A shifter who needed the internet to find his or her mate was a pathetic loser. Or so they said. I disagreed. I was a rare rabbit, trying to find another rare rabbit on an island where rabbits were few and far between. More than that, I was an endangered subspecies of rabbit. It wasn’t going to be so easy for me to casually bump into a mate of the same species at a social event, for instance.
I scrolled through the few men listed. Just a couple snake shifters and a lone wolf who looked like he’d been in one too many brawls. No rabbits.
Sighing, I pushed my laptop away and took a long gulp from my mug. I was ready for a mate. Not only a mate, but the whole nine yards—a mate, kids, a happy family. I could close my eyes and imagine little bunnies running around my house and yard, playing their little hearts out.
Laila pushed aside a palm leaf and poked her head around. “Thank God it’s you. I’ve invaded the privacy of three other people already.”
I raised my eyebrows at her. “You could try your nose.”
She scrunched it up. “It’s still weird for me.”
She’d only just found out she was a shifter over the course of the past year. She was a wolf shifter, though. There was absolutely no reason she shouldn’t be using her heightened sense of smell to her advantage.
“I’ll get there.”
She glanced at my computer screen and made a face. “Online dating? Come on, Parker. I don’t think that works. Online people are illusions. They’re half-truths, and then your own mind fills in the blanks with imaginary preferences. ”
I grunted. “I have to try. I haven’t seen another rabbit on the island since those damn polar bears showed up.”
She sighed dreamily. “Oh, yeah. The polar bears. They’re sooo hot.”
“Hot? They’re scaring away my chance of finding a mate.” I finished my coffee, stared into the mug, and blinked, wondering how I’d finished the entire cup so fast. “I’m going to die old and alone because of them. Hell, I’m practically an old maid now. Do you know I’m a decade older than my mom was when she had me? A decade!”
Laila shut my laptop and shook her head. “You’re going to meet your mate and live happily ever after. Stop stressing. It’ll happen when it’s supposed to. Just relax and let it.”
“I don’t think I know how to relax.”
“No kidding. You remind me of the energizer bunny. You have no chill mode.”
I gave her a blank stare, unamused. “First of all, no chill mode? What are you? Eighteen? Second of all, don’t play up stereotypes. They’re insulting.”
She just waved me off and pulled my mug towards her. “Want some more? I’m going to get a hot chocolate.”
“Sure. Decaf, though.” I waited until she was gone and then opened my laptop again. I logged onto a different dating site. No rabbits and even scarier looking options.
Someone needed to build a site for shifters that was legit. Not a sketchy, backwards, hook up site, but something modern and tasteful. Shifters needed help meeting one another, too. I had to wonder how many shifters were walking around living a lonely existence because they had yet to find “the one”. I bet there were tons who would jump at the opportunity to search for a mate right from the comfort of their own living room. Surely fate couldn’t orchestrate every pairing itself. Maybe fate needed a personal assistant from time to time.
I lifted the palm leaf to call to Laila. “On second thought, make the coffee regular. I’m addicted to the caffeine.” I frowned. “Actually, make it an espresso. Double.”
Paige laughed. “I’d already ignored the decaf order. I know you better than you know yourself, Parker.”
I lowered my leaf again, ensconcing myself in my hidey hole. My fingers flew over the keys, composing an email to a distant cousin in Jacksonville. She’d found her mate at a young age, a wolf shifter, but she still had friends who hung out in the single shifter crowd. Desperation was getting the better of me and I shamelessly requested she ask around her friend group about any single rabbits in the state.
“Okay. A double espresso and a muffin, your favorite—chocolate/chocolate chip.”
“Oh, I love you. And my fat rolls love you even more.”
Laila shrugged and flopped herself into her own fur-lined chair. “How was work today?”
“Boring. The rooms filled up yesterday and no one has checked out. All I had to do was clean rooms and give walking directions to various attractions.” I frowned. “No newly arriving guests to sign my petition.”
“I still don’t understand why you need to have the name of your species changed. It’s been the same since the eighties.”
I narrowed my eyes at her. “Because my species isn’t some sort of crude joke. That’s why.”
She held up her palms in surrender. “Hey, at least you get the energized and sex hungry reputation. I’m supposedly some terrifying monster who howls at the full moon wants to eat your children.”
“What children?”
She slapped my arm. “Stop. It’ll happen when it happens. Now, come on, relax and stop trying to force something.”
We both knew her advice was in vain.
I had no intention of sitting back and waiting for a mate to fall into my lap. No, this girl was nothing if not proactive.
4
Maxim
The AC units in the office were still going full blast despite the slightly cooler weather and the fact that Hannah, wearing a thick sweater and wrapped in a blanket, sat at the desk answering the phone with chattering teeth. I tuned in, waiting to see if we were needed for anything important.
“Police scanner 411. 719 with 212 at 901 Dockside Drive.” Hannah repeated the call, louder, and then hung up.
We were all hanging around the office, so everyone heard it. Serge translated aloud, “Rogue shifter. Domestic situation.”
“Rabbit with a reported firearm,” Roman added.
Dockside Drive was on the north end of town. We swung into action immediately and, after piling into the van outside with Serge behind the wheel, pulled out onto Main Street. We didn’t need gear for this one. Not for facing down a rabbit shifter. Not much of a threat there, even with a firearm.
“What kind of pussy shifter uses a gun?” Alexei shook his head. “And what’s with all these batshit crazy shifters down here?”
“Probably the weather. The heat would drive anyone loco,” I growled audibly, angry all over again about being sent to Florida. “We’re never going to work a real assignment again. The main office is going to hear about the work we’ve been doing here and they’re going to laugh us right out of every fucking special ops mission ever.”
Serge sped from the south end of the island, dodging what little traffic there was this late in the tourist season. “This is a real assignment. It may not be what we’re used to but, in the event you hadn’t noticed, these are real people and real situations and they need real assistance.”
“A rabbit shifter waving a gun around is a real assignment?” I stared ahead, seething. If it hadn’t been for Serge chasing Hannah instead of focusing on the job, we’d all still be in Siberia executing recon missions or hostage recoveries instead of responding to a domestic involving a fucking bunny rabbit. My grandma could handle that.
“Get over yourself and take this seriously, Maxim.”
Serge slowed and took a right. We pulled up in front of a little white cottage with a small but growing crowd gathering out front. One sniff told me the crowd was a mix of humans with a couple shifters thrown in.
We were out of the truck and parting the crowd in seconds. Just as we got to the front porch, the door of the house flew open and a woman came running out with a small man chasing after her. His eyes were crazed and had a drugged-out glaze. He was waving a small caliber pistol in the air and shouting something unintelligible.
As the woman flew down the steps, he was right behind her. “Get back here, Marisol!” His speech was slurred and it was clear he wasn’t in complete control of his senses.
Furious that the puny fucker would dare fire at me, and at point-blank range, no less, I yanked the gun away from him and lifted him by his throat. “Look at me, you stupid little cotton-tailed rodent. You just attempted to shoot me in the face! You’re lucky I don’t snap your worthless neck. Me and the guys would love a hearty pot of rabbit stew for dinner tonight.”
Serge relieved the perp of his weapon and grunted. “Alright. You can release him.”
I dropped the asshole to the ground and swore when he instantly sprinted away down the beach. I rolled my eyes. “Give me that gun back. I’m going to shoot his ass.”
Alexei and Dmitry took off after him and Serge stepped over to the woman, Marisol, to talk to her and determine whether she needed medical care. Roman stood next to me grinning. “So. Not a real assignment, huh? Thumper almost blew your head off.”
I scowled, about to respond, but something distracted me. A delicious but light scent of…carrot cake. It floated atop everything else, including the stench of the rabbit junkie. The aroma had my mouth watering and my cock jumping in my pants. I ignored Roman as I scanned the crowd trying to determine where it was coming from. There, near the back. A short, curvy woman with light purple hair, facial piercings and a mean scowl. She was evidently pissed about something, but she smelled like absolute heaven on earth.
I caught only a brief glimpse of her before she was swallowed by the crowd. Just a glimpse of pale purple hair and an angry glower. But, that was all it took to pique my interest and spark a strong urge to go after her.
Serge was yelling my name, though, calling for more restraints. Konstantin cuffed my shoulder, urging me forward, and then I was running through the sand, away from the scrumptious scent of carrot cake.
When I reached the guys, they’d made it pretty far down the beach. They were wrestling the rabbit, trying to hold him down. The drugs he was on had apparently given him some crazy super-strength. He shouldn’t have been able to hold his own with one polar bear, much less the group of us.
By the time we got him restrained and back on his feet, he had a bloody nose and a black eye and his bottom lip was starting to swell. He was also spitting mad, screaming and calling us every name in the book. We were all pretty much covered in sand and sweat and Alexei had apparently suffered a broken nose in the scuffle.
Back at the van, I caught another hint of that delicious aroma drifting through the air and I jerked around to search for its source. I found her standing behind a group of shifters, her eyes burning with fury as they raked over the drugged out rabbit shifter. I willed her to look at me, but she avoided my eyes as though she knew that’s what I wanted and instead intentionally chose to be defiant. Before I could do something to make her look, she was gone. I growled, frustrated that again, she slipped away.
I had felt her anger as though it was a living, breathing entity. It was almost as though, if I tried, I might’ve even been able to hear her thoughts. I didn’t try. I was tempted, but something held me back. There was some little niggling at the back of my brain, some little recognition of what that kind of connection might mean.
“Maxim?” Serge was staring at me, his anger visible, too. “Get in the fucking van.”
I scanned once more for “Carrot Cake” before getting in and slamming the door shut. She was hiding from me. That was fine. It was a small island. I’d find her.
5
Parker
I sat behind my desk at the bed and breakfast, still fuming over what I’d witnessed the day before. I hadn’t been able to sleep much last night, I was so angry. A local rabbit shifter had been beaten by those big, muscled, testosterone-fueled bully bears. Sure, the rabbit, Jamie, had been crazy and strung out on drugs. He hadn’t been acting right, but they didn’t have to beat him. And what the hell was Jamie doing getting hooked on drugs? Our population of rabbits was less than two hundred—worldwide! We couldn’t afford for a single one of us to be lost to street drugs.
God, once it got out that Jamie had been beaten up by a group of apex predators, I was most certainly going to die a withered old spinster. No rabbit was going to set foot on Sunkissed Key. The males of my species were careful. A little too careful at times, but who could blame them for not wanting to face off with a bunch of polar bears.
I groaned out loud and leaned back in my chair. “I’m destined to go through life alone.”
Penny popped her head out of the dining room and frowned. “Who are you talking to?”
“Myself? Mother nature? The universe? I don’t know.”
She furrowed her brows and shook her head. “Just…keep it down.”
I groaned louder and was rewarded with Penny throwing a leftover cinnamon roll at me. Of course, I caught it. I was a shifter with quick reflexes. Plus, I’d skipped breakfast and was ravenous.
I kept picturing that one especially cocky looking polar bear from the day before. He’d almost gotten his head blown off by Jamie because he was so confident that he could handle a little rabbit shifter. Ha! Then, he’d made that comment about rabbit stew. Disgusting. It was unfortunate he was such a Neanderthal because he smelled so good, like pine forests and spiced oranges.
The bell chimed and I looked up to greet whoever was arriving. “Welcome to—”
“Save your spiel. It’s just me.” Laila waved me off as she entered holding a wrapped sandwich that I could smell as soon as the door opened. “I brought you food, since you always seem to be starving to death.”
I tore into the vegan sandwich and moaned as it hit the bottomless pit that was my stomach. “Thank you! I can’t stop thinking about food today. I don’t know what it is.”
“Your period?”
I shook my head and shoved more food into my mouth.
“Pregnant?”
I snorted. “That would require sex with someone other than myself.”
Penny poked her head back out of the dining room. “Do you mind?”
I glared at her. “I’m sorry that I’m interrupting your polishing the silverware routine.”
“I’m sorry that I don’t want to hear about your masturbation sessions.”
“I don’t have to take this abuse, you know?”
“Quit. I dare you.” She laughed. “No one else on this island would be loco enough to hire you.”
I pouted at her and took another bite of my sandwich. Talking with my mouth full, I complained. “Lay off, boss lady. I’m having a bad day.”
“Because of the gorgeous guys who roughed up the asshole who was beating his old lady yesterday?”
I scowled at Laila. “Do you have to put it that way?”
“What way? Like they’re heroes?”
“They’re literally predators. Not heroes. And they’re scaring off all my potential baby-making partners. No decent prospect is going to come to this island if those ruffians are on the loose.”
Penny wagged her brows. “They’re more than on the loose. They’re wild and hot and if I wasn’t happily married, I’d let any one of them get loose on me. Come rough me up a bit.”
“Are you serious? Go back to your silverware, ya’ freak.” I pursed my lips. “How are all the women on this island blinded by the looks of those cretins. They have muscles, so what? They’re handsome, so what? They smell really good, so what? That stuff doesn’t matter in the long run.”
Laila giggled. “They smell really good?”
“Not the point.”
“What is the point, Parker?”
“Well, Penny, the point is that I want a man who has the right qualities to become decent marriage materials. Qualities like loyalty, and commitment and, oh yeah,
humility! Someone who will be as dedicated to my causes as I am and who will marry me and have little…Parker babies with me.” I couldn’t say rabbit babies, but that’s what I meant. “No man like that is going to come here while those beasts are on the loose.”
“Those beasts, as you called them, are helping this town and its unique brand of crime. Plus, they’re beautiful. And you’ll find your significant other whether those beautiful creatures are here or not.”
She didn’t get it. I wasn’t going to meet a rabbit with those polar bears on the island and without a rabbit, I had no chance of doing my part to help save my species. There was a very real possibility that in another couple generations, we would become completely extinct.
And that damned Hugh Hefner moniker would follow us to our graves.
I groaned and flopped back in my chair, letting my arms hang limply out to my sides. “You don’t get it!”
“I have to get back to work. I just wanted to drop off the sandwich, and you’re being weird.”
“And I have silverware to polish. You are being weird, Parker.”
I rolled my eyes to the ceiling. “You’re both fair-weather friends.”
Laila just laughed. “I’ll see you later. Your place after work?”
“Let’s do Mimi’s. I need a drink. Or a couple.”
Penny popped back out of the dining room. “Maybe you’ll run into one of those good smelling hunks there.”
God, I really hoped not.
6
Parker
I usually just drank at home or had a little “Irish coffee” at Latte Love. Even though Paige didn’t technically serve alcohol, she kept a bottle of whiskey behind the counter—hush-hush and only for her close circle of friends.
Tactical Bear (P.O.L.A.R. Series Book 4) Page 2
