Bear Me Away (Alpha Werebear Paranormal Romance) (A Jamesburg Shifter Romance)

by Lynn Red

  The room still smelled like him – like his leather gloves, and his sweat and his hard masculinity. But then, hanging in the air with it, was her. Her scent, mixed with his.

  Slowly, it faded, and she smiled longingly.

  She trekked outside, feet scrunching first on the grass and then on the rubber. She clenched her toes, digging in, then hopped up on the landscaping timber around the bed. She felt nimble and alive. That was different.

  With a flick of her foot, she tossed her phone in the air, and grabbed it as it fell.

  Immediately, that warmth trickled away. Eight calls, two from Ralph, five from Paul and one from an unknown number. There was a lot of bullshit, but as she flipped through the voicemails, one thing stuck out.

  “We know where she is,” Ralph said in one of his voice mails. “But we can’t prove anything. Can’t tie her to anything. Also, we found something else.”

  She didn’t want to read the next words.

  “Some kind of plant killer. Some kind of... fungus? I don’t know. Something is killing Jamesburg’s carrots. All of them.”

  Elena slid the phone into her pocket and balanced on one foot, then hopped off the timber and trotted to the Buick. Shaking her head, she turned the ignition and sped away, but not in the direction of the address Ralph gave her.

  She needed a partner, but with Paul nursing a hangover, there was only one other person she trusted.

  She only hoped he felt the same way.

  -9-

  “Sometimes, bad ideas are your ONLY ideas.”

  Elena

  What the hell am I doing? Getting a boyfriend isn’t enough, now I need to turn him into another detective?

  Elena steered her boat down the road, around a corner, and checked the map. Normally she was a GPS devotee but out here in the Jamesburg boondocks, a lot of places didn’t pick up signal, or were under such heavy tree cover that there wasn’t any point to trying. Anyway, she liked the idea of not having to rely on technology she couldn’t explain to a six year old for survival.

  Paul always rode her about that. He’d warble at her for being a Luddite, and she’d snap back and ask what he’d do when the power grid went out. They went back and forth like that all the time, and before West strode into her life with his vegetarian, cowboy swagger, she never felt as comfortable with anyone as she did with Paul and their verbal jousts.

  She took a deep breath and let it out as a sigh.

  The forest was getting denser, which meant she was on the right path. Only problem is, she couldn’t remember where the turnoff was. As soon as the forest broke and she was driving through fields, Elena pulled to the shoulder and hopped out the window, then on top of the car.

  Shielding her face from the sun, she peered around, over top of corn plants, trying to see the road.

  What she saw was about a thousand times better than a road. West had his shirt off, and was already somehow glistening with sweat even though he hadn’t left her ten minutes before she took off after him. His huge, sloped shoulders stooped as he entered the house.

  In one fluid motion, she was back in the car, the engine was roaring, and she was turning. Left, then left again, and finally a right, she pulled up to the front of his little house.

  She approached the door and heard the sound of something falling into a bowl, and then a can cracking. After what they’d just done, knocking seemed a little ridiculous, and after all, he had stalked her, so she figured it was turnabout being fair play.

  A cop? She thought, as she crept inside and saw a picture – an old one – of West standing beside someone. That must be ten years ago, maybe more. They were standing in front of a long-closed Pizza Inn that she remembered used to be in the middle of the Jamesburg town square. Is this your secret? But why hide being a cop?

  She filed it away in her considerable memory banks, and continued her unintentionally silent approach to the kitchen where she heard some crunching, and a sigh of refreshment. Sure enough, in a little shadowbox sitting in a recess in the wall, was an old badge, the sort the Jamesburg cops keep, even though they’re not supposed to keep them.

  That’s why he didn’t call the cops. Something stopped him. I knew that line about reading our reviews on Yelp was a load of shit. She narrowed her eyes, scrutinizing the badge for a second. Does he have some connection to Ralph? He seems way too interested in this case for just a random cop who wants to make a point.

  And then her detective eyes caught something else, something much more disturbing.

  Boxed Star Wars figures? She shook her head. I guess everyone’s got a skeleton in their closet.

  Slowly, she approached the open concept kitchen that would have made any number of HGTV hosts very proud. Slate gray granite countertops, smartly designed natural wood cabinets with European style hinges, and an understated, but fancy enough to stare at, breakfast table rounded out the look.

  Of course, at said table, sat a very large, shirtless bear, who had a bowl that seemed to hold about three quarts of stuff, eating Grape-nuts and drinking beer?

  “Talk about mixed nutrition signals,” Elena said.

  “Shit!” West swore, jumping about four inches out of his seat. His knees hit the underside of the table. Grape-nuts sloshed, spilling over onto the perfectly distressed wood of his table, and one of the three beers he had sitting beside the bowl took a quick trip to the ground. Somehow, he saved the beer on its way down. He didn’t seem so concerned about the cereal, which pooled on the table, then ran off the side.

  “When did you get here?” he said, laughing at the massive wet spot on his leg.

  “That looks familiar,” Elena said, with a grin.

  “Yeah well, the other one was about a thousand times better. This one just feels like... whatever Grape-nuts are made out of, stuck to my leg with milk.”

  Elena grabbed a towel off the stainless steel double-oven and threw it to him. “Little early for beer, isn’t it?” she asked.

  “I guess I could eat a bunch of pine nuts, but, well... Anyway, it’s got some protein in it. That’s good, right?” He flashed that smile that she couldn’t deny, and stood, grabbing her tight and pulling her against his soaking pants. “I’m glad you came,” he said, “but I’m not sure why you did. I thought you had to work. Unless you want to spend the day lounging around, and—”

  He kissed her neck, and pushed her hair back so he could suck behind her ear. Elena moaned softly, laughed under her breath, and pushed him away. “What I want doesn’t matter much. Not right now.”

  “Then—”

  “I got a call. Actually I got eight of them while we were, uh, indisposed.”

  “Is this about my garden?”

  Cocking a grin, Elena shook her head. “You ever thought of being a private eye?”

  Surprisingly, West looked a little more stunned than she expected for such an obviously dumb joke. “Why?” he finally asked, with a slightly defensive tone.

  Elena looked at him, confused. “I was just asking, I saw the cop stuff in the front and—”

  Something fierce flashed in his eyes, and then a split second later, vanished. He looked down at the table, and pushed the Grape-nut soup around with the toe of his boot. “Long time ago,” he said. “Too long. That was a different life that I want to leave where it is.”

  Not wanting to deal with anything remotely serious, not right then, Elena turned the tables with smoothness that surprised her. “You don’t have a Boba Fett,” she said.

  Suddenly, his eyes lit up. “Oh yeah I do, what are you talking about? I’ve got a Slave-One in the box and three different Boba Fetts from the first run of Empire Strikes Back toys, and,” he finally took a breath. “You’re making fun of me, aren’t you?” he asked as Elena cracked a grin.

  “Maybe a little?”

  “I’ll have you know,” he lectured, “those are not dolls or toys. They’re articulated figurines. That set is worth over ten grand. Ten grand! And each of those statues is—”

  “I’m
sorry,” she giggled. “Did you just call a Luke Skywalker action figure a statue?”

  He continued, blatantly ignoring her heresy. “Each of those statues was lovingly crafted and made to exact specifications. They are perfect examples, every single one of them. Look at this.”

  West, still shirtless, still beautiful, but also slightly dorky – which made him even more incredible to Elena, crossed the living room, a glimmer in his eye. Knowing he wasn’t some perfect, flawless, marble cut-out of a calendar hunk made him seem more real, and that’s what she needed.

  He grabbed a Darth Vader. “Look at the detailing,” he said. “His legs, with the exact replication of the texture from the movie. And look at this one!”

  After showing her approximately half the cast of the movies, most of whom she’d never heard of before – she was absolutely amazed that he even knew the name of the Cantina band, although slightly concerned for his sanity – West exhaled heavily, like he’d just... well, like he was coming down from a climax.

  She grabbed at his crotch, making him jump again.

  “Hey! What was that for?”

  Elena grinned. “Just making sure you didn’t actually get a hard-on for those toys. I was getting worried for a second.”

  He stammered for a second, and then actually blushed.

  “There’s something I never thought I’d see, as long as I lived. A blushing bear,” Elena said, letting him grab her again. “But I guess I’ll take it. I’m just happy you get that excited about something, even if it is, you know, dolls.”

  Laughing, he whipped her off the ground, spinning her around in a long embrace punctuated by the sort of kiss that only happens when someone first falls in love. Tasting love, tasting the joy and the ecstasy, neither wanted the moment to end. Both of them held on, both of them clinging to a love they never thought they’d find, and even though they weren’t ready to admit it, both of them had longed for as long as they could remember.

  “So that’s it?” Elena asked. “One long, wonderful kiss, and a long, curious lecture about Star Wars toys?”

  “I spilled that cereal, too,” West said, unable to contain his smile. “Saved the beer though.”

  “Thank God for the small victories, huh?”

  Inches apart, Elena could feel the heat radiating off of West. She wanted him so badly it hurt. The place where he’d been only minutes before ached for him, yearned to have him back, but she knew that at that moment, there was something more important – or at least more pressing.

  “We need to break into someone’s house,” she said, flatly. “Wait, that’s not exactly what I meant.”

  “So we aren’t breaking into someone’s house?” He still hadn’t mentioned the cop thing, but at this point she was starting to wonder why. “Or we are. Because last I checked that isn’t really legal.”

  “Yeah, half the shit I do to catch sleazeballs cheating on their mates isn’t really legal either, but there you go. Listen, my partner has a friend on the force, and—”

  “Is it Ralph?”

  Cocking her head to the side, Elena stared with disbelief. “How’d you know?”

  West cocked his head to the left, indicating one of the pictures. “That’s him, ten years back. He had a thing for going against the chain of command then, too.”

  “I don’t understand. Is that why...?”

  “Why I quit?” he asked. “No. That’s not it at all. There were a lot of reasons, actually, but the biggest one had to do with my heart.”

  Elena stood back and watched his face, remaining silent. She didn’t want to interrupt whatever he was thinking, but at the same time, the clock was ticking.

  “It was me, really, is what I mean. I don’t have a heart condition, if that’s what you’re wondering.” He smiled briefly. “I had too much of a bad thing. I was angry, and instead of being able to calm down, I was just getting worse. I’d catch myself seconds away from doing something I’d regret. I always stopped myself from hurting anyone, except,” he trailed off, his mind obviously far away.

  West’s eyes moved back and forth like he was watching a video that reminded him of the world before. Absentmindedly, he curled Elena’s frosted copper hair around a finger and then let the coil spring off.

  “Except what?” she asked, urging him to continue.

  “Except one time I didn’t stop myself. It was this,” he swallowed. Elena brushed his face. “I’m okay. There was a guy who was coming home from the Tavern, late at night on a Thursday. December... something. I forget exactly, but I remember the snow. It was falling in slow, patient waves, but falling hard. The roads were frozen, mostly, and the blanket of snow on top gave cars just enough traction to make the people driving them think they had more control than they did.”

  Elena watched his face and frowned slightly. She had a feeling where this was going.

  “You don’t have to tell me this if you don’t want.”

  He shook his big head and then turned his eyes back to Elena. “No, you... you give me this kind of comfort,” he whispered. “You make me calm like nothing I’ve ever felt. I came out here to get away from the things that gave me rage. It worked. I’m calm now. But every so often, I still feel it bubble up. Around you, though?” he shook his head again. “All I feel is peace.”

  She swallowed and slid her hand along his jawline, to the back of his head, massaging his neck softly.

  “Anyway, there was, this wolf, one of Danniken’s – the town alpha? His pack back before he was alpha. Anyway, this wolf was driving a delivery truck, and stopped off at The Tavern. Apparently delivering toilet paper to grocery stores didn’t carry much excitement, so this guy had a few, as wolves tend to do. He wasn’t stumbling around, wasn’t a walking mess, but he’d had a few. He plowed into a car, and killed the people in it. Almost all of them. Only good part is the little kid in the back made it.”

  “Jesus,” Elena said. “That must’ve been horrible.” The fact that the guy came from the cannery stuck in her mind, but somehow she managed to not say anything. Keeping her mouth shut wasn’t one of Elena’s strong suits, but the pain on West’s face made it easy to support him instead of blabbering.

  “The car wrecks were the worst. Worse than gunshots, worse than stabbings. Worse than anything. But that wasn’t it. With this,” he caught himself. “That job, you learn to turn off your emotions until shit is taken care of, then you can cry later, you know?”

  She nodded.

  “Anyway, what did it wasn’t the wreck, or the bodies, it was that the guy didn’t give a fuck what he did. He was standing there, pissed off at the world, and he couldn’t have possibly cared less.”

  “What happened?” Elena stroked his cheek.

  “I almost killed him. I don’t remember it, not at all. I remember taking the first swing at his smug face, and then... yeah, nothing. Ralph stopped me. It took a lot of Tasers and a lot of rubber bullets, but after that? I couldn’t go back. So, I came out here.”

  “I’m sorry,” was all she could think to say. In response, he just held her tighter.

  “That’s part of why I need you,” he whispered.

  “The other?” she asked.

  “The other is because I love you,” he said, stopping her heart right then and there. “But didn’t you say something about breaking into a house? Might as well get on that. I’m not good with subtlety but if I need to, I can probably plow through a wall.”

  He kissed her one more time, and dragged her out the door by a hand. Elena, for maybe the first time in her life, was absolutely, totally speechless.

  -10-

  “They want carrotsh? I’ll give ‘em carrotsh.”

  -Petunia

  The dentures clicked into place, and Petunia lifted the rib eye into the air on the end of her knife, staring at the marbling. “There’sh nothing like you,” she said. “Why couldn’t I be born shomething elshe?”

  This pair of dentures didn’t fit quite as well as the others, even though both pairs gave her a
lisp. But these teeth? These teeth had a mission.

  Her paranoia paid off. When she first hatched her plan to free the citizens of Jamesburg from carrots, it was a loose, sort of confused, pointless mission. Clarity fell on her though.

  In the haze of radish guts, cucumber seeds, and squished eggplants, she realized her calling.

  “I’ll show you,” she said, slurring slightly at the picture of her hunched up mother that she kept pinned to the wall of her dining room. It was sequestered between a lovely doll of German make, and one from a London doll maker she’d dated to the 1880s. She hated that picture of her mother, but that’s exactly why she kept it around.

  “Thish town ish gonna be free. No more foul, dripping, squishy vegetablesh. No more shtrained peashe,” she paused to wipe the drool off her chin, and stared at the meat. Crystals of salt sparkled in the light from her chandelier. Freshly ground pepper dotted the red. She turned it around on the knife, watching the glittering.

  She licked her teeth, then her lips, although when she did that, the fox fang dentures tugged slightly on her tongue. She liked the way it hurt just a little when she ate, like it was penance for something she’d done along the way.

  A moment later, she flopped the hunk of raw meat back down on the plate. “Wobbly veggiesh,” she lisped. “Boiled cabbagesh, ah!”

  She pushed back from the table and threw her head back, clawing at the sides of her face. While scratching at herself, Petunia caught a glimpse of the clock. It was time, she saw, to catch the news.

  Clicking her teeth, the cranked up rabbit flicked on her TV and sat back down. A story ran about a school crossing guard trying to start his own crossing guard for hire business, and being fired. Then the weather – hot and muggy – and then sports.

  “Where’sh my shtory?” she asked. She was sure the mess she’d made the night before, and the night before that, especially where she ruined the Jamesburg Cannery’s fields, would show up. She’d put in too much time, made too much of a problem. Eliminated too many damned carrots and peas and everything else, to be ignored.