“Max! Still there?!”
“Yes, sir, still here. So you found a suitable mate, huh?”
“Sure did! And she lives right here in town!”
“So, um, I guess you won’t be needing my services anymore.”
“Quite the opposite, Max! This is a...delicate situation! We need you more than ever!”
A ray of hope filtered through. If they still needed him, he’d get his full fee.
“Great, what do you need me to do?”
Elder Watkins cleared his throat and actually lowered his voice enough that Max could put the phone back up to his ear. No doubt he thought he was whispering.
“Well, you see, um... Thing is, she doesn’t know she’s to be mated with Yoren. Might need some...convincing. You’re good at that sort of thing, right?”
He’d had plenty of experience matching up weres who didn’t know each other, smoothing the way for them to form a lasting and tight bond. Once such an attachment was formed, it was nearly impossible to break.
“Well, yes, but—”
“Wonderful!” he boomed
“But, Elder Watkins, all of my clients have been actively searching for a mate. Is this woman even in the database?” The computer database he developed a few years earlier allowed weres to register their interest in finding a mate through the Council’s service.
There was a tense pause while he waited for a reply. Something about this whole thing wasn’t adding up. It was setting his bear on edge.
“Well, no, she’s not in the database but she is eligible and we know for a fact she’s interested in a new mate.”
The old man was being just a little too vague. He was definitely leaving out key pieces of information. He’d said she was “interested in a new mate,” not “in finding a new mate.” This told Max that the woman probably already had someone in mind, but that the council didn’t approve of her choice. Every hair on his body stood on end.
Max lowered his voice. “Her name wouldn’t be Veronica Muir, would it?”
“What?! Speak up, son!”
“Veronica Muir. Is that who you want me to set up with Yoren?” His hand was shaking so violently that he could barely hold the phone to his ear.
“Oh! That’s right! You know Veronica, don’t you? So does your heavily pregnant human mate, if I’m not mistaken.”
Max heard the sarcastic emphasis the old man put on the word ‘mate’, heard the unspoken threat in his suddenly steely voice. He didn’t need to hear the words to know that if he didn’t do the elder’s bidding, Bethany could be in grave danger. Damn, he knew he should have sent her home! She’d just have to catch the first flight out, no arguments.
As if reading Max’s mind, Watkins continued. “Oh, and another piece of news you might not have heard. The airport received a bomb threat an hour ago. No flights in or out for several days. That’s how long it will take investigators to get here by boat to do their thing. It’ll irritate some of the tour guides but we can’t take chances with public safety, can we?”
A terrifying combination of rage and fear was pulsing through Max, setting his bear rumbling and clenching his heart at the same time. His stunned silence didn’t seem to bother Elder Watkins, though. He was quite chipper, in fact.
“So we’ll see you at seven tonight to set this plan in motion. See you then!”
Max was about to throw the phone across the tiny bathroom when he heard the elder say, “Oh, and Max?”
He could only grunt.
“Be sure to keep that pretty mother-to-be safe and sound inside your room. Sure would hate to see her get in trouble on the mean streets of Kodiak.”
The line went dead and so did Max’s heart. How would he tell Bethany? More importantly, how would he keep her safe?
He was reaching for the doorknob when he hear the room’s main door slam. Yanking open the bathroom door, he looked around.
“B? Bethany? Bethany!”
The room was empty. She must have heard. He tore out of the room after her, calling to her as she stomped down the hallway to the elevator.
“Don’t you dare follow me, Maximilian Pearce!” He winced at the rage in her voice.
“Bethany, stop. It’s not safe. Stop!”
She turned and advanced on him. The fury etched on her face forced him back a step, making his bear cringe a little.
“So you’re just going to set her up with some stranger when she’s already in love with Jess? Why? Because he’s human?!” She spat out the last word with a venom he didn’t know she possessed.
“No, babe, listen—“
“They know, don’t they? The locals found out about her and Jess and are trying to put a stop to it. And you’re going to do it, aren’t you? You’re going to set up this match, which she’ll have no way to refuse, instead of fighting for her right to be with the man she loves. Aren’t you?”
“You don’t understand—“
“No, you don’t understand. If you go ahead with this, you’re agreeing with them. You’re telling the rest of the world that, no, it’s not okay for weres and humans to mate. And where does that leave us? Where does that leave our son? You’re limiting his choices before he’s even born!”
Did she just say ‘son’? She’d been alternating between ‘he’ and ‘she’ for some time, but her tone was different this time — confident, certain.
Maybe she didn’t know; maybe it was just a turn of phrase, or she was just guessing. The realization hit Max smack in the heart: Bethany knew. He was having a son!
“We’re...we’re having a boy?” he stuttered. Joy flooded him. It would have been no different if she’d said they were having a girl. The knowing was the thing. It somehow made everything more real.
“Yes, Dr. Graves told me. And wipe that smile off your face! I’m furious with you!”
Max opened his mouth to ask...well, he didn’t know what but before he could so much as formulate a coherent thought, Bethany shoved her palm up to his face.
“Don’t say a word. I can’t even look at you right now. And don’t even hint that it might be my hormones going crazy. I’m pissed, Max. I need to be away from you for a while. I need a walk, and if I so much as think you’re following me, this fight’s going to get a whole lot worse.”
She stormed off and turned the corner toward the elevator. Shock paralyzed him for a few moments. Max had been present at all of her appointments with Dr. Graves and he’d never mentioned the sex of the baby. Just how long had she known?
He shuffled back toward the room in a daze, imagining all the things he would teach his son, wondering just how Bethany knew, fretting if he’d be a good dad. It was the shock that distracted him.
He’d just closed the room’s door behind him when it sunk into his addled brain that Bethany was trying to leave the relative safety of the lodge. He couldn’t risk her safety, or the baby’s. He dashed out of the room and sprinted for the elevator. For such an ancient lift, it sure moved fast — the arrow was already pointing to ‘1’.
He spun around and ran the length of the hall to the stairwell, easily taking the steps two at a time. But they were on the fifth floor and she’d gotten a head start because of his confusion. She was long gone by the time he reached the lobby.
“How far could she get,” he mumbled to himself as he ran out the massive double doors, trying to guess which direction she went. He didn’t see her waddling along anywhere so he flipped a mental coin and turned right. That would be the earliest opportunity for her to turn a corner and get out of sight of the hotel’s entry, so it was as good a guess as any. But rounding that corner, there was nothing.
He ran back the other direction, scanning the street for her, but again saw nothing.
No, not nothing. There was something lying in the muddy gutter. Max’s body tensed with each step closer to it. He picked it up with a trembling hand and couldn’t restrain the anguished howl his bear let out.
It was a bright green Croc.
Chapter 13
<
br /> Within minutes of Veronica’s sobbing phone call, Grace was at her door carrying a pint of Chunky Monkey and a bottle of white wine.
“It’s a dessert wine,” she announced when Veronica raised an eyebrow.
“You seem to be better now,” she said, looking hard into Veronica’s face. “You really had me spooked, girlfriend. What the fuck?”
Veronica could only give her friend a thin smile — the pain was too fresh, too raw. She simply shook her head and sank into a chair at the kitchen table.
Grace slammed the pint of ice cream in front of her, dug in the cutlery drawer for two big spoons and screwed off the cap of the wine. Without a word, she thrust the bottle at Veronica, who looked at it for a second before upending it in her mouth. The sweet, cheap wine burned its way down to her stomach, warming the frozen tundra that had grown there over the last hour.
“Okay, go.”
Veronica knew Grace’s gruff demeanor was just covering up her concern. It was one of the many reasons she loved her. But she had no idea where to start. Grace had made it clear she didn’t really approve of her relationship with Jess, and the last thing Veronica needed right now was an ‘I told you so’, no matter how well-deserved.
Taking a deep breath that didn’t do a thing to steel her nerves, she gave Grace every tiny detail of their relationship, including how it abruptly ended. Only toward the end did she break down in tears a few times, each time Grace handing her another tissue and pushing the now-half-empty bottle toward her.
“And that’s all she wrote,” she finished with a defeated shrug. “I tried getting him on chat but he wouldn’t respond. He never wants to see me again.” Fresh tears burned her swollen eyes but instead of the choking sobs she’d experienced earlier, these slid silently down her cheeks, dripping onto the faded floral Formica tabletop.
Grace reached for the bottle and guzzled half the remaining wine before she responded. “Well, fuck him,” she said, smacking her lips at the sweetness of the wine. “You knew the risks and you gave it your best shot. He couldn’t accept them, which is...hey, whatever. So fuck him.”
Veronica couldn’t even muster a smile at Grace’s obvious bias toward her side, but she appreciated it.
“Yeah, I knew the risks. One of them was my heart.”
Grace’s arms were wrapped around her before she could register movement, pressing her head to her friend’s belly, hands stroking her hair as her soul leaked from her eyes.
“Shh, chica. It’ll all work out for the best.”
Comforting words that did little to comfort her. But the physical contact boosted her mood, strengthening her from within.
“How’s about we dig into that ice cream? It ain’t gonna eat itself.”
That earned Grace a weak smile and, so encouraged, she popped the lid and handed Veronica a spoon. “Brokenhearted first.”
Fifteen minutes later, the pint was empty and the women were half-drunk. Grace was digging around the cupboards searching for something.
“What are you looking—“ Veronica hiccuped, “—for?”
“More booze,” came the muffled response as Grace buried her head in yet another cupboard.
“Above the fridge.”
She scrambled out and climbed on the counter like a toddler after the cookie jar, making Veronica laugh — and not for the first time since Jess dumped her. Grace had a way of making her feel better, like things might just work out after all. After Keith’s death, Grace had been her rock, and now here she was, propping her up again.
“Found some!” Grace was triumphant, holding a three-year-old half-bottle of gin over her head. Scrounging through the refrigerator, she pulled out an opened two-liter bottle of cola. She threw Veronica a questioning glance before shrugging and mixing a couple of gin-and-colas. They tasted awful but kept the party going.
“So now the question is, what do we do with you?”
Veronica had no idea what Grace was talking about and told her so.
“About your love life. Duh!”
A pall settled over Veronica’s somewhat chipper mood, the little furrow in her brow growing deeper. She gazed into her disgusting brown drink thinking about her lost loves, first Keith, now Jess. Even though it had ‘only’ been an internet romance, and they’d only been intimate once, she knew love when she felt it.
“What love life? Love doesn’t seem to suit me.” Here she was feeling sorry for herself again. Pathetic.
Babe, cut yourself some slack. Keith’s voice startled her.
“Okay, well, that’s an idea.”
Ignoring her dead husband’s ghostly voice, she cast a sidelong look at Grace. “What are you talking about?”
“Why does love have to factor in? Think about it.”
Grace was inspired. She paced the kitchen and Veronica could almost see the gears turning in her brain.
“Sure, you’ve loved deeply and to a great guy. I don’t know this human chap but you say he’s great...whatever.” She waved off the very idea. “But both times have left you brokenhearted, right?”
She didn’t bother answering the obvious.
“So what if you chose your next mate strictly on non-romantic merits?”
Veronica squinted at Grace like she’d suddenly sprouted a banana nose. “Are you nuts? In case you’ve forgotten, we’re kinda programmed to love our mates.”
“Okay, so wouldn’t that just make my idea even more brilliant? Choose a mate who will provide for you and the boys, who’s a decent guy, and then fall in love with him! What’s so wrong about that?”
She had to admit, the idea wasn’t totally crazy. Look what happened when she’d led with her heart. Disaster, that’s what.
Veronica, don’t let Grace jade you.
“Shhhh!”
“What? Why’d you shush me?”
The booze was going to her head. She’d meant to shush Keith and had shushed Grace instead. “Oops,” she giggled. “I thought you were Keith.”
Grace looked at her funny. “Are you okay, chica? Are you so drunk you’re hallucinating?”
Veronica couldn’t figure out if she should nod or shake her head, so she did both at the same time, breaking into another fit of giggles. Thrusting her glass into the air in a mock toast, she shouted, “Screw love!”
“Ooookay, that’s enough for Mrs. Muir.” Grace pulled the drink from her hand and dumped it down the sink.
“Grace, you’re a genius, have I ever tol’ you tha’?”
“Drink this glass of water and let’s get you to bed. Methinks you need a nap before the boys get home from grandma’s.”
Veronica chugged the water, anxious to tell Grace again how smart she was. She had found the answer. Find a nice, stable werebear to become her mate, then fall in love. Or not. Who cared at this point? She wasn’t keen on opening her heart again anytime soon, so why not?
She didn’t even realize Grace had guided her into the bedroom until her pillow was rushing up to meet her face as she fell onto the bed.
“Soooofffft...” she murmured into the old fleece pillowcase.
“That’s right, soft. Now go to sleep, fair princess. Things will look better in a couple hours.”
~ * ~ * ~
Fred sensed his master’s black mood, pressing close against his leg as they plodded down the now-familiar trail to the river. Normally he’d be running ahead of Jess, flushing birds from the dense foliage and generally acting like a demented puppy. But Fred somehow knew this day was different. That or he was still recovering from his bear-delivered smackdown.
Jess was in a state of shock after he saw Veronica change from the beautiful woman he’d fallen head over heels for to a rabid grizzly bear locked in battle with another, much larger bear outside his cabin. For the millionth time in the last couple hours, he shook his head as though the movement might shake out the image forever burned in his brain.
“Can’t be...” he mumbled, again for the millionth time. What he’d seen was just plain impossible. A fantasy.
An hallucination. Definitely not real.
But it was real. As much as his logical mind was trying to persuade him otherwise, Veronica was a...what did she call it? Oh, yeah. Werebear.
A thought stuck him. They’d made love. Did that mean he’d committed bestiality? Revulsion rolled through him.
“No, no way.” Even the messed-up part of his brain said no. She’d been fully human — beautifully, wonderfully, sumptuously human — when they’d tumbled into bed. He hadn’t even known about her unique talent.
He shuddered again, drawing Fred’s concerned gaze. Patting the dog’s head, he couldn’t help but be grateful to Veronica for interrupting the attack on Fred. Who knows what that other bear would have done if she hadn’t defended him?
That other bear. Why had it attacked Fred in the first place? Bears rarely go out looking for a fight, especially with something as loud and obnoxious as a dog like Fred. In fact, in all the time he’d spent at the cabin, he’d never actually seen a sign of a bear, other than last night when Fred was acting strange. But even then, he had no real proof a bear had been out there.
Yet this bear was right up close to the porch. Jess had learned a long time ago to never leave food or garbage outside or even near a door, so he knew the bear hadn’t been searching for its next meal. On top of that, it hadn’t really injured Fred — though it was entirely possible it would have if Veronica hadn’t intervened.
So what was it doing there?
A stray root in the path tripped Jess, surprising him, but he caught himself before he landed on his face. Even though he’d already filed his report that morning, he thought the familiar walk down to the river might help his state of mind, which was decidedly upset. But his mind was elsewhere, and not being present in the moment was always dangerous in the woods.
Kneeling down next to Fred, he gave his old pal a big hug, burying his face in his fur and holding on tight.
Crazy About Curves: 10 Luscious Reads Page 112
