Jackson Valley Shifters Complete Series: Bear Shifter Romance

by Candace Ayers

  Torres led them into a living room off the main hallway. It was decorated with colored light bulbs, and when Chloe stepped into the room, she could see that there was a large balcony than ran the length of the kitchen and living room area. She smiled to herself. The guys who lived in the frat house really did have it made.

  It was slightly cooler in the room on account of the doors to the balcony being open, and the music wasn’t as loud. There were lots of people lounging on an assortment of sofas in the living room, while the coffee table was filled to the brim with liquor bottles and buckets of ice-cold beer.

  Mia handed Chloe and Harper each a beer, opening one for herself.

  “Nice, right? Better than out there.” She grinned at her friends. “Cheers!”

  Chloe and Harper both popped the tabs on the cans. Chloe slightly more reluctantly than either of her friends. She didn’t love beer—or any liquor really—and was especially reluctant to drink in surroundings like the one they were in. But she always promised Mia she’d have a least one beer when they went out—even if she spent the rest of the night drinking Diet Coke.

  “Hey, Chloe, right?”

  Chloe spun around at the sound of a male voice, coming from behind her.

  She came face to face with Todd, the Wolverines star quarterback. He was fit, tan and dark-haired, and made the hearts of most of U of M’s female student population race.

  “Hi.” Chloe replied cautiously.

  Remembering her manners, she stuck out a hand for him to shake.

  “Formal,” he remarked drily. “I like it.”

  “You’re Todd, right?” Chloe wasn’t going to pretend she didn’t know his name. He would just think she was playing games. Everyone on campus knew who he was.

  “That’s right.” He smiled, looking her directly in the eyes with penetrating intensity. Chloe was taken aback, at a loss as to what to say next.

  “Thanks for coming. Is this your first time at the frat house?”

  Chloe nodded, “Yeah. It’s…uh…nice,” she gestured toward the balcony, “Nice balcony.”

  Todd laughed good naturedly.

  “Right? It’s a good place to stay. Most of the team is in the fraternity, so it makes keeping up with the practice schedules a bit easier, I guess.”

  Chloe looked around the room. She recognized most of its occupants as U of M players. And most were extremely drunk.

  “You’re taking International Relations, right” He commented, smoothly drawing the conversation back to Chloe.

  “Yes,” she replied with a frown of confusion. “How do you know that?”

  Todd shrugged, “I have my sources. Are you enjoying it?”

  “I love it.” Chloe’s eyes lit up. The work was tough, but she found her classes fascinating, and enjoyed the debates in study groups.

  “What are you taking?”

  “Law.”

  “Oh!” Chloe was surprised. She had expected Todd to be taking an easy ride subject in order to focus on football. “Cool. Sorry. I didn’t mean to sound so surprised.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” he smiled. “I get it all the time. Everyone expects me to be taking a cake subject because I’m just a dumb jock, right?”

  “Not what I meant,” replied Chloe firmly. “Just that I thought you’d take something more straight-forward so you could focus on football.”

  “I like to keep my options open,” he said simply.

  Before Chloe could reply, she was shoved from behind. She tripped forward, almost spilling her drink in the process. Todd caught her easily in his arms, propping her up.

  “Todd?”

  Todd dropped his grip on Chloe instantly. Chloe turned to see the person who had shoved her, and was face to face with Todd’s girlfriend. Chloe knew her by sight because she headed up a number of social activities on campus and was constantly in the center of the events, backed up by a posse of equally well-manicured and rail-thin girls.

  “Hey Tiffany,” Todd replied. “What’s up?”

  “Nothing, babe. I was just missing you.”

  She side-stepped past Chloe and wrapped herself around Todd’s muscular frame like a feather boa.

  “This is Chloe,” Todd interjected. “Have you two met?”

  Tiffany turned her attention to Chloe. Immediately the cat-like purr for Todd’s benefit was gone. Her face was a frozen mask of indifference, looking through Chloe as if she was a ghost.

  “No,” she replied.

  There was an awkward silence while Tiffany just stared blankly at Chloe.

  “Hi,” Chloe said, thinking better of holding out her hand in greeting. She was pretty sure it would be left hanging in midair.

  “Hi,” drawled Tiffany, wrinkling up her petite nose like there was a bad smell.

  Chloe hid a smirk. She didn’t think she’d ever been treated so rudely by anyone in her life. It was so outlandish that she wasn’t even sure she could be offended.

  “Oh, hi Tiffany!” Mia interrupted loudly with a huge, entirely false grin. “You look so great. Chloe, have you just met Tiffany? Did you know that Tiffany followed Todd here from high school like a loyal puppy dog? Isn’t that so adorable?”

  “I did not follow–”

  “So sweet!” Mia yelled sarcastically over Tiffany’s reply, “Such a devoted girlfriend!”

  Before Chloe could burst out laughing, she dragged Mia away—cutting through a huddle of students to where Harper was standing with Torres.

  “That was mean,” Chloe tried to scold Mia, unsuccessfully.

  “What?” Mia was a faux picture of innocence. “It’s true! It’s super cute.”

  Chloe shook her head.

  “What did she do?” Harper asked, looking past them both to where Tiffany and Todd were standing. “Tiffany looks like she’s about to internally combust and hopes to take us down with her.”

  “I don’t know what her problem is,” Mia replied cheerfully.

  “Yeah, Tiffany’s always grouchy,” Torres added. “Don’t worry about it. If she catches any female talking to Todd, she has a mini tantrum and starts behaving like a bunny boiler.”

  Mia was about to reply, when a chant started up around the room.

  “REPLAYS! REPLAYS!”

  Every male in the room started yelling at the top of their lungs. Suddenly, the guys lounging on the sofa’s became highly animated, dragging down a large white projector screen from the ceiling of the living room.

  “What are they doing?” Chloe asked Torres over the loud demands of the students.

  “Watching replays from tonight’s Cubs game. We all saw it, but we wanted to watch the replays, especially this season. They’ve got a new quarterback that came from outta nowhere–”

  Torres was interrupted by one of his fellow teammates dragging him over to get a better view of the screen.

  “Turn up the volume!” Someone yelled.

  The music abruptly stopped. A commentator’s voice filled the room, leaving everyone in a hushed silence. Chloe, Mia and Harper looked at one another and rolled their eyes. None of them were particularly into football, but they would have understood a party closing down for an actual live game—but replays? Come on, thought Chloe.

  “…unprecedented newcomer from out of nowhere who was recruited last year from the AFL’s—that’s right ladies and gentlemen, you heard me right—the Arena Football League. Quarterback Wesley Reed, number nineteen, a star in the making, played his second game for the Chicago Bears this season, and oh, boy! What a game, we’ve never seen anything like it…”

  A giant roar went up across the room as number nineteen was shown emerging from a sack by four of the Philadelphia Eagles defense, and scattering them like skittles across the turf.

  The camera zoomed in on the face of number nineteen, and Chloe felt a queasy sickness in the pit of her stomach.

  She knew number nineteen. She knew him well.

  Wesley.

  “What the hell?” She muttered under her breath.

>   He turned to look directly into the camera. This time, Chloe felt like she’d been punched in the stomach. She knew that face better than her own. It hadn’t changed in the last five years, and those cool, piercing blue eyes were like daggers through her heart.

  “Mia, I need to get the hell out of here.”

  Without waiting for a reply, Chloe turned and fled the room.

  4

  Wesley gazed around at the chanting crowd in a daze.

  He could feel himself staggering around the turf like a dazed buffalo, but he couldn’t stop himself. The feeling was entirely surreal.

  A second later, he was tossed back by teammates, who lifted him up in the air, chanting his number, parading him around the field. Wesley could only see the sky and the bright floodlights, and it felt like he was floating across the starlit Chicago night sky.

  The commentators in their box kept remarking on what a great game had been played, but Wesley could barely hear them. His team had won—won by a landslide and completely wiped the floor with the Philadelphia Eagles.

  Eventually Wesley was dropped back on the ground, only to be pulled in by their coach, and given a hearty pat on the back.

  “I could goddamn marry you, Reed. You know that? I love you more than my damn wife right now,” the coach sobbed. “Get yourself in there kid. Go on, get!”

  Reed, along with the rest of the team, was pushed off toward the tunnel leading to the locker rooms. Reporters gathered on either side, shouting out his name.

  “Reed! Reed! What’s it like to take the Bears home like that?” and, “It’s your second game playing in the NFL. What’s that feel like?” “Reed—what’s it like to be the starting quarterback for the Chicago Bears having come from nothing?”

  “He didn’t come from nothing!” His halfback, Liam, yelled at the journalist. “He came from God Almighty—did you see him play? Reed has a God-given gift y’all!”

  He whopped, pushing Wesley down into the tunnel and away from the journalists. Wesley didn’t think he’d ever get used to the attention—or the personal questions—which often bordered on the offensive.

  Back in the changing room, Wesley felt far more comfortable. It was his job to congratulate the team on a brilliant game. While the journalists, fans and commentators gave undue credit to the quarterback, the players all knew that it took each of them to play a good game—and there wouldn’t be any trophies unless they could play as a tight, unified team.

  “You were all fucking awesome!” Roared Wesley as soon as the changing room door slammed shut behind him.

  The players went berserk.

  They jumped up, hugging one another, hitting and shoving and generally rolling around in a glory that belonged to them for the night. Each one of them felt like kings. They had toiled sweat, blood and tears to get where they were tonight. It was only the start of a long journey, but it was a start—an incredible, earth-shattering start.

  “Reed! I wanna have your babies!” Steve Young, the running back called out. His words prompted echoes of strange things his fellow team mates wanted to do to him.

  “I’m promised to the coach,” Wesley shot back.

  “I’m prettier!” the wide receiver cried out, to near-hysterical laughter. There was nothing attractive about their wide receiver, who was pug-eyed, thin-lipped and prematurely balding.

  The team eventually started to disperse.

  They would be up early training tomorrow—there were no post-game drinks or dinners while the season was in full swing. It would be training early tomorrow morning, followed by interviews and then more training.

  It was intense.

  It had been intense since Wesley was drafted. He’d been playing, part-time in AFL’s—for the Columbus Destroyers—when he’d been spotted by the Bears recruiter. He had been lucky. First for getting into the AFL in the first place—considering he hadn’t played college ball, it was a near miracle. And now the NFL. The big time. Before he’d even played his first off-season game, sponsors had gotten wind of him, coming down to the practice games to check him out. As his coach like to put it, his ass was basically owned by Adidas.

  As Wesley left the changing room, he saw his agent, Mike O’Neill standing in the corridor.

  “Thought I’d give you a lift,” he said on spotting Wesley.

  “Thanks man. I’m bone tired.”

  It was the best thing about playing ball. The game of football was well suited to shifters. The constant physical exertion fed the animal side well. When he wasn’t playing ball, he was off in the wilder parts of Wisconsin, roaming in bear form around Glacial Park and the Hackmatack National Wildlife Refuge. It helped to take his mind off Jackson Hole, the Holt family—and most painfully, Chloe. He pushed his body to its physical limits to avoid thinking of her. Hell, he’d walk through fire if he thought it would erase her from his mind.

  O’Neill took Wesley to his car, a fancy BMW imported from Europe—an old vintage model that Wesley had long admired. He had enough money to get his own, but he barely had a moment to think beyond his next meal during the season.

  “Do you want to come around this weekend, spend some time with Rosa and the kids?”

  O’Neill was Irish and had married an Italian woman from the Bronx where he grew up. They had four amazing kids, three girls and a boy, Little Mike. They were the closest thing Wesley had to family in Chicago. He could have spent time with Derek and his wife Audrey, and their kids, but it was too painful. Derek was a Holt, and it just brought up memories that he’d rather keep under wraps. Every time Audrey or Derek phoned him, he would politely decline—and promptly feel like an ungrateful jackass. Derek had given him his penthouse to stay in when he first came to Chicago, rent free. He owed the man a lot.

  “That would be great,” Wesley replied. “Thanks a lot Mike. I’ve got training in the morning, but I can do lunch.”

  “I’ll pick you up. Star treatment while season’s in action. Off season, you find your own transport.”

  “Sure,” Wesley grinned. “I’ll enjoy it while it lasts.”

  * * *

  Wesley entered his austere apartment.

  The silence was unnerving. He felt like he’d interrupted the place, an unwelcome visitor in his own home.

  It was a beautiful penthouse apartment, newly purchased, and as yet undecorated. It had high ceilings, with arched windows that looked out across the Chicago skyline. The floors were light birch wood, running uninterrupted except in the case of his bedroom—where Wesley had a solitary double bed. He had nowhere yet to keep his clothes, so they were folded neatly in piles in the closet. He had meant to get around to decorating the place but had kept forgetting—or just not having the time. O’Neill had urged him to get someone in to decorate it for him—he could afford it—but the idea made him feel uneasy.

  The only home he’d never known was the bunkhouse in the old barn on the Holt ranch and the large, messy ranch home that was always filled with laughter and yelling and the general sound of people gathering together as family.

  He and Josiah, the other, older ranch hand, had lived in a converted barn of the main house—but it was just as homely and welcoming as the main house. Especially after Heather had come into the picture. With a few well-chosen rugs, pictures and bookcases she had transformed the space for him and Josiah, turning it from a sparse crash pad into home.

  Wesley looked warily around the apartment.

  He wouldn’t even know where to begin. He didn’t really own anything other than some clothes and his football gear.

  Stepping out onto the balcony he had a final look over the city. It was still bustling and full of life. He could still hear drunken cheers and celebrations from fans heralding today’s win. Today had been miraculous. Most of his team mates would go to sleep re-living the glory of the final moments on the field, the seconds on the clock, the last second touchdown, roar of the crowd and the flashing of cameras.

  Wesley would go to sleep with another image burned on his min
d. The same one as always—Chloe, sixteen years old in her white party dress beaming up at him after he’d given her the necklace he’d painstakingly made her–looking at him like he was her entire world.

  5

  “I don’t think I understand,” Harper said quietly. “How could you not have known? I mean, did he even play football when you knew him?”

  Chloe shook her head, dazed.

  “No…my dad and Josiah always joked that he should join the NFL, because he was so huge, but he never played at home. I don’t understand, either. I’m starting to wonder if it really was the same guy. Maybe I was hallucinating.”

  “You weren’t hallucinating. It’s definitely a ‘Wesley Reed’.” Mia waved her phone at Chloe. “Touted as the biggest and best thing to happen to the Chicago Bears in over a decade,” she read from whatever site she had open on her phone.

  The three of them were sitting in Chloe’s small one bedroom apartment just off campus. They had met at Chloe’s after she had staggered out of the party, and they were as startled as she was when it was revealed that her long-held childhood crush now played quarterback in the NFL.

  Mia frantically swiped her phone, speed reading the latest articles on Wesley.

  “Okay, so he was recruited from the Arena Football League where he had been playing for about two years. Get this—the Bear’s coach found him playing in a park. Wow, can you believe that? This reads like every man’s fantasy, ever. He was signed to the Bears. They took him on this summer. They kept him on as a secret weapon, which is why none of us have heard of him. In off season games he wasn’t used.” Mia’s expression was one of amazement.

  “I can’t believe you know this guy,” she added. “I mean, he is super impressive and super—”

  “Mia, you’re not helping,” Harper snapped. Both Chloe and Mia looked at Harper in surprise. She was usually so mild-mannered.

  “I’m sorry. But Mia, Chloe knows he’s ‘hot’. That’s the point. Talking about how amazing he is isn’t going to help.”