by Sable Sylvan
Sleeping BBW And The Billionaire Bear: A BBW Bear Shifter Paranormal Romance Novella
The Shifter Princes, Volume 3
Sable Sylvan
Published by Sable Sylvan, 2015.
This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.
SLEEPING BBW AND THE BILLIONAIRE BEAR: A BBW BEAR SHIFTER PARANORMAL ROMANCE NOVELLA
First edition. July 31, 2015.
Copyright © 2015 Sable Sylvan.
Written by Sable Sylvan.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Epilogue
Sneak Peek: Three Grizzlies Gruff
About The Author
Prologue
What was supposed to end up being the happiest day in Talia Ackerman II’s life ended up being her last.
But for Talia Ackerman III? It was just the beginning.
“We’ve done everything we can,” said the doctor as he removed his stethoscope. The flatline had been accurate: Talia Ackerman II had passed on.
“Thank you, doctor,” said Helen Ackerman, one of Talia’s sisters, the second oldest of the four nonidentical quadruplets. “We know you tried your best.”
“Tried your best?” asked Martha Ackerman, the oldest sister, the only sibling that wasn’t part of the quadruplets, and the only one who had taken after their father: with a tall, slim figure, and dark, deep set eyes, she looked more exotic than they were. “Your best wasn’t frikkin’ good enough, doctor, and my sister...my sister...she’s gone.”
“There was nothing more the doctor could have done,” said Bertha, putting a hand on her older sister’s shoulder.
Martha shrugged it off. “There’s always more than could have been done. And I can’t believe...that thing, that thing killed her.”
“It isn’t the baby’s fault,” said Lorraine, cutting in.
“If it wasn’t for the baby coming early, Talia and James wouldn’t have had to rush to the hospital...and they wouldn’t have been hit by that drunk driver,” said Martha. “So don’t you tell me it’s not that...that freak’s fault.”
“Premature babies aren’t freaks, they’re frikkin’ babies,” said Lorraine angrily. “And that baby’s going to need all the support she can get.”
“You don’t seriously want to keep that...that thing?” said Martha. “It killed our sister.”
“She named that child, with her dying breath,” said Helen. “Talia. That thing has a name, and it’s Talia. Like her mother. Like our mother.”
“Heed my warning, sisters,” said Martha, crossing her arms. “That child...that child will not make it past its twenty fifth birthday.”
“What kind of a thing is that to say to a child?” asked Bertha, getting up angrily. Lorraine and Helen had to hold her back.
“It’s not my curse: it’s a curse on this family,” said Martha. “You remember what happened to mom.”
“Lemme at her! Lemme at her!” hissed Bertha.
“She’s not worth it,” said Helen, holding her back. “And now...we’ve got to be strong for the new Talia.”
The nurse knocked at the door. “Here she is,” said the nurse, carrying a pink swaddled bundle. She pulled back the layers of fabric. “Little Talia, say hi to your aunties.”
Bertha held her first, pulling her close. “Talia, we’re going to give you as much love and care as we can.”
Lorraine held her next. “We’re going to give you whatever we can, honey bun.”
Finally, Helen held her, and locking eyes with Bertha, the usually soft-spoken Helen said, “And we’ll never let anybody hurt you.”
Bertha nodded and looked out into the halls. Martha was gone...good riddance. She looked back to the baby: there was no way that curse was real...but she wasn’t about to take her chances either.
Chapter One
Men never walked into Spinning A Yarn. Never.
Okay, that wasn’t true. Ever so often, someone would wander in to the knitting store to ask if they could use the bathroom. But no man had actually ever gone and looked through the stacks of yarn, until the day that he walked in.
Tall. Dark. Handsome. Port Jameson was crawling with men like him. What they didn’t have? Men in tailored suits, with luxury cars parked on the street. The man palmed a ball of yarn and looked at the price tag. It was the nice stuff that had sat on the shelves for years.
Talia had sold only a few of the expensive skeins of yarn in her life, most of the goods being sold online to specialty buyers around the country. Spinning A Yarn had a special relationship with the various farms in the area, and farmer brought their best yarn to the store, from the sheep farms down in Oregon to the alpaca farmers who had moved out East, to Vermont, who still sent their goods back to the Pacific Northwest.
Right now, Talia wasn’t worried about making a sale, or, more realistically, about the yarn getting greasy from people touching it. No...she was trying as discreetly as she could to check out the big man in the corner and figure out what kind of a shifter he was. He was tall and had dark brown hair, with green eyes which shone like gems, but that wasn’t helping her figure out what kind of animal the man was.
“He’s a bear shifter, you know,” said Aunt Helen, putting her elbows down on the counter next to Talia.
“How can you tell?” asked Talia.
“The paw marks, dummy. You’ve lived here long enough to know that, right?” asked Aunt Helen.
“Only the last what, twenty-four years of my life,” said Talia sarcastically.
“I guess you were distracted by how handsome he is,” teased Aunt Helen. Talia blushed, giving it away. “I knew it! You should go and talk to him!”
“About what?” asked Talia.
“I don’t care, as long as you make the sale,” said Aunt Bertha, coming up from behind and readjusting the sign on the counter listing the credit card policy.
The man turned. He looked over Talia from head to toe: even though Talia was wearing a big baggy sweater and jeans, the way that her green apron was tied accentuated her curves drove him wild. They didn’t get many women like her where he was from.
“He’s looking at you: go get him,” said Aunt Helen.
“Make a sale,” said Aunt Bertha.
“Fine, fine,” said Talia, walking over to the tall man. She hoped she wasn’t blushing.
The man smiled as he saw the curvy woman walk towards him. “Hey,” he said, noticing the natural pink in her cheeks, which made him smile wider.
“Hey,” said Talia. “My name’s Talia. Can I help you find anything today?”
“In fact, that’d be great, Talia,” said the man, putting down the yarn. “I don’t know anything about this stuff.”
“Ah, so you’re not a huge knitter?” joked Talia. “I didn’t catch your name, by the way.”
The man was thrown for a loop: there weren’t any women he’d met who didn’t know who he was. Just ten minutes ago, in a café, he’d been approached and asked for an autograph by a barista. “My name’s Cedar,” said the man, shaking Talia’s hand. “I’m not a knitter at all, but I’m looking for a gift for someone extra special
.”
The man’s grip was firm and Talia could feel the pads on his hands, the markers of a shifter. The pads, dark brown, marked him a grizzly shifter, and were found on the palm of his hand and on his finger tips. “Is it for a girlfriend?” asked Talia, noticing that the man wasn’t wearing a wedding ring.
“No, I don’t have a girlfriend...this is for someone very, very special, my grandma,” explained Cedar. Being close up to Talia, he felt extra tall: she wasn’t in heels like most women up in the city, and from his perspective, he could see just how ample her curves really were. “She’s got a birthday coming up and I wanted to get her something nice.”
“Oh, cool, my birthday’s coming up soon too,” said Talia. “Well, what sort of things does your grandma like to knit?”
“My other siblings are all married, so right now, she’s been making a lot of baby clothes,” said Cedar.
“Well...babies grow out of baby clothes really fast. Is cost a concern?” asked Talia.
“Not at all: I want all my nieces and nephews clad in only the finest wool, “ said Cedar. He still couldn’t believe that Talia had no idea who he was. He’d come down to Port Jameson to get away from all the women in Seattle...he’d never thought he’d want a woman so badly on his self-imposed hiatus from dating.
“If you want to go all out, you could get your grandmother some angora wool, or some cashmere yarn” said Talia. “In fact, we have it in a really thick weight, so what we could do is make a kit for your grandma.”
“A kit?” asked Cedar.
“Yeah, with needles, a book, and yarn,” explained Talia. “We even have a gift wrapping service.”
“That’d be perfect,” said Cedar. “What do you have in mind?”
“Hmm,” said Talia aloud, going through the shelves and finding the heavyweight cashmere yarn. The yarn was very thick, about the thickness of her fingers, but soft. “First of all, do you like the way these feels?”
She held the yarn out like a small baby bunny and Cedar pet the yarn, pressing his fingers into it for a second, before pulling them out. Almost touching the tall man again made her turn pink again and she thought about yarn instead to get herself to calm down. It was never like her to show her emotions on her sleeve like this.
“Wow, this is really nice,” said Cedar. “This is perfect for blankets. What colors does it come in?”
“We have it in nice shades of baby pink and sky blue, which would be perfect for kids, or nice yellows, if your grandma wanted to make something that could suit either gender,” said Talia. “We could also find something else that’s neutral and nontraditional.”
“No, traditional is perfect,” said Cedar. “I’ll take the baby pink and the sky blue.”
“How many skeins do you want?” asked Talia.
“How many will I need?” asked Cedar
“Well...how many babies are your siblings expecting?” asked Talia.
“There’s eight kids coming,” said Cedar.
“You have eight siblings?” asked Talia.
“No...three,” said Cedar. He took a discreet look at Talia’s hand: no engagement or wedding ring. It was rare to find a woman as curvy as her that hadn’t already been snatched up. She probably had a boyfriend...but there was no harm in trying to steal a date. “There’s a set of twins, and two sets of triplets.”
“Oh, right, bear shifters, duh,” said Talia. “I forgot bears had big...batches. Your grandma will need ten skeins per blanket, so...wow, she’s going to need eighty skeins.”
“Do you have that many?” asked Cedar.
“No...but we can do a delivery for your grandma,” said Talia. “We can do a special delivery and include free shipping in a case like this.”
“Thank you so much,” said Cedar. “Do we need anything else?”
“Well...have you ever seen a home-made blanket in your grandma’s house? One you know your grandma made?” asked Talia.
“Nope,” said Cedar.
“Then we’re going to need to get needles, and a pattern book,” said Talia, taking the three sample skeins of yellow, blue, and pink yarn to the counter. “Aunt Bertha, we need as many of these as you’ve got. In total, there need to be twenty of the pink, twenty of the blue, and forty of the yellow. If we don’t have them, we’re going to do a delivery. I also need a basket, the biggest one we have, and with baby themed decorations.”
“You got it, Talia,” said Aunt Bertha with a wink, heading to the backroom to prepare the gift basket.
“Your grandma will need big needles for the blankets in this book,” said Talia, pulling out a big book from the bookshelf and handing it to Cedar to hold. Cedar took the book: nobody had recruited him for manual labor, other than his grandma, in the longest time...and he liked Talia’s take-charge attitude. She also knew her stuff about knitting: very few of the women he knew actually worked, but Talia was obviously not only a hard worker, but passionate about her job. Seeing her light up as she talked about yarn melted his heart.
“Over here, we’ve got the needles,” said Talia, leading Cedar to the needle section. The needles were in drawers, organized by gauge, and she picked a set of size twelve needles, made of wood.
“Are you sure those aren’t drumsticks?” joked Cedar.
“Nope, to make those big blankets, your grandma needs big needles,” said Talia with a smile. It was rare she got to nerd about knitting with people that actually cared. “Think she’ll be able to handle them?”
“If grandma can handle a Port Jameson winter, she can handle those needles,” said Cedar. “Is that all she’ll need?”
“Yeah, but we do offer knitting lessons,” said Talia. “And I can do house calls too. I’ll put a card and a coupon for six hours of free lessons into the gift basket. That should be enough to teach your grandma to make at least one or two blankets.”
“Talia, you’re too kind, I can pay for the lessons,” said Cedar.
“Cedar...you’ve made the biggest purchase I’ve seen working here, and I’ve worked here since I was thirteen,” said Talia. “Your grandma can get free lessons. It’s the least I can do.”
“Well, I can’t thank you enough, this’ll really make my grandma’s birthday special,” said Cedar, following Talia to the counter. Talia dropped the needles and book off with her aunt who was making the basket and came back out.
“You sure your grandma doesn’t want jewelry or something?” asked Talia.
“My grandma? No frikkin’ way,” said Cedar. “That woman has bent over backwards for everyone her whole life, and wouldn’t have it any other way. The biggest present I can give her is a gift that keeps on giving.”
“That’s really sweet,” said Talia, her heart melting at Cedar’s words. “That’s...really, really, sweet.”
Aunt Bertha carried out the basket. Layers of pink and blue tulle coated the bottom of a wicked basket like cotton candy. Ten balls of blue yarn, the book, and the heavy knitting needles were inside, and covered with another layer of tulle, tied with a bow at the top.
“So, there’s the eighty skeins of cashmere yarn at fifty dollars a skein...size twelve knitting needles, wooden, twenty dollars...the book is thirty...the gift wrapping is on the house...that’s...four thousand and fifty dollars,” said Talia. She took a second look at the screen. “Yup. Four thousand and fifty bucks.”
“Perfect, do I meet the credit minimum?” joked the man.
“Of course,” said Talia. “How many cards are you going to need to use?”
“Just one. I’m actually staying in town,” said the man with a smile. “If you end up having that birthday party, let me know so I can invite myself.” The man passed his business card over the counter with his credit card, which was pitch black and felt hefty.
Talia read the business card: Cedar Asher, Asher Lumber Co. There was no title listed but Talia recognized the name Asher Lumber Co.: it was the company that owned the mill in town and the tree farms in the area. She turned it over: no other info was on it, except
his mobile number.
“Let’s see if your card works,” said Talia, and she ran the card through the machine on the counter. After a second, there was a beep and a light: she read the screen. “It says here you’re approved.” She passed him back his black card and a receipt, the business card still in her hand.
“I can’t thank you enough,” said Cedar with a wide smile. He put his card back in the wallet and folded the receipt neatly. As Cedar picked up the basket, Talia couldn’t help but notice how thick Cedar’s arms were, practically bursting the suit at the seams, the muscles bulging against the fabric, and once Cedar turned...the tension between them didn’t snap. It intensified, and although Talia wanted to say something, anything, Cedar was already on the way out. The bear shifter left with the big gift basket, the bells of the door jingling.
Talia’s third aunt, her aunt Lorraine, came out from the backroom. “Talia...why does it say we’ve made over four thousand dollars today on the computer?” asked Aunt Lorraine.
“Because she just sold four thousand and fifty dollars of yarn to Cedar Asher,” said Aunt Bertha with pride.
Talia frowned. She hadn’t shown them the receipt or the man’s card. “Aunt Bertha, how do you know his name?”
“Because he’s the last of the eligible Ashers in the Pacific Northwest, you know, the big lumber company?” said Aunt Helen. “Everyone’s wondering who the next woman will be to join the Asher family. He’s practically a celebrity...although he’s one of the more reclusive of the Asher boys, just like his two cousins, who are also C-level execs at Asher Lumber. That clan has so many eligible young men of a marriageable age. I hear he’s looking for his fated mate.”
“Well, it certainly won’t turn out to be me,” said Talia with a laugh. Cedar was handsome, but he wasn’t a man from around here. The Port Jameson men loved thick women...but would a big shot big city billionaire appreciate her curves? “Can you imagine me, a billionaire’s trophy wife? Plus, I bet all the billionaires tell women they’re looking for their fated mate, to, well...you know.” Talia thought back to the summer after high school: so many boys had asked her out, coming up with half-assed excuses as to why she must be their fated mate, but Talia knew that the only way that the shifters could confirm whether or not she was really their fated mate was by...well, mating.
