I'll Be Dammed: FUC Academy, #2

By Mandy Rosko

Someone shaved his beaver... 

 

Waking up without her memory, unable to shift, and sore all over sucked. The big one. Who is she, and who shaved her beaver?! Beverley wants answers but she's having a hard time getting the truth from the barn owl who claims she's his mate.

 

At least he's handsome. However this supposed husband of hers is hiding something and it's driving her a little woody. She will gnaw at him until he tells her what's really wrong.

 

But when she finds out the truth…having her beaver shaved will be the least of her problems.

 

This paranormal romance novella is part of Eve Langlais' Furry United Coalition (F.U.C.) Academy EveL World!

 

Content warning: If you prefer to avoid books that include topics such as the loss of a child, we recommend you skip this book and stay tuned for the next FUCN'A installment. If you do decide to read, just know that there is a happily ever after!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mandy Rosko
• Release date: Jan 14, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393982593

Mandy Rosko

USA Today Bestselling and award winning author Mandy Rosko loves writing paranormal romances with werewolves, dragons and people with special powers. She is the author of the Things in the Night Series, Night and Day, and the Dangerous Creatures Series.She does M/F, M/M, a touch of medieval under her other pen name, Rizzo Rosko, and pretty much anything else she's in the mood to write (which makes things confusing for readers since that means she's too much of a flake to stick to any one brand).Favorite authors right now are anyone who writes dangerous and tortured heroes ;)If you want to keep up to date on the sexy guys in my hot new releases, then sign up for my Newsletter and receive a free copy of The Vampire's Curse: http://mandyrosko.com/contact.htmlAnd on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MandyRoskoRomanceThings in the Night Series:The Vampire's CurseThe Legend of the WerewolfThe Shepard's AgonyThe Dragon and the Wolf (A prequel novella)Night and Day Series:Night and DayThe Calm Before The StormAll Hell Breaking LooseBook Four Coming Soon!Dangerous Creatures:Burns Like FireA Shock To Your SystemAs Cold As Ice Coming December 8th 2015

Book preview

ONE

Someone shaved his beaver.

Those sons of bitches. He was going to kill them for this.

Even from the heights he was flying, his sharp eyes picked up on the movement down below on a quickly built, and unfinished, beaver dam.

She scurried back into the water, and he knew she would be pushing herself into the little den she'd made for herself.

Too late. He’d already spotted her, even if part of him couldn’t believe it really was her.

But the smell was the same.

It should be impossible, but that was his woman down there.

But how the fuck did she look like that? She didn't normally look like that.

Albert had to circle around a few times just to make sure he had her scent right. That his sharp eyes were not betraying him.

If there was no mistaking this.

It was her.

After two weeks and no word from her, no sign of her, only terrified days and sleepless nights, he finally had his first sighting of her.

She was alive. But someone had done something to her. Someone had done this to her.

How? And when would he be able to find them so he could wrap his hands around their neck and start squeezing until there was no life left to squeeze out?

Didn't matter. He’d already gotten a look at her, and he could tell from a distance that was no wild animal going about its business.

That was his beaver, and after two weeks of no word from her after the attack...he was going to get his answers.

The barn owl above definitely freaked her the fuck out in a way only a predator could.

She'd barely noticed it at first, but when she did, all instincts flew to high alert and it felt like she had less than three seconds to get her half-furry ass into the water.

Owls ate beavers, and she was not interested in being the snack of a mean, giant flying rat.

Especially with half her back and ass exposed, something she was reminded of whenever the wind happened to blow.

Ducking into the water, she looped around and beneath her dam, climbing and crawling through the little space she'd made leading to her den.

Her barely formed den, which any wolf or fox could take apart with even a small amount of effort.

Shit. The damned bird landed.

She couldn't remember much of anything since waking up, sore and bruised, and shaved, but she did recall that shifters weren’t immune to predators. A field mouse could shift into a rocket scientist or someone who was on the brink of curing cancer, and it wouldn't matter one inch to the hungry cat.

And beavers might be the second-largest rodents around these parts, but they were still rodents. Dinner for pretty much everything bigger.

She had to be careful. Until she could get herself back in working order and shift, she was a snack to the creatures out here.

She looked up. Her dam, beautiful that it was, was also imperfect. She would never admit to that out loud—it turned out she was a proud beaver—but as it was, it was not much protection. She hadn't even had the chance to start making a second, drier den.

She could see up and out of it in some places. Spots where she had yet to add more sticks, more mud, and more leaves. Her lodge was little more than a house made from barely glued-together matchsticks.

Which meant that damn feather brain could look down and see her through some parts of it.

And it did see her.

Fuck. Fuck her life right in the ear. She was going to be eaten.

No problem. She was just going to leave her little beaver tail in her hidey-hole, and when the bird lost interest and realized she wasn't going to come out, he would take off to chase down some other prey creature.

Of course, she knew that meant she could be there for a couple of hours if the scruffy bird turned out to be stubborn, but she was definitely not coming out.

It wasn't a beautiful owl. Not like Hedwig from Harry Potter. It really was scruffy, and were those horns?

Great, she had a devil owl trying to get a piece of her ass.

And it was still looking at her.

Go away, you stupid bird. Get out of here!

It wouldn’t leave. If anything, it hopped around, as though searching for a way in, hooting and clawing at her beautiful creation.

God, give her a break, please?

Shift. Come on, shift. I can scare the stupid bird away if I can just shift!

It didn’t happen. Like every other time she’d tried.

It was supposed to be easy. Something she just did.

But she couldn’t.

She was stuck.

She knew she was a shifter. She might have no memories of being in human shape, or even her name, but she knew deep down, through some untold instinct, that she was a shifter.

This should not be a problem for her, but it was, because her body was refusing to cooperate.

Which was terrifying enough when she’d woken up by herself in the middle of nowhere, but now that terror was back and making her head swim because an owl was above her.

Looking for a snack.

She glanced up at it, and those wide, round eyes peered back down at her.

There should have been another thrill of fear. The terror of being eaten alive should have paralyzed her, but no.

Something else caught her attention instead. Another instinct she knew in the core of her being.

There was something familiar within those golden eyes. Something that comforted her, called to her, and, most importantly, made her skin ripple.

Not the crawling sensation that came after she’d woken up next to her own vomit. This was a much more pleasant sensation.

Even though, by all natural instincts, she knew there was absolutely nothing safe about the creature staring down at her. The curl of its beak, which could easily dig in and tear out pieces of her flesh, was terrifying, and those talons were something she could almost feel sinking into the meat of her juicy hide.

But something inside her objected to those thoughts, and she couldn't stop herself from feeling almost safe around the creature.

As though this was a critter whose eyes she had gazed into many times before.

Could owls hypnotize? No. Those were snakes. And only in cartoons.

But then, much sooner than she anticipated, it flapped its wings and flew away in a ruffle of feathers.

Leaving her sitting there, curled up and waiting for a sign it would return.

Then she shook her head and brought herself back down to earth.

Was she crazy? She’d nearly let herself be eaten by a damned owl!

Where the hell had that feather brain gone? There was no way she was leaving her den until she was sure it was safe. That damned owl was probably waiting in a tree branch for her to get out, patiently waiting for a meal.

Her vision sucked, but her hearing and sense of smell were pretty good. Just not good enough to tell if there was a predator hiding in the trees.

Definitely good enough to hear the masculine voice calling a name, which she assumed was her name, from beyond her lodge.

Beverly! Beverly, I know that's you.

Beverly? That was… her. That was her name.

She didn't have anything to prove that with, but it was another feeling inside of her gut, something familiar and as wonderful as the sound of his deep voice.

Because it belonged to her.

That rippling feeling in her skin returned. She felt it beneath her fur and, where there was no fur, along her bare flesh.

Her name was Beverly.

And the male outside was hers. As much as the name belonged to her, so did he.

Come on out, baby. I'm here for you. I recognize you. You’re safe now.

She didn't second-guess it. For the first time since waking with no memories in the woods and stuck in this damn helpless form, she felt like something was right.

She needed to be closer to that voice.

Because the person it was attached to belonged to her as surely as that name did.

Beverly dove back into the water. She left her den and swam out and away from her lodge, kicking her webbed feet and pushing herself with her small paws. She pulled herself back up to the surface of the water, and there was no owl there to greet her.

Just a very naked, very good-looking, muscular man.

A man with deep brown eyes and messy hair. Hair that seemed to be black, brown, and gray all mixed together, just like the feathers of the owl who’d been looking at her. A man with broad shoulders and tired crows feet at his eyes, who stared at her with an expression she couldn't place.

Someone so sexy shouldn’t seem so vulnerable. Not with a chest like that or a package like that, yet the guy watched her as though she was going to swim over to him with the solution for world hunger.

And for the first time since she’d woken up two days ago, she, Beverly, felt the change finally coming over her body. The fight she’d had for so long coming to an end.

She didn’t have to think about it.

She just let it happen.

Of the few things she could recall, Beverly was sure that it wasn't commonplace for a shifter to feel like a prisoner in their own form. Her freedom from that prison happened gradually as she swam her way toward the bank, her little paws and feet becoming hands with slender fingers and long, pale legs. She was finally going to know what she looked like, and that should've been more interesting than it was, but she couldn't take her eyes away from the man in front of her.

He didn't move to help her, which was good. She wanted to do this on her own,