Target: BillionBear: BBW Bear Shifter Paranormal Romance

by Chant, Zoe

  He passed a row of closed shops. Only the grocery was lit. He stayed near the shadows, again out of instinct, aware that he was listening for the growl of motorcycle engines. What the hell was that about? Likeliest scenario was a random crazy, but he still walked softly, senses alert: sniffing the air, he identified a trace of exhaust in the sea breeze, but that could be from the occasional cars passing down Main Street.

  He smelled Ralph’s Eatery before he saw it, and when he walked into the slightly humid warmth carrying the delicious aromas of coffee and cinnamon rolls, he felt the back of his neck let go its tension.

  “Howdy,” Ralph said with a polite smile. “Coffee black, right?”

  “Thanks,” Jameson said. He turned to survey the place. The table by the window was empty. He started toward it, but sensed Kesley’s presence. He glanced around and there she was, waiting in a corner booth.

  His heart hitched in his chest. She looked so . . . beautiful—delectable—sweet—all these words came so easily, but none of them matched the warmth inside him when she saw him and her entire demeanor brightened with her smile.

  “How is the shoulder today?” she asked.

  “Good as new.” He lifted his arm. The pain really was all but gone. “Except for some fading blotches of green and purple, you’d never know what hit me. Luckily I seem to heal fast, or maybe it was your magic fingers. You?”

  “Great,” she said, looking up as Ralph approached.

  “My usual, waffle and tea,” she said. “Thanks!”

  Jameson realized he hadn’t even looked at the menu. “Bring me whatever you recommend. I guarantee I’ll like it.”

  Ralph looked him over, and gave a short nod. “I’ll order up a man’s breakfast.”

  “Sounds excellent.”

  Ralph moved away, and Kesley said, “Is your friend going to join us?”

  “Friend?”

  “Ms. Evans.”

  “She’s not my friend,” he responded, aware of an echo of Marlo’s voice at the beginning of therapy sessions, I want you to think of me as a friend. Don’t call me Dr. Evans, call me Marlo.

  He’d felt a resistance to that from the beginning. He didn’t know if it was because there seemed a falsity in a doctor insisting on friendship, or maybe because in real friendships one didn’t have to insist on labels like ‘friend.’ Still, he felt that Marlo had done her best by him, listening patiently to his dull blather when he was in the cotton fog, and making sensible suggestions to try to pry the lid off his memory.

  “Our relationship is professional.” Jameson looked around, and bent closer. “To tell you the truth, I don’t really understand what she’s after. ‘Meta humans.’ She can’t be looking for Superman or other Kryptonians, though that’s what it sounds like. Might have been the drugs I’ve been taking, because I heard her talking once and it sounded weird—something about rumors of people turning into animals, or animals into people. I have no idea why a doctor would find it necessary to chase down folk tales. Maybe there are holes in my thinking as well as my memory.”

  “She’s a doctor?”

  “A therapist.”

  “Pretending to be a journalist?”

  “She thinks people talk more freely to journalists.”

  “Wow.” Kesley shrugged. “I’m more worried about you, especially if you had to travel with your own doctor. Do you want to talk about what happened?” Her eyes were steady and serious.

  “I don’t know what happened. Plane crash, I’m told. I was in the hospital before being transferred to the rehab center. My memory is spotty, and I can still feel some of the mental fog I’ve been in. I can remember bits of my early childhood, and brief images from later. But nothing of the past, say, ten years. And what I do remember has me confused.”

  “I wish I could help,” she said softly.

  He studied her gaze. He could fall into that gaze. He knew he might be thinking with his dick and just fooling the mind that was supposed to drive his body, but every instinct demanded he trust her.

  So he pulled out the tissue with the meds. “This might sound really stupid, but do you know anyone with a lab? To test what’s really in these?”

  He felt stupid as he opened the tissue and disclosed the pills. She glanced from them to him, and to his surprise, gave him a serious look as she reached to take the tissue. Their fingers touched, and the spark of attraction, of connection, shocked him in a good way—the opposite of pain.

  “It doesn’t sound stupid,” Kesley said softly. “In fact, I know someone who would love nothing better than to test them.”

  “Look, Kesley. I don’t want Marlo to know. If it turns out they are what they’re supposed to be, then I’ll tell her myself that I’m experiencing paranoia, and yadda yadda. But right now . . . just say, after yesterday, coupled with my realizing how bad my head has been clouded, I’m paranoid.”

  Her pupils widened, and now she looked worried. “I totally get that.” She glanced out, then back at him. “In fact, if you don’t mind my leaving for a couple of minutes to talk to someone, I can get that happening right now. Stay here. I know you’re safe with Ralph.”

  He smiled. He’d been hearing a lot about his safety for the past month. Funny, or maybe it wasn’t funny at all, but the first time he truly believed it was from this woman he hadn’t known forty-eight hours ago. “Thanks,” he said.

  His reward was that bright smile again, and a quick, deft movement of fingers as she pocketed the meds.

  She walked away quickly, and he spent the time counting up his facts again.

  He had more, but still no coherent picture. Something big was missing from the middle.

  As she promised, Kesley was quickly back—half a minute ahead of the food. Ralph had cooked up what turned out to be a delicious Spanish omelet, with crispy bacon, beautifully cooked sausage, country fried potatoes, toast, and a bowl of fresh fruit cut up. He loaded honey onto the toast and in his coffee, and dug in.

  As they ate, the talk was easy—food, sunsets, music. He liked the way she adapted to his limits, because she never pressed if he hesitated on an answer. Several times he felt his mind on the verge of something . . . recovery? Recognition? But he knew better than to force it. The only result would be a headache.

  When they were done, he said, “Are you painting this morning? May I watch?” he asked.

  She looked searchingly into his face, then smiled. “Sure. But won’t it be kind of boring?”

  He couldn’t imagine ever being bored by her. “If I nod off, just kick me,” he joked, and won an answering smile.

  Ralph brought the check, and Jameson noticed that there was only a charge for his breakfast, not Kesley’s. After he paid and they were about to leave, she gave him a troubled glance, then said, “How about if we walk the back way? There’s an alley behind the shops.”

  He laughed. “Afraid to be seen with me?”

  “As if our breakfast isn’t all over town by now,” she retorted. “No, I was thinking of possible crazy bikers.”

  “Ah. I still think it was random. But I appreciate your looking out for me.”

  She led the way through the spotless kitchen, waving at a gray-haired woman and a skinny, lantern-jawed guy busy working with the food, and then they were outside.

  As they began walking he discovered a wish to hold her hand, like they were a couple of kids. He shoved his hands deep into the pocket of his trousers, as she set the pace.

  “Ralph’s daughter Madison is my old friend. She’s about to get married to Noah, who is going to take over his mom’s pharmacy. He’s been studying chemistry. He and Maddy live together, and built a lab in what used to be the garage. It’s like something from the future in there—she does experiments with food, and he does . . . whatever pharmacy people do.”

  “Drugs,” Jameson said, laughing.

  She wrinkled her nose. “Yeah, I know, but it sounds so, I dunno, crack-house to say that, doesn’t it? Garage lab, drugs.”

  “Mad scientist
has a promising sound.” He slanted a glance at her.

  “Except he’s not mad,” Kesley observed, her lips curving upward.

  “How do you know?” he asked. “There could be a complete set of body parts in his lab, and he’s just waiting for a passing thunderstorm.”

  “Not Noah,” she said, shaking her head slowly. “He’s far more likely to invent mecha, if mecha were useful for anything more interesting than duking it out with each other.”

  “Tell me about your friends,” he asked. “I have a feeling this town is much more interesting than it seems.”

  She gave him a round-eyed look. “What makes you think that?”

  “Anywhere a guy is generally known as Thunder-Chicken can’t be boring. Even if it’s just from some TV show.”

  She let out a breathy laugh that sounded distinctly relieved, then she said unnecessarily, “Oh, we’re everyday people. Here we are.”

  They walked through the back door of Flying Cranes. Jameson dropped onto the couch, watching with pleasure the way her neat, quick hands put together her brushes, paints, sponges, and other tools before she set her canvases out.

  But she had not even dipped her brush when she looked up at him, and their eyes met. His breath hitched when he saw the heat in her gaze, her soft, perfect lips parted. When her tongue darted out just long enough to touch her upper lip, heat ignited in him like he was fifteen.

  “I know we should take it slow,” she said. “Get to know each other. But . . . just one kiss?” she whispered, and he was up from the couch and next to her in two seconds flat.

  The brush clattered on the table as she took his chin in her hands, and when her mouth opened under his, he groaned, burying his fingers in the lush silk of her hair as he took utter possession of her mouth.

  She kissed him back frantically, breath shaking as they moved, and she pushed him back against the wall beside the couch, and they kissed again, tongues searching dueling, clash and retreat, teeth nipping.

  “One kiss?” He laughed, his breath as unsteady as hers.

  “Okay, two,” she whispered, and ran to the back door to turn the lock. “Or twenty.”

  “The owner?” Jameson asked.

  “Off with her grandson to look at a new ceramics shop for vases.”

  “Then why are we whispering?”

  Kesley glanced doubtfully at the clean but obviously old velvet-covered couch, then tipped her head and blushed as she admitted, “All night. I kept dreaming. You and me. Having brain-rattling sex. It doesn’t count if we don’t lie down,” she added.

  Hilarity chased through him, followed hard—oh, excruciatingly hard—by need. This time he held her against the wall, but only to steady her as they kissed again, his hands roaming over her delightful curves before slipping under her layers to her warm, enticing skin.

  “I can make that happen,” he whispered when they broke apart again, and knelt down to unzip her pants.

  Her hands tightened on his shoulders as he lowered her pants to her knees, kissing every inch of skin he revealed. She began to tremble as he cupped her mound and slid fingers into her—she was already gloriously, generously wet.

  In less than a minute he had himself unzipped. In two shakes she kicked off her loose pants and panties, then he stood up, slid his hands under her butt, and hoisted her up.

  She wrapped her legs around his waist as he slid home. God, how perfectly they fit—she writhed, tipping her hips into him, and he began to thrust hard as he buried his face in her neck, biting that sweet curve before her shoulder.

  She came hard, clenching on him with such strength that he came with the force of a freight train. If she hadn’t been holding on tight he’d have feared he might drop her because his limbs felt loose as string, as life beat around them in a supernova of ecstasy.

  He slowly let her down, and she leaned against his shoulder, laughing quietly. He felt a flutter of laughter, and smiled down at the tousled top of her head. Now, just as strong as the flash of coming, but far more enduring, tenderness welled up in him as he said, “Which was better, the dream me or—?”

  “You,” she said, bending to pick up her clothes. She was still laughing as she slipped into the bathroom behind them.

  When she came out again, her clothes were straight but the bright, dreamy look in her eyes and the curve to her lips gave her away. She looked adorable.

  He laughed silently to himself as he took his turn in the bathroom. When he came out, he was ready to keep the joke going about brain-rattling sex, when he saw her texting on her phone—her expression serious, even stricken.

  “What is it?” he asked.

  “Maddy says Noah didn’t have to do anything sophisticated—there’s a kit that tests for about fifty substances in a few minutes,” she said. “One of the pills showed traces of something called sodium azide.”

  “Poison,” he said—then wondered how he knew that.

  “Yeah,” she murmured, her thumbs working fast. She sent her text, and a minute later, said, “Maddy says, can we bring the bottles up to the lab?”

  “I’ll go get them,” he said.

  “I’m going with you,” she said in a gritty voice.

  Chapter Eight

  Kesley waited for him to laugh, to say it was none of her business, to do anything but what he did, which was to give her a tender smile. “Going to protect me?”

  “Yes. No. I don’t know,” she said, her stomach churning. Though her core still pulsed with the echoes of pleasure, all the joy had leached away, replaced by worry. Poison? Her raccoon was frantic to build a safe nest and hide. Hide him. “But I just think, if you aren’t alone, maybe . . .”

  “Thanks,” he said, with that sweet, flashing smile that lit his otherwise cool, chiseled face with its jagged scar.

  They didn’t talk at all as they hurried the back way to Aunt Julia’s hotel, but she sensed him . . . not stiffening. She saw absolutely nothing but the familiar Primrose, seen all her life, but somehow the man walking next to her had gone all stalky. His head was up, his eyes narrowed. Geez, he looked, well, dangerous. And she stupidly thought she could protect him?

  The hotel was a two-story building with rooms opening off a long balcony, the single rooms upstairs, the family suites downstairs. She and Jameson climbed the stairs and walked down the balcony. They’d just dodged around the cleaning cart when he stilled.

  At the other end, a big guy with a razored scalp and a Nazi swastika tattooed on his neck charged through the door at the other end, stopped, then called, “He’s here!”

  A gang of huge guys blasted through the door and thundered right at Jameson and Kesley. She froze for an endless heartbeat as the world slowed to the booms of her heart. Jameson stepped protectively in front of her, then turned sideways as the first, biggest guy reached them. A piston-fast elbow jabbed up under Nazi Neck’s jaw, then Jameson’s foot snap-kicked the guy’s knee.

  A high keening sound registered: Grandpa Amir, as usual in his parrot form, screeching like an air raid siren.

  Nazi Neck fell into the guy on his heels. They hit the ground, but the next pair dodged around them, sliding at Jameson from both sides. The last one held back, grinning as he played with a knife.

  Thugs One and Two attacked, one bumping against the other and cursing. Jameson feinted at One, then in a blur of speed cracked a roundhouse kick into Thug Two’s gut. He ducked One’s lunge, sidestepped and punched him fast in the ribs and the kidney. Thug Two staggered back, horking for breath.

  But the guy under Nazi Neck was up, joining Thug One, and Jameson shrugged his bad shoulder in a way that flashed warning through Kesley’s numbness.

  Think! Kesley looked around wildly, and her gaze lit on the cleaning cart. She plunged her hand into the canvas sack holding the used towels, and with the practice of years of defense against cousinly teasing at the beach, snapped the towel expertly at Thug One’s face.

  “Shit!” the guy howled, rubbing his eyes. Oops, the towel was loaded with soapy
water.

  That gave Jameson the second he needed to palm-heel the last guy in the nose and then punch him in the solar plexus, and he landed with a crunch on top of moaning, writhing Nazi Neck. Squinting against soap suds glinting in his eyes, Thug One leaped over them to grapple Jameson as Knife Guy’s grin turned nasty.

  He took a step toward Kesley, who backed a step and another, dimly aware of the sound of delicate little trotters charging down the balcony—and 150 pounds of beautiful pink pig plowed into Knife Guy’s legs from the back. Aunt Julia to the rescue!

  Knife Guy did a spectacular parabola, the knife spinning away to clatter near Kesley. The guy landed with a thud on the back of his neck, and lay groaning.

  Kesley kicked the knife over the edge of the balcony. Aunt Julia vanished down the back stairs as Sheriff Odom’s siren wailed from the street.

  Three of the guys got to their feet and staggered toward the back stairs. Jameson looked around sharply. Kesley understood at once he was looking for her. Warmth filled her heart as she smiled at him, and he smiled back, relief relaxing his face for a moment.

  Jameson held out his arm, and she moved to his side, her shoulder fitting under his as if they had been made for each other. She felt tension trembling through his body as he wiped the blood from the side of his mouth with the back of his hand. The other hand slipped around her waist as if he never wanted to let her go.

  Sheriff Odom appeared a half a minute later, pistol out, followed by Abe Rosen, his part-time deputy.

  “What happened here?”

  “They attacked him,” Kesley said, pointing with shaking fingers at the big, leather-clad guys lying on the ground. All their tats were about violence and hate. “Three ran off.”

  “We’ll take what we can get,” the sheriff said grimly, cuffing Knife Guy as Abe helped with Nazi Neck. They each only had a pair of handcuffs, but the sheriff spotted a laundry bag cord on the cleaning cart, and used that on the third.