The Bear's Reluctant Mate (Uncontrollable Shift Book Three)

by R. E. Butler

  The door swung open and Tomlin said, “You ready to take a shift at the bar?”

  Cruz glanced at the clock and realized the time had slipped away. Juliette hadn’t called yet, so he assumed she was hard at work. “You bet.”

  “Everything okay?” Tomlin asked, arching a brow at Cruz as he got up and walked to the door.

  “Better than okay. I’m going to romance the hell out of my mate this week and by the time Friday comes, she’ll be ready to join me here. After our date.”

  “So sure of yourself, Casanova?”

  “Hell yes.”

  Tomlin clapped him on the shoulder. “I’m happy for you. But if you’re planning to bring her back here on Friday, don’t you think you should talk to the clan first?”

  Cruz froze. “I was going to wait.”

  “If you weren’t so sure she’d want to join you here, I’d say that would be fine. But if there’s a female in the house, clan members are going to know something’s up. It wouldn’t be good for her to be the one to share the news with the clan.”

  “Yeah,” Cruz said, rubbing his chin. “I hadn’t thought about that. I’ll call a meeting for Thursday.”

  “I’ll put out the word. At the house?”

  “Yeah. Thanks.”

  “That’s what seconds are for.”

  His brother had been his right-hand male from the get-go. Cruz was thankful for Tomlin’s clear head at a time like this, because all he could think about was Juliette and getting her in his home where he could take care of her.

  As he headed to the bar to handle drinks for a couple hours and wait for Juliette’s call, he texted his mom.

  I need a favor.

  Sure, honey. What’s up?

  I want to send Juliette some blackberry tarts tomorrow. She liked them so much.

  You’re very sweet. We can easily do that, there’s a delivery van headed up her direction in the morning.

  I’ll have another package to go along with them.

  Of course. I’m so proud of you.

  For what?

  Being a good male. Your mate is human and you didn’t bat an eye. You clearly want to take care of her and that speaks volumes.

  Thanks, Mom.

  Standing behind the counter, he filled a couple drink orders and looked over the club. There were no new faces, which made him reflect on the point of the meeting with Juliette. He wouldn’t be using her for leverage for the club’s business, but he still needed to figure out a way to get the club’s business to grow.

  Stella, one of the bears who worked at the club, came over to pick up her drinks.

  “Hey,” he said, his mind spinning as a plan formed. “Are your sisters busy?”

  Stella had two younger sisters who were twenty-one and twenty-two.

  Her head tilted and she snorted. “Those two? Except for partying, they’re hardly busy at all. They’re taking a class at the community college so they don’t have to get a job, which my parents aren’t happy about. They want them mated or working, but they made the mistake of saying if they went to college they wouldn’t have to get jobs. Millennials.” She rolled her eyes.

  “They use social media, right?”

  “Are you kidding? They’re on all the time.”

  “Perfect. Can you tell them to come see me?”

  “Sure. When?”

  “In an hour.”

  She gave him a thumbs-up mixed with a curious look and left with the tray of drinks. By the time the young females arrived, Cruz had turned over the bartending duties to another male and was with Tomlin in his office.

  Becca and Myrian were all giggles and wide eyes as they waited to be invited into Tomlin’s office. “Ladies,” Tomlin said, “have a seat.”

  His brother had been impressed with his idea to use the younger bears’ social media savvy for the bar. It had taken only a cursory glance at the girls’ online accounts to see they had quite a following and were interested in everything from fashion to clubbing. Except they never clubbed at The Den, and after some digging, he realized that none of the younger clan members hung out at the club, either.

  “We’d like to hire you,” Cruz said.

  If possible, their eyes went even wider, which was almost comical.

  “For what?” Becca, the older of the two, asked, her voice cracking a little with nerves.

  “To handle the social media for the club,” he said. “We’ll pay you each fifteen dollars an hour. We’ll expect you to post to your social media accounts about the club as well as handling the club’s accounts. You’ll be accountable for your time to us, we’ll be expecting you to work ten to fifteen hours each week.”

  “Really?” Myrian asked. “Do we need to work here, like have an office, or can we work from home?”

  “Well,” Becca said, stepping in, “we’ll have to be here to take videos and pics to post, but we can do some stuff at home, maybe?”

  Tomlin nodded. “That’s no problem.”

  “We want the club to be a place where shifters and humans want to hang out. In order to do that, we need to get the word out,” Cruz said. “So tell me what makes you want to go to the clubs that you go to?”

  Becca frowned. “Are you mad that we don’t come here?”

  “No. I wish I’d realized it sooner.”

  Myrian turned her phone over and opened her photos. “We mostly go to a human club called The Crow’s Nest, it’s about thirty minutes from here. They’re cool about shifters, they have a great DJ on the weekends, and drink specials. And I don’t know, it’s just a fun place.”

  She turned her phone to face them and scrolled through some photos of males and females dancing, drinking, and generally looking like they were having a good time. He’d not seen anything close to that in their club since it opened.

  She shrugged apologetically. “The Den isn’t really a club as it stands right now. It’s a bar. And people our age – shifters or humans – don’t go to bars. Bars are lame and for old people. No offense.”

  Cruz grimaced but nodded at her to continue.

  “Clubs are about hanging out, dancing to great music all night, and meeting new people. There should be bodies packed tight on the floor having a ball, not groups of middle-aged males sitting at tables with beers.”

  Cruz hadn’t really thought about it before, but she was right. Just because they called it a “club” didn’t make it one. The music was low so patrons could talk. There were no strobe lights or lasers moving around the floor, and the dancefloor was most often empty. They needed to breathe new life into the club, to make it a place where people of all ages would want to come.

  “Oh! I know,” Becca said. “Let’s move Mellie’s party here.”

  Mellie was a clan member and was turning twenty-four this weekend. Cruz felt so suddenly out of touch because he hadn’t realized the younger bears flat-out weren’t spending time at the club. He wasn’t a whole lot older than these girls, but he felt downright ancient.

  “Make a list of what you need,” Cruz said, “and we’ll make sure it’s ready.”

  “A great DJ is a start,” Becca said. “I’ll text you.”

  “Can we get drinks comped when we’re working?” Myrian asked sweetly as she and her sister stood.

  Tomlin chuckled. “Sure. But if you get drunk, or you’re not actually working on promoting the club, you lose your privileges.”

  “We promise,” Becca said. “We won’t let you down. The Den will be banging by this weekend for the party, and we’ll make sure it stays that way.”

  Cruz liked her optimism. When they’d giggled their way from the office and down the hall, he looked at his brother. “What do you think?”

  “I checked out their social media accounts, and they’re popular in club circles. If we provide the right environment – good prices and good music is a start – then we could turn it around with their help.”

  Cruz’s phone buzzed in his pocket; he checked the screen, then smiled as he stood. “It’s Juliette
. I’m going to head home.”

  “Must be nice to be the king,” Tomlin said with a grin.

  “When I have my queen by my side, it damn sure will be.” He swiped his thumb to answer the video call. “Hey, sweetheart!”

  “You’re still at work? I can call back.”

  “Nah, I’m leaving right now, you can keep me company on the walk.”

  He hurried from the club and out into the summer night, humidity clinging to his skin. He glanced up at the darkening sky as he walked, Juliette’s sweet face on his phone and her voice echoing around him. Once he was home, he grabbed a bottle of water and headed upstairs to his room. As he walked down the hallway and passed the closed doors of the empty rooms on the second floor, he thought about having a family of his own, with Juliette. Someday the house would be filled with kids.

  Suddenly, he wanted that more than he’d ever wanted anything.

  They talked until she was yawning in between sentences, and he wished she were there so he could hold her all night long. After saying goodnight, he set an alarm and put his phone on the nightstand, stripped and climbed into bed. Although the bed was big, it hadn’t ever felt as empty as it did right now. He hoped that Juliette would be ready to join him and make a life with him. Soon.

  * * *

  After arranging for a lunchtime delivery of Juliette’s favorite baked ravioli dish from a local Italian restaurant in her town, Cruz traipsed through the woods looking for wildflowers. When he’d secured a large bouquet of them, he wrapped the bundle in butcher paper and tied it with twine. The delivery van for his parents’ bakery business left around nine, and he wanted to ensure the flowers went along with the tarts.

  He walked into the bakery, a converted barn that was rustic on the outside but all gleaming stainless steel on the inside. His parents had started the bakery so they could work together and provide for their family and the clan. Members worked for them, helping with baking, deliveries, and online orders.

  “Those are lovely,” his mother said as she brushed her hands free of flour and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “Are those from our woods?”

  “Yeah, I’m pretty sure Juliette likes wildflowers. At least I hope so. She writes about them.”

  “I’m sure she will.”

  His father came over with a square white box, set it on the counter, and lifted the lid. Six perfect blackberry tarts sat inside.

  “Thanks,” Cruz said. “They look great.”

  His father handed him a small card and a pen. “Roger’s getting ready to leave in about ten minutes.”

  Cruz set the flowers down and picked up the pen, writing a quick note. His mother used a thin pink ribbon to tie up the tarts while he tucked the notecard into the matching envelope, wrote Juliette’s name on it and taped it to the lid.

  His father leaned on the counter as Cruz watched his mother carry the box and flowers to a tray of goods that was going to be loaded into the van.

  “Tomlin said you’re holding a meeting Thursday.”

  “I’m hoping Juliette will want to come home with me Friday after our date.”

  He hummed. “Sounds smart to talk to the clan ahead of time.”

  “Tomlin suggested it. I was planning to wait until she agreed to be my mate, but assuming she comes home with me Friday, then it would be pretty clear to anyone who saw her that she was special to me.”

  It wasn’t like Cruz brought females into his home all the time. Juliette was the first one he’d ever planned to ask to be with him like this, and he was glad he’d waited.

  The day passed quickly. He heard from Juliette when his gifts showed up at lunchtime, timed to arrive around the same time as the food he’d ordered. He didn’t want to interrupt her too often during the day. When she’d video called him, she’d been beaming, and her sweet smile made him feel warm from the inside out.

  He was falling hard for the redheaded beauty. The week couldn’t go by fast enough.

  Chapter 8

  Juliette woke up Wednesday thinking about Cruz. She couldn’t have anticipated how quickly she was falling for him. She’d been tempted to stay with him on Sunday night, partly out of curiosity, but mostly because he was sexy as hell and she was strangely drawn to him. But after spending two days getting to know him, it had become increasingly difficult to like the idea that they would have to spend the rest of the week apart.

  If she’d written her current situation into a book, she would have had her heroine head to the hero’s hometown to stay so they could get to know each other instead of doing the long distance thing. But she also knew her editor would have told her that it wasn’t a good thing to make it easy for characters to be together, that waiting would heighten the moment they finally got together.

  But that was fiction. In real life? Juliette was a fan of hurrying the day along, particularly the next two days, so it would be Friday and she could get ready for her date. In the back of her mind, she was already planning to pack an overnight bag so that if Cruz asked her to come home with him – and she was fairly certain he would – she’d be ready. Every time she thought about him, excitement coursed through her like someone had plugged her into a socket and electricity was arcing over her veins.

  Damn she missed her bear.

  The day before, he’d surprised her by sending a noon delivery of wildflowers, lunch from her favorite Italian restaurant, and a box of blackberry tarts. When she’d called to thank him for the flowers, he shared that he’d read two of her books and noticed how she mentioned wildflowers, so he’d gone out into the woods and picked a bouquet for her. She’d been humbled and a little turned on by the sweet gesture, not to mention how much she enjoyed that he wanted to take care of her. She didn’t mind the afternoon interruption because he’d been worried about her missing lunch on Monday by working through it.

  Normally, she didn’t worry about what she was wearing when she was writing because the only person to see her was herself. But when she woke up on Wednesday, she had a feeling that she should actually get dressed. No lounge pants and braless day for her. After showering, she wove her hair into a French braid and put on a pair of jeggings and a cute top. She grabbed a yogurt and cup of coffee and got to work. When there was a knock on the door at noon, she grinned as she stood, wondering what her bear was going to surprise her with this time. Suddenly, she wished she’d sent a sweet gift to him.

  She opened the door, expecting another delivery person, but instead found Cruz holding a canvas tote with the name of the bar on it.

  “Hi, sweetheart.”

  “Cruz, oh my gosh, what are you doing here? Come in, come in.” Her cheeks heated and she knew she was babbling, but the grip on the doorknob was the only thing keeping her from launching herself into his arms.

  He seemed frozen, his whole body tense and his eyes flashing amber. “I don’t want to bother you more than I already have, but I couldn’t send someone else here on my behalf. I had to see you, but I can just go since you’re working.” His voice was gruff when he spoke, the words cut from his lips like they were being carved one at a time. It made her happy that he seemed to be as affected by their separation as she was.

  She tilted her head. “Do you really want to go?”

  “Hell no.” He rocked back on his heels and cracked his neck. “But my job wouldn’t be affected adversely if you showed up. I’m probably screwing up your... what did you call it? Writing mojo?”

  She chuckled as she fisted the center of his button-down shirt and pulled him inside. After shutting the door, she locked it.

  “I know you could have stopped me from tugging you in here,” she said.

  He set the tote on the kitchen counter and had her pressed to the door a second later. He planted his hands on either side of her head, gazing down at her with the most rapturous look on his face.

  “I’d never use my strength against you, Juliette.”

  She hooked her hands on his arms, feeling the rock-hard muscles under the silky fabric. “I believe you.
I’m glad you’re here. I was... missing you.”

  “Me, too.”

  She licked her lips and he tracked the motion, his eyes swirling with amber. He smelled amazing, like the woods at night mixed with a smoky, spicy scent. It made her mouth water and everything in her body tighten.

  “I want you to stay with me for a little while,” she said, her fingers digging into his arms. She felt like she was anchoring herself to him.

  He searched her face. “I knew when I was driving up here that I’d be interrupting you. My plan was to say hi, drop off my gift, and leave so you could return to work.”

  “That’s it?” she asked incredulously.

  He laughed. “Well, I would have tried to steal some kisses.”

  “You can’t steal what I’d give you freely.”

  He cupped her face with one warm hand. “I won’t stay long.”

  “It’s honestly fine. I was going a little crazy by myself.”

  “I was concerned my bear was going to rip through my skin again and run all the way here.”

  She rose onto her toes, sliding her hands around to his neck and linking them. He lowered his head and drew close to her. She closed her eyes and pressed her lips to his, her stomach flipping as their lips parted and their tongues touched. Electricity sparked within her, making her want to do more, so much more. He pulled her into his arms and lifted her up, and she wrapped her legs around his waist and tilted her head to deepen the kiss. He pulled from the kiss long enough to peek around her and carry her to the couch, where he settled on it with her straddling his lap. He sank his fingers into her hair and tugged lightly, angling her head as he pulled her close for another kiss. Everything inside her went haywire, roaring and twisting, need so rich and deep rising within, urging her to cement their relationship and to never let him go.

  She felt his chest vibrate as a growling purr rumbled, and she pulled from the kiss and smiled. His eyes were bright and she thought he was even sexier now.

  He brushed her bottom lip with his thumb and smiled. “You’re so beautiful.”