understood him better like this. She understood him as only a bear could understand him.
His bear scent spiked into her nostrils. She broke into a blinding, fluid flash of movement. She covered dozens of miles in a split second. She merged with the land. This must be what she sensed walking through the forest just now. She became one with it the way the guys always had been.
Trees and mountains blurred in a seamless curtain with her at the center. She didn’t need to think with a human brain. The forest did her thinking for her. It decided where she went and how she got there.
In a heartbeat, she vaulted over another random mountain and down into the dark shadows. She knew where she was now. She’d been here before, but so long ago she hardly remembered it.
She ran up the other side and burst through a veil of foliage. She entered a clearing ringed by granite blocks standing on their ends. The sun shone through holes in the tops of each monolith. The beams converged in the center to form a web of light.
She broke her stride and trotted into the place the firstborns called The Stones, the mystical place they originally brought her to show her their bear selves so long ago.
She studied The Stones with bear eyes. The carvings of people transforming into bears seemed to move before her eyes. She slowed to a stop to study them closer.
Garret halted at her side, but his presence set off an explosive reaction in her. Without thinking, she wheeled and flew at him. She collided with him and bowled him onto his side with her own massive weight. He dwarfed her by hundreds of pounds, but she caught him by surprise.
He bellowed once, but the fall knocked the sound out of his mouth. The frenzy taking hold of her rocketed her forward, and she bounded on top of him. Before he could react, she pounced and dove for his throat, but she didn’t try to bite. She veered her head to one side and barked a quick, playful snort.
He responded in a fraction of an instant and rounded on her roaring in annoyance. He launched off the ground and tossed her off with no effort. He landed on top of her, and she realized her mistake. He crushed her under his bulk, and his enormous, fringed head streaked toward her face.
She ducked under his chin, but that enraged bellow told her when she’d been beaten. She relaxed under his assault.
His fangs missed her cheek by a hair, but he didn’t try to bite, either. He pulled the blow sideways, holding her down with his body. She wedged her forehead under his chin and rubbed her furry neck along his throat.
He softened instantly, but he didn’t get off her. He reared back. With another threatening snarl, he dove for her throat and caught her. He squeezed his jaws together, but not hard enough to hurt her. He clenched her in a quick hold just to show her he could if he chose to.
She twisted back to expose her neck. Even now, in this play fighting, she knew at a gut level that he would never hurt her. She attacked him first. He had every right to school her.
He eased his hold ever-so-slightly and flexed his mighty frame against her. His body spoke to hers in ways she never imagined in human form. He kicked his hindlegs and flipped her over without releasing his grip. In a trice, he rotated her onto her stomach and came down on top of her.
He took a firm hold on the scruff of her neck and pinned her down harder than before. A quivering shudder went through him. It translated into her with an unmistakable charge. Her bear nature understood this position only too well. Those teeth digging into her neck commanded her to submit.
She froze, waiting for the inevitable, but the next moment, he vanished. His weight disappeared, and his teeth lifted off her. She glanced over her shoulder and spotted him standing a few feet away with his back to her.
His bare shoulders shone with sweat. The triangle of muscle shimmered in the sun down to his legs strapped with muscle. Just for a second, he looked frail and vulnerable in human form.
The next thing she knew, she changed, too. She shifted back into a woman lying stark naked on the damp grass. The air and the dew chilled her skin. She picked