Page 31 of On Tap for the Bear
My bear goes very still. "What did she tell her?"
"That Redwood Rise has always been a little unusual. That the land here is special." Anabeth shrugs. "But Quinn's smart, Eli. She's going to start putting pieces together, and when she does, she needs to hear the truth from you. Not figure it out on her own."
She's right. The longer I wait, the worse it gets.
"How did you do it?" I ask. "How did Beau help you trust him? After everything you'd been through with your ex?"
Anabeth is quiet for a moment, considering. "He gave me a choice," she says finally. "He told me the truth about shifters, about mates, about what the bond could mean. And then he stepped back and let me decide. No pressure, no demands. Just patience while I worked through it. He let me see who he really was and trusted me to make my own choice about whether I could handle it."
It sounds so simple when they say it like that.
The ley lines surge beneath the compound, a sudden wave of energy that makes both of us pause. It's stronger than usual, almost aggressive in its intensity. The air in the kitchen shimmers for just a second, and I feel it roll through me like electricity. My bear surges forward, alert, responding to the power. Through the kitchen window, I can see the trees swaying, branches moving in rhythm with the energy pulse and the slight breeze. A wind chime on Calder's porch chimes as well.
"That's new," Anabeth mutters, pulling out her phone. She's been monitoring the ley lines since she and Beau bonded, taking readings and tracking patterns with her scientist's precision. Her fingers fly over the screen, her frown deepening with each swipe. "The energy levels just spiked. Look at this."
She turns the phone toward me. The screen shows a graph with jagged peaks and valleys, the most recent spike shooting up dramatically—nearly double the baseline. Red warning indicators flash at the edges. "That's not normal fluctuation. The lines are responding to something specific… or someone."
My bear knows before my brain catches up. The ley lines responded to Cilla when she came to town. They responded to Anabeth. And now they're responding to Quinn.
"She's my mate," I hear myself say. "Quinn. She's mine."
Anabeth's expression softens immediately. "I figured as much. I've seen the way you look at her. Does she know?"
"How could she? She doesn't even know shifters exist." I run a hand through my hair, fear and frustration tangled in my chest. "How do I tell her? How do I explain that the land itself is pulling her toward me, that we're meant to be together, when she's spent the last few days learning not to trust anyone?"
"You start with the truth," Anabeth says. "About shifters, about this town, about what you are. The mate bond can come later, after she's had time to process."
Another surge of energy rolls through the compound, even stronger. The lights flicker, and from the dining room I hear Calder swear.
"Whatever you're going to do," Anabeth says, gripping my arm, "do it soon. The lines are getting stronger, and if they keep reacting to her like this, she's going to notice. Better she hears it from you than figures it out when something she can't explain happens."
The kitchen door opens and Calder sticks his head in. "Everything okay? That surge just…" He sees our faces and stops. "Eli?"
"Anabeth is lecturing…”
“I don’t lecture…”
Calder and I exchange a look, but then his expression switches to surprise, then understanding, then concern. "She isn’t wrong. You need to tell her. Soon. Before the lines pull her into something dangerous."
Before she wanders into the forest again at night, drawn by energy she doesn't understand. Before she gets hurt because I was too afraid to be honest.
"Tomorrow." The words solidify into certainty. "I'll tell her tomorrow."
"Good." Anabeth releases my arm and steps back. "Now can we please eat? That roast is getting cold and Calder's going to blame me if it's overcooked."
We return to the dining room where my brothers are pretending they weren't listening through the door. Beau's examining the label on a beer bottle with intense focus. Sawyer's suddenly very interested in his phone. Calder's carved the roast with surgical precision, each slice exactly the same thickness.
"Everything okay?" Sawyer asks, his tone too casual.
"Fine," Anabeth says sweetly. "Just girl talk."
"You're not a girl, you're a terrifying scientist who tracks magical energy for fun," Beau mutters, but he's smiling.
The meal is excellent—Calder's cooking always is, even if it's not quite up to Cilla's standards. The roast is perfectly medium-rare, the vegetables roasted with just the right amount of char. But the food might as well be cardboard. I'm too busy rehearsing words I don't have yet. How do you explain the unexplainable? How do you tell someone that the land itself has claimed them, that ancient power flows through the earth beneath this town, that you're not entirely human?
My bear stirs every time I think about Quinn, restless and impatient.Mine,it insists.Tell her. Claim her.
Not yet. Not like that.
