Page 129 of Choose the Bears

I rocked back on my heels, stunned at my brother’s snapped retort. His sleuth was as well because all of them fell silent. Big, bad Hawk just lurked in the background, nodding slowly in my direction to indicate I should continue.

“He caught me off guard. Last time I looked, he was bound up and pissing himself, but when I walked around to the tray, he smashed me in the head with a wrench. When I was out of it, he took the truck, my wallet, and my phone.”

Bjorn pulled me close and for a moment my heart lightened, but his fingers went to the wound, checking it over with careful fingers.

“Can’t have been too hard.” There was a taut wariness to his tone. “It’s damn near healed.”

The bear had been pacing back and forth inside me since the attack. He was keen to rip the face off the park ranger, despite the bloke helping me out, and he pushed forward now. Not to take fur, but to make clear he was here. The others swore, sensing my beast, but my brother? He held me at arm’s length, looking me up and down.

“This part of the long story?” he asked, daring a small smile.

“A real long one,” I replied, “if you’re keen to hear it.”

“Yeah, alright.” He turned and faced the others. “One of you get in the back in the bitch seat. Jesse’s riding up front with me.” My brother’s eyes met mine. “You alright with that?”

“Yeah… brother.”

“So you tookfur in a fucking pub in the middle of nowhere and scared the literal shit out of this prick?” Crash asked as we walked towards my brother’s bar. My head was feeling better and better the closer we got into the city, and right now I’d murder a beer. “Fuck, sexy?—”

“Don’t call him that.” Hawk never said much, so when he did, people paid attention. He stared at his brother, eyes narrowing when Crash wouldn’t look away. “That’s not Jesse anymore.”

He had no idea how much I needed someone to fucking say that. Every day I tried to be a better man, but it just felt like I failed over and over and over. Of course I couldn’t say that, could I? That’s not what blokes do, so instead I just acknowledged that with a chin tilt.

“No, he’s not.” Bjorn’s arm was a comforting weight around my shoulders as he steered me inside. “Fair warning, Maddie will be here by now. Word would’ve gotten out and she’d have hightailed it over.”

“You know I won’t cause any problems there.” I stopped midway up the bar steps and shot him a sidelong look. “I didn’t get it before, but now…”

A sharp nod, a stiff one, but there was real warmth in his smile. We walked inside to the musical sound of women talking.

Seeing your ex after a while was supposed to be a bit of a gut punch, right? But that wasn’t what happened. Maddie was looking damn fine in a pair of tailored slacks and a pretty blouse, one of the boys’ jackets draped over her shoulder, but my eyes skated over her to the other woman.

Roxy was the bar manager, had worked for my brother for years. She kicked me out for being too drunk, stoned, or when I came in looking for trouble. Fuck, I think she even held my hair back when I spewed, then handed me a mop and made me clean up the mess, but that’s not what I was thinking right now. My feet slowed, then stopped, the others grumbling as I stood in the middle of the doorway, staring like a fucking idiot.

“You sure about that?”

Razor was always too sharp, that’s where he got his road name from, but those eyes saw more than they should. He followed my gaze and saw it wasn’t his girl I was staring at.

It was mine.

Jesus, I owed my brother an apology, a thousand of them, as my heart started to gallop from a standing start. Every muscle tensed, the hair on my arms prickling as the bear pressed forward. Her, he said, with complete certainty, obviously having tried to show me just this many times before. There was a reason why I kept coming back to this bar, and it wasn’t Maddie, my brother, or the cheap booze.

It was my fated mate.

She looked up then, smiling, the skin around her eyes creasing slightly as if she was squinting into the sun, not just looking at me. Her head shook in the tiniest of movements as her eyes slid up and down my body. My hands formed fists, my forearm muscles popping, peacocking like some kind of bird shifter trying to impress his mate, not a fucking bear. My beast growled inside me, making one thing very clear.

We needed to start the process of wooing Roxy very soon. He was done waiting, and if I didn’t sort shit out…

But I wasn’t worthy.

It took next to no effort to provide him the kind of evidence that had him sitting back on his haunches, dejected. This was why he’d never shown himself before. The bear comes to those who possess a bear’s spirit, and there was nothing strong, bold, or brave about my behaviour. I felt him recede, which put me back in control of my body, so why did I feel this awful loss?

“Babe.” Razor slotted in behind Maddie, kissing one of the bite marks they’d left on her neck, and her eyelids fluttered at the feel of it. “You got word, obviously?”

“Of more than just your news.” She raised a hand and waved it at me. “Hey, Jesse.”

“Hey, Maddie. You’re looking well.”

This was the kind of stiff, awkward conversation strangers had with each other, not former lovers, but perhaps that madesense. We were strangers to each other in so many ways. The man I was didn’t exist anymore, but neither did the girl I dated. She’d been replaced by someone who was loved, treasured, and pampered, and it looked good on Maddie.

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