Hero Bear

by Candace Ayers

“She’s sick, I guess. She called this morning to let me know she couldn’t make it in today.”

  “She called you?”

  He frowned. “Yeah, she hasn’t been out of her room all weekend. I guess she’s been sick the whole time. I don’t know. Hannah’s taking her soup, or something. Looks like we get a day free from looking like completely incompetent idiots.”

  I growled under my breath at Serge’s insult to Kerrigan, but there was nothing I could say. What I’d done to her was worse than Serge’s implied insult. I sauntered to the back and sank into an office chair.

  “You look bright and chipper today.” Alexei followed me and sat across from me. “This wouldn’t have anything to do with our missing dispatcher, would it?”

  I scowled at him. “Don’t start with me, Alexei. I’m in no mood.”

  “No? Whyever not? A lover’s quarrel with everyone’s favorite Disney Princess Mulan, perhaps?”

  I knew he was attempting to push my buttons, and I should have ignored him, yet I didn’t. “Mulan is Chinese not Vietnamese, dumbass. And furthermore, fuck you.”

  “Me? Fuck me? Please, we all know it’s not me you want to fuck.”

  I was up and dragging him across the room before either of us could blink. I slammed him into the wall so hard we both went through it and fell into the front offices where the rest of the team was holed up. I shoved off of Alexei and stalked angrily toward the door.

  “Um, excuse me? You two want to explain why the fuck you just remodeled the place?” Serge gestured towards the chalky mess that had been a wall seconds earlier. Alexei was on top of the pile of drywall pieces, a stupid grin on his face. “And why are you grinning? What did you do? You’re fucking with him, aren’t you? Shit, what am I saying? Of course you’re fucking with him.”

  I ignored them all and left. I needed some air and to calm the fuck down.

  I worked through every trick I’d ever learned about how to calm the animal inside as I headed toward the beach, including counting slowly to a hundred. Nothing was working. My bear was pushing to get out.

  It took me a few seconds to realize that Kerrigan’s scent was what was riling him so much. Her naturally delicious aroma was mixed with the acrid scent of fear and I also scented another male near her. I growled low in my throat and charged forward, teetering on the verge of a shift, more bear than man.

  Down the beach, I spotted Kerrigan, her sandals in her hand, staring up at a fully dressed man, dress slacks and collared shirt, whose back was to me. Her face was contorted in worry and I could feel the anxiety rolling off of her.

  Instinct told me to charge the man. He was threat and needed to be taken down. But before I could implement the maneuver, Kerrigan hung her head and stepped around him. Eyes downcast, she strode quickly toward the house, not even noticing me.

  “Don’t cross me, Kerrigan.” The man’s warning carried to me due only to the direction of the breeze and my shifter hearing. “You hand over more or you’ll be paying in other ways.”

  Kerrigan’s shoulders stiffened and she froze for a moment without looking back, before running into the house. I watched until she slipped inside and shut the door behind her.

  Back down the beach, the man was already walking briskly away, whistling the theme from Jeopardy. The picture of ease and contentment, I was pretty sure I’d just overheard a threat of some sort—possibly a blackmail attempt.

  My already agitated bear eating me alive trying to get me to shift right then and there and end the fucker. Fortunately, I still had some rational brain power—enough to put two and two together. Kerrigan was in some kind of trouble. The man may have thought he had the upper hand, but what he didn’t know was that Kerrigan had a small army of highly trained, lethal polar bear shifters at her back. Or that it would require only one of us to neutralize him. Me.

  9

  Kerrigan

  Back in my room, I emptied the contents of my purse on my bed and gathered all the loose change that had fallen to the bottom. Then, I emptied the shoebox under my bed. I didn’t have much. Everything went toward my student loan payments. One loan in particular. I gathered the small stack of bills in my trembling hands. It wasn’t enough.

  I wouldn’t get my paycheck from P.O.L.A.R. until Friday. Once I did, I would have just enough to settle with Knuckles for the next month. The problem was that I didn’t know how to convince him to hold off until I cashed my paycheck. But, there was no other way. I couldn’t ask Serge for an advance. I hadn’t even worked there long enough. Plus, I was pretty sure he hated me. They all did.

  I was praying my miniscule savings would hold Nicky over until payday. I shoved the cash into an envelope and sat on the edge of my bed wondering if I was just prolonging the inevitable. How long could I hold the man off? He was getting pushier and pushier—demanding double the normal payment amount. Why? Because he could. I had no recourse. Private loans weren’t governed by any laws, so he could do whatever he wanted. It hadn’t taken me long to realize he was a loan shark. A greedy, evil loan shark named Nicky “Knuckles” Palermo who was known on the street as Nicky Knuckles. Unfortunately, I’d learned of his street reputation too late, after I’d already borrowed a hefty chunk of change. Now I was drowning in my biggest mistake.

  I rested my head in my hands and tried to steady my erratic breathing. It wasn’t easy. I was terrified and rightly so. Knuckles was getting nastier. He’d threatened me with horrible things. Breaking my kneecaps had been an early threat. Selling me into sex slavery was the latest. The threat worked because I was pretty sure he actually had the power to do it. So, with my personal safety on the line, I was willing to do whatever I could to procure and hand over double my normal payment.

  The trouble was, whenever I met one of his demands, he had another, more difficult stipulation and I had no recourse. I was between a rock and a hard place. I knew I needed help, but I didn’t feel right involving anyone else in my mess. Besides, I didn’t have anyone else to involve.

  My mom was off in Northern Russia somewhere with her mate. My father had been dead for years. I had no siblings or any other family. I’d been too busy in college, with my nose always in a textbook, to make friends or engage in social activities. After college, I’d hustled my butt off working two jobs—nightshift at a convenience store, and days writing for a small magazine. No time for social pursuits. When the magazine shut down, I lost my tiny apartment and lived out of my Honda Civic. I was lucky to have Mom’s mate find me the job with P.O.L.A.R. even though it meant moving an hour away and losing the second job at the convenience store.

  I was alone. Worse than alone, lonely. Oddly, before meeting Dmitry, alone and lonely weren’t synonymous. Now, the loneliness was a slow burning ache.

  I rubbed my tired eyes and stood up. I couldn’t be bellyaching about Dmitry. Not when I had real problems to deal with. Knuckles was back to his highly effective intimidation tactics. He was a legit danger.

  Whatever had happened with Dmitry was a mistake, anyway. A dumb, stupid mistake. If anyone found out, I would lose my job and right now, that was the only thing keeping Nicky Knuckles from selling me into sex slavery. I’d had to sign a strict non-fraternizing contract. After some incident that caused a big tadoo and got the team in trouble, the main office wasn’t taking any chances. If I was caught dating or otherwise sharing intimate relations with any of the guys in the P.O.L.A.R. unit, I was out. And not even my mom’s mate could stop it. It was bad enough that I sucked majorly at my job, I couldn’t afford to be a rebellious rule-breaker, too.

  My silly crush and my raging hormones had allowed me to jeopardize the house of cards that was my life. If I was out of a job and Nicky Knuckles found out, I’m pretty sure his reaction would be swift and brutal. I damned sure couldn’t afford to let thoughts of Dmitry allow this precarious balance to crumble.

  And I had! I’d called off sick because of what had happened with Dmitry even though I couldn’t afford to be shorted a day’s pay. Not only that, but I had
to do better and work harder, so P.O.L.A.R. wouldn’t fire me.

  I pulled my hair up in a ponytail and headed back out in the direction of the team office.

  Like a cruel joke from life, Dmitry was opening the front door just as I was about to. I didn’t meet his eyes as I sidestepped him and rushed away. Part self-preservation, part hurt, I didn’t want to see him. I never wanted to see him again. Already, as it was, I couldn’t stop thinking about him.

  “Kerrigan…”

  I tossed a wave in his direction. “Can’t talk. On my way to work.”

  I picked up my pace until I was running, and made it to the office in minutes. Shocking everyone, I burst into the frigidly cold building sweaty and out of breath. Serge stood up from my desk and frowned. “What are you doing here, Kerrigan?”

  “Miraculously, I’m healed. And reporting for duty.”

  “There’s no problem with you taking a sick day. We’ll manage just fine. You should take the day to rest up so you’re at 100% tomorrow.”

  I didn’t meet his eyes, and simply plopped into my desk chair. “No, thanks.”

  He looked like he had more to say but the phone rang.

  I yanked it up and brought it to my ear. “P.O.L.A.R..”

  Listening while a harried woman shouted numbers at me, I yelled them out to the room just as she’d yelled them to me. Slamming the phone down, I turned to the men who were all staring at me and widened my eyes. “Well?”

  Alexi sported a half-grin. “That works.”

  Maxim nodded. “Got it.”

  Serge patted my shoulder with his heavy hand. “Good job, Kerrigan. Keep it up.”

  I stared down at my desk as they did their thing and geared up for the job. I didn’t want to see if the call involved weapons or not. I just wanted to do my job and pay my debts. If I could avoid getting sold into slavery, that would be great, too.

  Alexei stopped at my desk and ruffled my ponytail. “The yelling technique. I like it. Serge likes to be yelled at—keeps him in line.”

  Serge slapped the back of Alexei’s head and shoved him towards the door. “Hannah is stopping by. Do me a favor and lock the door while the two of you are here alone.”

  “But not when I’m here alone?” The question was out before I could stop it.

  He hesitated and frowned. “Yeah, you should lock the door when you’re alone, too.”

  I nodded. “Sure.”

  It was just another reminder that I meant nothing to them. He wanted his mate safe, but it hadn’t crossed anyone’s mind to care about me.

  I waved them off and left the door unlocked. What did it matter? The most dangerous man to me was already on the island and had my number. The second most dangerous man slept across the hall from me. I was screwed, no matter what.

  10

  Kerrigan

  I needed a drink, and not just one. Most of my money was going to Nicky Knuckles, but I’d seen a flyer posted at Mimi’s Cabana when Hannah, Megan and I had been there on our girls’ night outing that advertised dollar beers for Monday night happy hour. It was Monday and I was planning to hit those dollar drafts hard.

  I headed to Mimi’s straight after work. Alone. I didn’t care that it might look weird to be sitting on a barstool sucking back cheap beers all by my lonesome before it was even dinnertime for the senior crowd. I truly didn’t care.

  The interior of Mimi’s Cabana was all Polynesian themed with tiki masks, palm trees and coconuts. I was surprised Mimi hadn’t carted in sand for the flooring. Mimi herself was a larger woman who wore a coconut bra and grass skirt to work daily. She had curves on top of curves, but she actually made it work. I liked her. She was all smiles and sunshine.

  The dollar beers were served from 4pm to 6pm. It was a little after four thirty, so I had to get right to drowning my sorrows. I started out strong by ordering two beers from Mimi. I sat at the bar so it would be easy to get my refills when those were gone.

  Dollar beer tasted a little like flat sour ginger ale without the ginger, but it was ice cold and after the first, the next went down easily. I found the more I drank, the lighter my problems became. The alcohol was numbing my weighty emotions for the moment and I was all for it. It was just the respite I needed. Beer number two had gotten warm, but I didn’t care about that. When Mimi came back, I ordered two more.

  “Honey, what’s going on with you? I only gave you two beers to start out with because I thought you had a friend coming.” Mimi poured me another but held it back. “A little slip of a thing like you shouldn’t be downing so much so fast. What’s got you chugalugging?”

  “Men.” I shook my head. “Two men, to be exact.”

  She pouted her thick lips and poured a fourth beer for me. “That I understand. If I wasn’t working, I might join you in guzzling these things myself.”

  I saluted her with my Beer number three and burped. “Excuse me.”

  She just laughed and patted my shoulder as she wandered off to serve her other patrons. “Hold it together, honey.”

  Hold it together. Didn’t that sound easy? I was intelligent, compassionate, well-educated. I could write a novel in under two months and be proud of it. Yet, there I was chugging back dollar beers and wondering how much longer I could balance on the tightrope I was walking.

  The fourth beer was the best of all. I saw some fruity drink with a fancy umbrella served in a coconut go by and almost fell out of my chair drooling over it. Mimi noticed and grinned. “Stick to beer, honey, or you’ll hate yourself in the morning.”

  So, I did. I had a fifth before the happy hour deadline arrived. I was wasted, anyway. I wasn’t much of a drinker, but I usually held my alcohol fairly well for a woman who was a hair over five foot tall and weighed about 100 pounds soaking wet. Or, I could at least pretend to hold my alcohol. That night was different. I felt every ounce of cheap draft sloshing around in my gut, taunting me with the knowledge that it wasn’t actually going to solve any of my dilemmas.

  The numbed emotions were still there, just under the surface, but now I felt out of control. I swayed on my stool, which had nothing to do with the song playing in the background.

  When someone sat down on the stool beside me, I paid them no mind. I was in my own world, wondering how long it would be before I could safely stand up without embarrassing the hell out of myself. Mimi had brought me a glass of water, but I needed to pee again and not another drop of was going to fit inside of me until I did.

  “You drinking away all of my money, Kerrigan?”

  I steadied myself by grasping the lip of the bar and digging my fingernails in. My eyes remained on the bar top. Nicky Knuckles. What the hell was he doing here? I’d already texted him that he could have my meager savings and that I’d give him the balance when I got paid. Why was he stalking me?

  “Don’t ignore me, sweetheart. That’s not very nice.”

  “What do you want, Nicky?”

  He wrapped his arm around my waist and leaned into me, his stale breath on my face was like a warm breeze rolling off a trash heap. “You know what I want.”

  I shuddered, the feeling of him so close was worse than having a slithering snake crawl over my skin. “I-I already told you when I’d have your money.”

  He tsk-ed and lightly tugged at the end of my ponytail. “I’m an impatient man. If you want me to wait until Friday, I’ll need to be entertained in the meantime—in other ways.”

  I tried to pull away, but he was strong. “Leave me alone.”

  He grasped my chin between his thumb and forefinger and forced my face to turn his way. His grin was bone chilling. “Let’s dance.”

  I tried to hold onto the bar, but it was useless. Nicky was a big man and he easily picked me up merely by scooping his arm around my waist. He put me down out of reach of the stool and bar. When I tried to pull away, I felt the room spin and he simply wrapped his arms around me and held me against his chest. My face pressed into his shirt, his sickly sweet smelling cologne made me gag and the gold chai
n he wore dug into the side of my cheek.

  “There we go. Isn’t this nice?” He ran his hands up and down my back, his grip firm. “Just a nice dance between old friends—or maybe a little more than friends.”

  The threat was clear. He was letting me know how easily he could overpower me and that, unless I wanted everyone to know my shameful secret, there was nothing I could do about it. I wanted to scream, to beg someone to help me get away from him, but I knew it would only make things worse for me. Even filled to the brim with liquid courage, I knew better than to try to cross Nicky. The punishment would be too severe.

  His strong cologne was mixed with cigarette smoke. I could feel the prickliness of his chest hair through the silk shirt he wore. My heart hammered in my chest and I had twin death grips on each side of his shirt, fighting to stay upright. I felt like I was going to vomit.

  There were other couples dancing around us to the piped in calypso music and I knew that we didn’t stand out. A bar full of people around and Nicky could maul me in plain sight without anyone noticing.

  “There’s something you should know about me, Kerrigan. I always get what I want. Always.”

  “Just let me pay you on Friday. Please.”

  He dug his fingers into my back suddenly and then pulled away with a big smile on his face. “Thanks for the dance.”

  “Honey, you okay?” Mimi was right behind me, undoubtedly the real reason Nicky had let me go. “Let’s get you to a chair. You can barely stand on your own, child.”

  I wanted to kiss Mimi I was so thankful for her. I didn’t notice whether or not Nicky left. I didn’t see anything else. I was too focused on putting one foot in front of the other on a relatively straight path back to the barstool. That, and trying to keep the room from spinning.

  “Okay, here we go.” Mimi tried to help me, but I was already wobbling like a newborn colt.

  Trying to get onto the stool was a joke. I lifted one leg and the other one buckled beneath me. Before I could help it, I was going down.