Taming the Beast

She laughed at the ridiculousness of the statement. If she was smart at all, she wouldn’t be out here. She would be writing her dissertation on the effectiveness of spas and doing her research by testing out different masseuses, rather than out here, observing the complete lack of owls.

“Have you seen any owls lately?” she asked Cliff. “Can you send them my way if you do?”

Cliff raised his head, his gentle eyes turning hard and fierce as they narrowed on her.

“Or not,” she said with a gulp as he slowly raised his head. Streams of water poured out of his black lips that were curling up over his deadly teeth.

“Cliff,” she whispered, swallowing hard as he stepped around the pond with the long brown hairs on his back standing straight up. “Please don’t eat me.”

He looked terrifying as he circled the pond, never taking his heated eyes off of her. Bella’s pulse started racing as her stomach hardened.

She would have ran if her legs didn’t feel so weak and if she had somewhere to run to. “Cliff,” she whispered again through trembling lips. Her bulging eyes were locked on him. She was unable to blink.

Her breaths were coming out quick and raspy even though she wasn’t moving.

Cliff picked up the pace, his massive body rushing toward her as his face twisted in ferocious anger. Bella was frozen to the spot. All she could do was shake and watch as he barreled down on her, wondering why her only friend was about to kill her.

She squeezed her eyes tight and cringed when he was a heartbeat away. She clenched every muscle in her body, expecting his teeth to sink into her but all she felt was a slap of wind as he flew past her.

“Wha-” she gasped, opening her eyes and turning as the flash of brown exploded past her.

Cliff roared as he collided into another grizzly bear that she hadn’t seen sneaking up behind her. The two bears crashed to the ground, snapping and snarling in a gnash of vicious teeth and claws.

Bella found her strength and jumped up, backing away as she watched, cheering on Cliff. The fight didn’t last long. The second bear got to his feet and ran away, whimpering and whining as he left a wet trail of red spots behind him.

Cliff turned and looked at her with a somber face, his heavy breaths coming out deep and raspy. She had never been this close to Cliff before. He looked so beautiful and so sad at the same time. A tragic beauty.

The scars on his face ran deep, the scars on his soul ran even deeper.

There was something about him that took Bella’s breath away. Maybe it was the mournful way that he was looking at her or the heartbroken look in his eye, but it made her want to reach out and hug him.

He wasn’t going to hurt her. She knew that now.

Cliff had saved her life and she was going to repay him with a show of affection, which he looked like he desperately needed.

“Thank you,” she whispered, her heart pounding as she stepped forward. She reached out for him and he swung his head to get away from her, but his shoulder crashed into her ribs. He was so large and strong that she flew to the side, unable to break her fall.

Luckily, there was a large rock to do it for her. Her head slammed into the rock, shaking her to the core as blackness descended on her.

The last thing she saw was Cliff’s worried face approaching before the darkness swallowed her whole.

Chapter 3

“Ow,” Bella groaned, holding her head and snapping her heavy eyes shut. The bright sunlight was burning her eyes like fire. What the fuck?

Her head was thumping, her jaw and neck were sore, and she couldn’t remember anything.

Oh, wait. She remembered a little bit. Cliff knocking her down. Her head smashing against a rock. A blurry naked guy carrying her.

Geez, now I’m hallucinating things.

She took a deep breath and slowly squinted, letting her eyes adjust to the bright sun as she opened them. They flew open when she realized where she was: inside a freaking house.

What? Where? How? Who? Why?

Her head was pounding with the worst headache ever but she sat up anyway, grimacing in pain as she moved. She was lying on a bed in a small bedroom. The walls were made of logs, and not the smooth varnished logs like the expensive log cabins that her parents rented for family vacations, these logs were rough and raw with twigs sticking out of them.

The room had no decorations, just a night table made out of logs and the hard bed with the rough blanket that she was lying on. It looked how a small cabin in the middle of the woods would look like. And there was only one kind of person who would voluntarily give up the comforts of society to live in the deep woods like this.