by Sasha Winter
That he had been drawn to a place his stomach liked best wasn’t exactly a surprise, but the result was. Maybe Erin had failed to lock the place properly, but more likely his great bulk had something to do with it—either way he should’ve known better and, even in one of his ravenous moods, should’ve been able to hold back. The incident had encouraged him to take better care of his diet; even when faced with hectic days, he told himself, don’t be afraid to shout up for some jelly donuts.
Now the incident had come back to haunt him in a new way, however. It was foolish to think that he could get to know Erin better and not have her finding out at some point that he had been the bear in question.
He hesitated but decided that, when the time came, he would just have to bite the bullet and tell her. She was too much of a lure to move on without knowing whether they could have something special. Turning away that curly dark hair and those gorgeous green eyes was an act his friends would have beaten him around the head for if they found out (actually they would probably have been more likely to bring up the two generous portions of something that were not on the menu, which every hot-blooded male was challenged not to look at whenever she leaned forward to hand over their change). You didn’t need to be six and a half feet tall as he was to become aware of those, though it was far too premature to feel grateful for them just yet.
‘Sunday evening’s a great idea,’ came the response to his suggestion.
‘You know a place in Cold Lake that would be good?’
‘A couple off the top of my head, but I’ll have to check to see if they’re definitely open and get back to you on here—or in the bakery if you happen to be around.’
‘Probably not—regrettably so—work’s got me upstate for the next couple of days, but I guess it just means we can look forward to Sunday.’
‘Looking forward to it already.’
Tom was thinking what to ask Erin next, keen to have some points of conversation when their date came to help disguise his shyness around beautiful women. If he wasn’t talking to them about a law enforcement matter he clammed up and, being as sizeable as he was, he often worried it came across as weird. People just didn’t expect a person of his type, especially not a cop, to be anything other than supremely confident—although at least their interaction at the bakery meant she knew not to be terrified of him like some were.
Almost on cue, however, as he mentioned work to Erin, his train of thought was interrupted by the buzz of his cell phone. Seeing that it was Jake—the county sheriff—Tom knew it would be regarding a matter of some importance and that pretending to be asleep would not be an option. Managing to speed type the garbled half-gibberish message of, ‘Argh! Phone interruptnn!’, he hoped that Erin would understand and not think he’d left her hanging.
“Yeah?” he said, on pressing the receiver.
“Hey, Tom. Looks like we’ve got another one,” came the response he’d been dreading but sort of predicting. Jake wouldn’t have called at that hour except on some important development, and the ‘another one’ he was referring to was a dead body. A third dead body in a case the like of which Tom would’ve hoped to never encounter. Two could’ve been a coincidence—not that Tom thought that—but three wouldn’t be dismissed by even the laziest of their team. Three was the magic number for knowing you had a serial killer on your hands, but more disturbing for Tom was the fact that he thought the killer to be a fellow bear shifter.
“You certain?” he asked, knowing the answer would be ‘yes’. Already all the excitement he had felt over his conversation with Erin had drained away, replaced by a sense of foreboding and an image of blood and guts lining the side of the road, that he knew to have been repeated.
“Damn certain,” Jake replied. “Same forest road, a couple of miles closer to Cold Lake this time. Same gruesome mess—the team’s on its way out to start the whole clean up. Sorry buddy, but you’d better get out here.”
“Of course,” Tom replied, ignoring the apology even though he knew Jake was not referring to the late hour he was calling. That was part of the job; Jake was actually a best friend as well as a colleague, and he knew about his suspicions that the killer was a bear shifter and why that would prove so alarming. “I’ll be right on my way, man,” he concluded, then hung up.
Leveling his mind with what was going on wouldn’t be easy. Neither would seeing another grisly scene which having the stomach of a predator did not, for some reason, make any easier to withstand. The last one had given him nightmares, but not just because of the gore. His shifter nature meant he was doomed to have a personal connection with the case, as if it was crying out for him to solve it, even though it was the one he least desired to work on. There were no other bear shifters working in the local forces, and it was obvious that his colleagues, even those more attuned to investigatory work, would be looking to him for expertise.
Tom faced a real problem in getting across the message that the killings made no more sense to him than anyone else. It was the same as with any psychopath who murdered for cruelty’s sake; the public was left with the same question each time.
Why?
In looking to understand the killer’s motivations, Tom was left groping in the dark as much as with every other sad tale of senseless murder. This didn't change the fact that he was a bear shifter, however, and would be called upon to understand the nature and even the thinking of the individual at work. Was he not also able to transform into the wild’s most powerful land predator, with fangs and claws to tear the head off a moose if he so chose? Did he not also know what it was like to walk on all fours and scent blood? Even those who harbored no shifter prejudices would be asking such questions and, although he could hardly blame them, failing to have any useful answers would likely cast him in a poor light—as if he was in denial as to what was going on, or even looking out for his own ‘people’.
This case had so many dire connotations attached to it that just thinking about them made his brain whirl in circles. This was supposed to be the age of enlightenment; the historic realization of shifter rights and integration into regular human society.
A bear shifter serial killer wasn’t going to help any of that.
Hell no.
Local media attention would intensify now they were sure what the perpetrator was and, either the nationals would follow, or else they would resist and result in conspiracy theories about the government hiding the real truth about how unruly some shifters could still be. It was a lose–lose situation, unless the killer could be caught quickly and they found some non-shifter related matter to be at work.
Tom even found himself thinking, why did it have to be a bear? Being among the least understood and certainly the shyest of shifter folk, his kin would be in a poor position to be weathering the storm of this one. They had always been there as the shifters that humans might fear the most, were it not for the fact that their great bulk was counteracted by a stereotypical gentleness and docility. As stupid—and in fact insulting—as Winnie the Pooh stereotypes actually were, he was under no illusion that they were there to be embraced during this time in history, for his kin’s own good. Only an out-of-control bear shifter serial killer might succeed in quashing all that cuddliness, reminding people of what else a bear is capable of. Instead of having bouncy English buddies and eating honey, the public’s sentiments would likely to be pushed towards imagining what might have happened to Goldilocks had she failed to get out of the house in time once she had eaten all the porridge.
This one was going to give him sleepless nights at best; at worst tear his world apart…and he was still yet to witness the bloody crime scene.
Tom had the composure to recall that he had been talking with Erin and remembered to send a message of apology for cutting things short. Sorry, work calls. Talk to you soon.
Then he grabbed his coat and headed out to a task his willpower would seek to repel every inch of the way, wishing that it was already Sunday so that he could be with Erin.
> 3
During the three-day wait before her date with Tom came around, Erin’s initial delight and excitement had been gradually overwhelmed by nerves. After countless months of lying awake wondering when love, or the possibility of it, might return to her life, she had forgotten just how much meeting men was also a daunting experience; the more so for being so out of practice.
The two of them had returned to the dating website for one further short exchange since Tom had asked her out on the date, because Erin had to break it to him that no decent eateries were open on Sunday evening and so they had to rethink their dinner plans. Professional lives that demanded daft hours also demanded being creative and versatile with personal lives, and so Erin had suggested he come round to her place and she cook for him.
She just had to hope he didn’t get the wrong idea from that invitation…
Although making a needlessly self-deprecating comment about the right way to his heart being through his stomach (it wasn’t like he was a bloater or anything), Tom did resist initially, pointing out that, although they had already established that he loved her cooking, that her idea was effectively him asking her to take work home for his benefit. Erin’s response was to concede that he was right, but that she simply wouldn’t hear of an alternative so long as one couldn’t be figured out, and besides…she loved cooking. There would be another time for Italian food—there always was.
So the rearrangements were settled. Tom was coming around for dinner on Sunday night, and she damn well wanted to make a good impression.
As the evening neared, Erin found her nerves were quadrupled as a result. As much as she longed for a date, a busy restaurant where there were lots of distractions and observations to make would have been preferable, especially for a first meeting. Undoubtedly there would be far more opportunities for awkward silences in the still environment of her own house, which increased the likelihood of awkward comments if they became desperate for conversation or if she was generally making a fool of herself.
She was accustomed to making pleasant chitchat with the multiple brief exchanges she had on a daily basis, but she feared she’d forgotten how to connect other than on frivolous ‘small talk’ matters. Dating couples were supposed to get to know each other, and her instincts were stuck between gabbling to hope for some good content coming out, or else holding back and giving him the opportunity to talk. The latter would mean there was less chance of embarrassing herself, but given Tom probably thought of her as comfortable in conversation there was also the chance of coming across as stand-offish.
There was just so much to worry about!
As the hour of his arrival approached, Erin was glad to have cooking to focus on, which allowed her to focus on the one addition to the evening she was at least confident of getting right. Other than that, she was driving blind, having no idea what they would talk about or how she should behave in order to appear interested but not desperate.
Deciding what to wear had also taken her all day. There were enough dilemmas to consider when going out, but staying in really threw the rulebook up in the air. She was at home so guessed that she would have to look relaxed in some way, but smart also because it was a first date and failing to dress up felt lazy. Then there was the dilemma of how ‘available’ to look. In the privacy of her own home, she didn’t have to worry about looking too skanky; there was a temptation to be slightly risky and give him a sexier impression of her than working at the bakery in her typical jeans and flowing blouses usually provided, but the desire to make his jaw drop was counterbalanced against self-respect.
She knew she wouldn’t be hard to get for a sexy man like him, but she conceded that looking too forward was unwise. Sure, they were in her house, but maybe he was one of those rare men who made a point of not trying to bang a girl on a first date. Forcing her brain to acknowledge that she also desired a partner—as well as a good romp in the bedroom—in the end Erin decided on a cream-textured short-sleeved shirt-dress combo, which felt more casual than a full-on dress for being buttoned, while still being an ideal shape for showing her legs and ample curves. It wasn’t particularly low-cut, but with breasts like hers there was always cleavage on display anyway.
It had been a long time since she’d been sensitive about men staring at them… they were just such as obvious part of her. A fairly manual profession surrounded by cookers meant it was either be comfortable with that or else a load of sweat patches later. Get used to it or do something else, baby. Additionally, Erin had taken her hair out of its usual ponytail and let it hang loose for a change, admitting she was impressed by the thicker look and a certain vibrancy it gave her.
When the doorbell rang, the knot in her stomach tightened and, though hardly able to feel her legs, she managed to reach the front door. She took a deep breath and opened it before saying hello to an inch of chest hair poking out the top of a casually buttoned shirt.
“What the…? Oh…”
She had forgotten the step up to the serving counter in her bakery, and she found that Tom was even taller than she realized, demanding she flex her neck back more than she was used to. Being barefooted was a mistake—she should’ve put her cowboy boots on so she wouldn’t seem so damn tiny, or maybe even high heels…although they weren’t really her thing.
“Hello to you too, Erin.”
Tom responded to her shock with a warm smile and a slight look of surprise of his own which gave her encouragement that the decision-making had not been a disaster.
“Sorry, I just forgot how tall you are,” she replied with an embarrassed grin.
“Yes, I hear the same from all the NBA recruiters,” he said in a teasing tone.
She laughed, only then noticing that he was holding a bouquet of flowers in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other. “Oh! Flowers! You shouldn’t have.”
“The least I could do after you offered to cook,” Tom replied. “I’ve got no idea whether you like wine, though, so no worries at all if it ends up collecting dust somewhere.’
“Are you kidding? That will go great with dinner! I’ll get it on ice.”
Once inside, the conversation went very quickly. It turned out there was a lot more to talk about than Erin had suspected, and she almost had to pinch herself that she was neither gabbling nor endeavoring to fill awkward silences. Unpracticed though she was in this dating game, they were hitting it off well, which caused her to suppose they might be well suited to each other.
Talking about the dating site was a convenient place to start.
“I was really surprised to find you on Dare2Bear,” Tom said. “I always thought you were taken by some other lucky person.”
“I thought the same about you,” Erin replied, her cheeks flushing. “So what brought you onto it?”
He shrugged. “Friend of mine recommended it, I think. Probably because I’ve been single for so long. My work hours are a bit weird, and most of the spare time I have is early in the mornings. Not exactly the best time to try and pick up women.”
Erin chuckled. “Indeed. If anyone hit on me first thing in the morning, I’d probably throw a sandwich at them.”
“Ah, so that’s the real reason you’re single,” Tom said with a grin. “You throw sandwiches at all the poor unsuspecting men who try to ask you out.”
The two of them laughed at that, and they kept talking in the kitchen while the food finished cooking, soon accompanied by two glasses of white wine. Shortly afterwards, Erin began to feel very relaxed in Tom’s company. She had no idea that he was originally from New York, but his parents had decided he should move to a more rural setting after some health concerns as a teenager. Erin didn’t pry about them, considering that whatever they had been hadn’t stopped him growing to a size that would make any criminal think twice. The only slightly awkward moment was when she decided to ask a little about his work, which caused him to frown a little.
“Some people don’t expect it so much away from the cities, but work can be a bit gruesome at
times,” he told her, a little gingerly.
“I’m sorry, I guess I watch too many TV shows,” she replied—although this was not the case.
“Oh, no worries, I just wouldn’t want to freak you out, that’s all. Guess I need to think up some funny stories to tell people.”
“Well, at least you guys are pretty well thought of around here,” she said. “Cops have bad reputations in a lot of areas, but all the regulars who visit the bakery speak unguardedly around you and often ask after Jake…erm…what’s his last name again?”
“McClintock.”
“That’s right, Tocky they call him; makes for a nice community feeling if people get on with the authorities.”
“Thanks! Doesn’t surprise me about Jake, though,” Tom replied. “He’s been building up his reputation in these parts since day one without anyone ever having an issue with him. The locals in his town call him the ‘good ol’ boy’. Come to think of it, he was the one who recommended Dare2Bear to me.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. His nephew met his wife on it a few years ago. Anyway, he’s a great example to the younger guys like me who are supposed to look out for people. I suspect his boys will follow in his footsteps.’
“He has kids? I didn’t know.”
“Yeah, two boys and a girl and they all love country music, want to drive a truck and be cops. It’s almost annoying really; Jake isn’t even forty yet and he has absolutely everything in place and figured out.”
“Oh well! We won’t be too bitter about it,” Erin said, laughing and resisting telling him he could have all of that someday. Having a tall, good-looking man in her kitchen was resulting in an almost visceral level of excitement. Consequently, she almost felt she deserved an Oscar for appearing to be so cool, calm and collected. So far they had avoided any of the awkward moments or silences she had feared and it was time to serve the food.
