by Zoe Chant
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Epilogue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Tropical Lynx’s Lover
Shifting Sands Resort, Book 4
Zoe Chant
Copyright © 2018 by Zoe Chant
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Created with Vellum
Contents
Foreword
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Epilogue
A Note from Zoe Chant
More Paranormal Romance by Zoe Chant
Zoe Chant on Audio
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Special Sneak Preview - Tropical Dragon Diver
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Foreword
Tropical Bartender Bear is book four of the Shifting Sands Resort series. All of my books are standalones (no cliffhangers!) and can be read independently, but this book closely follows the events in the previous book. This is the order in which the series may be most enjoyed:
Tropical Tiger Spy (Book 1)
Tropical Wounded Wolf (Book 2)
The Master Shark's Mate (A Fire & Rescue Shifters/Shifting Sands Resort crossover)
Tropical Bartender Bear (Book 3)
Tropical Lynx's Lover (Book 4)
Tropical Dragon Diver (coming March 2018)
Chapter 1
Travis James stumbled into the empty staff house, dropping his toolbox just inside the door, where he also took off his sodden shoes and shrugged the work gloves off his hands to flop onto the floor like small dead things.
His lynx stirred at the idea of small dead things, twitching metaphorical ears in interest, then expressing disdain. Living things are more fun, Lynx told him.
That eliminates us as “fun,” Travis told him in return.
He felt like a zombie, limbs numb with exhaustion. Only shifter strength kept him stumbling forward at this point, and only hunger made him stagger into the kitchen instead of immediately finding his bed.
The harvest gold fridge revealed a treasure trove of food; cold cuts, fruit, deviled eggs, cold grilled fish, and even a few legs of crab standing guard over the bottom shelf, all of it leftover from the resort buffet. A cling-wrapped slice of cake said “Breck’s. Eat at your own risk.” Someone had left a sticky note on it in different handwriting: “I licked it.”
“Don’t eat Breck’s cake,” a voice behind him startled him, and only Travis’ shifter-quick reflexes kept him from banging his head into the refrigerator door.
Bastian was standing at the door to the kitchen, and it took Travis a moment to realize that he looked strange because he was wearing something other than his bright-colored lifeguard uniform. The resort polo shirt was unexpected over the dragon-shifter’s chest, and the khaki pants made Travis realize he’d never seen Bastian out of shorts.
“At this point, spit doesn’t scare me,” Travis told him with a tired grin.
“You look like hell,” Bastian told him frankly.
“Feel like it, too,” Travis said briefly. “Been a long couple of weeks.”
That was an understatement.
It had been an insane, demanding several weeks, as Shifting Sands Resort hosted the World Mr. Shifter male pageant.
Booked to capacity, as Travis suspected it had never been, the resort had performed well for a facility built in the eighties. Even though Scarlet had modernized most of it over the past several years following its long period of abandonment, it had required a flurry of last minute upgrades and Travis had spent the weeks leading up to the event putting cottages back into service, checking and monitoring the aging septic system, and upgrading the wiring and water heaters in anticipation of the influx of guests.
Considering how many people had descended on the resort, it had all gone very smoothly, Travis thought.
But that didn’t mean it hadn’t been a lot of very long days, running from task to task. The air conditioner in the hotel was down as much as it was up, and there wasn’t a day that there wasn’t some minor plumbing emergency. The laundry load had been higher than anyone had anticipated, and though Breck was able to help with some of the mechanical work, and most of the staff knew how to respond to blown fuses, Travis had been required to do any of the finesse work on the wiring, and troubleshoot the inevitable problems you had with generators run at full capacity for so long. Only he could do work that required welding or pipe replacement.
“You should get some sleep,” Bastian advised.
“Oh, I plan to,” Travis said. “Scarlet told me that if I showed my face before noon, she’d fire me. I’m pretty sure she wasn’t kidding.” The red-haired owner of the resort was not one to be trifled with.
“You’ll miss a helluva party,” Bastian laughed. “And I’ve got to get down to it now. Tex isn’t back, so I’ve got to run the beach bar.”
“Better you than me,” Travis told him.
“You going to need any help?” Bastian asked, concerned.
Travis realized that he’d been staring blankly, standing with the fridge open and the cold air swirling over his feet. He shook his head. “Nah, I got it. Just going to have some food and then sleep until noon, as commanded.”
“You do that,” Bastian agreed, and he disappeared from the doorway. The front door slammed, and Travis could hear footsteps crunching away in the gravel through the open windows.
Travis left the cake alone, and went for a pile of meat. A slice of bread from the sealed loaf bin on the counter folded around it to complete the sandwich; he didn’t bother with condiments or a plate. By the time he made it back to his bedroom, it was gone, all the crumbs inhaled, and he felt full enough to sleep.
He shucked off the filthy staff polo shirt, making his shoulders ache in new ways, and unbuttoned his heavy canvas pants.
The bed had been made up, though Travis was sure he had left it in disarray after too few hours of sleep far too many hours before. He was touched. The staff was usually self-
sufficient about their own housekeeping, so one of his co-workers must have done it for him as a personal favor. The sheets even smelled clean, and Travis sighed. There was no way he was going to put his filthy body in those linens.
Not bothering with a bathrobe, Travis slipped his briefs off to join the grime-stiff pants and walked naked back out into the hall to the shared bathroom.
The marble and tile room that greeted him was more like a Greek steamhouse than what would be expected for a mere staff bathroom, even at an upscale resort like Shifting Sands Resort. It had not only a shower and separate tub, but also a steam room and a completely private water closet. The vanity had three separate sinks below an expanse of framed mirror.
Travis caught a glimpse of himself and grimaced.
He looked like a zombie as well as feeling like one. Fast-healing bruises from crawling under the cottages fixing plumbing problems showed purple through his golden skin along one flank. There was a scratch along one arm from a stray wire while fixing the circuitry for the ailing air conditioner in the hotel. The circles beneath his eyes were distinctly unflattering, and his short dark hair was stiff and wild with sweat and grease.
He turned away, and pulled the shower control to full heat and full strength, standing in the stream even before the heat from the tank had reached the shower. The rest of the staff would be away for hours; the World Mr. Shifter event was in its final, glorious throes, and the wrap-up party on the beach would keep the rest of the staff busy until morning. Travis didn’t have to worry about saving any of the precious hot water for anyone else.
The water was running scalding hot now, and Travis lay his brow against the steamy tile and let it beat the stiffness out of his tired muscles.
There was a tremendous amount of satisfaction from the work. He took pride in keeping Shifting Sands running smoothly, and the staff was more like family than simply co-workers. The perks of the job included a beautiful place to live, all of the gourmet food he could eat, and most of the time, the workload was minimal. Scarlet listened to his advice when it came to remodeling and buying new equipment, and was fair and clear in her expectations.
It wasn’t the work that was leaving Travis feeling hollow. He loved Shifting Sands, from the persnickety power grid to the steep, sprawling gravel paths. The resort was home, in a bone-deep way that even his native village in Alaska had never been, and he was proud of how beautiful and functional it was, and how much it had improved in the past few years.
Maybe it was just exhaustion, making him feel like like something was missing.
Travis leaned against the shower control to turn it off, and stood there a weary moment, dripping.
The empty house felt unexpectedly lonely.
It took a ridiculous amount of time to reach for a towel and give himself a cursory pat-down. Scarlet didn’t skimp on towels, so the thick, fluffy terrycloth absorbed most of the water even with halfhearted application. Travis barely got it back onto the towel hook before staggering back to his bedroom.
Even the fireworks couldn’t keep him awake after that.
Chapter 2
Jennavivianna Smith wasn’t floating.
For the first time in a very long time, she wasn’t floating.
She wasn’t all-Jenny, yet, but she wasn’t as not-Jenny as she had been, and she kept her eyes screwed shut for a while after she was actually awake, trying to process what had happened.
“You’re not sleeping anymore!”
At first, Jenny thought that it was her own thoughts. Her own, weirdly divided thoughts. The otter inside her that wasn’t her, but was, all at once.
“You can’t fool me,” the voice said firmly, and Jenny remembered.
She remembered Gizelle, the slight, salt-and-pepper-haired woman who had talked her back into human form, and remembered seeing Fred again and feeling the sting of his betrayal, and Laura, oh, Laura! Her twin was there in her head again, that unspoken connection they’d always had was back and as strong and comforting as it had always been, even when they were at odds, or miles apart.
She opened her eyes. She was in a little square of neat lawn near a white gravel path, tall, flowering jungle brush on all sides. She could hear the ocean, and smell it’s sharp, salty tang, but she couldn’t see anything past the dense foliage.
Gizelle was kneeling above her, hair wild around her face, big eyes earnest. “Come on, then, you’ve had a good sleep.”
Jenny opened her mouth to protest that the sleep had been restless, and full of floating dreams, but it came out as half-trill and half-purr, and she snapped otter jaws together again.
“It takes a little while, that’s all. Come and walk on two legs with me. See your sister!”
Jenny balked. The last time she had changed from otter to human, it had burned. She remembered the feeling of her bones cracking and resetting, the muscles stretching impossibly, the tendons snapping into new places.
“Don’t be afraid,” Gizelle said coaxingly.
“Don’t baby me,” Jenny wanted to tell her, but couldn’t, through otter teeth. Nothing frustrated her more than being patronized.
Don’t act like a baby, then, her otter told her. Its voice in her head was not scornful, exactly, but teasing, prodding.
Jenny felt more stung than she knew she ought to. I’m not being a baby.
Of course you aren’t, her otter mocked. You’re a ‘grown-up’ coward.
With an otter sigh of frustration, Jenny stretched.
At first, it was simply a stretch of otter limbs, then Jenny focused furiously, remembering human arms and human legs, and she reached and wrenched herself back into her own form.
Gizelle clapped her hands in delight as Jenny lay on the ground, naked and panting. “Good job!” she said enthusiastically.
“Don’t baby me,” Jenny was finally able to say, breathlessly.
Then don’t-
Shut up. Jenny was dismayed to see that her fingers were still slightly webbed, and tipped with sharp claws. She ran her tongue over teeth that were too sharp and grimaced.
Gizelle took no notice of Jenny’s crabbiness, simply offering her hands to stand up.
Let’s go run around on those human legs you love so much, her otter suggested. Maybe go swimming at the beach.
I’m a little naked, Jenny reminded her, accepting Gizelle’s offered hands and climbing to her feet.
I know, her otter purred back at her, full of mischief. Images of admiring men accompanied the rejoinder. Jenny felt her skin heat, hating herself for how the idea stirred in her loins.
“How do you do this?” Jenny demanded of Gizelle, standing unsteadily.
“I know, it’s weird there’s only two of them,” Gizelle said comfortingly.
“Only two?” Jenny asked. Were there shifters with more than one extra voice?
“You just have to shift your weight between each one, and not think about it too much to keep your balance.”
When Jenny looked blankly at her, Gizelle scampered away and ran in a circle. “Like this!” she called merrily.
“You meant legs,” Jenny realized. “Only two legs.”
Returning, Gizelle said, “Of course I meant legs. What else would I mean?”
“I thought you meant voices,” Jenny said, feeling foolish.
“There are always more than two voices,” Gizelle said solemnly, eyes big in her face.
Jenny had just started feeling like things made sense, and then suddenly she didn’t again. She could feel her otter’s amusement, and shunted it away. “There’s more?” she said unhappily. She could barely stand otter’s demanding voice, should she expect more of them?
“Voices that whisper. Voices in the sky with no sun. Feathered voices. Voices that-”
“Gizelle,” said a new voice, gently chiding.
Jenny turned, half-crouching, and nearly let her otter take control of her skin again instinctively. No! she thought fiercely, fighting to stay in human skin.
The red-haired woman
from the night before stood at the opening in the hedge by the white path. She was neatly dressed, and Jenny was relieved to see that she was holding a summery dress.
It was her own dress, Jenny realized, and more memories flooded back. Laura, her twin, had come to the resort pretending to be Jenny, and of course she would have packed Jenny's clothing for the trip.
Naked would be more fun, her otter pouted at her.
Jenny ignored the voice.
“I’m Scarlet,” the woman said, handing her the dress and looking politely aside while Jenny struggled to put it on. “I run Shifting Sands.”
Jenny, still trying to work out how to get her head through the neckhole and feeling stumped by the armholes, was keenly aware of Gizelle staring at her.
“Gizelle,” Scarlet said kindly.
“She’s really bad at that,” Gizelle said frankly.
“I need you to help Graham in the upper gardens, please.” Scarlet’s tone made it sound less like a request and more like a royal command.
Triumphant at last over the openings in the dress, Jenny pulled it fiercely down over her generous curves.
“Bye!” said Gizelle merrily, and she skipped off across the lawn and out the way Scarlet had come. Her footsteps were quiet on the gravel, and Jenny realized she was barefoot.
“I apologize for Gizelle,” Scarlet said, sounding not the slightest bit apologetic. “She has taken great interest in you.”
“She’s not neurotypical, is she,” Jenny observed. It felt ironic to say so, since she felt so much less than normal herself.