Page 9 of Taming Her Bears

It took a little longer to thaw toward Captain Josh. He was an authority figure, and I didn’t have a lot of patience for authority figures right now. I had been trying for months to push an investigation into the girls that were disappearing along the coast, but had been dismissed by the leading authorities every time. That the Coast Guard hadn’t even been alerted only proved my point—it didn’t make me any less angry. His recovery efforts, though, had been amazing. Because of him, I was in a lean-to made of branches. I had slept well. There was a Bunsen burner in front of me and warm food in my stomach.

Captain Josh gave us twenty minutes to digest the food, then said, “Break camp”. We dismantled the branches and picked up the evidence of our overnight stay. It warmed up enough during the day for the snow to turn back to rain, but it was still icy cold and clung to the skin. It was difficult to walk. After several miles, I began to feel numb. I wasn’t dressed for this much exposure. All I was wearing were my boots, jeans, and a light jacket over a knitted top. None of it was rain gear. I didn’t even have a hat. The tarp I had used during the night was needed for sheltering the salvage from the chopper.

I trudged along, growing colder and less energized with each mile. I wanted to lie down. I wanted to curl up and sleep for just a little while. I wanted to be carried back into the dream of luxurious furs. I sank to my knees and refused to get up, no matter how much they shouted. Sleep was good. Sleep eased the pain.

I felt myself being picked up and placed on something warm. The luxurious furs. I embraced them, burying my arms deep into them. I slept on my stomach, my arms and legs wrapped around a rippling body of fur, my cheek resting against the velvety softness. When I woke, I was in a dark, dusty cabin that was just beginning to heat up from the fire in the wood burner. I was covered with a couple of well-worn army blankets, but no furs.

“You should have spoken up sooner,” said Darkhorse. “You were suffering hypothermia.”

I tried to orient myself and make sense of why there were only the two of us. “What’s going on, Darkhorse?”

He looked at me in surprise. “Oh. Well, Roy and Lee are fishing, and Josh is chopping firewood. The owner left a nice crib, but he’s been gone for a while. Several months, I would say; probably won’t be back until spring. I found some dry cereal, if you want some, and popcorn. No butter, but there’s salt.”

“No, I don’t mean that. You came here with no weapons. None. Not even a blade. Some of the branches the boys brought back for the lean-to were four inches thick. How did they snap them like that? How do you catch your fish? Why is it that every time I fall asleep, I feel like I’m being covered by a fur rug? And most curious of all, Darkhorse—why, when I first saw you, were your clothes rolled up in your wetsuit? Why weren’t you wearing them under your wetsuit? You were naked!”

“Yes, I was, wasn’t I? That was inconvenient.”

“I apologize for hitting you.”

“No, don’t. You can’t hurt my skull. It’s too thick.”

“So, what are you? A secret military experiment for a perfect soldier?”

“No experiment. I’ve always been this way.”

“What way is that?”

He knocked some sand off the drying radio receiver and wiped at it with a cloth. “You’ll have to ask Josh.”

I didn’t want to ask Captain Josh. I wanted my answer now, but I waited. I fumed and waited, stalking up to the window and peering out at the darkening sky and bleakly falling rain. I could have sworn that instead of two men fishing by the dock, I saw two bears. I shook my head and strained to see if I could find the captain by the wood pile. I made out a flickering shadow, which satisfied me, so I turned back to the pier. Lee and Roy were walking back to the house, a string of fish in each hand.

Suddenly, I didn’t really want to know what they were.

The boys started the fish frying and boiled some rice they had found in the cupboard to go with it. Captain Josh brought in a load of firewood that would keep us warm all evening. The disturbing thoughts of what they could be gave way to the more pleasant aspects of who they were to me.

Rummaging around in the cupboards, Darkhorse had found several bottles of homemade cranberry wine—a thick, sweet alcohol that will knock the antlers off a moose. By the time we had gotten through the second bottle, we were all feeling a bit loopy. It seemed very funny to me, all of a sudden, that I was literally on a deserted island with four of the biggest heartthrobs a girl could imagine, posturing and pumping themselves up in front of me. Josh and Darkhorse were strutting around, shoulders back, heads held high, flexing their very impressive muscles. Lee kept breathing into his hands and smoothing back his hair.

I leaned against Roy, the quietest and the most markedly different of the four. Instead of strutting around the cabin, he was sitting next to me on the bed, playing around with a Japanese puzzle box. There were several lined up on a shelf, along with a few hand-whittled objects. The cabin owner clearly liked to keep his hands busy.

So did Roy. I leaned a little harder. He dropped his head to his chest and pushed at the puzzle pieces more intently. I grabbed his shirt just under the collar and breathed in his musky scent. It was sensory overload. My wine-addled brain burst with the full flavor of lust.

“What did the Viking say to the state trooper when he was being arrested?” I asked him, my voice slurring.

He shook his head. I tickled him under the chin, breathing the words huskily. “Nothing. He was too drunk to notice.” I laughed wildly as though I had made a terrific joke, and cocked one eye, trying to correct my double-vision. His expression could have been interpreted as alarm or intrigue. It made me feel wonderfully naughty, as though I was seducing a virgin.

“Now,” I continued breathing in his ear. “If I had been that state trooper arresting a Viking, I would make sure he noticed.” I pulled off my sweater top and gave him a big smile. “Don’t you think he would notice?”

“I think he would notice,” Roy mumbled. He dropped his puzzle to pull me into the contour of his arm. He began nuzzling my neck while his hand slid under my bra, his fingers finding the nerve endings of a nipple.

I sighed with pleasure and turned my head to look at Lee. “You, too, Lee. I think you’re cute, too. Come over and kiss me.”

He snuggled close on the other side, his hand unsnapping my bra, liberating my breasts for them all to see. Roy continued playing with them, holding one up to kiss its pulsing pink tip. I felt my breasts swelling, the nipples standing to full attention. “All of you. All of you. All my gorgeous men,” I moaned.

I didn’t know what had gotten into me. I wanted them all. I was hungry and couldn’t be satisfied until I had touched and kissed and held each of them. It was as though I had been starved for love and now couldn’t get enough of it. It didn’t make sense. There was always someone available, but someone wasn’t the same as getting off like a rocket launcher.

There was Josh, his short-cropped hair tending to curl slightly, the ocean weather already etching lines at the sides of his eyes. Even under our strange conditions, he commanded respect. He was a leader, yet around a woman, he had the sweetness of a St. Bernard puppy. He was sitting on the floor, leaning against the bed, his hand crawling deliciously between my legs. I sucked in my stomach and unzipped my pants. Grasping on both sides, he pulled them down, kissing each inch of newly exposed flesh until he came to the short-haired, golden triangle. Combing through it gently, he brushed the hair away from the opening and slipped his tongue inside. I tightened my hands into fists and felt him hold them down while he licked me.

Meanwhile, Darkhorse had finished pulling my pants away, leaving me completely naked. As soon as I had been completely stripped, they all stopped a moment to look. The sensation of having four men gaze at me in the middle of erotic foreplay made me hotter than a fire engine. I squirmed in protest and they went back to the serious business of kissing me on the face and neck, fondling my breasts and running their hands down the insides of my arms, my sides, and curving around to cup my buttocks. They left my legs free.

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