Chapter One
Zakari
Even now I was harder than fucking steel thinking about her, the woman who I didn’t even know, had never even seen her face.
But she was out there, I knew it.
I felt it.
My mate, the one woman made solely for me.
I had to be patient, had to keep looking.
And when I did find her, I was going to claim her and claim her really. Fucking. Hard. She’d know exactly what it meant to be mated to a grizzly bear shifter.
I exhaled slowly, my thoughts moving at a fast rate, causing the animal inside of me to grow restless. At thirty years old, I still hadn’t found my mate, but I knew she was out there. I could feel her close, as if her very presence, her life force slowly pulled us together.
I looked over my shoulder at my cabin, the one situated on ten acres of thick Colorado Rocky Mountain forest. Five cabins spread out between those acres, even space for each of us, yet close enough if need be.
My brothers.
All without their mates.
All of them just as anxious and frustrated as I was to find that one woman that would make us whole. But, what we lacked in control we had in patience tenfold.
I stayed a few feet away from my cabin, staring off into the thick woods, my heart racing and my blood pumping through my veins. My grizzly was right below the surface, pacing, anxious to be released, to run free. I had a lot of pent-up energy, my animal side needing this more than I needed to breathe.
I started taking my clothes off and tossing them aside until I stood there naked, my muscles starting to grow bigger, my skin tightening. I felt the shift move through me, this tingling starting at the base of my spine and spreading throughout my whole body, consuming me, claiming me and having me submit to the power.
Closing my eyes, I tilted my head back, feeling the beast break free.
Bones breaking, skin tearing, everything realigning.
And then I fell forward, no longer hands, fingers and skin, but paws, claws and fur.
I slowly shook my big body, my skin and fur moving over my bones and muscles, my bear pleased he was finally out, ready to run, ready to work off the energy building within me. I wasn’t the bear and he wasn’t the human. We were two separate entities, working together, thinking, feeling, being as one the best we could.
I took off in the woods, running, twigs snapping beneath my massive paws, dirt digging under my sharp claws. In this moment both bear and man worked together. But right now, my animal side had the upper hand, called the shots.
He was brutal and savage, primal and animalistic.
I was alpha and possessive, territorial but rational. And together we made one crazy fucking pair, one that would never back down, would always fight for what we believed in, and who would go to the ends of the earth to find our mate.
And we would find her, no doubt about that.
That was my one mission in life, the one reason I was born, and my bear’s only need as well.