She knew they needed to get out of here as fast as possible. She was driving a stolen car from the hyena pack who claimed to own her. Standing on the side of the road, this close to their mansion, was not a good idea. Even though Jessie was now here and knew that he was her mate, the possibility of them coming back for her was still high. She also didn't want Jessie to get involved with the Updikes any more than he had to.
"I'll hitch the car up to the tow truck and you can ride back to the Timber Bear Ranch with me. I have a shop there. I can fix it.”
"Great," she said, not sure if that was really a good idea.
At least the car would be off the side of the road, and she would be out of sight. She had planned to go down the mountain into Portland and start a new life. But going to the Timber Bear Ranch was as good a solution as any, for now. Plus, she would get to spend time with her fated mate.
Dana had wanted a mate for as long as she could remember. She had always loved babies and had always wanted a family more than anything.
When she’d lost her parents at ten, something important had died with them. A sense of safety and belonging and acceptance that she'd never felt anywhere else. She wanted to get that back and she wondered if she could with Jessie. He was panty-meltingly gorgeous, built like an athlete, smart, and from what she understood about the Kincaids, rich. For some reason, he just didn't seem that into her. She couldn't quite place it, and it made her feel bad.
She stood back and watched him as he attached her stolen car to the tow truck. His deft hands and strong arms made quick work of the project, and she was impressed. She'd never found mechanics as sexy as she did in that moment.
He opened the passenger side of his truck and she climbed inside. After getting behind the wheel, he found a place to turn around and head toward Fate Mountain Village. Before he reached town, he took a turn off the highway and drove up a gravel driveway.
Jessie parked in front of a large machine shop positioned between several houses. Dana hopped out of the truck and looked around, inspecting the property.
The Updikes talked about how much they hated the Kincaids all the time. Brandon and Chuck were pissed as hell that the Kincaids had found the goldmine on their property. The Updikes were always looking for easy money like that, and they’d wanted to buy the Timber Bear Ranch at a government auction. They knew about the goldmine from before Hank Kincaid had passed away. They’d come out to prospect the place for repayment of Hank’s gambling debt. But Leland had found the mine, by chance, and now the Kincaids were swimming in gold.
Dana had never been a greedy woman. All she wanted was to love and be loved, but the Timber Bear Ranch seemed like a lovely place to live. Jessie unhitched her stolen car and put it into the machine shop. She watched him carefully pop the hood of the car. Then he looked up at her with embarrassment in his eyes.
“Why don't I take you inside. You can relax while I work on the car," he said.
"That sounds great," she said. “I would love to see where you live.”
He guided her to the front door of a small log cabin. Inside was decorated in a rustic and masculine fashion. She had been living with the Updikes for the last two years and they had the worst taste she had ever seen. But Jessie’s simple decorating, in the two-bedroom bachelor pad, suited him just right. There was a line of motocross trophies across the mantle and she walked to the fireplace to inspect them.
“Are you a professional motocross racer?" she asked.
"I was for a while. But I keep it part-time now. To be pro I'd have to travel and that would mean leaving the Timber Bear Ranch and my family."
"You're very loyal," she observed.
"Being loyal to your family is more important than anything," Jessie said.
Dana thought about that for a minute. She had been loyal to her family. Even though they had sold her down the river. But now that her great uncle was gone, she didn't feel any of that loyalty anymore. She felt loyalty to her parents, even though they had been gone for twelve years. She would never forget them.
"Can I get you something to drink?" Jessie asked.
"Yes, please," Dana said.
Dana watched Jessie over the counter as he swung open the refrigerator and looked inside.
"Would you like soda or bottled water?" he asked.
"Do you have any coffee?" she asked.
Chapter 3
Jessie made coffee on autopilot. Finding his mate had thrown him for a loop and he was having a hard time recovering from the shock. Dana was more amazing than he ever could have imagined.
She was beautiful, strong, and intelligent and those were just the things that he’d noticed about her in the hour since they’d met. He couldn't imagine how wonderful she would be after he got to know her better.
Alongside his elation, he was filled with rage at the idea of the Updikes holding his mate hostage, all the while masking her scent from him with an illicit mating bite. As the coffee percolated he turned back to Dana and asked if she was hungry.
"I could eat something, but I don't want you to go to any trouble," she said.
"It's no trouble at all."
Jessie hated that she felt she was imposing on him after everything she'd been through. All this time, he had been telling himself he didn't want a mate and all that time his mate had needed him to save her. Instead of him being there for her, she’d had to save herself.
"I have eggs and bacon and toast if that sounds good," he said.
"That sounds absolutely perfect."
Jessie began pulling everything from the fridge and cabinets. He put a pan on the stove and sprinkled the black surface with oil. He flipped on the heat, and tried to get his heart rate under control. As the youngest in the Kincaid family, he was known for being impulsive and free-spirited. He was feeling anything but that, right now. His emotions clashed in his chest like a heart attack.
Everything he’d said to his family about not wanting a mate had gone out the window the moment he’d met her. As many shifters said, fate has a way of changing your mind. One look at Dana and his mind had certainly been changed. When the coffee finished brewing, he poured her a cup and fixed it how she liked it, with cream and sugar.
As he cracked eggs into the pan and slid slices of bacon into a second, he vowed right then and there that he would do everything in his power to protect his mate from now on.
"Why did you leave the Updikes now, after so long?"
"They threatened to hurt my great uncle if I left. I’d seen enough to know they weren’t joking around. Last week my great uncle passed away. I've been saving coins and bills I found while cleaning. I have over a thousand dollars now. Last night, the entire pack got hammered and passed out all over the mansion. It was my chance, so I took it. But with my luck, the car I stole broke down on the side of the road."
"That's a stolen car?" Jessie said, raising an eyebrow.
“It was my only option. I took the chance when it presented itself. I was going to report the car lost when I made it to Portland. I figured the Updikes owed me that much."
"I can see where you're coming from," Jessie said.
He meant it. She had every right to take the car and drive into the city. They had been holding her hostage with threats for over two years as an unpaid laborer. She deserved much more than borrowing a car for a trip into the city.
"You don't know how relieved I am that you understand," Dana said with a smile.
Jessie slid eggs and bacon onto a plate and poured her another cup of coffee.
"I can't believe what a miracle it is that you came and saved me on the side of the road," Dana said. "They say fate works in mysterious ways."
Jessie ate a piece of bacon and smiled. He had to agree that the meeting was almost miraculous. He had only found her on Mate.com the night before. Then she’d texted him early that morning, saying she needed a mechanic.
"I know. We are very lucky to have found each other right now," Jessie said, feeling philosophical.
&
nbsp; "You're telling me," Dana said shoving a strip of bacon in her mouth.
"I'm going to start working on your car so we can get all this taken care of as soon as possible."
"Taken care of?" Dana asked.
"With the Updikes. We need to return the car and make sure they never bother you again."
"Oh that," Dana said, deflating.
"You seem tired," Jessie said. "Why don't you finish eating breakfast and then rest in the living room or the spare bedroom. Or in my bedroom," Jessie said feeling like a dork for the first time in his life.
Jessie usually had a way with women, but with his fated mate, he was feeling over eager and instantly devoted. He wanted to please her and fulfill all her desires. Usually he was a “love ‘em and leave ‘em” kind of guy. Not that he disrespected women, but a lot of the girls nowadays enjoyed playing the field as much as he did. He didn't feel bad about it. In fact, he was on several other social media dating sites that catered to such things. He always felt it was a harmless pastime to fill the void and fulfill his needs.
With Dana, it was a whole different story. He wanted to know everything about her. He wanted to spend precious, tender moments doing everything he could to make her smile. She sat eating breakfast at the breakfast bar, a smile on her face but worry in the corners of her eyes.
He had to get out and fix the car. The feelings raging inside him were too confusing to feel all at once. As much as he wanted to be with her, he had to get away. Dana was a fox shifter, and he knew that she was having a similar reaction to him. Unlike human females, female shifters automatically recognized their fated mates. That was when repugnant hyenas weren't interfering with illicit mating bites.
"I hope you’ll be okay here by yourself for a while," he said.
He turned to her, patting her arm with his hand, noticing the oil in the cuticles of his fingernails.
"Thanks," she said looking up at him with trusting eyes.
He left the house, his chin sets with determination. He walked across the yard to the machine shop and opened the hood of her car. He was able to quickly determine that the fan belt had snapped. He fixed the problem and closed the hood of the car. As he passed the driver’s side door, he noticed that the tire was flat. He knelt and found a nail deep in the rubber. He stood and headed to the trunk. When he popped the trunk, Jessie nearly fell on his ass.
"What the hell?" he stammered.
The man lying in the trunk of Dana's car had been shot through the chest and lay in a pool of blood. It stained his white tracksuit dark red. Jessie staggered backwards and gasped at the horrific sight. Chuck Updike lay dead in the trunk of the stolen car. There was no mistaking his pointy hyena face.
How had the dead body of Chuck Updike wound up in Dana's trunk? He walked back to the body and looked over it again. He’d clearly been shot. But how? And by whom?
He knew he had to call the authorities. But first he wanted to ask Dana if she knew anything about it. Everything in him wanted to trust her. But he couldn't take for granted the fact that he didn't know her. They’d just met and she’d been living with the Updikes all this time. Maybe she had snapped and done something she hadn’t meant to. Maybe there was something more to it.
Ultimately Jessie believed she had nothing to do with it. But he wanted her to be the first to know what he’d found. She was his mate after all.
He closed the trunk and slowly walked back to the house, his mood dark in the bright summer sunshine. Inside, Dana sat on the couch with her feet up under her, watching a historical melodrama on public television.
"Why do you look as if you’ve seen a ghost?"
"Not exactly a ghost."
"What do you mean?" Dana asked, standing from the couch.
She turned off the television and put her hand on his upper arm. The feeling of her touch ignited the passion inside him and he had to resist pulling her into his arms. He didn't want her to have to see what he had to show her.
"You have to look at something in the trunk of the car.”
"Okay."
Jessie led Dana back to the garage and popped open the trunk of the car. She screamed when she saw it and he closed it quickly
"You didn't know anything about this?" he asked.
"Of course not!" she cried, shaking. He went to her and gathered her in his arms.
Stroking her hair, he said "I'm sorry you had to see that. I wanted you to know before I called the authorities."
"What should we tell them?"
"The truth," Jessie said.
Chapter 4
Dana bit her lip and looked up into Jessie's big blue eyes. She glanced around the garage at all his tools. Jessie had looked so yummy this morning when he had saved her on the side of the road. She hated that their time together was ruined by dumb Chuck Updike’s dead body. Now she would have to go to the law.
She’d just found her fated mate, and now the Bear Patrol would probably think she had killed Chuck. Her luck hadn’t changed, it was still getting worse and worse. Fate had given her Jessie just to snatch it all away again.
Jessie put his hands on her shoulders and gathered her up into another bear hug, pulling her tight against his hard and welcoming chest. She breathed in his scent, full of sunshine and rain and rested her head against his burly chest. The fox inside her purred with contentment. All she wanted was to be home like this with Jessie once and for all. She had to trust that this was all going to be okay.
"Are you going to call the police?" she asked.
"I'll call Rollo Morris. He and my brother are friends."
"I'm going to trust you," she said, clenching her teeth.
"Everything is going to be okay. You'll see.”
“I hope you’re right,” she said nervously.
Jessie smiled at her and pulled his cellphone out of his back pocket. He dialed the direct number for the chief of police. Dana examined Jessie’s face as he listened to the phone ring.
“This is Jessie Kincaid. I need to speak with Commander Morris.”
Jessie waited. Dana took a deep breath and let it out, trying to get her heart to stop slamming around her chest. She’d been a prisoner of the Updikes for so long that the thought of the authorities scared the hell out of her. Jessie nodded at her and smiled as he listened to the phone.
“Hi, Commander Morris. This is Buck Kincaid’s brother, Jessie,” he started. “We have a situation at the Timber Bear Ranch. You should come out here and take a look.”
Dana raised an eyebrow.
“It’s hard to say over the phone, sir. But we seem to have found a dead body in the back of a car.”
Dana could hear Commander Morris’s voice grow intense over the phone. “That’s right,” Jessie said. “You’ll be here in a few minutes then? Good. We’re in the machine shop.”
Jessie flicked off his phone and shoved it into his back pocket.
“What did he say,” Dana asked.
“He said he’d be out here in a few minutes to investigate. He’s bringing the rest of the Bear Patrol.”
“Oh,” Dana said weakly.
She wanted to run away as fast as her feet would take her. The urge to shift into fox form and take to the woods overwhelmed her. The voice of her fox inside her mind yipped and barked to run away. But she couldn’t. Jessie was her mate and this was her chance to have the life she’d always wanted.
Jessie, seeming to sense her concern, walked to her and wrapped his arms around her shoulders, pulling her into his warmth. She felt a tear threatening to roll out of the corner of her eye, and she sniffed it back.
“I know we just met, Dana. And you don’t have any reason to trust me. But I will do everything in my power to protect you and take care of you. Whatever I have, it’s for you.”
“How did you get so sweet?” she asked, looking up at him with a smile on her lips that belied the tears collecting in her eyes.
“Believe me, I’m as surprised as you are.”
“What do you mean?” she asked, st
epping back and breaking away from his embrace.
“Just that, among the Kincaid brothers, I don’t think I’d be considered the sweet one.”
“Really? Why?”
“Because, well, I’m generally the brother who everyone knows likes to have a good time.”
“Nothing wrong with that,” she said, wiping the stray tear from her cheek.
“I’ve had a lot of… dates,” he said.
“Oh, then we’re a perfect fit. I’ve had exactly zero.”
She burst into a nervous giggle, and he patted her shoulder.
“This is strange for both of us,” he said, looking her in the eye. “Honestly, I never wanted to find a mate. Until I met you. And that was kind of an accident. My family kept pestering me to join Mate.com and I finally did it last night. That’s the only way we got matched.”
“Why didn’t you want a mate?” Dana asked.
“A lot of reasons,” he said with a sigh.
She could tell the subject distressed him. She didn’t want to press it too hard, but the curiosity was killing her. Jessie was her mate, and she wanted to know everything there was to know about him.
“What was the biggest one?” she asked carefully.
“Probably… what happened to my dad after my mother died. She had an accident when I was a kid, and my dad never got over it. Even twenty years later, his love for his mate ruined him. It almost ruined the family and lost us the ranch. I couldn’t imagine ever being that dependent on another person. I vowed to live my life on my own terms.”
“I see,” she said quietly. It was a very sad story, but she felt she understood where he was coming from. “It must have been hard for you, growing up without your mom.”
“It was. Especially considering how her death was my fault.”
Just when she was about to ask how his mother’s death could possibly be his fault, black SUVs marked with Fate Mountain Police Dept rolled into the parking area outside the machine shop. Dana’s heart leapt and she gulped hard, trying to force it back down into its proper place. Jessie took her hand as the police cars parked and the officers stepped out onto the gravel drive.
Mechanic Bear Page 2