Page 5 of More Than I Can Bear

“Locked down tight,” I replied, shooting him a dark look.

I wasn’t a cub anymore, ready to explode at a moment’s notice. I saw what Macca was, what he was trying to do. His words didn’t hit me hard like they could’ve. They wouldn’t have hit at all if he hadn’t talked about her.

Freya.

Macca didn’t know her name and I’d make damn sure he wouldn’t get to know it, because while the bear could be convinced to put up with a lot of shit, he wouldn’t put up with that.

“What happened?” Kaine asked, much more gently, and that’s why he was my sleuthmate. Other people made assumptions, jumped to conclusions about the guy whose mother wasn’t his fathers’ fated mate, but not him.

“He was talking shit like he always does.” I rolled my shoulders, trying to lessen the tension. “Then he talked shit about Freya.”

Kaine shifted his focus then, turning those laser eyes on the plasterer until the little guy was moving faster than a one-armed paper hanger with the crabs.

“I’ll let his boss know he’s not welcome on site after today,” Kaine said.

And, just like that, problem solved.

Except it wasn’t. The world was full of little men, and not just in stature. Men who had to pull others down if they were to feel good about themselves. Men who preyed on others, thinking that would fill the hole inside them. I nodded, then moved off to get my own work done. But all afternoon I moved through it like I was in a daze, because I couldn’t help but worry about what guys would be buzzing around our mate.

Chapter3

Freya

There was nothing worse than a customer who wouldn’t leave after a long shift.

I’d been on my feet since just before lunchtime and I could feel every hour of my shift in my aching arches. But right when I should’ve been packing up the chairs and mopping the floors, this guy was sitting there, nursing his tenth cup of coffee.

Art Boy, I was calling this one. It said more about him than Mr Big, Tall and Silent.

Unless there was a slew of random drive-by artists dropping portraits of me down on tables, he was the same massive guy with the grey eyes who’d been in before, at lunch. I’d smiled when he walked back in again in the late afternoon, this time dressed in a pair of jeans and a neatly pressed shirt. I’d shown him the menu, brought him his first coffee, then his meal.

And then he was supposed to have gone home.

People had done that all afternoon and throughout the evening and now I was still standing here at 9PM waiting to finish my shift.

“What’s the hold up…? Oh.” Amber swept out of the kitchen, then came to a stop beside me. “He’s still here?”

“He’s still here.”

We’d pitched our voices real low, little more than a whisper, but somehow that had him looking up, meeting my eyes for just a second, before staring back down at his coffee like it had personally offended him.

Maybe that was a hint that he should go home like a normal person and make one more to his liking.

“I’ll let him know we’re closing up,” she said, a determined look on her face. As owner of the place, she could do things that I didn’t dare.

“It’s OK,” I said. “If you’re happy for me to give him the move along. I can handle it.”

“Good girl—” She was about to clap a hand on my shoulder when the late news report came on. Amber always left the TV running all day for customers, on the footy on game days or the cricket in summer. Anything to keep customers happy. But right now she stared at the screen.

“Has Adam Farrelly’s Cinderella girl been found?” the news anchor asked with a smug smile. “Not yet. The star footballer and winner of this year’s Magarey Medal…”

I shook my head, moving away from the counter and taking several steps towards the lingering customer. I’d seen the afternoon report, the evening report and every one between, with some variation on this story and each time it hit me the same.

I ached inside, but it wasn’t a painful thing. It was like the ghost of pleasure I’d left behind, reminding me of everything that had happened. It’d been perfect, that night, that moment, and part of me had been unable to believe a guy like Adam would be willing to skip out of the medal ceremony for me. But there’d been no mistaking his intent. He was hot, demanding—so intense—and I’d lapped it right up.

He was like a fire for me to warm my hands by. And as far as I was concerned, the moment he got too hot, I’d be gone, keeping myself safe from getting burned. But then he’d fronted up to a press conference and told everyone… I scowled at the photo of Adam on screen today just as I had yesterday, sitting in my parent’s lounge room when I’d gone around for Sunday dinner. All that golden perfection seemed… oppressive, somehow.

“He needs to give it a rest,” Amber said, hand on her hip. “Poor girl obviously didn’t want anything serious. And this guy’s using the damn media to get himself another date? These idiots are lapping it up, but now it’s verging on stalker behaviour.”

---