felt possible. Now, he was stuck across the room from her, trying to figure out what he was supposed to do.
And while he dithered, Julie exhaled loudly, folded her arms across her chest, and pinned him with a heavy glare.
“So now that you’ve effectively killed my buzz, I figure it’s time I kill yours.”
Oh, shit. “Um, what?”
“You’re going to tell me exactly what those things were this morning and what the hell they want with my father.”
Oh, goody. Because it wasn’t enough that she got introduced to the shifter world today. Now she insisted on finding out that there were honest-to-goodness sicko bastards in the magical realm, too.
CHAPTER 12
Julie watched Mark settle back in her father’s recliner, looking like a man facing a firing squad.
“I don’t know what they are or why they attacked,” he said. “We have guesses, but nothing for certain.”
“And they are?”
He huffed out a breath. “Complicated.”
She matched him with her own heavy exhale. Julie had one goal this evening: to get answers. At least that’s what her tequila-sloshed brain told her. Sadly, that goal seemed to be at odds with what her body wanted.
Her body was all about noticing that Mark had shaved and changed, which made him look kind of dashing. Especially since he’d put on dark jeans and a plain black tee that hugged every ripped inch of him. No tats. Clean nails. And eyes that looked straight at her even as he seemed to be apologizing without even opening his mouth.
Weird. What did he have to be sorry for? Saving her life? Giving her great head? Or maybe it was that other part. The part about being a freaking bear. And since she’d just consumed enough tequila to wash away the filter between her brain and her mouth, questions just spilled out.
“Are you ashamed of being a bear?”
“Grizzly,” he corrected. “And no shame.”
She narrowed her eyes, trying to gauge if he lied. Men were notoriously clueless about their own emotions, but there seemed to be no half measure in his answer. And when she looked at him—evenly shaved and neatly dressed—she could sense the animal just below the surface. It was in the way he moved, she thought, or didn’t move. Right now, he sat with an animal stillness, a wary patience broken only by the occasional twitch of his nose. And when he moved, it was smooth and substantial. She’d assumed it was because he was a large man, but now she saw it as more. He carried the bear’s weight even as a man. The sheer power of a large predator, raw and untamed.
“Are you ashamed?” he asked.
She frowned. “Ashamed? Of what?”
