9.

The door opened and the butler looked down at her with a raised brow.

“Good morning,” he smiled as he stood back and left a space for her to pass through and into the open aired atrium.

It was another stunningly sunny Autumn day and Cally had swept her hair back into a tight little side ponytail which draped delicately down her shoulder.

When she had woken earlier, she had wanted to rush to see Hugo at the crack of dawn, but she knew that she had to wait. She didn’t want to turn up when he wouldn’t be expecting her.

“Mr. Carter is in his office,” the butler said as he closed the door behind her and the sound of it echoed around the mosaicked hallways.

Cally nodded and smiled and made her way back to the only room in the house that she knew. When she reached the door, she felt the butterflies begin to flap furiously inside of her. She was nervous but it was mostly from excitement. She had been able to think of nothing but him, and he had completely consumed her since she had been gone.

Behind the door, she heard his smooth voice call for her to enter before she even had a chance to raise her hand to knock.

He can sense me, she thought with a dip of excitement.

She opened the door slowly and he was standing there wearing nothing but an opulent silk robe, tied at the waist, and a smile.

“Good morning, Cally,” he said warmly.

She felt her own smile creep out across her cheeks along with a rosy blush. Seeing him half undressed again reminded her of what his body was like naked and she longed to have him closer to her.

“I’m glad you came back,” he said as he rested the documents he had been reading down on the desk and gave her his full attention.

“There was no way I couldn’t,” she said. “I agree with everything you said yesterday. I feel it too.” She meant every word, and she realized that she wasn’t nervous anymore. All of it felt too right to question.

Hugo took a step forward and took her arms in his hands and pulled her closer to him.

“There’s so much more you need to know,” he whispered.

“You’re...different, aren’t you?” Cally was looking deep into his eyes and she could feel it then, more than ever, that Hugo wasn’t like anyone else she had ever met. It was as if he was a man of two halves. And the side that he had hidden, the part of him that ran deep in his veins, bubbled and fought its way to the surface whenever he laid eyes on her.

“You awaken the animal in me,” he said as he rubbed his thumb across her bottom lip. “And it’s becoming harder and harder to control it.”

Cally didn’t want him to control it. Looking at him there, half dressed, his deliciously tanned, hairy and toned torso peeking out from the middle of the robe, all she wanted was for him to ravish her. She wanted him to unleash whatever he was hiding and make her his.

Her nipples hardened underneath her shirt and she trembled as he traced the tip of his finger down her neck to her collarbone. Her pussy was slick and wet, and becoming more engorged with each passing second. The attraction they shared was like nothing else. There was a deep connection there that had been forged and it was so strong it was overpowering.

She closed her eyes and let him lead her back to the desk and he pulled her right up against him as he leaned back on it. He ran a hand through her hair and kissed her softly, slowly, and then harder until she moaned with desire.

As he slipped his hands up the side of her body and to the tops of her thighs, Cally panted and gripped onto his shoulders. They were so broad and muscular she felt tiny next to him. He parted her legs with his hand and slipped his fingers into her underwear. When he touched her, she was ready to unravel right then and there, but she bit her lip and let herself grind against his touch. His own grunts and growls were becoming louder and more powerful as she felt his own need mounting.

He pulled her around and pushed her back onto the desk as he took hold of her feet and wrapped her legs around his waist. When he opened the robe, his huge, powerful cock sprang into view and Cally gasped as she remembered every inch of it and how it had penetrated her so perfectly. It had reached further inside of her than anyone ever had and as he took hold of it and rubbed it up and down her slick pussy, she moaned as he hit her in all the right places, again and again.

He teased her for what felt like an eternity, and when he finally pushed himself inside of her and thrust so deeply it felt as if he was opening her up for the first time, Cally came before she even had a chance to try and stop herself from tipping over the edge. She clung to him tightly, her thighs tensing around him as he gripped her hips and powered into her. She writhed on the desk beneath him as she looked up at him and squealed with delight.

Hugo grunted and a loud growl escaped from his lips. Cally looked at him with wide eyes and she could see something in him then that she had known had been hidden. The animal inside of him was at the surface and it was desperate to break free.

Hugo thrust into her once more and came so hard she felt every last drop of it emptying into her. Cally pulled him close to her as he squeezed her breasts and kissed him hard on the mouth as he collapsed down on top of her.

They panted and heaved as he lay there, still inside of her, and then they collapsed onto the floor in a heap of passion and ecstasy.

“Only you will ever make me cum like that,” he panted as he wrapped his hand up in her ponytail and pulled her closer to him. “Because you’re mine now.”

Cally looked deep into his eyes and knew then more than ever that he was different.

“Tell me what you are,” she whispered.

Hugo kissed her delicately on the lips and smiled.

“My family and I...” he began but then faltered as if he wasn’t sure whether he should really continue. Cally widened her eyes and urged him to carry on. “We are different.”

She took hold of his hand in hers and squeezed it reassuringly.

“We are half men, and half animal,” he said it and Cally wasn’t at all surprised. She had felt it within her since she had seen him again. “The night we met, I imprinted on you,” he said. “That is why you’ve felt that I have never been far away. And it is why fate brought us back together at the perfect moment.”

Cally felt tears welling up behind her eyes. It was the most romantic thing anyone had ever said to her, and it was also the truest thing she knew. Everything he was telling her was striking such a chord, she was almost annoyed with herself for not figuring it out sooner.

But half man and half animal? What did that even mean...?

“I’m a werebear, Cally,” he said as if he had read her mind. “I can shift and change shape from man to animal...”

Cally looked at him and felt a fire rage inside of her. That was the sexiest thing she had ever heard, and it explained so much. He was so well groomed, but he was also so rugged and animalistic. There was an untamed side to him that she could tell could rip her to pieces, but she loved it.

“Show me,” she whispered as she leaned up on her elbows and urged him to get to his feet.

Hugo looked at her with uncertainty, but then he did as she asked.

Without a word, right there in the middle of his beautiful office, the man she was already in love with began to growl and breathe deeply. She watched as his demeanor changed, as his eyes glinted and flashed with something raw and powerful. When his skin split open and rich brown fur began to sprout in its place, Cally couldn’t help but gasp. It was shocking to see, and she almost couldn’t believe her eyes, but she could tell that this was him. This was Hugo. He was half man and half bear.

When he stood there in front of her in his bear form and growled so loud that it blew the hair back from her face, her heart was racing and she didn’t dare breathe. He was so strong. He could kill her right then if he wanted to. His jaws and claws were so big they could have destroyed her in seconds, but she knew that he wouldn’t. She could tell more than anything that he was her protector now... And not just her...

In that moment, as she watched him shift, she felt something inside of her move.

The tiredness, the feeling of belonging, the changes in the way she felt, and now how protective he was over her. It was all making sense.

Cally was pregnant with Hugo’s baby... He had sown his seed, a cub, into her on the night they had met.

She looked up at him as he began to shift back into his human form and her heart was now pounding more than ever.

Oh my God, she thought. I’m pregnant.

Hugo walked back over to her, now fully back as a man, but his chest still heaving and the growls still escaping from his lips and he pulled her up to him and kissed her so ferociously that she never wanted it to end, and it took her breath away.

“Does it frighten you?” he asked with a pant.

“Oh yes,” she whispered. “But in all the right ways.”

She looked into his eyes and felt, for the first time in her life, as if she belonged somewhere. And then she wondered if he could sense it too... Could he know that she was already pregnant?

She would have to find out for sure before she told him. Everything was moving so fast, but as Hugo had said, he had claimed her three months before, and she was his now. No matter what.