Read Billionaire Alpha Romance: The Proposal (Mature Gentlemen Book 2) Online
Authors: Maurice Bedard
Amanda and Dylan have now been together for two months. Amanda is still trying to get used to the fact that Dylan is not only a bear shifter, but is actually a rare white Spirit Kermode Bear.
They’re getting ready to go on a ski vacation to Whistler Mountain and one day, during a very “steamy” session over the phone, Dylan tells Amanda that he loves her. Amanda does not reciprocate but after some awkwardness, things get back to normal.
On their ski trip, they encounter a mysterious man named Jase who is actually Dylan’s long lost brother and also a White Spirit Bear. They learn that there is a curse on the White Spirit Bears and that the only way to break it is for Jase and Dylan to reunite with their other lost brother. If they do not break the curse, the Spirit Bear will fade into extinction.
But only one person knows where that brother is, and that person has been kidnapped by poachers. They set out to save Edgar, the shifter that has the information about Jase and Dylan’s brother.
At the end of the story, Amanda must decide if she’s ready to tell Dylan that she’s in love with him. Will she tell him?
Amanda sat on the bench seat in the bay window at her mom’s house. It had been a few months since her father had died and she had met Dylan in Mountain View.
“So when do we get to meet this boy?” her mom asked as she walked into Amanda’s bedroom.
“You’ll meet him,” Amanda answered. She smiled up at her mom and continued to paint her toenails.
“Well, I was hoping to meet him before we all went to Vancouver, Amanda,” said her mom, a little bit miffed.
Amanda pushed the blond hair out of her face.
“He’ll be here tomorrow when we leave,” she said. “You’ll like him, mom. I’m sure.”
“Oh, I don’t doubt that. I’m just glad that you’ve found someone.”
Sometimes Amanda’s mother made comments like that. Comments that indicated that she thought maybe someone like Amanda, someone who was a little heavier, wasn’t going to find someone as easily as anyone else.
Amanda tried not to give her a little bit of credit. Amanda hadn’t lost her virginity until two months ago when she’d started seeing Dylan. She’d had a lot of firsts on that solo trip to the mountains. Including meeting someone who could shift from human form into the form of a Kermode spirit bear.
The first time Dylan had done it, Amanda had thought she was losing her mind. She hadn’t known what to do. It had been frightening, but if it hadn’t been for Dylan’s shifting abilities, they wouldn’t have gotten away from that nasty pack of black bears that were trying to take over Dylan’s family’s turf.
It seemed like so long ago.
She missed Dylan’s touch. She missed kissing his golden brown skin and running her hands through his shoulder length dark hair. She missed his strong features and his brown eyes. She missed everything about him.
They texted constantly, of course. Amanda like it when the texts took a turn for sexy. She wasn’t entirely sure of herself in that arena, but Dylan was an excellent and patient teacher. He didn’t mind that she’d been a virgin their first time. He seemed to have really liked it, actually, and his enthusiasm hadn’t ended there.
Amanda’s mom walked out of her bedroom and went back to preparing things for their trip to Vancouver and on to Whistler Mountain.
Her family had a cabin up there. It was one of the most sought after ski resorts in the world. People like Sean Connery stayed there sometimes. It wasn’t uncommon at all to spot a celebrity on the slopes or in one of the restaurants. Amanda had brushed elbows with David Duchovny once.
She still had a little bit of packing to do. She finished up painting her toenails and sat in the window seat with a book while she let her toenails dry.
Her phone buzzed.
Dylan: Hey, beautiful.
Amanda: Hey, you.
Dylan: Can’t wait for tomorrow.
Amanda: Aren’t you nervous at all?
Dylan: Nah. I’m sure your family is great.
Amanda: Really?
Dylan: I just want to see you.
Amanda: I know. I want to see you, too.
Dylan: I can’t wait to see you take off your ski suit and slip into the hot tub up there.
Amanda: And what do you think will happen then?
Dylan: I’d slide in with you and let you lean against me. Then I’d rub your shoulders until you were nice and relaxed. I’d run my fingers over the tops of your breasts and make your nipples harden. Then I’d slide a hand into your bottoms to see how turned on you were.
Amanda: I’d turn around and show you how turned on I was.
Amanda immediately felt stupid at her response. Everything he’d said was so sexy that she could feel herself getting wet just thinking about it. Of course, she got wet every time she thought about Dylan. Sometimes at the most inappropriate of times.
Dylan: Where are you?
Amanda: In my bedroom.
Amanda’s phone began to ring. Her heart jumped when she saw that it was Dylan. She answered in a hushed tone, as though she might be caught.
“Hello,” she whispered.
“Hello,” he said, his voice barely above a groan.
It did things to Amanda that she hadn’t experienced with anyone ever before. Everything was new with Dylan. She felt his voice vibrate through her and land right in her groin, sending pleasure radiating throughout her body.
“What are you doing?” she asked, trying her very best to sound sexy.
“Do you want me to describe what I’m doing to myself?” Dylan asked, his voice husky.
Amanda drew in a breath sharply. She wanted to know exactly what he was doing to himself, and yes, she wanted to know about it in great detail.
“Yes,” she breathed.
“Only if when I’m done, you do exactly what I say,” he said.
Amanda swallowed. She would do anything for Dylan.
“Okay,” she agreed.
“Okay,” he said. “Well, right now, I’m lying in my bed with my boxers pulled down around my knees. I’ve been thinking about my girl, you know? I keep thinking about how it feels when she puts her body against mine. I keep remembering what it felt like to slide into her that first time, and damn, it makes me so hard, Amanda.”
She felt herself shiver when he mentioned her name. The details were delicious and she only wanted more of them.
“Right now, I’m running my hand up and down my cock, teasing myself, because I know that even if I do come, it won’t be anything in comparison to the way it feels when it’s inside of her.”
Amanda went weak in the knees.
“You like that?” he asked. He must have heard her breathing.
“I do,” she whispered.
“Then I want you to do exactly what I say, okay?” Dylan said.
“Okay,” she agreed.
“Get your vibrator,” he began. She did. “I want you to take your pants off and I want you to turn it on.” Amanda followed his every direction. “Now, lay down on it and run it up and down your thighs but don’t touch yourself with it yet. Run it over your nipples and run it along your lips, but don’t let it touch you. Keep going.”
Amanda wanted nothing more than to feel the vibrations against that sweet spot inside of her or against her clit.
“Please,” she said, finally.
“Yeah, baby, I want to hear you,” said Dylan.
Amanda slid the vibrator inside of herself and gasped at the sensation. She pumped it in and out several times, her breathing becoming more rapid. She imagined Dylan inside of her, filling her up like he did so many times during her stay at the cabin. Only one more day and they’d be together again.
The vibrator hit that spot that Dylan so expertly had on their first night together. She could feel the pressure of orgasm begin to well up inside of her. She longed for release. She moved the vibrator to her clit and gasped. The buzzing sensations were nothing compared to Dylan’s tongue and the way he worked her over with his mouth, so she fantasized.
“Are you close?” she asked him.
“I’m close, baby,” he said.
“I want to hear you,” said Amanda.
There was something about the noises that he made when he went over the edge that almost sent her into orgasm immediately, and she needed to hear it.
“Okay,” he said.
She heard his breathing accelerate with the speed of his hand. He grunted as he grew closer. Finally, he was near climax.
“I’m coming. I’m coming,” he said.
Amanda felt herself begin to roll over the edge. Pleasure rolled through all of her limbs and her abdomen contracted, sending juices flowing out of her and onto the sheets.
“Ugh!” Dylan groaned as he almost came. “I love you, Amanda!” he said at the moment of climax.
It felt like a cold bucket of water had been thrown on her. He’d said, “I love you, Amanda.” Holy shit. He couldn’t mean that.
He finished and began to catch his breath. He was silent and so was she. It was awkward.
“Umm,” she said.
“Uh,” was all he could counter.
“I’ll see you tomorrow?” she asked, more of a question than a statement.
“Yeah, absolutely,” he said. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Amanda pushed the button to hang up the phone and as she pulled it away from her face, she saw that Dylan hadn’t hung up yet. What was he waiting on? Her to say it back? She wasn’t ready to say that. She didn’t know if she loved him. It had only been a couple of months and she was only twenty years old. Of course, she was crazy about him.
But was being crazy about someone enough to be sure that you were in love with them?
Amanda wasn’t sure. Suddenly she wasn’t sure about anything. The idea of seeing him tomorrow was enough to make her stomach do a backflip, and not in a good way. A sense of dread began to overcome her.
“Great,” she said as she got up onto her elbows. “Just fantastic, Amanda.”
She cleaned up and began packing her things, trying to tell herself that none of that had really happened.
The next twenty-four hours seemed to drag on endlessly. Amanda had gotten all of the last minute things taken care of and she was ready to go. She and her mother were waiting for her aunt, uncle, and cousins to arrive at their house.
Oh, and for Dylan to get there.
Amanda couldn’t forget that. Just like she couldn’t forget the fact that he’d told her he loved her the day before. They hadn’t texted after that. She wondered if he felt as awkward as she did. He probably felt worse, but she wasn’t going to tell someone she loved them just to ease them from having to feel any sort of awkwardness. That would just be wrong.
Amanda was sitting on the couch when she heard a large SUV parking in the driveway.
She got up and went to the front door. When she opened it, her aunt and uncle were walking towards the glass storm door and she opened it.
“Amanda!” her aunt squealed.
Her aunt Terri was thin and beautiful. She looked like she had once been a model, and maybe she had been. Amanda didn’t know her very well. Terri’s husband, Jim, stepped in and gave Amanda a short hug after Terri was done with her.
Slowly making their way up the sidewalk were the twins, Alex and Emery.
They were about seventeen. Just at that age where they were too cool for almost everything, especially family vacations. They smiled at Amanda from behind matching pairs of Ray Bans. She smiled up at both of them. It had been awhile since she’d seen them if she didn’t count the funeral, and they had gotten so tall.
“Alice!” Terri squealed once more when Amanda’s mother came into view from her bedroom.
“Terri!” Alice said back, though not nearly as enthusiastically.
Terri was Jim’s second wife and the twins’ mother. Though Terri and Jim had been together for as long as Amanda could remember, apparently it wasn’t as long as Amanda’s mom could remember, and it always seemed like there was some sort of awkward tension there between Terri and Alice. Amanda wasn’t sure about it. She wondered what sort of secrets lie buried there, but also wasn’t sure that she wanted to know.
Alice served some snacks to everyone and they all sat down in the living room.
“So, I hear that your boyfriend is coming with us? Where is he?” Terri asked as she munched on some graham crackers and cream cheese smothered in jalapeno jelly.
Amanda nodded.
“He should be here—“
There was a loud knock at the door. The kind of knock that only someone with huge paws could make. It had to be Dylan. Amanda felt both relieved and a little bit of dread.
She walked to the door and saw him standing there, that crooked grin, wearing a gray t-shirt that looked so soft she wanted to cuddle with it. Or did she want to cuddle with him? Maybe both. He held a dozen roses in his right hand. She opened the door.
He handed them to her, looking slightly sheepish.
“Here,” he said.
“Thank you,” said Amanda, surprised by the gesture. She had never been given flowers before. It was a lovely thing to do, she thought. She took in a huge whiff of them, but the smell suddenly made her sad. All she could think of was the funeral home where her dad had been. A frown immediately replaced her smile.
“I’m so sorry, Amanda,” Dylan began even as the sea of eyes watched them.
“No, it’s not—“
“I shouldn’t have said—“
“Well, you must be Dylan!” said Alice, walking towards them. “And look at this! You brought our girl flowers?!” She turned to make sure that Jim and Terri could see.
Apparently there was a lot of discussion about Amanda dying alone, she thought, as she watched Jim and Terri nod in approval. What was this? The Middle Ages?
Amanda walked away from the scene and laid the roses down on the bench beneath the coat rack. She went to her bathroom saying, “Excuse me,” rather quickly.
She hurried down the hall and heard a voice after her. It was Dylan.
“Amanda!” he called.
She went into the bathroom and locked the door. She felt a flood of grief hit her. It came in nauseating waves, sometimes out of nowhere, and in that moment, she felt the loss of her father like a pit in her stomach, like the ache of a hunger that no food could satisfy. It was something she would live with for the rest of her life. She let the tears roll out of her eyes freely.
“Amanda,” Dylan said on the other side of the door.
“It’s okay,” she said, clearly crying.
“Amanda, I’m sorry,” he said.
“It’s nothing you did. Honestly,” she said back and unlocked the door.
Dylan came in and hugged her tightly.
“I shouldn’t have said what I said yesterday,” he began. “I just know how—“
“No, it’s not that. It’s the flowers. The smell. It reminded me of the funeral home. It’s not your fault. What you did was incredibly sweet. It was perfect actually. And I ruined it.”
Dylan paused for a moment and pulled away.
“Amanda,” he said seriously. “You didn’t ruin anything. I’ll never bring you flowers again. I promise.”
He hugged her tightly again and her breathing began to slow down and gain a more normal pace. The tears stopped flowing so freely and she felt herself calming down. She grabbed a tissue and blew her nose, trying to ready herself to step back out into the group of people waiting on them.
“C’mon,” she said, forcing a smile. “You need to meet my family.”
She took Dylan’s hand and they walked out of the bathroom and into the hallway, finally entering the living room where the twins were engrossed by their cell phones and the adults had already moved on to other topics of conversation.
“Sorry, guys,” Amanda said, getting everyone’s attention. “This is my boyfriend, Dylan. Dylan, that’s Jim; that’s Terri; this is my mom, Alice; and Alex and Emery are the twins.”
Dylan nodded to each of the people as he was introduced to them and they nodded back. The twins even did, though they didn’t take their eyes away from their cell phones.
“Well, that went well,” Amanda said to no one in particular and turned around and smiled at Dylan.
He smiled back at her from under his black eyebrows. His smile was that same crooked smile that had gotten Amanda that day in the grocery store. She longed to kiss those lips, and even though the next week was going to be all about her family and they were all sharing one cabin, it was a big one. Plus, she and Dylan had their own room. They would have plenty of privacy. She couldn’t wait.