Bear Guards: A Paranormal Romance

by J. S. Striker

  Their time together was done.

  Evan looked at her with probing golden eyes. She did the same until he finally nodded.

  “I will. Good luck on your journey.”

  She nodded. She gave him a small smile.

  Then she left before she could regret it.

  Chapter 15

  His last day in prison was filled with visions of water and dying, as well as a desert that he trekked on bare feet as he searched for an oasis. But there was none, and he ended up burning his soles from all the walking. His vision blurred even while he tried to fight it but fighting became useless in the end as darkness came.

  Before the darkness, a face flashed in his mind: one with red hair surrounding her and gray eyes that reminded him of smoke.

  Garrett woke up with a start, the sound of grinding metal jarring him from whatever darkness he’d been in. His vision was still blurry, but he could see enough to know that the desert hadn’t been real, but this was.

  In front of him stood the sheriff, Nikolai, eyeing him calmly and telling him he could come out now.

  That confused Garrett at first until he remembered where he was, though he couldn’t remember anything beyond that. Not yet. He stepped out slowly and let the sunlight shine on his face, then inhaled the warm air as he finally stepped away fully from his prison cell. He blinked his eyes several times, then looked back at the row of prison cells in the forest—one on the Eastern side of Orville, where they punished citizens who’d done crimes and needed to pay for them with time.

  “I believe you might be hungry. Go shift and hunt. You know the protocol. Stay away from the city. Go home after. Get dressed, then report to the police station.”

  The words rolled around in his mind before they started making sense. He nodded his head. Then Garrett was shifting, letting instinct take over as his muscles crunched and his beast came out. Without thought, he ran out of there and into another forest, where noises from small animals came and gave him the freedom to have his picking.

  Garrett ate to his heart’s content, a part of him unused to the taste of raw meat but letting it fill his hunger. When he was sated, he went for fruit next, letting their sweetness coat his tongue until all he wanted to do was lie down on the grass and sleep.

  He did just that, letting the warmth of the town gather around him and lull him. It was a short but refreshing nap, and when he woke up, he felt like his old self again—enough to change back to his human form and try to recall all the other events that happened before he was imprisoned.

  Red hair and gray eyes came back to mind, along with the sight of blood and life lost. His chest tightened at the memory, and he was running to his home before he knew it. There, he found Evan waiting at the back of his cabin, golden eyes serious.

  “Where is she?”

  Evan didn’t even blink at the question, which told Garrett that the other already anticipated it. Impatience ran through his bones, and he almost snapped as Evan looked like he was trying to find words.

  The words that came out of him, however, had Garrett’s heart sinking.

  Apparently, Angel had left him a message. Evan recited that now word for word, never missing a beat. It was delivered as cleanly as possible, with no tone to mess it up—but in Garrett’s mind, it was Angel talking, and he could already see what she looked like as she said those words.

  There would be sadness in her eyes, even while she’d try to appear strong. Her shoulders would be straight, and her chin would be up. The little spitfire would pretend to be alright, even when he knew she was broken over what happened. The grief he saw in the warehouse was something he would never forget as she clutched her stomach as if that would fix everything.

  His own heart broke at the memory.

  She fucking loved that child already, and now it was gone.

  Anger surged inside him, and he moved before he could think. His fist connected on wood, sending it cracking as he put all his force into it. He smelled blood, but the pain was superficial as he punched the wooden column of his back porch over and over until he was numb from the pain.

  “Stop that,” Evan admonished. “Did you think that would solve anything?”

  “No, it wouldn’t.”

  “It’s done. She said what she said.”

  “I goddamn know that.” Garrett looked at Evan once, glaring. Then he sighed. “Thanks for everything. You can go.”

  “And you?”

  “I’ll roam the fucking earth until I find her.”

  “We need you back on the force.”

  “Then consider this my resignation. I don’t care either way.”

  He slammed the door for effect.

  *****

  Finding her would take forever—and Garrett had that because he had nothing else in town without her. It was cheesy as hell, but it was the truth smacking him on the face, leading to a determination that he didn’t even know he had. He started by going from one town to another, knowing she wouldn’t risk the big city. He let his patience lead him on a string as he subtly asked around without giving too much away.

  One week of searching became two. He wasn’t exactly giving up yet, but the hope he brought with him dimmed a little bit as he doubted his own thoughts of where she would go based on her personality. But on the last day of that second week, he hit the jackpot when someone recognized his description of red hair and smoky gray eyes.

  Apparently, she’d been in that certain town a few days ago, and he only just missed her.

  He let that lead him on. He traveled by foot, followed her trail until he got to a diner where she was last spotted. He expected to find a waitress who recognized her to ask for more leads.

  He found her instead, doing the waitressing.

  Garrett stared. Angel was wearing a pale pink uniform, one that was loose on her and made him see right away all the weight she lost. She was wiping a table with vigor, then stacking dirty plates and glasses on a tray, which she then carried with ease. She was even humming, some tune that was soft and made him think of happiness. She turned around, a smile on her lips as she glanced in his direction.

  The glasses wobbled before she steadied the tray, and shock flitted on her expression as she stared at him.

  Garrett devoured the sight of her, letting it fill his vision. He slowly walked over, encouraged when she didn’t move. Their gazes connected when he stopped in front of her, and the need to reach out was almost unbearable. But he didn’t.

  Instead, he tilted his head and gestured towards the diner, which was slightly bigger than the one they had back in Orville. “I should have figured you’d go work somewhere there’s food.”

  Her eyes sparkled. A shadow of a smile flitted on her lips before they disappeared, and her serious expression confronted him.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I came looking for you.”

  “Since when?”

  “Since I got out two weeks ago.”

  Her mouth formed into an O, as if she wasn’t expecting that at all. He watched her thoroughly, the smile from earlier gone, along with whatever spark had been there. He’d been planning to ask her to come back home the moment he found her, had been prepared to fight for it. But now all that fight left him as he realized he didn’t want to take her home, not when it meant she would never be smiling like that anymore.

  “How are you, Garrett?” she asked.

  “I’m fine.” I miss you.

  “I’m sorry for leaving.”

  “Don’t be. We both needed to cope.” He reached out a hand, let it drop. “I’m sorry for not protecting the baby.”

  Her eyes dulled, then softened. He saw understanding flash and felt like the lowest of low.

  “Garrett…”

  “It hurts me that I wasn’t able to. It hurts me because the loss made me realize how much I wanted to keep the baby…how much that child already meant to me.”

  Her breath hitched, and she nodded. “It’s not your fault.”

  �
��Maybe.”

  “I wanted to keep the baby, too.”

  “Damn it, Angel. I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.”

  “Garrett…”

  “You know what? I’ll go. I’m sorry for being selfish. You’re happy here, and I’m not going to take that away. I hope you stay happy, Angel. I hope you don’t let bastards like Dan ever get you down, because you’re a goddamn beautiful person. You were smiling earlier, and I don’t want that smile to disappear.” Silence followed his speech, so he plowed on. “Go explore the world. Take all the time you want. Take care of yourself. I’ll take my leave.”

  He turned around and walked away, the difficult decision making his feet feel like lead. But he did it, anyway.

  His heart ached. Misery wrapped around him at the thought of returning to Orville, where he knew his life would be empty.

  “Garrett.”

  Footsteps approached, making him go still. He turned around in time to see Angel catching up to him, her braid out of place and her cheeks flushed.

  “You mentioned the smile on my face earlier.”

  That wasn’t what he expected her to say, and he blinked. Then he cleared his throat. “Yes. I want that smile to remain.”

  “Garrett, I was smiling because today’s my last day in the diner.”

  He stared at her. “You’re fired?”

  “I’m returning to Orville.”

  The words floated in his mind, and shock flitted through. He opened his mouth. Closed it.

  She smiled, and his heavy heart lightened immediately.

  “You’re…returning to Orville?”

  She smiled wider. “Yes. I needed time to get away and move on, and I got it. I miss Orville. I miss living there and helping people find a home. What happened can’t be erased, but I’m strong enough to move past it. And Garrett?”

  “Yes?”

  “I miss you.”

  “You miss me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is it because we’re mated?”

  His words had her eyes widening, and realization struck him that they never actually discussed it. Her jaw dropped, and amazement filled her expression.

  Then, wonder.

  “That’s why I felt you,” she whispered. “I felt you would come for me, back when I was kidnapped. That’s why…you heard the baby all this time.”

  He nodded his head. “The baby connected us. We mated without me realizing…us realizing it. It happens.”

  “Oh.”

  He held out his hand, the hope in his heart too much. “Can we talk?”

  Angel looked at his hand, gray eyes softening again. Then she put hers through it, intertwining their fingers. Warmth filled him. She tugged in a certain direction, and he followed. “Yes.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “To my motel. To pack up. To talk.” She took a deep breath. “I love you, Garrett. I want to return home with you. I don’t know how this mate thing works, but I know my feelings.”

  Garrett’s heart squeezed so tightly as an ache surrounded him. He tugged her back, using his other hand to pull her in. He leaned down and touched his lips to hers, the soft kiss full of need and all the things they felt for each other.

  They might need to go back to the council and explain all about his involvement, might need to restart this peacekeeping thing that they had planned. It all still needed discussion, but one thing was clear.

  They had each other, and that was more than enough.

  Adam

  Chapter 1

  Her garden was starting to bloom.

  That was the first thing Hazel Woodson noticed when she stepped in her backyard, which she often used as a shortcut on her way home to her cabin. There were flowers planted there, arranged in the corners so that they’d intertwine on her short, chain-link fence and make it more like a flower fence than anything. There were also flowers in the middle of the small lot, some of which were very hard to grow in a town like Orville, where the weather was mostly hot but basically unpredictable.

  It stormed a lot here when you least expected it—except Hazel already expected it because most of those storms were caused by her. As a doctor, healing lives was part of her daily routine, especially when the doctors in this little town of five hundred residents could pretty much be counted in a hand and a half.

  As a witch doctor, she was one of the only two qualified to handle the less-than-human residents, especially since their cases involved claw slashes, body parts torn open and getting poisoned by whatever the hell they got themselves involved in. Slashes could be fixed with stitching, but the rest could only be fixed with magic, and she couldn’t exactly deny them the service considering they paid her well and made her stay secure in Orville: aka, the town where creatures like her found sanctuary against the outside world, where humans where much, much harsher.

  The magic she used made her surroundings just a little bit temperamental, especially when she used a lot of it. That was the case earlier when she had to rush to the house of one of the town vampires, who had a brawl with another vampire ending in broken ligaments and torn chests. Hazel managed to save one, but the other’s heart had been torn out—a consequence for some cheating that happened in the relationship, apparently. It was a messy thing altogether, and she was glad to be back home after a long day.

  She rolled her shoulders to get rid of the ache, then looked up at the sky, where the sun had been blocked by dark gray clouds—an indication that it was going to rain soon. She then headed to the sensitive flower patch that weathered many storms and would probably weather this one, too: a beautiful orange thing that she found in the mountains somewhere in Europe.

  Grow.

  She touched the tip of her finger to one of the petals, feeling a tiny energy swirl in her finger before sliding down into the flowers. The flowers vibrated slightly before staying in place, and she smiled before heading to her back porch and stretching some more.

  God, she was tired. Hazel had had to heal a couple more teenage shifters before the whole vampire thing—mostly burns, as said shifters were trapped in a warehouse fire they’d broken into for who-knew-what. She didn’t really ask why, only how, as she learned that finding out about what they did or didn’t do often colored her thoughts when it came to healing.

  If she thought long and hard about it, she actually had the option to just leave this town altogether and find a city where she could blend in. Unlike vampires and shifters, witches were often more human than not, with just the addition of magic to make them different. But being in the city meant disguising her witch side and pretending to be a normal person with a normal job—a huge no-no because the energy contained just made her restless. Keeping the magic inside with no outlet drove a lot of witches crazy: case in point, some of the witches on the outskirts of this town who became hermits and were too dangerous to even talk to.

  Sometimes, Hazel felt it, too: thoughts in her head that were dark whispers, mostly manifesting when she didn’t have many patients. That tended to happen in a small town, and she ended up combating it by making potions and practicing her magic out in the fields, where she’d been given permission to, so long as she didn’t harm anyone.

  So really, with all the freedom provided to her—even if it was still monitored—this was the best place to be.

  Because she lived at the very edge of witch territory, isolated from the other factions, she didn’t really bother with locks. No one dared to enter her home, anyway, as the first one who did years ago and tried to steal her potions had had his mind electrocuted with horrible images that he carried for life. It had been an accident on her part when she still hadn’t learned to control her magic yet, but it worked out well as that man had turned out to be a very disgusting sick man who deserved it.

  The flash of lightning illuminated her path as she opened her back door and slid inside her home, where warmth immediately surrounded her. A quick snap of fingers turned on the lights—not magic, but rather technology she bought from Austin
and modified to suit the not-so-bright white lighting she preferred. She left her shoes by the door and let her feet touch the wooden floor, feeling comfort in the familiarity.

  Now, if she could just gather enough physical energy to take a quick bath, then climb into bed—

  Whatever other thoughts she had in her mind left immediately when Hazel felt something…not right. She stilled on her spot in the kitchen, then slowly approached the living room. A sense of foreboding entered her, and when she stepped into that part of her house, she knew where the feeling came from.

  There was a man standing there.

  Her gaze first started in on the feet, which were large, bare and attached to strong, long legs and thick thighs that looked exactly like tree trunks. He didn’t look like he had any underwear on, but whatever there was to see was covered by a long white thermal shirt, one that was dirty with mud and filled with blood. The shirt stretched across broad shoulders and a wide chest, and the blood extended up to his thick neck. Her clinical observation was finished off as she looked at silver hair, a cut lip, a nose broken and bleeding, and glinting bronze eyes that were clouded and just a little bit crazed.

  Despite that, they zoned in on her right away, freezing her on the spot as she eyed him back. Something pulled at her stomach—a jolt at the energy she felt from him, even while he was obviously hanging on by a frayed thread.

  She placed her hand behind her, a subtle movement in case she needed to use her magic—not that she had much stock to begin with, but she supposed she could still carry out some ass kicking spell before she passed out from exhaustion. To her shock, the man noticed the movement, head whipping in the direction of her hand just as she fisted it.

  Bronze eyes narrowed, and he coughed.

  More blood spilled on her floor.

  “I need help,” he said gruffly, voice deep and just a little bit shaky. She watched him straighten his shoulders as if trying to fight it. Those bronze eyes tried to connect with hers, and the jolt came back at what she felt hidden beneath that skin.

  “You’ve trespassed inside my home,” she said in response. “What makes you think I’d want to help you?”