by J. K Harper
His big plan was to give her a Christmas gift she'd always remember: a stunning engagement ring. That night, under the decorated tree twinkling in his little apartment in downtown Deep Hollow, he would ask Brynna to come with him to Montana, ring on her finger, and make him the happiest bear on the planet.
Well, that was a big, fat nope.
Cute little Brynna Darby, fuckin' love of his life and definitely his mate, had broken up with him on Christmas Eve instead.
“I'm sorry, Wyatt,” she'd said, her eyes shining with tears even as she stood firm. “I just can't go with you.” She said she needed more from life than being a reindeer shifter, living in little towns that had ridiculous expectations of her every holiday season. She wasn't about to move from tiny Deep Hollow, Colorado, to equally tiny Snowhaven, Montana, just to follow Wyatt.
Not even if she loved him with all her heart, which he knew for a damn fact she did. Brynna Darby was his mate, and they both knew it.
But a place called Snowhaven probably had even more crazy Christmas celebrations than Deep Hollow anyway, and who wanted that? Not Brynna Darby, reluctant reindeer shifter. A shifter who'd never left Deep Hollow and was itching to see what the rest of the world might offer. She needed more than Wyatt could offer her, she'd said, even though tears had started to stream down her face.
Then she'd up and really destroyed him.
After saying no to his romantic holiday proposal, she had even more news for him. Since he'd already told her he was leaving Deep Hollow and she had nothing else to keep her there anymore, she'd secretly applied for and then accepted a job based in Miami as an international tour guide for an upscale company.
Fuckin' Florida. Far from winter, other reindeer, and holiday traditions like the ones in Deep Hollow.
Far from Wyatt.
Yeah, that had stung. Real bad. Worst Christmas ever, and it had soured him on the season for a while.
So he'd left for Snowhaven all by his lonesome, made himself lose touch with her, and didn't keep up on news about her from her family and friends still in Deep Hollow. He just sucked it up like the big bear shifter he was and forced himself to focus on his new life. He'd worked damn hard over the past several years to forget Brynna, and he'd practically succeeded, even though his bear had never been quite the same.
But then the other night happened. Oh, yeah. The other night.
Sexy, sexy little Brynna that night. Running into her all unexpectedly had brought back every single memory he had of all the time they’d ever spent together, which was basically their entire lives. Then the kiss. Hell, yeah. His whole body tingled right now just remembering it. It was just a kiss, but it had lit something between them again. And that was saying a lot, considering how many times he'd been privileged enough to kiss Brynna in the past. But hell. He couldn't focus on that too much right now, or he'd get a freaking boner for sure. Just like damned teenager again.
Quickly, before the moment could get any more stupid awkward, Wyatt went in the other direction. Caveman style, all the way. He looked square at Brynna and said, “So what do you say, Bryn? Dinner? Tonight.” He shoved as much bold assurance into his voice as he could. He was still pushing her buttons a bit, yeah. But he also meant it. He'd pissed her off the other night, and again now. He honestly wanted a chance to make it good between them again. The holiday season was giving him confidence.
Brynna stayed quiet for a moment, then dragged her eyes to his. Her irritation was gone, and something else flared in her expression.
After she paused too long, Thor nudged her. “Come on, Bryn, tell him what's up.” The guy flashed a quick glance at Wyatt before he looked away. An almost sympathetic glance.
Shit.
Taking a breath, the sexiest little reindeer shifter in the world opened her mouth and once again rocked Wyatt’s world. Badly. “I’m sorry, Wyatt, I can't have dinner with you. I'm all healed up as of today. So I’m ready to go back to where I live now. In Florida,” she added, as if he might have forgotten. “I'm packing my stuff tonight and hitting the road soon. I'm leaving Deep Hollow, Wyatt,” she finished in what was almost a whisper.
Another fucking awkward silence landed like a dirty bomb. Wyatt could sense both Thor and Slade itching to just turn and bolt away.
He looked right at Brynna. “It’s almost Christmas, Bryn.” His voice was soft, but there was a sharp edge under it that he couldn't quite control.
She swallowed hard, nodding. “Yes.” A very faint wobble stuttered through her voice. But her gaze stayed firm.
The world narrowed in on Wyatt. Brynna kept her gaze locked on his. Something flickered in her pretty eyes that he couldn’t quite read, but she didn’t say anything more. She didn’t need to.
Right. The other night with her, brief as it had been, had given him hope again. Stupid, idiotic hope. Because Wyatt's burning, nearly unstoppable desire to protect this woman, and his bear's fierce, nearly overwhelming urge to claim her, told him something he couldn't deny.
Sexy, fiery, amazing Brynna was still his mate. Always had been, and always would be.
But even so, even though he knew it and she knew it and everyone in town probably knew it, that still didn't seem to matter to her. She was still leaving both Deep Hollow and him. Again.
Fuck his life, and fuck Christmas.
3
Brynna tossed things into her suitcase like she had a herd of merry reindeer chasing her down trying to throw jingle bells on her tail. Her parents were both out of the house, which made this activity much easier. She wouldn’t have to deal with their disappointment at her leaving before Christmas, at least not until later.
What did make this activity much harder was the picture of Wyatt’s face she had in her mind that wouldn’t leave her alone. His expression when she told him she was leaving again—oh, that hurt. She’d socked him in the gut with it, and the pain she could sense in him hurt her too.
“Not fair,” she whispered to herself as she carelessly flung a sweater into her wildly disorganized suitcase. She was never this disorganized. As an experienced traveler, she’d long ago learned to pack little, and to pack smart. But that didn’t matter right now. She just needed to get all of her things gathered up and ready to go, so she could zoom out of here.
So she could leave Deep Hollow, her shifter background, and Wyatt behind for good.
Why? It came up inside her more like a feeling than a question. Her reindeer, filled with just as much angst and confusion and sorrow as Brynna felt.
She stopped her packing and moved over to the window to look out into the back yard. Snow filled it, along with enough holiday decorations to rival what was in the front yard. She couldn’t help a tiny smile. Her parents were just as Christmas-crazy as Wyatt and always had been.
Why did she want to leave? Good question, but there was an equally good answer.
“Because there’s too much pressure here,” she answered herself as well as her despairing reindeer. “Because everyone always expects me to be someone, and something, I never asked to be.” Her voice had dropped into a whisper. She leaned against the wall, still staring out into the yard.
“He just expected I’d move to Montana with him.” She almost shouted now. “Montana! The middle of nowhere. Another shifter town.” Her voice softened as she continued her one-sided conversation with herself and her now very silent reindeer. “He assumed I’d go with him, but he never asked me what I wanted to do. And,” her chest suddenly heaved as the old, buried pain crawled up, “that really hurt.”
Brynna stood quietly for several long moments, slowly breathing in and out, unable to keep the sadness from washing over her. She’d pushed it away for a long time, but seeing Wyatt not once but twice in less than a week apparently had broken all the protective barriers she’d erected against it.
Damned sexy bear shifter, showing up back in town and making her look at her own shit. It sucked. She’d been running from it for a long time, and that had been easy to do.
R
ight now, this was anything but easy. Yet for some reason, it felt absolutely crucial to go through it. She forced herself to feel all the ancient hurt. To let it open up all the things she’d kept hidden inside for years. To let them out in the open so the light could shine on everything she’d shoved away.
Finally, so deep inside herself, so quietly, she admitted the biggest thing. The thing so big she couldn’t say it out loud, not even to herself.
I wanted to leave because he didn’t stop me from moving across the country back then. He just let me go, and he never came to get me back.
Oh, that was big. Big, scary, and true. But ah, dang. There was more.
I wanted to leave because he was my mate, and he broke my heart by not proving that. By not claiming me, by just letting me leave instead. Like it didn’t really matter to him.
That was even worse. Even more true.
Now came the hardest part. The part she was responsible for all on her own. Brynna let out a shaky breath as she forced herself to face her own failure.
But I didn’t go after him either so he would know for sure I was his. Because I was too afraid to admit how much I needed him.
Oh, wow. Gut punch, that one was.
Blinking her eyes fast to hold back the prickling that surged forth, she stayed by the window for several more moments, arms clutched tight around herself. When she could finally see again without an ocean of tears making everything blurry, she slowly unwrapped her arms and turned back to her packing.
She’d known when she came back home to recuperate from her injury that Wyatt wasn’t here. But running into him the other evening, when they’d ended up having dinner together, had been one giant shocker. She’d texted Alina from dinner, asking why she hadn’t told Brynna he was back in town. But she couldn’t blame her sister. Alina hadn’t known that he’d just moved back.
Being with Wyatt again, kissing him again, feeling his hard, strong body pressed closely against hers, made it all come flooding back.
The heartbreak when they'd gone their separate ways five years ago.
The pain that she'd never been able to make a real connection with another guy since Wyatt.
Not just because she was independent and knew she didn't need a man to complete her or whatever. No, it was because, as her heart and her reindeer side had always tried to tell her, Wyatt was her other half. Her soul.
Her mate.
The knowledge of that truth had seemed to threaten everything she wanted for herself. Wyatt wanted to stay in a cute little mountain town like Deep Hollow forever, and Brynna wanted more. So much more. And she didn't want to be a reindeer shifter, darn it. Or rather, she didn't want to deal anymore with the annual holiday demands on reindeer shifters. Been there, done that, got the jingle bells to prove it. Ugh. No thanks. Not her jam at all. Her jam was taking people on tours all over the wide, exciting world instead.
But like the scared girl she’d been, she'd instead made the excuse it was all Wyatt's fault. That he was an arrogant, pushy jerk by getting all snarly at that other random guy. She'd run away from Wyatt yet again the other night like all the demons in hell were after her, instead of only his startled, upset “Brynna!” chasing her down the street under the pale fingers of the half moonlight.
Just like she’d run from him again today, telling him she was leaving. Marching off without a backward glance.
Because if she’d looked back, she would have thrown away all her dreams and leapt into his big, strong arms, asking him to hold her forever and never let her go again.
Brynna squeezed her eyes shut. Her entire body felt rattled. Taking several deep breaths in and exhaling long and slow, she managed to calm herself. When she opened her eyes again, her gaze landed on the calendar on the wall above the desk. Squaring her shoulders, she walked over to it. Paris gleamed brightly from the December image, sparkling and shiny and enticing. Brynna loved Paris. It was a fun, vibrant city.
Fun to fly over, her incessant little inner voice murmured.
Well. Yes, she’d shifted into her reindeer very late one night when she’d been there and flown over the beautiful city, admiring its stunning array of lights. It had been very fun to fly over it.
Not that she would ever tell anyone she’d done so. As a rare reindeer shifter, she’d been born with the ability to fly as well as pull a sleigh through the sky. Just because she didn’t want to have to do that once a year didn’t mean she didn’t like to fly around at night every now and again.
Just because she didn’t want to embrace the shifter part of her life didn’t mean she totally denied it.
A little snort deep inside dripped with cynicism.
Crinkling her brow, Brynna heaved a big sigh as she forced herself to woman the hell up and admit yet more truths to herself.
“I don’t hate being a reindeer shifter,” she murmured to the empty room at large. “And...” She hesitated.
Slowly, she reached for the large black marker on her desk. With a precise hand, she crossed off today’s date, just like all the days in the many weeks before had been crossed off ever since she’d hobbled back home. She’d been counting them down till she could leave Deep Hollow. The X she squeaked over the calendar now was on the 23rd. Slowly, she reached out to it, her fingers lingering on tomorrow’s date. The 24th of December.
Christmas Eve.
Just a holiday. Not the end of the world. Just a holiday that was very important to those she loved. Just a holiday she didn’t actually hate. It was just a little—much.
Her reindeer harumphed again, but it sounded more hopeful.
Brynna sighed. Yes, she could wait a little longer. Not just because it was almost Christmas Eve, and her family had gently, hopefully been wanting her to stay for it. But also because the pure, undeniable truth was this: Wyatt was her bear.
Wyatt-the-ultra-annoying-and-heartbreaking-bear-shifter-Webber was her man, her bear, her mate. She did know that. She could acknowledge that.
And maybe she owed it to Wyatt to make the memories of this holiday season a good one, instead of dashing it all to dust yet again. Maybe she owed that to both of them.
“Yes,” she whispered. “Okay. I’ll stay a little longer.”
As a hint of smile lifted her lips, tiny hooves seemed to dance through her heart, clattering with joy.
4
The Deep Hollow sheriff’s department looked like Christmas had thrown up all over it. Twinkling lights, decals of sleighs and toys and snowmen on office windows, holiday music floating out of every room.
Wyatt’s jaw twitched as he strode down the main hallway. Christmas Eve should be one of his favorite days of the year, but all it was doing to him right now was making him want to punch something. Probably himself, if he was truthful. Good thing the department was closing early today, and he wasn’t on duty over the holiday. He was off the clock in half an hour. Then he’d make his way to one of the bars in town and drink himself into oblivion. An oblivion that would black out any and all thoughts of Brynna and that she was probably already on a plane, headed back to Florida.
And then there was the gawky young shifter jogging along behind Wyatt. He growled under his breath. He wanted to swat the kid away, like he was a fly. A rookie deputy here, the kid had attached himself like a barnacle to Wyatt right after he'd moved back to town a few weeks earlier. He couldn’t even remember the kid’s name, but the kid sure knew who he was. Everyone in the department did.
Word of Wyatt's stellar record back at his old department in Montana had preceded him, especially his feat saving that little boy from drowning in the local river late last summer after a huge storm had swelled the water over its banks. He did so-called hero shit like that simply because his job meant he was supposed to serve and protect. Not because he wanted a worshipful young shifter dogging his every step. He couldn't even tell what kind of shifter the guy was, but he was on the small side. Probably some kind of rodent shifter, for crying out loud.
“Did your paperwork come through ye
t, Wyatt? I bet you'll be starting any day now. Sure hope we can be partners out on patrol beats.” The kid was all animation as Wyatt strode down the hallway to his office. “I'm fast, and I pay attention, and I got good commendations during the last evaluation period. I'm ready to step up and learn from the best,” he added so seriously that Wyatt almost choked trying to hold in his disbelieving snort. Instead, he grunted something noncommittal and walked faster.
He was not long past the rookie stage himself, having completed his grueling first years back in Snowhaven. He'd gotten restless there, though, and when the time came for him to move up in the ranks, he'd instead decided to come back home when the deputy position opened up here. He'd always loved Deep Hollow, and he still had family here. Being a deputy in a tiny shifter town like Snowhaven was exactly what he loved to do, but he'd realized in the last few years that he missed his own tiny shifter hometown, not to mention his family and old friends. Being back in the Colorado mountains felt damned good. When the job here came available, it had been a clear sign to him that he was meant to come home.
The fact that Brynna wasn’t here anymore had made his decision to return all the easier. Until, of course, he realized she was here, and all the old shit between them had come roaring to the surface again. Now his entire being seemed to see-saw with confusion and doubt. But damn it all, he was home, he was settled here, and he wasn’t about to leave again. Brynna was the one leaving Deep Hollow again. He’d eventually calm back down to the smooth-running, emotion-ignoring life he’d been leading for the past several years. He could handle this, damn it all.
His bear grumped inside him. Wyatt bit back a growl, walking even faster as the memories of yesterday washed over him again. Slade had peeled off after their run, happily saying something about needing to go see his mate. The quietly thrilled smile on his face as he said it made Wyatt wince. Hell, he was glad his cousin recently had claimed his mate, but he had admit it smarted to see the happy couples that seemed to be everywhere he looked lately. They strolled along the town's little Main Street arm in arm, shopping for gifts and kissing under the mistletoe that had sprouted seemingly overnight above a lot of business doorways in town.