Bear No Loss

by Anya Nowlan

  “Practice going well?” April asked, her smile easier now than it had been the previous day.

  Despite there being some awkward tension at the end of the evening that she couldn’t quite put her finger on, April had thought the dinner had gone very well. She hadn’t participated in the conversation as much as she would have liked, but she’d been glad to listen and answer questions where there had been any to reply to, though Nicky had easily monopolized the topics.

  In retrospect, she would have probably enjoyed the meal more if it had just been her and Memphis, but having Nicky there had really bolstered her confidence and let her ease into the new situation. It had taken her years to really peel herself away from her parents and try to make it on her own, and this seemed to follow much of what she did with her life. She was always cautious, perhaps overly so and it was something that she was working to handle better as time passed.

  “It’s all right,” he said with a heavy shrug of his shoulders, the padding that he wore making him look even more towering than he was.

  She saw him toss one quick look at Nicky, who was explaining something in an animated fashion to Cannon and Heath, both of them looking a little bit confused. Memphis grinned and April matched his smile, liking the way his face looked when he smiled. He had a scar on his forehead and another on his cheek that didn’t take away from his rugged features, but when he wasn’t smiling, he could look almost haunted at times.

  “Hey, I wanted to ask you somethin’. I have tomorrow off, the whole day. What do you say you and I sneak out together? I wanna show you a place and I’d like to have some one-on-one time without the chaperone. How does that sound?”

  Memphis looked a bit too hesitant when voicing his question, but April thought nothing of it. It wasn’t like she was entirely calm and collected around him either. Maybe he had a shy streak to him that she just didn’t know about yet?

  Should I go? But Nicky… no, that’s why I came here! I need to get to know him better to know if there’s ever a shot for anything more…

  Just the thought of there being something “more,” or even the same as that one evening they had shared in her apartment, made her flush up with pink a little and give an uncertain nod of her head. Okay, so maybe it looked like she was waggling her head far too eagerly, but she couldn’t really stop herself at that point and Memphis quirked one amused brow at her.

  “Is that a yes, Miss April?”

  “It’s a yes,” she confirmed with a nervous laugh, getting a chuckle in response from Memphis.

  “Great! I’ll pick you up bright and early. I’ll text you the details. Don’t let your little friend know, okay? I promise I’ll be on my best behavior,” Memphis said with a wink, pushing away from the railing and skating away from her backward as Nicky popped up at her side again, her dark eyes narrowed as she glanced from Memphis to April.

  “What was he saying?”

  “Oh, nothing. Just confirming if we’re going out for drinks with the team tonight,” April said, turning away from Nicky and climbing back up to her seat with a private smile on her lips.

  She was impossibly thankful to Nicky for having decided to make the trip with her, but dammit, she needed some alone time with the big hunk of hockey bear who had been keeping her mind so preoccupied, and she wasn’t above using a tiny bit of secrecy to achieve it.

  You’re turning positively devious, she thought with a snicker, shaking her head as she sat back down and looked at the pristine ice and the snow-capped mountains jutting out behind it as far as the eye could see.

  For a moment, the realization that she could live there and be perfectly content crossed her mind, and she shooed it away just as quickly. No sense in getting too invested too early, right? This was just one extended SassyDate meetup, after all, nothing serious!

  At least that’s what she tried to believe.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Memphis

  “Oh come on, I swear, I won’t bite. Hard,” he teased, dancing up in the snow in front of April, his back turned in the direction of where they were heading.

  She gave him the cutest little scowl and it took all he had to keep from sliding down the hill, scooping her up, throwing her over his shoulder, and running off with her despite all her objections.

  “I’m telling you, I have two perfectly fine feet. They can trudge through snow on their own,” she said, sounding exasperated, but a smile tugged at the corners of her pink lips, and so Memphis decided to take her jabbing for the good-natured fun that it was.

  It had been a long day so far, starting with a hearty meal courtesy of Cerise, a drive around Wolf’s Eye Lake with detours to a couple of the more notable mountains, like Sleeping Dragon Hill, which really was a mountain despite its name, and now they were heading toward the last in Memphis’s list of surprises. April didn’t know it, but there was a track about half a mile to their left that led exactly to where they were going, because Memphis had been up before the crack of dawn, setting everything up where they were going. But he wasn’t about to tell her that.

  “As the lady wishes,” he said with a swooping bow, causing him to almost stumble back over some roots as he got carried away with the antics.

  He couldn’t help it. He felt energized. Full of life. Ready to tackle anything that life had to throw at him—but preferably April, really. She simply had that effect on him. At first, he’d thought that his bursts of adrenaline and energy during the game against the Coyotes and then the practice after it had just been Idaho getting to him, but today he realized the real cause of his good mood.

  It was April Whitaker. His little good luck charm and the sexiest woman he’d ever met. The fact that she had no idea how damn hot she was only made it that much better.

  After the stumble, he turned around and took the last couple hundred feet with his eyes actually on the goal. He took April’s hand as soon as there was enough room amongst the trees to walk next to one another. To his relief, she didn’t pull away from the touch and together they came upon the campsite he’d set up.

  “Memphis! Did you do all this?” she asked, looking at the sight before her with the kind of surprise that made Memphis feel all the more better for his attempt at some proper romance.

  He’d set up a big tent along with a heater and mattresses in the middle of a secluded patch of forest, placed on a slight ledge that opened up to a view of the forests below and Wolf’s Eye Lake glistening in the setting sun, with reds, golds, and yellows creating streaks upon the smooth ice. There were two chairs by a fire pit, which was stocked with logs and waiting to be lit, and a container of food, snacks, and drinks for them to enjoy.

  “I wanted us to be somewhere where no one can barge in,” he said sheepishly, squeezing her hand before letting it go.

  “So you took us to the middle of nowhere to camp?” April asked with a laugh, warm and adorable.

  “I believe the term is ‘glamping,’” Memphis shot back, pulling a lighter from his pocket and moving to set fire to the kindling.

  Soon enough the sun was so low it barely lit the sky at all and a hearty fire was crackling in the pit. Memphis and April huddled around it on their chairs, close to one another as they sipped on whiskey and shared sandwiches that Cerise had prepared. Like most of the day, they’d mostly been chit-chatting and having fun, managing to steer clear of the truly difficult, heavy topics that had to be discussed eventually. But Memphis was a patient guy.

  His first instinct after talking to Nicky had been to call the whole thing off, and just give April the cold shoulder or maybe sleep with her again before her time in Shifter Grove was up, but he’d quickly realized he couldn’t do it. Having seen plenty of puck bunnies in his days, he couldn’t imagine April as one of them. Despite the possibility of coming to regret his decision later, he decided to give the two of them an honest shot.

  It was that or get internally mauled by his polar bear, and as any shifter knew, disagreeing on a topic as important as whether or not someone was their
mate was not something that would end well for the human side of any shifter!

  Taking another sip of his drink, he glanced over at April, smiling as her hazel eyes glittered in the light of the fire. She looked luminous, almost angelic. He felt lighter when he was around her and even while they discussed nothing of importance, he was incredibly happy for the conversation and the fact that she felt comfortable enough to joke with him.

  “So why did you decide to come here, after everything?” Memphis asked, deciding to take the proverbial bull by the horns.

  It was getting late and while he was looking forward to the prospect of maybe snuggling up with her for the night, he would have preferred a cold walk home than allowing himself another night of happiness only to later find out it was for the wrong reasons. April sputtered into her drink a bit, inhaling it wrong, and coughing once or twice to clear her airway.

  “Sorry! That just… caught me off guard,” she said, smiling apologetically.

  “I try to keep you on your toes,” Memphis said, reaching a hand to her and squeezing her wrist gently for a moment.

  “Why did I come? Well, I… I really liked the conversations we’ve been having, Memphis,” she started, looking from him to the fire, her eyes following the flames. “And honestly, that one night we had together was more fun and a lot more connected than I’ve felt with anyone or anything in a really long time. I tend to overanalyze and worry about things for so long that I might miss a good thing when it’s staring me right in the face. But this time, everything seemed to be coming together despite my efforts to fuck it up.”

  She shrugged her shoulders, looking back to Memphis. He hadn’t seen her look so insecure or so sad before, and it took everything he had to keep from pulling her into his lap and cradling her in his arms. That dash of vulnerability was just about all he needed to confirm to himself that she hadn’t been lying to him and whatever game it was that Nicky was playing was not orchestrated by April in the least.

  But you have to be sure, he reminded himself, and he wasn’t entirely sure if he was referring to the topic of her being there because she really liked him or that old polar bear doubt of choosing the right woman—not that they ever had anything to argue about, because fate treated each of them right.

  Memphis reached a hand to hers and laced his fingers with hers on the arm of her chair.

  “I know how that is. Truth be told, I can get stuck in a rut of my own creation far too easily and make circles around myself until whatever I was worryin’ about is long gone to begin with. I’m glad you came, April. Trust me when I say this isn’t somethin’ I do. I don’t just invite someone out to the middle of the woods with some untoward plots in my head.”

  He paused for a moment to smile at her, catching that hint of a grin on her lips as well, as she let her hand rest in his.

  “Yeah? So I should consider myself special, then?” she asked, chuckling. “Because I can promise you, I don’t make a habit out of hanging out with hockey players or coming to see them in Idaho!”

  “Oh, trust me, sugar, you should consider yourself very special,” he said, chuckling.

  He didn’t miss that comment she made about hockey players not being her usual MO, and a part of him tucked this information away to reconsider at a later time. Not in reference to her, but to Nicky. He had to wonder if the star struck roomie actually had some sinister motives in mind or if she simply got off on screwing with other people’s happiness. Both seemed like likely candidates, considering the kind of people Memphis had been forced to deal with.

  Better keep an eye on that girl, he thought grimly, making a note to pay closer attention to anything Nicky said in the future as well.

  The stars came out in full force as the sun tucked itself away behind the mountains, leaving Memphis and April in the flickering warmth of the fire, underneath a magnificent, star-studded sky. He leaned back in his seat after having added wood to the fire, admiring the blanket of stars.

  “I’d forgotten how many there were after moving to Chicago,” he said, his hand still holding April’s.

  “You don’t see anything quite like this in Cheyenne either,” she answered quietly, the silence between them as comfortable as the conversation, which still completely floored Memphis.

  He was the kind of guy who didn’t say much, compared to guys like Heath who could rattle on for hours, but it was a rare case when he could spend hours with someone and not feel the need to fill the silence. Most of the walk up to the campsite had passed in silence, for example, and Memphis had never felt so at ease.

  “Do you like it? The quiet? The stars? The… not-city?” Memphis inquired, pausing to look at her and having April catch his gaze.

  She nodded, a thoughtful crease on her brow before looking back up at the starry night.

  “I do. I was raised in the city and I rarely got out, really. But ever since coming to Shifter Grove, I’ve felt oddly at peace. Maybe even inspired.”

  “Inspired to do what?”

  “You’re going to think it’s silly,” April said, her voice earnest, not fishing for the “No, tell me anyway” that so many men fell victim to with women who had little substance and had to make up for it by playing coy.

  “No, I want to know. Tell me,” Memphis pried, his attention now squarely on April.

  What could this little gem of a woman be hiding inside of her? He already knew she was sweet and just sassy enough, and her hidden appetite when they were together was a pleasant surprise as well, but he was insatiable. He wanted to know all there was to know about her, and even then he doubted it would be enough.

  “I… I want to write. Novels. Romance, actually!”

  He could see the blush sparking up on her cheeks even in the darkness and he grinned, squeezing her hand again.

  “And why don’t you, then?”

  “That’s what you ask? Not ‘Why would you want to write chick lit’?”

  “Is that what I’m supposed to ask?” Memphis quipped, doing his best to look innocent.

  “No,” April laughed. “Okay. Why? Because I think there’s enough evil and pain in the world. I think people deserve to have a way to escape from it, and if I can write something that allows someone to forget about their daily burden for a while, I think that would be incredibly rewarding. I’ve always struggled with doing things for me and I think I’ve never really sat down and made a go of it because I was afraid to fail or afraid that I’d be wasting my time and anyone’s who happened to read it…”

  “If it’s in your heart, you gotta follow it,” Memphis said matter-of-factly, the words resonating in him as much as he hoped they did in her. “If you sit around for a lifetime hopin’ for the right time to come, it might never arrive. You have to make your own fortune in a way. If you think you’d be happy writin’ romance novels, go for it!”

  Looking at her, he found her becoming more and more beautiful by the moment. It wasn’t just that she was a curious little thing that made his bear growl with desire, but that she was an intelligent, sweet, thoughtful woman even when the world tried to turn her and everyone like her into someone much more jaded and detached. Memphis appreciated the fact that she had seemingly managed to hold onto her dreams and that the thought of starting over from scratch, even while it was terrifying, was something that she was willing to consider.

  “Speakin’ of which, I see somethin’ that I want, too,” he said, his voice almost a purr as he leaned over across the arms of the chairs and caught her lips in a kiss, the first one they’d shared since the night in Cheyenne.

  She gasped as their lips brushed together and it was a sweet sound, making Memphis cup her chin with his other hand and draw her nearer for that lingering taste, his tongue slowly pushing into her mouth and twisting against hers. When they broke the kiss, both of them were breathing a little bit harder, and April’s gorgeous eyes shined with the same kind of unashamed desire that he’d seen in them the first night.

  But this time it wasn’t just somethi
ng that had the makings of a one-night stand, something simple and easy. No, this time Memphis was gambling with his heart, and he hoped she was as well. Because one thing was for certain, he had already lost his to April, even if he didn’t admit it yet.

  You’ve gotten yourself in deep, Memphis, he thought with a grin.

  He couldn’t have been gladder for it.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  April

  It hadn’t taken long for April to go from kissing Memphis to suddenly being in his lap, and then being carried into the big tent he’d set up that she hadn’t even looked into before. All the while her hands were clinging to his neck, and she wouldn’t leave his lips for a moment, their tongues involved in an intricate competition of trying to figure out who wanted the other more. So far, it was a solid tie.

  Compared to the cold outside, the tent was warm, almost balmy, as the battery-powered space heater had been working hard while they’d been enjoying their dinner and conversation. When Memphis set her down, her hands went to the zipper of his jacket as he pulled off her fur hat and cupped her face in his palms again, kissing her deeply.

  “Are you sure about this?” Memphis asked when April pushed his jacket off his shoulders, her hands already slipping under his sweater.

  “What does it look like?” she asked, eyes hazy with lust and her body burning up with the need to touch him and be close to him again like they had in Cheyenne.

  “It looks like you’re sure,” Memphis said with a chuckle, taking her jacket off in a flash and tossing her sweater and shirt after it a moment later, all the while standing hunched over because despite the size of the tent, he was still too damn big for it.

  “So that much we agree on,” April quipped back, feeling completely brazen around this sexy man who seemed to understand her better than anyone else did.