Riding the Entire Pack (BBW Werewolf Shifter Steamy Menage Romance) by Willow Wilde Page B

settled debris. It made sense to go hunting for a clean water source, but perhaps I should have tried to establish some sort of shelter around the rock.
     
    As I reflected on these things, it occurred to me to abandon my wanderlust and find my way back. If I traced my way up the river, I reasoned, I could cut out the vast majority of the guesswork and search for the appropriate landmarks. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I hadn’t quite paid attention to where I had first encountered it. Worst case scenario, I veered back into the woods too soon, or too late. Either way, without any sort of a vantage point, the likelihood that I could return was incredibly low.
     
    I could only press forward and hope for the best.
     
    But there was more to it than that. I wanted to see more of these woods. I felt something drawing me closer, following this riverbank further along. I couldn’t explain it to myself, and I still can’t now – it was an irrational compulsion, driving me further into the heart of the forest. By now, I’d reasoned that I wasn’t anywhere near civilization. For all I knew, I’d wandered directly in the opposite direction. It occurred to me that I didn’t know of any major road that ran near here. But my path was set, and instead of being terrified…I was at ease, somehow.
     
    I felt like it didn’t matter that I didn’t know what I was doing. All that was important was pressing onward…and with my surprisingly intact stamina, it was easy to dispel my fears, putting one foot back in front of the other as I spotted a large, thick tree trunk in the distance, just a short ways from the river. It seemed as good as any a place to rest, and I made my way towards it.
     
    *              *              *              *
     
    It was when I was resting at the crook of that tree, resting peacefully for about half an hour, that I saw the large grizzly bears. There were two of them, lumbering quietly towards me at a leisurely pace, and I tensed up for the first time in hours. It was then that I realized I hadn’t actually SEEN any active predators this entire time — not besides a few wolves that were slumbering to the side earlier, or a wildcat lazed on a tree bough above the river.
     
    The bears were clearly advancing on me, and I felt too terrified to move. Are these the kind of bears you challenge? Do you shrink down from them? What the fuck am I supposed to do?
     
    “You are not meant to be here,” a rugged voice warned me. My gaze reluctantly drifted from them to spot the broad, sculpted build of a man in the semi-darkness. He stood close and menacingly, his hand pressed against the tree as he watched me. Had I not been completely preoccupied with the approaching bears, I would have wondered why he was completely naked, his thick cock hanging between his legs.
     
    “The bears! What do I do?” I quietly shrieked.
     
    “That depends on you,” he answered, turning to the advancing bears. They paused, pacing in front of us but within lunging range.
     
    “I don’t think I understand,” I replied, shocked at what I was seeing. Why weren’t they already springing to rip me apart?
     
    “My brothers here help me protect this grove from your world. Here, in this place, nature thrives — as it was meant to.” His eyes glared down on me now, even in the dim light. “But you humans and your need to conquer have destroyed many places like this. This grove is one of the last few dozen left, bastions of paradise that humans have not yet scarred or wiped from the land.”
     
    “But you’re human!” I stumbled through my thoughts, finding it hard to comprehend what I was experiencing.
     
    “I am a shifter, much like my brothers.” He waved his hand toward the pacing bears, and something incredible happened. The very air began to glow around them as their bodies contorted and shrank, their thick fur receding until they rose as very