Her Chef Bear

by Alice Summerfield

  That was assuming that they would someday have children together, of course. She wanted his – already, her treacherous heart was dreaming about little girls with his eyes and little boys with his strong jaw – but who knew if he wanted hers.

  Yet, Frederica reminded herself. Who knows if he wants mine yet? He’s my soul mate. He’s definitely going to come around. Somehow.

  Frederica wished she sounded more confident.

  After dinner, Frederica went back up to her room to read for awhile.

  One more day, thought Frederica, while smiling down at her paperback, and then I’ll see Scott again.

  She could hardly wait!

  Chapter 09 – Scott

  Saturday nights were too busy for Scott to simply close the restaurant and go to the community meeting. Instead, he opened his restaurant as he always did and then ducked out, leaving it to his other head chef to run the kitchen for the rest of the night. Scott didn’t anticipate staying for the whole meeting, but no one really wanted to show up for a two or three hour shift at work.

  When Scott got to the community center, it was roughly five-thirty and the parking lot was already half full. Finding a spot near the back of the lot, Scott parked his loaner and went inside.

  Signs printed on computer paper directed him to what proved to be a theater, complete with comfortable seats and a stage at the front. Already, the seats provided for the audience were three-quarters full, and Scott hastily slipped into one of the empty chairs before taking a good look at the six people already on the stage.

  There were four men and two women sitting in folding chairs on the stage, all of them wearing black suits. Scott knew from information shared before the meeting that one of the women on the stage was the mayor.

  The other was Frederica.

  Scott stared at her, feeling shocked and horrified.

  Her knees together, back straight, and hands in her lap, Frederica was sitting primly near one end of the line of chairs. Her black suit was conservatively cut, and all of her glorious hair had been pinned back into a severe bun. As Scott watched, the man sitting next to Frederica leaned over to murmur something in her ear, and Frederica tipped her head towards him, listening to him without taking her eyes off of their growing audience.

  This was Frederica Hale at work. The mere sight of it was enough to make Scott’s aching heart twist in his chest.

  She said that she was here on business, thought Scott. She even said that she had work tonight. I just never thought…

  The problem was that he should have thought it. He should have at least considered it, knowing what he knew about her. And there wasn’t likely to be a lot of other legal work for one of the state’s attorneys to do in Mermaid County on a Saturday night.

  Looking at her now, Scott didn’t know who he was angrier with: her for obscuring her purpose or him for allowing himself to be blinded by her – by the way that she moved, the directness of her gaze, and the way that she felt against him. Even the sound of her laughter, the scent of her on his skin, and the way that her serious face lit up with pleasure at the mere sight of him were distracting to him.

  No wonder he hadn’t allowed himself to wonder too much about Frederica’s business in town. If he had, he wouldn’t have let himself get to know her as well as he had. He certainly wouldn’t have spent enough time with Frederica to fall in love with her.

  And looking up at her now with a vast gulf lying between them, Scott knew that it was love.

  He was in love with one of the people that wanted to take his house away, bulldoze it, and toss him out in the street. She was going to bulldoze all of the trees and wild places around here, and erect a steel and concrete habitat for students in their place. Just thinking about it made him angrier.

  How could he have done this to himself? How could he have let himself fall in love with such a woman?

  Because I am an idiot, Scott thought, answering himself.

  Up on stage, Frederica was looking around now, her head turning slowly from side to side as if she was scanning the room for something – or someone.

  Does she know I’m here? Did she guess about me, even if I didn’t guess about her? Was she deliberately keeping this from me? Scott wondered, now furious. The entire time that we were together was she laughing at me behind my back?

  It didn’t bear thinking on, but Scott found that he couldn’t think about anything else.

  The small theater in which Scott and Frederica sat was now so full of people that a crowd stood at the back of it. It spilled out of the open doors at the back of the theater, people standing in the community center’s stark hallways to hear what they could of the meeting.

  The room was filled with people and the white noise naturally produced by so many people speaking to each other in undertones while enclosed in such a small space. Overhead, the lights began to flick off and then on again in roughly ten second intervals, and one by one, the conversations around Scott began to peter out.

  The community meeting was about to start.

  Scott tried to get a grip, to quiet his mind – and his heart. He needed to focus now. His house, the woods behind it, and his access to said natural areas might all depend on the next few hours. He could deal with Frederica and his feelings for Frederica and all his questions about her later. There would be time to grapple with all of that after he understood the lay of the land here, so to speak.

  Scott listened to the mayor’s opening remarks. They mayor welcomed everyone, reminded them why they had come, and briskly introduced everyone on the stage to the people gathered in the audience.

  “And this is Frederica Hale, an attorney out of Damian Judith’s office. She’s his number two,” said the mayor, gesturing at Scott’s lover, and Frederica inclined her head regally.

  Scott scowled.

  With effort, he pushed down his most immediate response to Frederica and focused his attention on the next person’s introduction like it actually mattered to him.

  It didn’t.

  And, as the evening progressed, Scott began to suspect that his opposition to the new university complex didn’t matter either.

  From the mix of questions and personal declarations presented to the group sitting on the stage, it was becoming obvious to Scott that not everyone in the audience was opposed to the new university complex. Lots of people seemed excited about the project, and they had questions about how it would affect their property values or the local job market. Others were cautiously optimistic, but they wanted to know what sort of strain a large student population would put on the local infrastructure and how the builders intended to mitigate it. But it warmed Scott’s heart to hear from the small group that staunchly opposed all the eminent domain letters, bulldozing the undeveloped land, and building the university. Those people, Scott suspected, were other shifters like him.

  But as the evening wore on, two things became more and more apparent to Scott: firstly, that there was definitely going to be a university. And secondly, that no one on that stage was open to the idea of moving it to another location.

  Still, he had to try. When he saw an opening, Scott stood and accepted the nearest microphone.

  Lights swung his way, shining into his eyes. It blinded him. What expression, if any, Frederica wore when she saw him standing there, Scott couldn’t say. Blinking hard against the lights, Scott cleared his throat and began.

  Chapter 10 – Frederica

  When Scott’s familiar form stepped up to the microphone, Frederica’s heart skipped a beat. She hadn’t known that he would be there.

  It did, however, explain the immense hurt and anger and distress that had been radiating through their bond earlier, as well as his current frustration. Scott’s growing unhappiness had been tugging at her heart for the better part of two hours. Frederica just wished that she could think of something that she could do to make him feel better.

  At least I know what that’s about now, thought Frederica, as she nervously smoothing her skirt ove
r her thighs.

  “My name is Scott Behr, and I own the Treasure Trove restaurant down on Turtle Beach,” said Scott. “My house is one of the ones that got an eminent domain notice. What if I refuse to sell my property to the county?”

  Damn it, thought Frederica. Valiantly, she resisted the urge to scowl… or wilt. Property law and eminent domain fell within her bailiwick.

  Her boss, ever helpful, nudged her in the ankle. Hard. A less enlightened person might have mistaken it for a kick.

  Frederica felt her expression flicker. With effort, she smoothed it into pleasant lines, as she accepted the microphone from Damian.

  “Unfortunately, eminent domain doesn’t generally allow that,” said Frederica with real regret. “You will, however, be fairly compensated for your property. In Florida, that means that you will be paid the highest amount that a willing buyer under no particular pressure to buy would pay for the property based on its best use and highest recent value.”

  “I don’t want the money,” said Scott, his voice hard. “I just want the house.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Frederica. “If you would like to explore your legal options, Florida has many excellent bar certified attorneys. If you call the state bar, they can recommend an eminent domain lawyer in your area. Or, if you like, I can give you a few names after the presentation. Either way, though, your attorney’s fees can be covered by the state along with any ancillary damages you incur as a result of having your property condemned.”

  Scott did not look cheered by that. In fact, he scowled at her.

  Frederica’s heart sank.

  Frederica genuinely believed in the university project, and she couldn’t wait to see them break ground on it, but she was also genuinely sorry that some people were being inconvenienced by it. If she could lessen that in any way, then she would. But it hit particularly close to home when it was Scott being inconvenienced by her work.

  She waited, but Scott merely nodded and returned to his seat somewhere in the crowd.

  It was a short interaction and not particularly charged, but it rattled Frederica. Taking a deep breath, she crushed those feelings down as best she could.

  Focus on the here and now, thought Frederica sternly. Patch things up with Scott later.

  And there would be a later. There had to be. Scott was her soul mate. No matter how angry he was now, he was going to have to forgive her – eventually. At least, Frederica hoped that was what being soul mates meant. The alternative was unthinkable.

  Frederica tried really, really hard not to think about her sister Constance. She and Scott were nothing like Connie and… whoever her soul mate was, the man that she had never seen again.

  For Frederica, the rest of the community meeting passed in a blur, one that thankfully did not require much input on her part.

  Afterwards, Frederica sat with the others and watched as the locals filtered out of the room in small groups. Rising, she said her goodbyes to her colleagues.

  “Hey, did you forget? We drove over together,” said her boss, Damian Judith.

  “I know, but I think I saw someone I know in the crowd,” said Frederica. And she thought that he was still there, waiting for her – or maybe she just wanted him to be.

  “Well, call me if you take off with ‘em,” said Damian. “I don’t want to accidentally abandon you in a strange parking lot in a strange city.”

  “Will do!”

  Following the tug on her heart, Frederica left the community center. She found Scott waiting for her outside of the building’s front doors. Standing under the orange light of a nearby streetlight, Scott was a forbidding shadow. His arms were crossed over his chest, and as she drew nearer, Frederica could see that he was wearing a thunderous expression.

  Frederica tried to smile for him.

  “Did you know?”

  “Know what?” asked Frederica.

  “Did you know that I was going to come here tonight as one of the displaced homeowners? Is that why you were so evasive about your business here in town?”

  Frederica shook her head.

  “No,” she said. “I was surprised to see you there. I didn’t say anything sooner, because I didn’t want to bore you. Most people aren’t as excited by legal minutia as I am.”

  “In this case, I would have been very interested.”

  “Well, I know that now!” Frederica retorted. “Why didn’t you tell me that your home was being condemned?”

  “It didn’t come up,” said Scott. “And I didn’t think it would mean anything to you anyway.”

  “It still doesn’t,” admitted Frederica. “I’m sorry that you’re upset, and your house is very nice, but I still don’t understand why you’re so upset about this. There are other equally nice houses elsewhere in this area.”

  “Not like that house,” rumbled Scott, his arms briefly tightening across his chest. “C’mon. I’ll show you why I like it so much.”

  Curious, Frederica nodded.

  On their way to Scott’s car, Frederica sent a quick text to Damien, trusting in the hand that Scott had settled at the small of her back to guide her around any obstacles.

  The ride back to Scott’s house was silent.

  Scott stared straight ahead, his hands at ten and two on the steering wheel and his jaw working as he thought about something – hopefully nothing to do with her.

  For herself, Frederica didn’t know what to say. She wanted to brush the earlier part of the evening aside and focus on repairing their previously easy connection, but she didn’t know how. It was obvious that Scott was still very unhappy about her work, but there was absolutely nothing that Frederica could do about that.

  The university had been in the works for a long time, and at this point, there were far too many moving parts in play for the university project to be stopped or even moved to an alternate location. There was nothing that she could do to stop it or turn it aside. There would be a new university, and it would be built in Mermaid County.

  Worse, it was a project that she truly believed in. Everyone deserved an excellent education – or at least, the level of education that they desired in the areas that they were most interested in pursuing. In a perfect world, her university complex would be able to pursue educational excellence at no cost to its students.

  In the less than perfect world in which she lived, though, Frederica was willing to settle for creating a university whose founding principle was to provide an excellent education to students from all backgrounds at a reasonable price – and then taking the necessary legal steps to ensure that it stayed that way. Frederica was a lot of things, but she had never been careless.

  Except with Scott, thought Frederica, feeling a pang of guilty remorse.

  Even though he lived in the right area, it hadn’t occurred to her that Scott might be one of the ones affected by the necessary changes surrounding the university. Truthfully, she hadn’t thought about much during their time together. Mostly, she had been focused on how much she was coming to care about Scott, how much she enjoyed time spent with him, and how lucky she was to have him for a soul mate. And Frederica’s focus, once engaged, had always been laser-like.

  If she had used her head a little more, she might have noticed the bigger picture surrounding him. She might have cushioned the blow for him a bit, maybe even helped him to find a way to salvage what was most important to him from the morass surrounding the university’s creation.

  There’s still time for that last, at least, thought Frederica, her mind already turning over the possibilities. She just needed to find out what was most important to him, so that she could rescue it for him.

  When they reached his house, Scott led Frederica around the side of it, through a gate, and into his backyard.

  Scott’s home had been built on a surprisingly large parcel of land, maybe half a mile of space in total, and so it had a very large backyard. Said backyard abutted undeveloped land lush with Florida’s scrubby trees, ancient fronds, and thorny climbing vin
es. Like his neighbors, Scott hadn’t bothered to fence the back of his yard, leaving it open to the local wildlife.

  In the ambient light filtering out from the house, Frederica saw a rounded grey back and a long pink tail disappear into the tangled bushes and fiercely hoped that they didn’t belong to an opossum. Opossums were just too creepy with their tiny opposable thumbs and long teeth and completely in your face attitude. She was a dragon, but even dragons had limits.

  “Stand right here,” said Scott, giving Frederica’s hand a little squeeze. “And – And try not to be scared. I just want to show you something.”

  “I fear nothing,” Frederica blustered – cheerfully, she hoped.

  It was a blatant lie. There were at least two things that frightened her: opossums and the tense, unhappy silence that they had ridden over in. Frederica wanted it to go away so that they could return to their previous state of easy affection.

  Stepping away from Frederica, Scott began to undress. As she watched, he folded his shirt into a square, plopping it on top of the closed lid of his grill. Scott toed off his shoes.

  Frederica blinked. When he had said that he wanted to show her something, she honestly hadn’t expected him to start stripping.

  It actually took her a minute to realize what he was doing – and the most likely reason why.

  “Oh!” gasped Frederica, as several facts rearranged themselves in her mind. “You’re a… Well, you’re not a dragon. So you’re a were-something?”

  Scott, now bare-footed and bare-chested, narrowed his eyes at her. He studied her intently for a moment before he said, “A were-bear. And you’re a were-dragon?”

  “A storm dragon!” said Frederica proudly. “Not a were-dragon.”

  The difference probably seemed small to others – particularly someone who was a were-bear by his own admission – but it was enormous in its effects. Aside from anything else, none of her abilities were ruled by the moon or stars… and neither was she.