A Flash of Fang (Wiccan-Were-Bear Book Two)

By R.E. Butler

Wiccan Elizabeth and her werebear mates Ash and Axe have spent the last few months making a home for themselves, splitting their time between the coven and den. When evil comes to the den, they must work together to save their family. Can Elizabeth, Ash, and Axe find peace and safety or will there always be danger on the horizon?

• Language: English
• Publisher: R.E. Butler
• Release date: Dec 9, 2011
• ISBN: 9781466068537

R.E. Butler

I write for the readers who stay up past their bedtime, telling themselves "just one more chapter" long after the lights should be out. The ones who fall in love with fictional characters, escape into magical worlds, and crave protective heroes who would do anything for their women. My love for paranormal romance started as a young mom reading ebooks in the middle of the night, drawn to the monsters who were more than villains—they were heroes. Inspired by shifters and fated mates, I set a goal in 2011 to publish my first book. Over 100 books later, I'm still creating the kind of stories I love to read. Now, I spend my days dreaming up protective heroes, captivating heroines, and the happily ever afters they fight for, often while walking with my pup coworker and plotting my next book. I write for readers who love adventure, passion, and a touch of magic—because I'm still that girl under the covers, reading by flashlight, lost in another world.

Book preview

A Flash of Fang

Wiccan-Were-Bear Book Two

By R. E. Butler

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Excerpt from A Price for a Princess

About the Author

Books by R. E. Butler

Copyright

Chapter One

Drumming my fingers against my purse, I sat in the doctor’s office waiting room with one of my two were-bear husbands sitting next to me. The picture of perfect calm, Ash reclined in the straight backed chair and fiddled with his cell phone.

Why are you so nervous, Aleni? Ash asked, calling me their pet name for me, which meant little bear.

I don’t know. I sighed and shifted in the uncomfortable seat to look at my husband. We’d been mated by were-bear standards since before the full moon in March, prior to the spring equinox. In June, we married by human standards, and he and his identical twin Axe became not only my guards for the Wiccan ceremonies that required me to officiate as South Corner, but also my all around guards so that I never really went anywhere alone anymore, ever.

I wasn’t complaining. Not exactly. But I’d never been to an OB appointment with a man before, and it was just a little weird. But that wasn’t really what was bothering me. The last few weeks I’d started to have bad dreams. Not nightmares, exactly, but they were bad nonetheless. I always woke up unable to remember what was in the dreams except that it wasn’t good. Try as I might, I could never remember anything about them. And with the bad dreams came unhappy days, as worry plagued my thoughts. Was I just having generic bad dreams for no reason at all, or was the universe trying to tell me something? I knew that Ash and Axe were picking up on my unhappiness even though I tried to shield my mood from them.

Picking up my harried thoughts, I said, I don’t know what’s going to happen when my IUD is out, and with the fall mating season coming up quickly, I’m just kind of worried.

He flipped his onyx hair over his shoulder and gave me the weight of his dark eyes. If you don’t become pregnant with this heat, there’s always spring. And if not then, eventually, I know that you’ll carry our cubs.

I opened my mouth to tell him that it wasn’t that I worried about becoming pregnant, necessarily, but that I had this weird tickling feeling in the back of my mind because of the dreams that something bad was coming. It made me feel like the last thing I should be thinking about was having a child.

Something wicked this way comes….

My thought process was interrupted when the nurse opened the door and said, Elizabeth….Stalking Horse? Is that right? She looked up in confusion.

Yes. I smiled and took Ash’s hand as he stood to his full six and a half feet of hot goodness. She looked up at him and said oh softly, making the connection of my last name to the man next to me. Ash was gorgeous. Long, straight, onyx hair fell to the middle of his back. His skin was the beautiful coppery color that heralded his Native American heritage. Set in his strikingly handsome face were brown eyes like melted dark chocolate surrounded with thick lashes, a straight nose, and a perfectly kissable mouth. Even though he wore a long sleeved Henley and jeans, it was easy to see that his body was sculpted, masculine and muscular. He looked so very young, like me, but there was nothing boyish about him except perhaps his sense of humor. That he was an identical twin just made him–both of them–that much hotter in my book.

My five-foot-three curvy frame, ivory skin, dark brown hair, and jade green eyes were a stark contrast to the exotic man next to me. It never mattered to me, though, what others thought of us together. Because we just fit together perfectly. I was technically eighteen, although since my last birthday I was eighteen plus four, which was how supernatural beings talked about age. From the age of eighteen, I aged one full body year for every twelve years that passed. My husbands were eighteen plus ten, identical twin were-bears that shared my unique long-life. I was so glad to be married to two men who aged as slowly as I did. If I had to watch my husbands die of old age while I stayed young, I wasn’t sure how I would deal with that.

We followed the nurse down the short hallway to the scale and I huffed at Ash and he grinned. Dropping a kiss to my ear, he made exaggerated motions of squeezing his eyes shut, clamping his hands over his ears and humming The Star Spangled Banner.

He’s adorable, the nurse gushed, swiftly clicking the weights around in front of me.

He’s something all right, I smiled at him even though he couldn’t see me.

You’re right where you should be. Were you worried or something? She asked, sliding the weights back to one end and casting a glance at Ash. I stepped off the scale and tugged on his arm.

No, I just think there are some things that should be kept secret between husbands and wives and one of them is the exact weight of the wife.

He rolled his beautiful eyes at me. I’ve seen your drivers’ license, Elizabeth.

I rounded down. Maybe. I grinned and he laughed, shaking his head.

The nurse sat down at the small desk in the narrow exam room and asked me the cursory questions about my health and history. When I turned eighteen, I had an IUD implanted to prevent pregnancy. I had known my own flighty brain would not do well with a daily pill, and extra hormones tended to make me wiggy anyway. And there was something unsatisfying about the thought that the quarterly shot could make me gain weight. So I got tested for the IUD to make sure it would fit, and it did, which meant at least in my head that I had the perfect sized uterus. Not that I could take a picture of it to frame or anything, but still. I liked having medical proof of my perfection, not just my glowing husbands’ comments. I found that most men, probably all of them, would say anything to get a woman naked. And once they married them, they said lots of wonderful, sexy things about her to encourage her to stay naked. Maybe it was just my horny husbands, though. I never really asked my married friends about their sex lives and their husband’s abilities to encourage said nakedness.

The nurse handed me a short gown and walked out, shutting the door soundly. I had been sitting in Ash’s lap in the only free chair and when I stood, he eagerly tugged on the bottom of my shirt.

I slapped his hands away with a growl, No, no. No touching. This isn’t for fun, it’s for…science.

Toeing my shoes off, I began to work my shirt off and then my jeans. Science, yeah? Sounds sexy. He settled back in the chair and crossed his very long legs at the ankles and gave me a wicked smile. He could get me wet with a look. Damn it.

You know, I groused, tossing my clothes at him one by one until I was naked and climbing onto the exam table, it’s not exactly okay for me to be all horny and wet before I get a pap.

He snickered and tried to stop from laughing, but he couldn’t. He was just too good natured and funny to not enjoy the situation for what it was. I tugged the front opened short gown over my shoulders and laid the blanket across my bare hips. You’re just lucky I was willing to trade my very handsome male doctor for a female.

He stopped laughing abruptly. Aleni, he protested, I don’t think you would want me to slaughter your doctor for touching your sweet treasure, would you? He looked genuinely remorseful but I knew he was faking it.

You’re impossible, Ash.

And very lucky. He stood up and leaned over enough to kiss the tip of my nose and settled back in the chair with an amused look. The doctor came in a few minutes later as Ash and I were discussing our plans for the coming weekend. She was slender and tall, mid-forties with her long mouse brown hair pulled back in a sensible ponytail. After the cursory pleasantries, and trying to explain to a human that my husband wasn’t going to leave the room without me, she started the exam.

As she declared everything looked just fine, and then took out the IUD, I tried really hard not to make