Page 7 of Spark
Matt was right—making a move on Sophie would be a bad idea. When Chris had started this conversation, he'd mostly just wanted to acknowledge her hotness and maybe poke at Matt a bit.
But he couldn't help thinking about how much he wanted to kiss her, and even better, put his hands all over her body.
Too bad Matt will blow a gasket if that ever happens.
Chris sighed softly with regret, and eyed his housemate's broad back as he fixed his coffee at the counter.
Growing up in Albuquerque without any other shifter kids around, Matt had been Chris's other first real friend in Bearpaw Ridge, someone who'd quickly become a brother to him. Chris liked to give Matt a hard time, but he didn't want to hurt his friend…or do anything that might blow up their long friendship.
Sophie is off-limits, he told himself, trying to suppress a pang of resentment.Totally off-limits.
But I'm still going to ask her out for coffee.
Chapter Three
Caitlyn and Mark Swanson's house
Grizzly Creek Ranch
Two hours later
“I’m telling you, Caitlyn, the Bearpaw Springs Resort is haunted,” Daniel Langlais said in his soft Gulf Coast drawl. “And I’d sure appreciate it if you could look into it on the down-low.”
Sophie blinked at his statement. While she'd been growing up, the tall, silver-haired sabertooth shifter dressed in a chef’s coat and checked pants seated next to her on the sofa had come across as extremely down-to-earth. Basically, the complete opposite of woo-woo.
And Caitlyn Swanson, who was sitting at a sleek modern computer desk across from them, had always been a die-hard skeptic.
This was despite the fact that she had begun her career twenty-five years ago as the lead investigative journalist for the long-running and extremely popularMythtrust Newswebsite, which reported on unusual phenomena that ranged from hauntings to UFOs.
Now the owner ofMythtrust Newsand the author of several best-selling books on paranormal phenomena and cryptozoology, Caitlyn also regularly investigated purported sightings of aliens, Bigfoot, Chupacabra, dinosaurs.
She had debunked them all so far.
There was one giant exception to her investigations…shapeshifters. Because Caitlyn was married to one of the Swanson bear shifters, and she had promised her husband and his family that she would keep their secret.
Sophie had made a similar promise to Mitya and Grandma Elle when she was eight years old, after Mitya and his brother-in-law Ash Swanson had both transformed into bears to save Sophie from some bad men.
She had spent a sleepless night after her disastrous birthday dinner, and gotten out of bed later than she planned.
While finishing up breakfast, she'd received a group text from Caitlyn, asking if the witnesses to last night's incident at Calidus wouldn't mind dropping by and telling her about what they'd seen and experienced last night.
Which is how Sophie had come to be sitting between Daniel and Chris in Mark and Caitlyn Swanson’s house, instead of catching up with her other friends on the ranch.
Sophie had always loved visiting Caitlyn’s home, which was an old two-story Craftsman house on the ranch, with a pair of French doors opened on either side of the foyer.
One set of doors led to Mark's home theater, where Sophie had spent many happy childhood hours watching movies with her friends.
The facing door led to Caitlyn's office, a light, bright space furnished with built-in bookshelves on either side of a tiled fireplace, and a computer desk facing a comfortable sofa that stood under the office windows.
Caitlyn was a curvy woman in her late forties, with a warm smile and shoulder-length silver-blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail. Sophie had always admired her on-screen poise and her knack for putting people at ease, which was an invaluable trait if you were a reporter…or a doctor.
Sophie could only hope that if her med school applications were successful, she could someday develop a bedside manner like Caitlyn's.
"But Uncle Dan, you know that Eddy absolutely hates it whenever anyone mentions the word ‘ghost,’" Chris objected.
Today, he wore worn jeans that fit him in all the right ways, and a dark blue Bearpaw Ridge Fire Department t-shirt that emphasized his lean, athletic build.
Sitting next to him, Sophie was hyper-aware of his hard, warm thigh pressed against her leg. She wished she'd remembered to put on some makeup before walking over to Caitlyn's place. After a year spent in the heat and humidity of Todos Santos, she’d gotten out of the habit of applying anything but sunscreen, mosquito repellent, and lip gloss.
