Shifters' Storm Part 8

His c.o.c.k would press against her b.u.t.tocks, yet, somehow, he'd ignore its command until he'd told her everything. Then he'd turn her over and reach for her jeans zipper.

49.

"That's it," Rane said and jerked her head at the door. "I've had enough of whatever it is you think you're doing."

Instead of taking her not so subtle hint to leave, he leveled a steady gaze at her. "I'm still getting used to these mountains. I don't understand them the way I need to. The way you obviously do." She touched her chest with a fist. "Yes, I do. All right, d.a.m.n it. What brought you here?" Was it possible she'd tapped into his mental images of capturing her? Was that why she'd agreed to hear him out?

"This time last year I was far from here with the rest of my kind. You call the place Alaska."

"Your kind?"

Her whisper was like a warm breeze on his flesh. Beneath the layers of human clothing, his c.o.c.k stirred. Watching her have s.e.x had jolted him to his core. If he hadn't been concerned that her f.u.c.k partner might turn back into an elk and battle him, he would have forced himself between them and finished what the human she called Songan had begun.

Now, in contrast to his earlier reaction, he simply accepted the feminine touch on his senses. For as long as necessary, he'd drift in her presence.

"Shape-s.h.i.+fters. Not so different from your Songan."

"He isn't mine." Eyes wide, she shook her head. "You, a s.h.i.+fter. This is so much to absorb. I always thought only elk-and not all of them. Only the males."

He could tell her that one of the reasons his kind were considering moving here was because they'd heard about the elk s.h.i.+fters who lived peacefully in the Chinook Mountains. He'd been sent here to check further into the situation. That would have to wait, however, because he first needed to tell her something more vital. Something that might end what had barely begun between them.

"I was born a human," he began. "As a small boy, I believed my parents had died."

"Believed? You mean it wasn't true?"

"No. An elderly woman who I a.s.sumed was my grandmother raised me."

"She lied to you?"

Much as he wanted to believe Rane felt sorry for the child he'd once been, he didn't dare let that distract him.

"That was to protect me from saying things I shouldn't to outsiders, to protect my true ident.i.ty. A child accepts the world he finds himself in. Then they came for me. Said it was time for me to embrace my destiny." He hated revisiting the emotions that had overwhelmed him that fateful day and had no doubt they showed in the way he held himself and how the words came out.

"They?"

"Bear s.h.i.+fters. We call ourselves Enyeto."

"Enyeto?"

50.

"Eskimo for walks as a bear. My grandmother and I lived in a small, remote village. I was too young to wonder how someone who didn't work was able to keep a roof over our heads. A few weeks before I was taken away, she started acting different. Distancing herself from me. I thought I'd done something wrong, but we'd never been good at communicating, so I didn't know how to ask. The day the Enyeto came, she told me she'd been trying to make things easier for me."

"I don't understand," Rane said and sank back onto the couch. "You were doing whatever it was little boys in the middle of nowhere do. Living an ordinary life when suddenly these strange people-were they in human form?"

"Yes."

She looked relieved. "Okay. So these men and women showed up and-"

"Only men."

"Only men." Her fingers trailed over the knife handle. "They knocked on the door and said pack your things, you're coming with us."

"In essence." The truth was, the moment he'd looked into coal eyes much like his own, he'd known he belonged with them.

"I don't understand." Rubbing her thighs, she leaned toward him. Just like that, her impact doubled.

"You will in time. Because you f.u.c.k an elk s.h.i.+fter, you must know how it is for them."

"How what is?"

"The way they are at birth. What are they, elk or human?"

Her hesitancy said she wasn't sure she should answer. "Elk."

"Tell me, please."

"I, ah, guess. Every one comes from a cow elk. The females don't s.h.i.+ft. From everything I've been able to determine, they're one hundred percent animal. For the first year, all calves are nurtured by the cows. Then they push the yearlings away to make room for the next year's calves. The bulls move into the male society, where they're guided into life as s.h.i.+fters."

Her features sobered. "It's always bothered me that after the first year, the males never have anything more to do with their mothers, and their mothers, because they're what they are, forget who they gave birth to."

"Oh."

"You're right, oh. Different strokes for different folks."

What she'd just said made little sense, but then maybe he'd never understand the nuances of human speech. He often felt like an outsider during human conversations. Maybe, if things turned out the way they needed to between this mountain woman and himself, she'd guide him toward greater comprehension.

"When does a bull elk learn he's more than an animal?" he asked.

51.

She rubbed the bridge of her nose. "It's different for each one but basically when adolescence begins.

Songan told me it's tied into s.e.xual maturation. Older males are always there to insure that the youngsters understand what's happening to them."

"That's good."

"More than good-essential. There's so much that needs to be learned. When does a boy start to become a bear s.h.i.+fter?"

Heartened by her curiosity, he granted himself a slight smile. "The process, which takes the better part of a year, begins before adolescence. I wasn't yet nine when it started. I've sometimes wondered if that's so an Enyeto grows up accepting his existence."

"Wait." She pressed her hand to her forehead. "Male bear s.h.i.+fters are born to human mothers, only somehow the Enyeto know which infants belong to them? They what, harvest them? My G.o.d, that has to be devastating to their human parents."

"No, it isn't."

Looking as if she'd forgotten she had hold of it, Rane stared at her knife. He wondered if she still believed herself capable of using it on him, or if she had at the beginning. "What then?" Getting her to fully comprehend might be easier if she was in his arms, but maybe if their bodies so much as touched, they'd never get around to words. And maybe his touch would repel her.

52.

Chapter Eight.

"s.h.i.+fters are born to sows," Ber explained. Saying the words made him feel as if he'd come to the end of a long search. Finally, he'd found a woman he trusted with the truth. "The male newborns, which are identical to human infants, are taken from the sows-I've done that-and placed with humans to raise for the first few years."

"No way! How-d.a.m.n, I don't know what I'm saying-how do you get some woman to nurture a baby knowing she'd have to give it up?" She flattened her hand over her heart. "The vast majority of women aren't made that way, and those who are shouldn't have children." Knowing they'd eventually get to this point didn't make it any easier. "We carefully select the surrogates."

"Do you? Or do you rip little boys from the only mothers-or grandmothers, as in your case-they've ever known?"

"No." He'd been sitting too long and needed movement, but the only place he wanted to go was toward her. "Rane, the Enyeto kind have always lived in Alaska. Near the Inuit."

"Which is Eskimo for The People. Are you saying you have some kind of arrangement with them?"

"No matter how much whites study and think they know about Alaska's indigenous people, they'll never be privy to certain things."

"Ber, I'm a wildlife biologist working for the Forest Service. Before my mom-I'd just accepted a transfer to Alaska. I know more than a lot of people about that incredible wild country, and yet I never- what kind of things?"

He had to tell her. Otherwise, they'd never move beyond this point. "A heritage that goes back to when the land bridge connecting Siberia to America existed. Tradition. Cultures people like you believe no longer exists."

"Too much." Mouth open, she pushed herself to her feet, plodded over to the window and looked out with the knife dangling at her side. She seemed to have forgotten he was there. "I can't absorb all this." Aware of every heartbeat, he waited her out. If necessary, he'd continue the explanation but hoped she would start to put things together on her own.

Arms still dragging at her side and knife appearing too heavy to hold, she faced him. "What are you doing here? I don't mean tonight. I'm talking about being in Oregon. Did you come alone or are others with you? Maybe they're out there, closing in, taking over."

"I'm alone."

Closing her eyes, she started to lean back against the window. Straightening, she stared at him.

"Why?"

"I was chosen to determine if this is where some of us will relocate to."

"Go on."

Her lips had barely moved. Despite that and her clenched teeth, her mouth was soft. If he pressed his to hers, she'd respond. Their tongues would dance, their breaths meet.

"We knew this would eventually happen," he explained. "That eventually there'd be too many of us in one place."

"Too many? You're talking about Alaska."

"Only a small part of it. A safe region where we're accepted."

"Which is where?"

"I can't tell you, yet."

"Oh."

She'd better not say the word again because if she did and her lips softened as they just had, he'd be on her. Over her. In her.

Willing his thoughts to return to what needed to be said, he took a deep breath. "The Inuit there embrace us. We're part of their culture and belief system. With their help, we've thrived. Too much so."

"Overpopulation?"

Amus.e.m.e.nt looked good on her, but then her every emotion, even sorrow for her mother, captivated him.

"Yes."

"So some of you are looking to, ah, move elsewhere?"

She was trying to put what was happening to the Enyeto in terms she understood. He just hoped he could deal with her sensuality and the effort wouldn't make him lose sight of how vital she was to his kind's survival.

"We need a safe place to live."

"Why here?"

If he pointed at the couch, would she sit back down? He doubted it. "I told you. The humans who live in or near the Chinook Mountains accept elk s.h.i.+fters."

"Yes." She made the word last a long time. "We do. Most of us anyway."

"Most?"