Page 33 of Goldie and Her Bears (Dirty Paranormal Fairytale Haremlan 3)

Kai opened his mouth to argue. Before he spoke a syllable, I shook my head and turned around, leaving the room before I destroyed what was left of it. Kai was too stubborn for his own good and he was his own worst enemy. If he only learned to lay down his silly prejudices, he might actually find a glimmer of happiness.

Hell needed to freeze over before anything close would happen.

I wasn’t about to sink to his level. It would make me no better than he was. Instead of staying longer and risking another fight. I left. I had said what I had to say. Now I just needed to go and smooth things over with Cassie.

I had a sinking suspicion it was going to be the hardest thing to do in my life.

15

CASSIE

I had been sitting out on the swing for so long that I wondered if I was starting to turn into a human popsicle. The evening was a damp and cold one, and as the minutes continued to tick by, I worried I was going to be stuck outside for the rest of the night. Not that I was completely opposed to that. There was no way in hell I was going back inside the cabin until the all-clear was given.

Despite the music of nature erupting around me, I still heard growling and roars from within the cabin. The terrifying sounds had carried over the soft pattering of rain. I could only imagine the damage they were still doing to the cabin.

After another ten minutes or so, the growls and loud thuds had stopped. I was incredibly thankful that they had.

The only problem was, now there were only voices. Human voices. The men were arguing. I didn’t want to know how or what Jasper did to make the fight stop, but I was also secretly relieved. Though I couldn’t tell exactly what they were saying, thanks to the words being muffled by the rain and the walls within the cabin, I had a sinking suspicion they were minutes from getting into another brawl.

I hoped not. I was no longer in the midst of the war between beasts, and I definitely didn’t want to be thrown back into the middle of it. Though I still couldn’t wrap my head around what they were. Everything that happened started to seem like a dream. A strange figment of my imagination. Perhaps, it was all a hallucination.

In the end, it didn’t matter how I spun it. It happened. And I wasn’t sure if I would ever be the same.

Twenty minutes later, I was back to wondering when it would be safe to go back in. I wrestled with whether or not to hobble myself into the living room at the very least, so I warm up when Jasper rejoined me on the porch. He carried another blanket with him and held out a cup of hot chocolate toward me.

I smiled politely. “You sure know the way to my heart.”

My comment fell short of being genuine. If Jasper heard anything in my voice, he didn’t call me out on it. I had no idea how he dealt with Chase and Kai being what they were, and I wasn’t about to ask either.

“You seemed to enjoy it quite a bit the last time, so I figured this was the perfect way to start making up for what you went through,” he said.

I took a sip and then held the cup in my hands, allowing the heat from the ceramic mug to bleed into my skin and warm me. But the kindness of the moment wore off as I found myself replaying everything all over again. I frowned.

“Thank you for the hot chocolate,” I said, trying desperately for my brain to focus on something else. Whether it was by his mention of it or not, I couldn’t seem to find a way from the whole terrifying event altogether. At least for longer than five minutes.

Jasper took a seat next to me and then unfolded the blanket, draping it over my lap. “You’re welcome. I am so sorry for Kai’s behavior.”

“Don’t you dare,” I snapped at him, setting my glare on his charming, beautiful face.

He pulled back almost as though I had slapped him and stared at me with wide eyes.

“You will not apologize for that… that… thing.” I started to shake as tears filled my eyes. I was still having a hard time reconciling everything I had witnessed. I wanted it to all be in my head. At least insanity seemed like a far better thing to deal with than Chase and Kai turning into bears. I clutched the mug tighter.

Jasper stiffened next to me and fell completely silent, except for the occasional sniffs. After several moments of trying to figure out why he was reacting like that, it occurred to me that he might be just like them. A monster. A thing that shouldn’t exist. Not in real life.

“You’re not one of them too… are you?” I asked and carefully studied his reaction.

He frowned. His jaws clenched and his breathing turned heavy.

I sucked in a shocked breath as fear once again filled me. I wanted to run away and put as much distance from this place as I possibly could. I wanted nothing more to do with this cabin or the monsters within it, but here I was… still trapped. Because my leg was still useless.

I considered I had died and gone to hell. But that was just wishful thinking.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” I finally said, barely above a whisper.

I slid myself as close to the end of the swing, as far away as I could get from him, as I could. I stared at him in shock. Then I recalled I had sex with him. A monster. Tears blurred my vision as he continued to sit there and not say a damned thing in his defense.

I didn’t understand what was going on. When did I leave reality? Did I die in the woods when I was caught by the bear trap? Was this what hell was like? Was I really damned?

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