Boarlander Beast Boar (Boarlander Bears #4)(32)

Beck was the only one on the outside looking in.

Silly her. She’d thought for a moment she was a part of this, but she’d been mistaken. She was here for a job, and Mason was broken enough that she had entertained him for a while. But not enough to commit to her, as her animal had demanded she do.

“I’ll send you everything I have and put together the calendar as soon as I get these photos edited,” Drea said distractedly. “It’ll probably be a week before I get you any of the files.”

“That would be perfect,” Beck said softly. “Thanks so much for doing this. The pictures I saw are incredible.”

“Thanks. I’m pro-shifter, so this was really a dream job. I mean, who gets to meet and photograph the shifters in Damon’s mountains? Don’t worry about me, though. As per our contract, I will only share these pictures with you, and I’ll give you all the files as soon as we send the calendar to the printer.”

“Great.” Beck shook Drea’s hand. “It was a pleasure working with you.”

“The pleasure is mine. You have a real good thing going up here.”

Beck’s heart felt like it was being run through with hot metal, but she resisted the urge to wince at the pain as she made her way down to where all the trucks, cars, and jeeps were parked in Damon’s yard. She hopped over a long scorch mark. Her instincts told her she didn’t want anything to do with the bad mojo wafting from it.

“Can we talk?” Mason asked from where he was leaning against his truck.

Beck startled to a stop. She had thought he’d shoved off when she’d left for the Grayland Mobile Park to shoot the Gray Backs.

Beck checked her watch. “Sorry, but I don’t have time to hash this out right now. It’s getting late, and I have a long drive to Saratoga. Bash said I could borrow his ride.” She dangled the fun-lovin’ bear’s keys up in the air as proof.

“Are you going to meet Robbie?”

That was none of his damned business. Beck bustled past him and yanked open the door to Bash’s truck, but Mason plucked the keys from her hand, tossed them in the passenger’s seat, and threw her over his shoulder like a sack of mulch.

“Dammit, Mason. Put me down!” She beat on his back, but he didn’t even flinch under her.

“You’re being stubborn and, besides, Bash needs his ride. I’m your driver, so I’ll be the one taking you to meet your ex.” With a grunt, he set her in the front seat of his Raptor and slammed the door.

He blurred around the front of the truck before she could scramble out. The truck rocked as he slid in and shut his door. “And after we go meet your baby-daddy, I’m taking you out.”

“No, thank you. I can only handle managing one bad decision at a time. Not two.”

He leveled her with a look so intense she couldn’t hold his gaze. “Don’t you call me a bad decision, woman.”

He spun out of the yard and blasted down Damon’s well-paved road.

“Why were the Boarlanders so surprised by you not claiming me?”

Mason made a pissed-off ticking sound behind his teeth and turned down the blaring radio. “Because they don’t understand what I’m going through. I don’t talk about it with them. If I was okay right now, things would be different, but as it stands, I’m not ready to mark you.”

“Why not?” she asked softly.

Mason shook his head for a long time, jaw clenched hard. “Because of Esmerelda. Because I’m just not ready.”

“How long ago did she pass?”

“Beck,” he warned.

“How long ago, Mason? It’s not a hard question!”

“Ten years. She hung herself ten years ago.”

A decade. Beck felt slapped and socked in the stomach all at once. “Mason, I’ve been split up with Robbie for a few years, and I was ready enough to mark you because I really do love you. Because my animal chose you. If you’re still hanging on that hard to Esmerelda…if I’m not pulling at your claiming instincts after so much time without a mate…maybe I’m not it for you.”

Mason looked sick as he whispered, “Beck, it’s just not that simple.”

“It really is. I don’t want to be a replacement mate that you keep around because I’m comfortable. I don’t want to compete with a ghost. I don’t want to play second fiddle. I did that before with Robbie. I played replacement * for him every time he came home from one of his girlfriends, and it gutted me. It ruined my heart. I had no self-worth, didn’t value myself at all, I hurt all the time. I can’t do that again.”

“It won’t be like that if you can just give me time to get myself out of the hole I’ve dug.”

“You mean the hole Esmerelda dug.”

“Yeah, Beck. We should be taking this slower. I haven’t even met your kid yet. I don’t know if I’ll be any good at parenting or at being a mate for you. I screwed up everything when I was with my first mate. She’s dead because I couldn’t make her happy. A claiming mark came easy for you, but for me, I want to be careful. I want to make sure I do this clear-headed when I’m not spiraling. I want to make sure it keeps and I can make you happy before I bond us like that.”

“You already bonded us, Mason! Last night, did you not feel it? Did you not feel the painful pull to me when we were making love? You carved your name into my soul. Did I not do that to yours?”