Werebears of New Hampshire Box Set: Paranormal Romance BBW Bear Shifters

by Fox, Kim

  He sighed, feeling his bear pacing within. He feared that these questions would haunt him to the rest of his days.

  Every bear shifter had seen an older, unlucky bear who had been denied by their mate. It wasn’t a pretty sight. The bears turned the men bitter and resentful. It was a slow death. One with very little happiness. Sidney paddled along wondering if that was his future.

  The sun was fading as he got closer to his destination. It was just up ahead. The cut tree trunk just off the river bank. Sidney steered the kayak onto the beach, got out and pulled it onto the grass.

  He took a deep breath as he headed into the forest. The little cabin was just ahead. It was the same abandoned cabin that he had stayed with Angie on their first night together.

  He walked past the garden, remembering her squeal in delight when she found it, saving them from eating a poison ivy salad.

  Sidney stepped into the cabin and looked around with slumped shoulders. He had been sleeping here every night since he returned from New York City.

  He sat on the cot and brought the musty blanket to his nose. He could still smell her scent on it. It was fading but it was still there for now. It was all he had left of her. And even that would be gone soon.

  He laid down on the groaning mattress, curled up with the blanket and cried.

  “What the hell did you do to this guy?” Grace asked over the phone. Angie swallowed.

  “Is it bad?”

  “He won’t stop talking about you,” Grace complained. “We have to watch these football tapes over and over just to cheer him up.”

  “How do you like living over there?” she asked, trying to change the subject.

  “Amazing,” she said. “I never thought that I could leave the city but it’s just incredible. Peaceful and relaxing. We had a herd of deer walk by this morning.”

  Angie glanced back into the restaurant. Her team was sitting with their significant others with the heads of the University. They had taken them out to celebrate.

  “I have to go luv,” Angie said. “They just served dinner.”

  “Well I just wanted to congratulate you,” she said. “Big kiss. Muaah.”

  “Thanks Gracy,” she said. She slipped her cell phone back into her pocket and headed back to the table.

  She had spent the rest of last weekend, red eyed and Red Bull fueled, finishing the project by herself. She got all of the data, compiled it and managed to publish her findings. It was a big deal in her tiny world but she had discovered that the movement of quantum molecules mutate into erratic patterns when exposed to electrical currents. It had huge consequences for the work done at the Hydron Collider in Europe. Consequences that she originally wanted to discover for herself. Now she wasn’t so sure.

  Frank nodded his head at her and raised his wine glass. She shot him a nice, fake smile. She had published the report on her own and even though her team had abandoned her she invited them to put their names on the ground breaking study. It was her fault, after all, that the project had gone off the rails in the first place. Frank was reluctant but when she told him her results he instantly agreed. He did have a professorship riding on it.

  “Cheers,” Rick, the head of the science wing of the University, said as he raised his glass. “To a job well done.”

  They clinked glasses and dug into their food. Angie poked a potato with her fork. She hadn’t been eating much lately and her insomnia was back after a quick break of it while Sidney was in town.

  She looked around the table with a vacant stare at all of the couples, smiling and holding hands as Rick spoke. She was the only one who showed up alone.

  She was being celebrated tonight but she felt like a failure. How could all of her peers have significant others and a career and she couldn’t?

  Her purse buzzed and lit up an electric blue as the table nodded in unison at whatever Rick was saying. She grabbed it, excusing herself and headed towards the hallway where the bathrooms were. She didn’t care who it was, she just didn’t want to be at the table any longer.

  She slid her thumb across the screen. “Hello?”

  “Angela Hawkins please.” The man had a strange accent that she couldn’t quite place.

  “That’s me.”

  “Oh,” he said, startled. “This is Dr Alexia Achterberg calling from Geneva.”

  Her stomach dropped. She had dreamed about getting this call since she was sixteen.

  “We are very impressed with your work,” he said. “How would you like to come work on the Hydron Collider?”

  Her appetizer came crawling back up her throat. She was happy that she only nibbled on it or it would be all over her shoes.

  “Hello?”

  She exhaled into the phone. Why wasn’t she excited? It was a lifelong goal coming true. She dropped her head back and looked up at the water marks on the ceiling.

  Yes she had been working for this. But what do you do when you realize that what you were working for won’t make you happy? She could go to Geneva, leave Sidney behind and let her work consume her only to reemerge decades later when her wits had started to fail her. She would have a stack of awards and a bookshelf full of studies but nobody to share her successes with.

  “Hello?”

  “Yes. Sorry,” she said. “This is all a bit shocking.”

  “We would like you to come to Geneva as soon as possible,” he said. “We have a lot of things to discuss.”

  She stood up and took a deep breath. “Dr. Achterberg I have another idea.”

  seven

  Angie pulled up to Brooke Excursions in her rented car and smiled. She was amused that she was back here and even more amused for the reason why.

  She cranked the rear-view mirror down and checked her reflection. She winked at herself. You’re making the right choice kid. She wiped the Dorito crumbs off of her shirt that she was munching on the drive over and stepped out of the car.

  The air was electric. There was a natural energy radiating up here in the mountains that got killed and smothered by all of the concrete and pollution in the city. She looked up over her shoulder at Mount Washington in the distance. That’s where it’s going to be. She squealed in delight.

  It wasn’t the Hydron Collider but Angie knew in her gut that it would make her happier than moving to Europe. And if she had learned anything over the past few weeks it was to follow her gut.

  “Hey shorty!” a familiar voice called out. Angie turned around and burst out laughing.

  “What the hell happened to you?” Angie asked, laughing.

  Grace was stripped of all her expensive, designer clothes. She wore cargo shorts and a loose t-shirt that was covered in different colored paint spots. Her hair, usually all done up like she just stepped off a photo shoot, hung loose and free on her shoulders.

  “Did a raccoon steal your Louboutins?” Angie asked looking down at Grace’s muddy hiking boots.

  Grace walked over and hugged her. “You have Dorito crumbs in your hair,” she said, swatting them off.

  “What did I tell you?” Grace asked.

  Angie raised an eyebrow.

  “Once you get fucked by a jock you’ll never go back.” She laughed and wrapped her arm over Angie’s shoulder. “Now look at you. Coming back all this way just for some cock.”

  “Shut up,” Angie said, giggling. “You did too.”

  “You bet,” Grace said. “I get fucked so hard my headboard is dented from the back of my head smashing into it.”

  They giggled as Connor spotted them and made his way over.

  “Hi Angie,” he said. “I’m so glad you’re here. I haven’t known what to do with him.”

  “I’m sorry about Becca,” Angie said, kissing him on the cheek. “I don’t know what she’s thinking. Mark is such a piece of shit.”

  “Yeah well…” he muttered, looking at his foot that was drawing a circle in the dirt. “I just hope she’s happy.”

  Grace caught her eye and shook her head quickly. Angie got the gist. I
t was best to not bring it up.

  “Where is Sidney,” she asked. “I would like to speak with him.” Her stomach fluttered with nerves.

  “Come here,” Connor said, waving her to follow him. They walked around the cabin to the river bank. “This is what I’ve had to deal with.”

  Sidney was sitting on his kayak in the river surrounded by a group of a dozen or so women, all listening to him, hanging on his every word.

  “What the?” Angie whispered to herself, feeling a pang of jealousy.

  She watched his rugged, stubbled jaw as he spoke. He looked tired and worn out. He hadn’t shaved in days. The sun reflected off his cheek. She narrowed her eyes and saw that he was crying.

  “That’s a bachelorette party,” Connor said. “They’re supposed to be having fun.”

  She tried to hide her smile. He had all of these women in the palm of his hand and he was talking about her.

  “I’ll make him feel better,” Angie said.

  “Thank you,” Connor said, throwing his hands up in exasperation. “Sidney,” he called out as he ran to the river. “There’s someone here to speak to you.”

  He perked up, scanned the area and almost fell off his kayak when he locked eyes on Angie. He navigated his kayak through the ladies and jumped onto the shore.

  “Ahhh that’s her,” one of the girls said as he ran to her.

  “Angie,” he said, towering over her. “What are you doing here?”

  She glanced behind him at the women on the river staring at them, waiting to see what was going to happen. “Can we go somewhere private and talk?”

  “Yeah but I have to…” he mumbled, pointing to the kayakers.

  “Just go,” Connor said, pushing him. “I’ll take them out with Edwin.”

  Connor ran to the shed and came out with his and Edwin’s kayaks. “Edwin!”

  Edwin came running out of the forest a minute later wearing a shredded pair of shorts and nothing else. The knots of fabric clung together, exposing the defined V on his lower pelvis and the tops of his muscular legs.

  The women stared at the two guides, all of them holding their breaths, as they placed their kayaks onto the water.

  “Sorry ladies,” Connor said. “Change of guides.”

  He pulled off his shirt in one fluid motion, his abs flexing as it came off. A woman with thick eyebrows and pink sunglasses on her head, flipped over backwards, plunging into the river. Her head popped out of the water a few seconds later with red cheeks minus one pair of pink sunglasses. The other girls exploded into laughter like they were preteens again.

  Angie smiled, remembering how Grace, Becca and her were acting the first time they were here. They must have looked as star struck as those giggling women. These bear shifters really were hot.

  “Is there somewhere we can go talk?” she asked, her hands fidgeting.

  Sidney nodded and waved her to follow him. They walked into the guesthouse and sat at the dining room table in the same spots where they were sitting the first day they met. She flashbacked to his unwelcome foot playing footsie with her under the table.

  “Yes,” he said, folding his hands in front of him on the placemat. “I’ll take you back.”

  She snorted a laugh. “As if.”

  “Then what?”

  She took a deep breath. “I got the job in Switzerland.”

  He looked devastated. His face looked like someone told him his puppy just died.

  “But I didn’t take it,” she quickly followed.

  He was breathing again.

  “I have something else instead,” she said.

  “Where in New Zealand?”

  She shook her head. “Come.” She stood up and walked to the window. Mount Washington was in the distance with its snow capped peak thrusting into the sky. “Up there.”

  “In the tree?” he asked, peering out with a focused face.

  “No you idiot,” she said with a chuckle. “Really up. The mountain. Mount Washington.”

  “What’s up there?” he asked.

  “Nothing yet,” she said, gazing out. It was going to be incredible. “I threw out an idea to the company in Switzerland and they went for it.”

  “A hot dog stand?”

  “An observatory,” she said, squealing in delight. “It’s going to have the biggest telescope in this hemisphere. I’ll be able to continue my research at the spacial level. You see,” she explained, “I discovered that the quantum molecules release unpredictable waves when heated, but with the celestial currents emitted from space, they act in-”

  “So what does that mean?” Sidney asked, grabbing her arms.

  “I’m going to be working within walking distance from you. Well, walking distance for your bear that is.”

  He lifted her up and squeezed her in a tight bear hug. Angie buried her face in his neck and wrapped her legs around his torso. He was so big that her feet couldn’t reach each other.

  He lowered her to the floor and looked in her eyes. “So what does that mean for us?”

  “I’ve been thinking a lot about that,” she said, biting her lip. “And I have no idea why but I kind of feel like we are meant to be together.”

  His eyes were sparkling as his lips curled into a smile.

  “I mean,” she said, “you say the stupidest things that just get under my skin but I feel it. I was working really hard to deny it. But I’m ready to accept it now. I would like to be with you.”

  “Yes,” he yelled, fist pumping the air. “I win the challenge.” He threw his hands up in the air and did a ridiculous dance, looking like a baboon on ecstasy.

  “You did not win,” she said, crossing her arms. “I withdrew myself from the competition.”

  “Because you lost.”

  “That horrible dance is really making me reconsider my decision,” she said.

  He froze. “Well maybe this will confirm it for you.” He stepped forward and planted an inside melting kiss on her lips. She moaned into his mouth and his inner bear responded with a purr.

  This was definitely a challenge worth losing.

  epilogue

  Five months later…

  Angie closed her eye and peered into the telescope. The depths of space lit up before her, bright and full of endless mysteries. She moved the dial slightly to the left, one millionth of an inch at a time, until the star that she discovered popped into view.

  She had discovered it so she got to name it. It was the first star in the universe named after a breakfast cereal. She gazed at Captain Crunch and smiled.

  She sat back in her chair with her mittens on and sipped on a cappuccino. She breathed in the vapors as the liquid warmed her insides. It was autumn and chilly at the top of Mount Washington, but she didn’t mind. She loved this place. The Swiss company had set her up with all of the equipment that she needed and she was free to work on her experiments in a peaceful, tranquil setting. She had even published two highly regarded studies in the three months since it opened.

  But all of that wasn’t the best part.

  There was a thud on the door. She took another sip of cappuccino and then hopped down off the telescope to let her mate in. A cold breeze blew in through the door as she let in the polar bear waiting outside. He was holding the handle of a basket in his mouth.

  She slipped off her mittens and dug her hands into the cold, furry scruff of the bear’s neck. She loved to hug her bear. He was so soft.

  Sidney came to see her every night at this time, bringing her a delicious late dinner. They got to eat with each other every night under the stars. It was perfect. She couldn’t even imagine going back to the chaos of the city. This was too serene.

  They had bought a cabin a few minutes walk from Brooke Excursions and Angie loved her new home. She would drive up the mountain, until the snow became too much, then she would take a snowmobile that the Swiss company provided, up the rest of the way. Sidney would walk up in his bear form.

  She kissed her bear on his forehead and then
headed back to her cappuccino, covering her ears as he phased. She hated the sound of his bones snapping. It was worse than fingernails on a chalkboard.

  She sat on the telescope and peered back into it, up at the stars. Strong hands massaged her shoulders turning her insides to goo. She groaned as his hands worked.

  After a few minutes she was nice and relaxed and his hands became more daring. More mischievous. His fingers worked their way down her back and unhooked the clasp of her bra. He massaged his way down her lower back, crept inside her shirt and rubbed back up, pulling her shirt up with his hands.

  He slid his palms to her front and caressed her breasts under her bra.

  “Excuse me,” she said, turning her head. “I don’t believe I ordered this with my massage.”

  His hands continued to work, ignoring her playful protests. “No speaka English,” he said, in a funny accent.

  “Well then it looks like it’s my lucky day.” She slid her shirt off over her head and pulled her bra down her arms. It was chilly in here. Her nipples perked up against the cold but it wouldn’t be long before he was keeping her warm.

  He leaned over her shoulder and kissed her. Deep and passionate. Her pussy ached. She had been waiting for this all night.

  “Sit,” she said, standing up.

  She turned as he sat down in the telescope chair. He was naked, his enormous erection just waiting for her. He gripped it and bit his lip as she slid down her pants and underwear in front of him.

  She glanced down at his thick cock and let out a tiny gulp. Even after all this time it still took some psyching up to get to ready to take in his impressive size.

  Angie lifted her leg and straddled over him. She held onto the back of the seat as she got ready to lower her hips.

  She smiled to herself. If only the Swiss company knew that she was using their four million dollar telescope as a sex chair.

  She slammed her palm on the big red button beside the chair and the ceiling groaned as the two enormous slabs it was made of slid open. The night sky lit up the room in starlight; a trillion balls of hydrogen and helium exploding in a nuclear reaction a gazillion light years away all for their viewing pleasure.