Page 43 of Having the Bear's Baby

The two men with their size fifteen shoes pressed against Liam’s calves chuckled as Liam shook around, his jaw looking like a steel pipe running through it. Emma decided to take the lead, wanting Liam to get his anger in check before it cost them their lives.

“What the fuck do you want?” she bellowed.

The man raised a finger to his lips and shook it back and forth. Looking at him under the pale light of the moon pouring in through the window, Emma could see that he was a big man … not as big and broad as Liam, but thick in ways you rarely find in humans. She knew then that he was an alpha, the same one that had threatened her.

“You’ve got to teach your mate to hush up when the men are talking,” he said, rolling his eyes. “I was just getting to the good part, love.”

Liam let out a roar that reverberated through the entire cabin, making the floor beneath them shake. The window trembled as well like an earthquake had passed through.

The man cackled again, slapping his knees, and moving in closer. Emma leaned backward against the stone of the fireplace while Liam forced himself in front of her. From her peripheral vision, she could see that his teeth were bared.

Her man was an atomic bomb ready to go off, and there was nothing she could do about it.

“Fucking hell, she really is your mate, isn’t she?” The man snarled and crouched down before them. “Well, we can’t have any of that. Your clan is already too strong as it is, and by having a mate and a child, you will be Superman. So we’re here to take care of that.”

What happened next all moved in slow motion from Emma’s perspective. The man, ugly in his ill intentions, reached behind his back to slip a long, silver hunting knife from the sheath. The chrome glittered under the moonlight with ominous, dark beauty. The man slithered his tongue between his pink lips, pointing the blunted end of the knife at Emma while muttering.

“Now, let’s start with that infant…”

Detonation.

Liam’s body began to swell all at once. The first spot Emma saw was his calves and thighs, where the enforcers had him pinned. Fur the same shade as Liam’s sandy-brown locks exploded out in an instant. The cables binding his hands and feet snapped simultaneously. His jaw elongated with crackling bones. A roar that dwarfed the first came out, and thunderous wouldn’t even begin to describe it.

The unknown alpha had literally poked the bear and would suffer for it. He trifled with the most primal part of his heart and soul, one that vehemently protected the life and well-being of his mate and offspring.

Emma found herself entranced by the heroism and violence that ensued. Her alpha, her mate, her man, shot up three feet in height. The enforcers barely had time to think about their fates before their heads were sliced clean off their shoulders by his claws, landing on the cabin floor with a visceral and wet thump.

Liam was in prime form. Emma watched in awe as the enemy alpha tumbled backward in fright, the knife falling from his hands and bouncing roughly toward the fireplace where she sat. Terror painted his glare as he sprinted from the cabin, his clothes tearing off his body as he shifted into his own animal form.

Liam landed on all fours, grunting. When he turned to face Emma, her heart leapt into her throat, not out of fear but by the sheer majesty of his size and power.

“I’m okay,” Emma breathed.

Liam noticed the hunting knife that had fallen to the floor, then slid it across the floor in Emma’s direction with his paw. He lifted his head up and down, asking her without words if she could set herself free.

Emma smiled, the absurdity of it all fueling her survival instinct. She nodded and shuffled her body toward the knife, positioning her wrists just above the blade to cut through safely and efficiently.

“I got this, Liam. Go get that bastard.”

She knew it must be a mate thing to know what your person was thinking without the presence of language. Or maybe it was just a love thing. It brightened her, even in the scariest of moments.

A cascade of howls brought both of their attention back to the battle at hand. Emma’s heart thumped hard in her chest with anticipation.

“Go. I’ll be fine, Liam, go!” she implored.

He hesitated for a moment, then turned away, galloping out the front door in a sprint. Emma crooked her neck at a weird angle as she slid her wrists up and down, the sight of the knife barely visible from the position she was sitting in.

“Come on, come on,” she muttered.

She was going on trust and the rush of dread at that point. She wasn’t a shifter, but she had to do something to help her beloved. Slashes and roars rang out in the forest beyond, and she continued struggling with the binds, sweat beading from her forehead to her mouth.

By some sort of miracle, the cable finally weakened enough to snap. Emma’s fingers looked dark blue and pulsed as she quickly untied her feet, casting aside bodily concerns until after the fight was over.

She stood, having to steady herself against the hearth of the fireplace after a short dizzy spell. There was no time for faintness. Emma really had no clue how many of the shifters outside were from their side and how many were from the enemy clan. She couldn’t fight a fucking bear, but there was something she could do.

A source of weaponry that humans have relied on for hundreds of years.

Guns.

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