I’d known she was my destined mate ever since she’d found me in the woods. That night I’d lain helpless on the ground, wounded by some scumbag from the Bow Mar clan. She’d approached my bear, undaunted, drawn to me as my mate. She’d gently stroked my fur. The warm feeling that had washed over me is something I’d never experienced up until that moment. She was mine.
Tonight hadn’t gone well. I felt like a teenager again, awkward and monosyllabic, not even charming enough to get her to stay for a drink. At least I got her number. That was one small comfort, but it wasn’t much. I knew when she gave it to me that she didn’t really want or expect me to use it.
I don’t get it. The attraction between us must have been mutual; that’s the way it usually worked between potential mates, even if one of them was human. I could have sworn I’d heard her heart rate increasing when I approached, and the faint blush of her cheeks, all indications of a pleasant physical response. So what the hell was the deal?
There was something holding her back. It probably didn’t help that I’d had Jessica with me. We’d slept together a few times, years ago, but it had never meant anything. We were both shifters, both unmated, and our arrangement had always been just hanging out, no-strings. Jessica was particularly unpleasant sometimes, cruel even. I don’t know why I’d agreed to go anywhere with her again.
Dumbass.
I made my way up the walkway to Nathan and Chloe’s house. Nathan had moved out of his apartment shortly after meeting Chloe, and they now lived in a gated community outside of Denver. The wide path up to their door was leafy and totally silent. I envied my brother.
Nathan had always been better at keeping his bear under a tight leash and this was his reward, a loving mate, a beautiful home and a successful business. No doubt they’d start a family soon, and I’d feel even further adrift. As happy as I was for my brother, the thought depressed me.
I pressed the intercom button and was buzzed in. I hoped Chloe was home. I wanted to get a better idea of what Brianna thought of me after last night.
“Hey Byron,” Chloe smiled at me from the open door, “C’mon in. Can I get you a beer or something?”
“That would be great.”
I hugged her hello. I loved Chloe, and she was always welcoming and happy to see me. That was a rare thing for me. Bonus that she never took sides when my brother and I argued.
“Nathan’s in his man cave watching the game.”
We walked down the hallway to the huge open kitchen and living area. The night flooded in through the sky light and I felt that twist of envy once again. My brother really did have it all.
“I’d rather talk to you, if you’re not too busy.”
“Thought you might,” Chloe laughed as she retrieved a beer from the fridge, “About Bri, right?”
“Right,” I mumbled.
“So, you turned up with another woman and you wondered why she was a bit hesitant about you. Seriously, Byron?”
She rolled her eyes at me.
“I didn’t know you were going to be there!” I exclaimed.
“I know that, but you can’t hit on someone when you’re already on a date,” she explained patiently as if she was speaking to a small child in a remedial class.
“Okay. Fine. I get it. But how else can I get her attention? Give me some insight, please.”
Chloe observed me closely. She narrowed her eyes and screwed up her mouth. I could tell she was weighing my pros and cons, trying to decide if I was worthy of her best friend.
She sighed. That wasn’t a good sign.
“Byron, why are you so eager to get Bri to go out with you? We both know you could snap your fingers and have pretty much any woman you wanted. Are you sure you’re ready to take a relationship seriously?”
I took a sip of beer, trying to find the courage to be honest.
“She’s… my mate,” I replied softly.
Chloe practically peed her pants. Her shrieking level went from shock, to excitement, to full out jubilation.
“Oh, Byron! That’s amazing! I’m so happy for you… and me! We’re going to be a family!”
I tried to share in her enthusiasm, for her sake. But it was impossible. My mate wasn’t interested in me, and when she found out what I was, she’d probably be even more repulsed. My bear wasn’t like Nathan’s. His was a harmonious part of him, natural and pure. Mine was often dark and unruly, prone to violence and constantly eager to escape my human skin and wreak havoc.
“Okay, so give me a clue? How can I at least find a way to talk to her?”
“Well, she volunteers every weekend at the bear sanctuary. I know she’ll be there tomorrow afternoon. Maybe you could stop down?”
She works in a bear sanctuary?
“Really?”
“Yep.” Chloe laughed at my expression, “After the hiking trip, she keeps waiting for ‘her bear’ to turn up. Maybe you could show up and make her day?” She joked.
“Sounds like a plan,” I smiled, feeling good about something for the first time in weeks.
The good feeling didn’t last long. After finishing my beer, I headed back into town and over to my apartment. It was a dirty, messy crap hole at best, a far cry from the opulence and grandeur of Nathan and Chloe’s place, but when I arrived at my front door, things had gone from bad to worse.
Across the front-facing wall, graffiti had been spray painted over the brick. It was black and runny, as if the act of vandalism had been done in a hurry.
It read: “Miss us?” and had a logo in which the letters B and M intertwined.
A nice message from the Bow Mar clan. I clenched my fists. Ever since Nathan had a run in with them earlier this summer, fixing my mess, as he never got tired of telling me, things had been quiet between our clans.
Clearly, that was about to change. Typically, they came after me first. The volatile one, the one who’d fight, the one who would provide justification for an all-out war between the clans after doing something reckless. I was tired of this bullshit.
I jammed my key into the front door, let myself in, and locked it behind me. The Bow Mars were a problem for tomorrow. Right now I needed to strategize my ‘accidental’ meeting with Brianna.
4
So, mucking out enclosures wasn’t my favorite job, especially in sweltering heat, but it was a price I was more than happy to pay if it meant I got to spend some time with the bears.
There were four currently in residence, a great old sow called Bertha who spent all day lounging around in the shade and taking moody swipes at the others whenever they got too close, a black male bear called Shadow who had been injured somewhere in the Rockies and was recovering well, and two abandoned cubs, Tiki and Riki, playful and mischievous little bundles of joy that I couldn’t stay away from.
I always half hoped that one day the bear that I’d seen in the woods would make an appearance. But, if its absence meant that it was happily roaming freely somewhere in the Rockies and not getting into any more fights, then it was a good thing. I just prayed that nothing horrible had happened to him. When Chloe and I stumbled across him, the creature had been badly injured.
“I’ve never seen anyone shovel turds so enthusiastically.”
I spun around at the sound of the low-pitched male voice, and was amazed to see Byron. He was leaning against the enclosure fence watching me through heavy-lidded eyes as though he wanted to devour me whole. He was wearing his trademark black jeans and t-shirt, clearly his go-to ‘bad boy’ uniform. I couldn’t blame him. The ensemble did his smoking-hot looks justice, making his dark features more prominent and utterly irresistible.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, stunned. The question came out a lot more accusatory than I’d meant it, and I felt myself blush. It didn’t help that his presence was once again doing strange things to my body. I was already perspiring under the sun’s blaze, and on top of that, my body was now experiencing added heat from his presence.
“Visiting these noble creatures,”
he gestured at Bertha, deadpan. She promptly released a very bored and inelegant fart and I stifled a giggle.
“Right, sure. I’ve never seen you here before. You like bears?” I asked, genuinely curious. We always needed an extra pair of hands at the sanctuary, though I couldn’t really imagine Byron mucking out enclosures.
“They’re okay,” he shrugged, “Some of ‘em can get a bit violent. They’re dangerous creatures. What makes you like them so much?”
Though I hated to admit it, his answer disappointed me. If he’d felt an affinity for the bears, it would have given me a reason to reassess my initial opinion of us grabbing a cup of coffee together or something. There would have at least been some common ground between us.
“Well, I like animals in general,” I replied, “I saw a wild bear in the mountains, and ever since then I’ve been kind of… obsessed, to tell you the truth.”
“Really?” His eyes lit up and he seemed to be enjoying some private joke I didn’t understand. “What made that bear so special?”
“Hmm… It was the first wild one I ever saw. It was so majestic, even injured. It was beautiful,” I blushed, aware I probably sounded like the bear equivalent of a crazy cat lady, “Anyway, that’s why.”
He smirked at me, crossing his arms. I could see the sinewy muscle of his forearm, and the elaborate, interwoven ink of his tattoos. I wanted to reach out and trace the patterns, but stopped myself just in time.
What is this man doing to me?
“Lucky bear,” he smiled.
His gaze was heated. He raked his eyes up and down my body, making me feel as if I was standing there in the enclosure naked. Normally, if a stranger behaved that way to me, they would have gotten a dirty look and an earful, but Byron was different. My body couldn’t seem to help but respond. A flaming heat grew between my thighs, my nipples tightened reflexively and my mouth suddenly ran dry.
“Well, can I help you with anything?” I asked, trying to get to the bottom of what it was he was doing there.
“I came to see you, actually. Chloe told me you worked here.”
Nice one, Chloe. When I saw my friend next, we’d need to have a long chat about why she wasn’t to send hot bad-boys my way. What was she thinking? She knew me so well. She knew I wouldn’t be able to hack a relationship with a player like Byron. Especially after Derek.
“It was nice to see you,” I tried to sound casual and relaxed, “But I’ve got to get back to work.”
“Do you want a hand?”
“You… want to help me shovel bear shit?”
“If that’s what you’re doing, then yes. I want to help you.”
I pointedly looked at his attire, and then glanced over to the manure pile. I smiled. It was time to give this guy a break.
“Look, why don’t you come back in two hours with coffee? My shift will be over and we can sit and chat for a minute. If you want to, that is,” I finished lamely, far more confident when I started out the proposition than when I finished it.
“I would love to,” he replied sincerely. “Two hours.”
I waved him off, and returned to my shoveling. It took five minutes for sanity to return and for me to wonder what the hell I’d just done.
When my shift came to an end, I showered rapidly in the staff facilities and did the best I could with a mini hairbrush and lip balm from the bottom of my handbag. It wasn’t much, but I really hadn’t been expecting company, other than my four legged friends who loved me regardless of my looks, or smell. As long as I fed them.
With one last cursory glance in the mirror, I headed back to the enclosure. My stomach was already twisting wildly. I felt like I had a million knots tying up my insides.
He was sitting on a bench, leaning back comfortably, with two large cups of coffee beside him and a brown paper bag that, from the smell wafting my way, definitely contained baked goods.
“Hey, beautiful,” he flashed a charming smile of straight, white teeth which I’m sure had women’s panties dampening everywhere he went. It was doing a number on mine.
“Hey, thanks for bringing coffee.”
I shrugged off his compliment. He probably supplied them as easily as he breathed.
“You’re welcome. How was the rest of your shift?”
“Good. I had a little trouble with Shadow, he gets moody when you don’t feed him first. Grouchy bear.”
Byron laughed out loud, though I wasn’t entirely sure why that was so funny.
“You need to show him who’s boss. Take control. Bears respect dominance.” He explained when his laughter had subsided.
“Okay,” I replied, bemused, “I’ll do that next time.”
I took a sip of coffee, trying to think of something to distract me from his nearness which was causing tremors of excitement to shoot through me.
“Brianna,” he put his coffee cup down on the bench, and turned to face me, his hypnotizing eyes capturing mine, “Go on a date with me. Please. One date is all I ask. Just give me a chance?”
My gaze scanned his rock-hard chest and beautifully chiseled biceps. I sighed. He was a million and one kinds of crazy hot, but I was still resistant. My self-preservation was like a hard shell around me that I’d built up over years of disappointing and bitter romances.
I took a deep breath before replying, and averted my eyes from any and every part of his anatomy. The temptation was just too much.
“Look, Byron, you seem like a really fun guy and all, but I’m not sure that we’d be the perfect match. I’m looking for something serious, not just a casual fling or one-night stand.”
“Who says I’m looking for a one-night stand?” He actually looked hurt.
“That’s vibe I got.” I gestured helplessly.
“Okay, well, let me be clear. I want to date you. Badly. Shit, Brianna, you’re the most amazing woman I’ve ever laid eyes on. This isn’t some casual feeling I’m having. I want to get to know you, find out what vegetables you hate, what your favorite movies are, and how bad your singing voice is. That kind of stuff.”
“Oh.”
I was taken aback. That wasn’t at all what I’d expected. At all.
“Ok-ay,” I replied slowly, “That’s…great.” I could feel my cheeks heating a bright red. Half of me wanted the ground to swallow me up for being so judgmental, and half of me was a big pile of gooey mush from the raw honesty of his romantic sentiment.
“I’ll pick you up at seven tomorrow?”
“Um,” I hesitated, suddenly remembering Jason, the guy I was already sorta-seeing. It wasn’t as though we’d decided to be exclusive or anything, but I felt a bit callous to be accepting invitations from other men.
The problem was, Byron didn’t feel like other men. More like the man. Crap. I was already in ‘dangerous thinking’ territory.
“How about a double date, with Nathan and Chloe?” Byron offered in response to my hesitation.
“Okay, yes.” I replied quickly, before I could deliberate anymore. After all, it was just a date with friends. It didn’t necessarily mean anything serious. If Byron and I were still into one another at the end of the night, then I had decisions to make, but until then I could relax.
5
This was a problem. I was standing in the doorway of my apartment, trying to see what the mess and general disarray might look like through Brianna’s eyes. Empty beer bottles, old take out containers, dirty clothes strewn over the sofa and floor, and besides the filth was a lack of décor. I had the bare minimum where furnishings were concerned. I hadn’t bothered to do anything to the place when I’d first arrived. It had never seemed worth the hassle; I never stayed anywhere for long.
I wondered what my life would be like had I not been born a shifter. Would I have a regular job like the suits I saw on the subway? I liked to think that I’d have been more successful, made more of my life.
It was nearly impossible with the rampaging bear inside me. Whatever job I tried to hold down, I always ended up in a scuffle with someone.
My bear was highly dominant and overly aggressive and because of it, I often couldn’t control my temper.
Music had always been my saving grace, but even that was a hard fail. I looked at the one prized piece in my apartment, the Fender that had been my true and only love the past few years. I’d been in several bands. Unfortunately, my talent was overshadowed by my inability to show up to practice on time because my damned bear needed to shift and run off for a couple of days into the wild, or because of my behavior at gigs when I saw men getting too rough with women. I was a nightmare to work with, and I knew it.
The only money I made now was from session guitar playing. Locked in a studio, I couldn’t get into any trouble. It was just me, my equipment and the music. I’d given up playing gigs at bars and small venues a long time ago. Occasionally, I still got stopped in the streets by some crazed fan, but I knew how to quickly douse their enthusiasm by being cold and distant.
Reaching under the sink, I took out a trash bag and got to work. I would probably have to bring in some professional cleaners to do a deep-clean before I let Brianna set foot in this place, but for now, it was a start.
After an hour, and four full bags of trash, I felt somewhat satisfied. I made my way to the back porch to haul the bags to the dumpster.
As soon as I stepped outside, I could smell him, and my bear started going nuts. Another shifter was in the vicinity and it wasn’t one of the Varga clan.
The motion sensor lights flicked on as I stepped off the edge of the porch, and I saw one of the younger members of the Bow Mars waiting for me in the back alley. He was dressed in a polo shirt and pressed khakis. The Bow Mar Clan liked to hide their nature beneath an air of sophistication and WASPish dress. Yet another of the reasons I hated them so much.
“Come to borrow a cup of sugar?” I called out jovially.
Byron_Heartbreaker Bear Page 2
