“I’m not sure I like you.”

The feline slowly got to her knees in front of him and slipped one arm around his neck.

“Do not kiss me,” he told her. But she did it anyway. And before Crush could stop himself, he had his arms around her and her body pulled close to his. They nearly had each other’s pants off when her idiot brother yelled, “Are you two at it again?”

Malone pulled away first and quickly got off the bed.

“You want to come with us?”

“I haven’t showered or anything and I need to take care of Lola and—” Crush frowned. “What are you doing?”

“Pouting. Until I get what I want.”

“Dude! Just tell her you’ll meet us there,” Tommy yelled.

“Yeah, but—”

“Dude!”

“All right!” he roared back, and the male tiger laughed at him. “I’ll meet you there.”

“Promise? Because I know you. You won’t break a promise. So promise me.”

“Fine. I promise. I’ll be there.”

“I’ll text you the coordinates so you can find it.”

“Can’t you just give me—?”

“We’re trying to keep out the riffraff so we have it in the middle of nowhere. You’ll need coordinates.” She stretched across the bed and kissed him again. “I’ll see you there.”

Crush fell back on the bed and again wondered what he’d gotten himself into with this crazy feline.

Cella got in the SUV with her brothers. “Okay. Let’s go.”

“Where’s the bear?” Liam asked.

“He’ll meet us there.”

“So he’s dumping you already?”

Cella let out a breath. “No. He’s not dumping me.”

“Because I think you should go for the RV dealer in A.C.”

“He’s a cousin, you idiot!”

“What is the deal with you and all these rules?”

Cella made a fist and turned, but Tommy, who was in the driver’s seat, caught her hand. “Would you two cut it out? I’m not going to have all this fuckin’ arguing all the way to the party! Now everybody face forward and be quiet!”

All the siblings faced forward and were quiet—for about five minutes. Then they argued all the way to the party.

Crush followed the directions his GPS gave him based on the coordinates provided by Malone. He ended up in Macon River County. One of the vacation places that only shifters knew about. There were quite a few of these, but Crush had heard a lot about Macon River because it was very bear-friendly. Some places were bear-friendly, some places bear-only, and some places simply didn’t like to have bears around at all. Of course, that wasusually anyplace with a lot of wolves, coyotes, or mountain lions. Other cats and wild dogs had more tolerance, but didn’t get too close to bears, either. And wherever there were bears, there were foxes somewhere—stealing shit.

When Crush finally hit the end of the directions, he parked his truck beside a bunch of other trucks, SUVs, vans, and Hummers. Vehicles big enough for all sorts of bears.

He stepped out and looked around. Beautiful country that no rational human beings would be wandering around with close to zero degree temperatures and hard-packed snow and ice on the ground and covering the trees. Although for Crush, it was kind of pleasant.

He started walking, hearing music off in the distance. He didn’t know what he expected with it so cold out. Maybe the Malones would have a little barbeque. Seemed weird in the middle of an East Coast winter ...

Crush stopped at the top of the rise, gazing out over the area beneath.

During Crush’s time in undercover, he’d gone to more than a few outdoor raves. How could he not? The best drug dealers always showed up to those things. Either to sell or party, but they were there. But those raves clearly had nothing on this.

The first thing Crush could see was the giant dance floor packed with partially dressed shifters. Polar bears, Arctic foxes and wolves, Siberian tigers, snow leopards. Grizzlies and black bears, too, probably from Kamchatka, tough Russian country. Dressed in shorts, T-shirts, fur bikinis, flip-flops, they writhed on the dance floor to what sounded like Caribbean tech music.

A musk oxen—where the hell did they find a musk oxen?—ran behind Crush, two tigers and a leopard chasing him down. Farther down in the trees, Crush could see two polars fighting over a seal. When he looked down and to his left, he could see an ice lake through the trees and a rough hockey game going on.

And when he looked right next to him, Crush could see an Eskimo. Okay. Not really an Eskimo, but Blayne Thorpe dressed in the biggest, warmest parka zipped so high he couldn’t see her mouth, the hood pulled down so low over her forehead, he could barely see her sunglass-covered eyes. Big mittens on her hands, big ski boots on her feet. Honestly, he only recognized her because of her scent.

“Hi, Blayne.”

She said something, but he couldn’t really understand it through the layers of parka.

“Huh?”

She unzipped a bit of the parka so that he could now see her mouth. “I said, ‘Hi, Crush!’ ”

He laughed. “How are you, sweetie?”

“Okay. Cold.”

“Hon ... why are you here?”

“I’m marrying a man more Arctic bear than African lion. I figure I better get used to it. It’s not bad, though. They have a really big hot tent.”