“It’s ok dad, I get it. Tyler lives 50% of his time with his mom and her husband, and the other 50% with his dad and his dad’s girlfriend and their two kids. He says it’s really great, as he gets to have two families.” This time, Bruno couldn’t restrain himself. He threw his arms around his son and hugged him tight, awed by his maturity and generous spirit. After two seconds, Tad wriggled to get free.
“Aw, dad, stop it!” he protested. Bruno started tickling him instead, which soon turned to wrestling.
“Ok, I surrender!” Bruno yelled, when Tad was sitting on his chest, pinning his wrists with his small hands. He was strong for his size. He would definitely be capable of shifting – Bruno just knew it. Tad got off him and picked up the phone.
“So, I’m going to help you pick someone out,” he said, and settled back onto the couch again.
Bruno got up and sat on the arm of the couch, near Niall’s head.
“How’s it going, bro?” he asked his friend, who seemed to be deep in concentration.
“I’ve just finished answering all the questions,” he muttered.
“Awesome! Now you’re ready to find your match. Let me figure out how to set up the compatibility checker. So the app says that we should filter at 80%. Does that work for you?” Niall looked bewildered.
“I guess.”
“I’ll set the order to random, and you’re good to go.” He handed the phone back to Niall.
“Wow, this is a lot easier. I was getting overwhelmed before. Now there are only 34 women who might be my match.” Niall scrolled up and down, tapping on thumbnails.
“Blonde, brunette or redhead?” Bruno asked.
“I don’t mind,” Niall said dreamily. “As long as she’s curvy and has a kind face, I’m happy – hey, this looks like – ” Bruno leaned over so he could see better as Niall tapped on another thumbnail. The photo expanded to reveal a close-up shot of Lori. Her dark hair hung loose around her shoulders, and her violet eyes sparkled. Her deep pink lips were parted in an endearingly innocent smile.
“It says that she’s 80% compatible with me,” Niall said. An emotion tightened Bruno’s gut. What am I feeling? he asked himself. Jealousy? The word fizzled in his brain, as if it had been written in the air with a sparkler at Guy Fawkes’ night. I’m jealous that Lori could end up with Niall. Instead of me. He was too shocked to reply to Niall. Instead, he watched as Niall scrolled to her other photos. There was another close-up of her holding Nancy on her lap, her face lit with tenderness. Her baby looked so much like her, it was uncanny. There was also a full-body shot. It had been taken at the Hope Valley ball. She looked great in the deep blue dress she’d been wearing, with the nice tight waist. He felt another twinge. He’d been dancing with her, laying his hand on that dress, feeling the heat of her body radiating through. It had felt so good to hold her in his arms, and he’d loved sitting in the car with her afterwards, taking care of her after the shock she’d experienced.
“Hey, I recognize this lady!” Tad called out, staring at Bruno’s phone. Bruno jerked out of his reverie.
“Who’s that?” he said, going over to him. When he saw the thumbnail, he did a double take. “That’s a hell of a coincidence,” he muttered.
“Dad, that’s the lady whose suitcases we brought over. Nancy’s mom,” Tad said.
“I know son, I’m not blind,” Bruno said with a laugh.
“She’s really pretty! I think you should date her. And, guess what?”
“What?”
“Shiftr says that you’re a 100% match!”
“Nice try, but I haven’t answered the matchmaking questions yet,” Bruno said, ruffling Tad’s hair and taking the phone back. “Huh? That’s weird.” The app did say that they were a 100% match. Bruno scrolled to the personality questions. They’d already been answered. “Tad! What have you done?” Guilt was etched into his son’s mischievous face.
“Please don’t be mad, dad. I was just trying to help.”
“I know, but I need to answer the questions myself, otherwise it will create false matches. Ok, I should probably fix this, before I get myself into trouble.” Bruno looked through the options, until he found the one called ‘retake quiz’.
Tad went and sat with Niall, while Bruno answered the questions for himself.
At last, he hit submit. Then he scrolled back to his feed. There were 21 women who were at least an 80% match with him. He ordered them in terms of compatibility. And Lori was right at the top. A 100% match.
“Tad, I owe you an apology. You obviously know me at least as well as I know myself.”
“Does that mean the pretty lady is still your perfect match?”
“It does.” Tad let out a whoop and bounced around the room.
“That’s great, dad!” he yelled. Bruno smiled at him sadly.
“Tad, c’mere.” Tad walked over to him and draped his small arm around Bruno’s broad shoulder.
“I know Shiftr thinks we’re a good match, but it doesn’t know everything about my life. And I’m afraid Lori and I just aren’t right for each other.” Tad’s face fell.
“But, dad! Why not?” he demanded, and stamped his small foot. Bruno sighed.
“There are some things in life that you can only understand when you’re a grown up,” he said.
“But I’m not a baby!”
“I know that, I do. And I’m amazed how well you seem to know my personality. But I can’t explain. There just can’t be anything between me and Lori, and that’s all there is to it.” Tad stared at him, big eyed. It didn’t make any sense to him at all. But he knew the tone in Bruno’s voice well. It meant this is for adults only, and please don’t ask any more questions. He groaned.
“It’s not fair,” he said, and stamped his foot one final time for good measure.
All this time, Niall had been very quiet, seemingly absorbed in the app.
“What’s your next best match?” he asked Bruno.
“Uh, 88%.” Niall raised an eyebrow. “I know what you’re saying – that Lori is most likely my mate. And in a parallel universe, she probably would be. But it’s just not happening.” He looked at his feed in dismay. And now his track was on Lori’s profile, so she’d be able to see that he’d checked her out. Shit. That’s really awkward. At least she wasn’t online right now. But he had to act fast. He turned his messaging capability on and tapped ‘send this member a message’. He typed:
Hey there,
Nice to see that you’re on Shiftr too! Tad just signed me up and immediately spotted that you had a profile.
Good luck in your search,
Bruno.
Ok. That should explain it.
“Bring your phone over here, bro,” Niall said. “I want to check that we’re not getting matched with any more of the same ladies. I’d hate to go head-to-head with you.”
Bruno joined him on the couch and they compared matches. Tad perched on the back of the couch, sulkily at first, but soon draped his arms around their shoulders so he could get a better look at the screens.
There was only one that they had in common – a pretty blond with an elfin face. She was an 80% match for Bruno, but a 90% match for Niall, which made her Niall’s best match overall.
“Go for it, dude,” Bruno said. “She’s all yours.”
“Are you sure?” Niall’s deep brown eyes were full of questions. Bruno knew that Niall looked up to him as the more senior bear, and that he’d never intrude on his territory.
“Of course I am!” he replied. “I have a feeling she’s going to be your mate.”
“Really?” Niall looked at her photo again. Then he swiped left and looked at her other photos. Then he went back to the first one again. A light came into his eyes. Bruno envied his youthful exuberance. Envied his conception of romance that hadn’t been tainted by tragedy. It was very uncommon for shifters to lose their mates. He’d been one of the few unlucky ones. A similar number of shifters never found their fated mate in the first place. And sometimes, in
his darkest moments, he wondered how he’d been singled out to both find his perfect mate and lose her again.
“Send her a message,” Bruno urged him. Niall looked excited and panicked at the same time.
“What shall I say?”
“Say, ‘Hi, you have a really nice profile and I’d love to get to know you better,” Tad said.
“Couldn’t have put it better myself,” Bruno agreed. Niall typed it out and sent it. A few moments later, Niall’s phone beeped with a new message alert.
Same here, handsome : ).
“Way to go!” Tad exclaimed. Bruno got up from the couch.
“I think we should give Niall a little privacy to chat to his match,” he said. “Let’s go outside and play ball. We’ve been cooped up in here too long.” By the time he’d finished his sentence, Tad had leapt off the couch as well, picked up the ball, and was already running outside.
Chapter Eight
Lori was lounging on her bed with Nancy asleep next to her. It had been a difficult two days. Nancy was teething, and she’d been up most of the night crying. Lori so hated to see her daughter in pain and be unable to do anything about it. She’d barely slept during the last 48 hours, just napping here and there while Nancy was asleep. Andrea had very generously offered to take her for the night, but Lori was well aware that she had work in the morning. Now Nancy had fallen into a deep sleep. Her cheeks were flushed and she felt hot. Lori was beyond exhausted, but she wasn’t good at napping during the day. Feeling like her head was full of fog, she gazed aimlessly out of the window at the sunny afternoon.
There had been some good news in the midst of the teething drama. The money from the sale of her house had come through, and she now had $30,000 in the bank. It seemed like a crazy amount of money just for owning a house for a few years and then selling it on. She’d made a lot of improvements to it over the years though. The décor was a lot nicer than when she and Rob had bought it, and there had been some structural improvements too. Compared to what she might have earned from her business over the years if she hadn’t been bullied into giving it up, it wasn’t so much money. But hopefully it would be enough to buy her shop back. The thought of owning the shop again filled her with excitement. Ever since she’d talked to Bruno about it, it had been on her mind constantly. She’d like to get it looking exactly as it used to. There was a room out the back with enough space to have Nancy there during the day. Maybe she could get a part-time assistant as well, who could handle the shop floor, while she took care of the online side of the business. She’d look into it as soon as Nancy was better, and she’d had enough sleep to be able to think clearly.
Aimlessly, she picked up her phone and checked her emails and the news. The little orange Shiftr app kept catching her eye. She told herself she was too tired to look at it now, but somehow, her thumb tapped the paw print icon, and it opened up. She’d answered all of the matchmaking questions on the same day that the girls had showed her the app, but she hadn’t had time to look at it since.
An alert popped up immediately:
You’ve got mail! To activate your inbox, tap the icon below.
She tapped the icon and an inbox opened on the screen. Her heart jumped when she saw that she had a whole bunch of messages. And it jumped again when the thumbnail of the most recent one looked very familiar. Is it really him? Her heart pounding, she tapped the image and it enlarged. It’s Bruno! It was an action shot. He was chopping some wood, his lumberjack shirt tied around his waist, and his tanned torso gleaming with perspiration. He wasn’t looking at the camera, and she had the impression that he didn’t know the photo was being taken. The image was also a little skewed, as if the person taking it didn’t know much about framing a shot. It was Tad’s work, she guessed with a smile. Her heart lurched when she swiped to the left and saw his bear photo. This was the second time she’d seen him in his bear form. Of course, the first time had been very fleeting, and she hadn’t known which one he was. In his bear form, he was massive, with glossy, chocolate brown fur. It was intriguing seeing him like this, running at the head of his clan, full of animal strength and agility. She’d never thought of bears as attractive animal before, but she found herself having the urge to bury her fingers in his luxuriant fur. She wondered if his claws were sharp, and how his muzzle would feel pressing into her hand. Hold on, what’s that ‘100%’ at the top of the screen? She looked more closely. It was a compatibility rating. The app had deduced that she and Bruno were a 100% match! Her heart thudded triple time and her stomach was full of butterflies. This is crazy! I felt like we had a powerful connection, but this is even more than I’d dreamed of.
Wait – she’d been so excited to see that Bruno was on Shiftr that she’d temporarily forgotten that he’d sent her a message. What does it say? She scrolled back to the inbox, and tapped her thumb on his message. Her excitement quickly turned to misery. She read the message through three times.
‘Good luck in your search’. That only meant one thing. He wasn’t interested in dating her. Why has he even bothered to message me? To warn me off. It was obvious. He’d seen that they were apparently compatible, and felt the need to tell her that she shouldn’t bother entertaining any romantic ideas about him. He was essentially saying ‘Hey, I know Shiftr thinks we’re a match, but we’re not, so let’s forget about it.’
His message was like a needle to the tender red balloon of her heart. Blinking back tears, she slumped down further on the bed. She’d never before wanted a man like she wanted him. And he was such a great guy – so kind and caring. And they evidently had lots in common. But he didn’t want her. He didn’t think she was pretty enough. Or she was too fat. Maybe he didn’t even like curvy girls that much. Perhaps he’d only signed up to Shiftr because it was for shifters, and he hoped he’d find someone on the slim side of voluptuous.
She pressed the home button on her phone and the screen went black. Right now, she didn’t want to speak to him or hear from him again. He’d stirred something in her that she’d hadn’t know existed before, and now it was there, he didn’t want it.
But if she didn’t reply to him, he’d think she was sulking. Sighing, she picked up her phone again. She’d just compose a polite, adult message. She typed:
Hi Bruno,
Yes, the girls signed me up to it. It’s a whole new world to me!
Thanks again for helping me the other day, and for the chat. Nancy has been having a hard time teething for the past couple of days, but she seems to be over the worst of it now.
Good luck in your search too. I hope you find the one for you.
I’m sure I’ll see you around some time,
Lori.
She killed the app and dropped her phone on the comforter. She had no right to expect any more from him. He’d put his life on the line to rescue her, but not because of anything personal – he’d just been doing his job to its fullest extent. And then he’d taken care of her again at the ball. As a friend. But here she was getting emotional about him, acting like she had a right to demand more, as if he’d kissed her, or they’d slept together. She had a one-year-old baby, for heaven’s sake. She began to feel stupid, and angry at herself for feeling stupid. She needed to forget about him. And the first step would be to remove him from her feed. What had Dina said about swiping to the right? She opened the app again. He was right at the top of her feed, and there were now some little hearts and stars around his photo. Shiftr was obviously very keen to promote him as her perfect match. Her stomach lurched. She tapped his photo, and, as it enlarged, she right-swiped it. And he was gone, just like Dina said.
She let out a long breath. That was that. All those ideas she’d been harboring for the past days were dead now. Oh well. At least she knew. Instead of continuing to obsess over them like a fool. She felt flat, and suddenly, very sleepy. She picked Nancy up very carefully and put her in her crib. Unfortunately, the movement woke her up and she started screaming again. Sighing, Lori brought her back to the bed and began to
nurse her. Her first duty was as a mother, and she needed to remember that. Maybe she’d come back to Shiftr in a few weeks. Now was obviously not the right time.
*
Lori woke the next day to sunlight streaming in between her half-open curtains. She looked around, disoriented. She dimly remembered feeding Nancy for a long time and putting her in her crib before passing out on the bed, fully clothed. She was still lying on her comforter, as if she’d barely moved during the night. Her stomach was rumbling with a fierce hunger. She looked at the time. It was 8am. She’d slept right through the night, and she hadn’t eaten for almost 24 hours, but she felt so much better for having had a long sleep. She’d been exhausted yesterday, and over-emotional. Today she was going to go and visit her old shop and see what kind of shape it was in. Being rejected by Bruno had hurt a lot, but it had shaken her up, and made her determined to move on with her life.
Lori took a shower and bathed Nancy, who seemed better this morning, her cheeks back to their usual shade and her eyes clear and bright again. She chatted to Magnus and Andrea while they had breakfast together, all sitting at the breakfast bar, with Nancy in her new wooden high chair. Magnus volunteered to feed her, and Lori was touched beyond belief to watch him patiently spooning porridge into her little mouth, scooping up the mess when it missed its target, and trying again. She got a lump in her throat thinking that Nancy should have a father to do that, to love her and take care of her, and to share the joys and strains of parenting with her mom. Magnus had a good technique, doing funny animal impressions that made Nancy squeal with excitement, and then turning the spoon into an airplane and putting the food into her mouth before she had a chance to refuse it. Lori caught Andrea’s eye. Her sister’s eyes were sparkling as she watched her mate. Magnus would be a good father to their child, Lori knew it, and she knew that Andrea was thinking the same thing.
“What are you going to do today, Lori?” Andrea said, turning to her with a smile.
Shiftr: Swipe Left for Love (Lori) BBW Bear Shifter Romance (Hope Valley BBW Dating App Romance Book 5) Page 8