Covert Bear

by Candace Ayers

  “I’ll pay. Just grab my wallet.” I turned so she could see my wallet in my back pocket.

  “Nice try. I’ll pay.” She did just that, chatting with the woman at the register one minute, holding four cones stacked high with ice cream, the next. “Come on, guys. We can eat outside.”

  The boys were suddenly wild animals in my arms. Shrieking and wiggling to get free and run. The slippery little guys were like greased piglets. I held on, ending up with my arms around their waists, holding them parallel to the ground. They let loose laugh-like squeals that I wasn’t sure was good until Heidi turned and laughed with them.

  I held onto them for dear life until we got outside and I managed to put the boys on their feet. Heidi still had them by their…leashes? I made a face. “Are they on leashes?”

  She handed them their cones and nodded. “I’m not losing them. They’re like little magicians who can vanish with the snap of their little fingers. I’m not chancing anything in public.”

  I held our cones as she settled them into a chair together, right up next to her. She even tied the ends of their leashes to her arm before reaching for her ice cream.

  “So, this is your day job?”

  She nodded. “Yeah. I babysit and help Maria around her house during the day. Then, I bartend at night.”

  “You’re busy.” I licked the tip of my ice cream and nearly groaned when her heated eyes followed the motion.

  Instead of replying, she just nodded and looked away. Then, she licked her cone, completely unaware of the torture she was putting me through. Her tongue stroked the cone in ways that my mind would not ever forget. I adjusted myself in my chair and forced my eyes away.

  “Oh, crap.”

  I looked over and saw that she’d gotten ice cream all down her hand somehow. She passed me the leashes and stood up. “I’m getting napkins. Are you okay with them for a second?”

  I nodded and looked at the boys. “We’re good, right guys?”

  They ignored me, the ice cream was far more captivating. I held their leashes and watched Heidi walk inside, a big smile on her face. She’d just grabbed a stack of napkins and turned to head back out when a woman stepped up to her and said something that made the joyful expression on Heidi’s face drop like a lead balloon. The woman’s expression was a snarl of disgust and anger and she poked her index finger into Heidi’s chest as she spoke.

  It was over in seconds, and Heidi returned with the napkins, her eyes misty. Her smile was gone and she looked flustered with her face red and her mouth pinched tightly.

  “You okay?” I didn’t realize I was standing until the boys cried out. I was pulling their kid-leashes too tightly.

  She nodded and took the leashes from me. “We’re going to go home. Come on, Jayden, Jonas. You can eat your ice cream on the walk home.”

  “Hold on, Heidi. Talk to me. What happened?” My stomach was in my throat and I wasn’t sure what to do to help.

  “It’s nothing. See you later.” And then she was leaving, rushing the kids off with trembling hands.

  14

  Alexei

  Unable to let her leave like that, I went after her. I caught her arm and pulled her to a stop. When I saw that she was crying, I felt my bear rage inside me. “Come on. My office is right down here.”

  She let me scoop the boys up and pull her with me. Her hand gripped mine tightly and I could hear her heart racing. We were passing the ice cream shop again when the same woman who’d upset her initially stepped out and scowled. Heidi froze.

  “Is that someone else’s husband you’ve got your hooks into? Shame on you!” The woman’s voice was harsh and cruel, her eyes just as condescending.

  I put myself between the two woman and looked down at Heidi. “Come on, Heidi.”

  She shook her head. “We’ve really got to get home. I have something to do that I just remembered.”

  I felt my blood boil as she took the boys from me, a distressed look on her face. Before I had a chance to argue, she was rushing away, a child in each arm, sticky little hands in her hair, and ice cream dripping down one of the boy’s cones and onto her shoulder.

  Spinning around to face the woman who’d hurt my mate, I found her staring after Heidi with a vicious scowl on her face. I didn’t like to yell at woman. I didn’t like to hurt women. Of course, in my line of work, there were exceptions. I’d dealt with women who could make Osama Bin Laden look like Mickey Mouse. With the sour woman before me, I was sorely tempted to snatch her up by her ankles and shake her.

  “Who are you?” My voice was barely more than a growl and when the offending woman heard it, she stepped back.

  “It doesn’t matter who I am.” She shook her head but took another step back concerned for her safety. “Are you married?”

  I frowned, confused by the woman’s obsession with marriage. “Of course not! What’s your deal, lady? What do you just go around spewing vitriol and hurting people?”

  “Me? ME? Don’t you know who she is? She’s the one who hurts people. A shameless hussy who breaks up marriages with her selfishness.”

  It was my turn to step back. The venom coming out of the woman was overwhelming. “What are you talking about?”

  “That’s Heidi Garcia from Love In An Instant. The TV show?” She rolled her eyes. “She was on the first season that came out. She’s a monster. She slept with people’s boyfriends, just to cause trouble. Her motto was something about being a slut and proud of it and she certainly showed the world her true colors. A complete trollop.”

  I saw red and stepped closer to her. I lowered my voice and growled at her. “Watch your mouth. You’re behaving this way because of something you saw in a TV show? You’re the one who should be ashamed of yourself. I would say that you’re lucky you’re a lady, but I think we both know that you’re no lady. So, I’ll say you’re lucky I’m a gentleman.”

  She blanched, her anger instantly replaced by fear. When I growled again for good measure, she whimpered and scurried away.

  I shook my head and ran my hands through my hair. I wasn’t proud to have threatened her, but what the fuck? She’d just verbally attacked my mate for something on a TV show?

  I made my way back to the near-empty office and was glad to see Hannah inside. I dropped into the chair in front of her and sighed.

  “Whoa. What’s up, Alexei? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you frown before.”

  Megan’s head popped out from the back office. She looked at me and her eyes widened. Kerrigan’s head popped out right below Megan’s. She slapped her hand over her chest and hurried out. “Oh, my gosh! What’s wrong, Alexei?”

  Their mates, Serge, Roman, and Dmitry, stepped into the main office, their faces masks of confusion, too. Serge shook his head, like he was trying to clear it. “What happened to you?”

  “You guys ever heard of a show called Love In An Instant?”

  Hannah nodded. “Yeah, why?”

  “I met someone from it, I guess.” I hesitated. “What is it?”

  Dmitry mock saluted. “I’m out of here. I’m going back to work.”

  Roman settled next to his mate. “I’ve got nothing better to do.”

  “This isn’t important, then?” Serge held up his hands when I growled at him. “I meant work important. It’s not work-related, then?”

  Hannah shushed her mate and turned back to me. “It’s a reality dating show. The biggest one on TV. They put together groups of people to see what happens and film it, basically. I mean, they pair you up with someone based on some kind of test you take, but then it’s kind of this free for all. They try to pretend like it’s this love at first sight thing, but it’s just a ploy to watch people fool around and make asses of themselves. I mean, no one ever sticks with the person they’re matched with.

  “Who’d you meet from it?”

  I frowned, not understanding most of what she said. My brain was trying to relate it to Heidi and what I knew about her but it wasn’t computing. “Heidi Garcia.”<
br />
  Hannah’s mouth fell open. “Holy shit.”

  “What?”

  “Even I know this part.” Megan shook her head and moved nearer to Roman who pulled her into his lap. She let out a startled, “Oof,” but didn’t lose focus on the conversation. “That poor girl.”

  I sat up straight and felt my bear fighting to get loose. He wanted to fight for his mate. “Tell me.”

  “The show has this cult-like following. There are so many people who think it’s real and they are obsessed with it. Well, Heidi was the villain on her season. I don’t know how much was real and how much was staged for dramatic effect, but to say she was not nice to the other women on the show would be a huge understatement.”

  Hannah nodded. “I mean, like Megan said, who knows if it was real, but if it wasn’t, that’s even more messed up. She was painted as a complete evil bitch.”

  “Well, yeah.” Megan made a face. “When that one couple that everyone loved, Aaron and Ashley, were about to get engaged and they were the sweethearts of prime time TV, she was caught in bed with Aaron.”

  “I read something on Yahoo News a while back. A ‘where are they now’ type of thing. No info on Heidi. Apparently, or so the article stated, she was so hated after the show that she couldn’t get any other work. She actually received death threats and just kind of vanished.”

  I stood up and slammed my hand down on the desk in front of me. “It’s all bullshit. She’s sweet and kind. When we were getting ice cream, she was confronted by some woman whose face looked like she’d just been sucking lemons. Heidi turned away, nearly in tears.”

  Roman growled at me, but it was just a warning to not yell at his mate. Megan patted Roman on the chest to placate him and gave me a warm smile. “Sorry, Alexei. Is she…”

  “She’s my mate.” I stood straighter when I said it, filled with pride. No matter what they said, I knew what kind of person Heidi was. “And she’s not an evil bitch. Not by a long shot.”

  Hannah smiled. “Well, she is gorgeous, I’ll say that. She reminds me of, whose that actress from the show Empire?”

  Megan nodded. “Nicole Ari Parker! She has the same coloring and they’re both rare beauties.”

  “Yes! Nicole Ari Parker. I feel bad for Heidi. Even if she had been that person in the past, it doesn’t give anyone the right to attack her. Everyone has a past.”

  I raked my hands through my hair and crossed my arms over my chest. “I don’t like seeing her upset.”

  Roman grunted. “Welcome to the club, brother. Get ready to suffer for a while. Until it sorts itself out, anyway.”

  15

  Heidi

  Work was hard that night. I wanted to call off and hide out at home, but there was no one who could cover my shift and I wasn’t going to leave Mimi with the whole bar by herself. I was in a terrible mood though. I knew that I wasn’t making anyone’s night with my saltiness. I just couldn’t shake my mood. Hearing that woman insult me so thoroughly at Clotilde’s had thrown me. It hit me harder than normal because I was there with Alexei and the boys. They could’ve overheard the vile things she’d said about me.

  It wasn’t fair. I wanted to scream back at everyone who taunted me and reminded me of that stupid show. I’d done that in the beginning—flipped out and told them how I felt, but I’d since learned. It never changed anything. No one cared about the truth. They had their opinion and that was that. I could scream until I was blue in the face about how it was a fake TV show, how we were all following prompts and director’s cues and everything was staged to make for good television, but they’d never believe me. My name was tainted. I was labeled a whore and a homewrecker. The Cuban slut, people called me. And, hell, they knew all about it, or so they thought, since they’d seen it with their own eyes.

  If I knew when I’d signed on what that show would end up doing to my life, I would’ve run as fast as humanly possible to get away. I’d just seen it as a way to jump start my fledgling acting career. I thought that if I did the show, I could get an agent and, subsequently, some better gigs. Little did I know, I’d never get a call back again. I was branded by the character I played—a nasty, bitchy troublemaker. I would have accepted being typecast as a villain, but it was worse. Producers and casting directors assumed that I really was a difficult person, like the character, and that I’d be hell to work with. No one would come within a hundred yards of me.

  At the end of the day, the missed career opportunity was fine. I was happy being a small-town girl in the Florida Keys—a bartender and babysitter. It was the harassment and judgement from fans of the show that I couldn’t handle. And it would usually pop up from out of left field, like the woman in the ice cream shop.

  I’d never actually slept with anyone from that show. I hadn’t done any of the things I was continually accused of. I was just a foolish kid who’d mistakenly thought people wouldn’t actually believe that reality TV was, well, reality.

  My stomach ached from knowing that Alexei was going to hear those things sooner or later, and that he’d already heard some of them. I knew that I had no business worrying about what he thought of me. I had no intention of developing any type of relationship with him beyond a very casual friendship. I couldn’t. That was how it had to be and that was fine. Everything was fine.

  “Are you with me, Heidi?”

  I snapped out of my trance, and turned to Sarah. “Sorry, what’d you need?”

  She called out her order again and frowned. “You okay, girl?”

  I nodded and started working on the drinks. I wasn’t up to my usual self, but I was still faster than most bartenders. When I handed the drinks over to her, she was still frowning. “I’m good.”

  She looked away and then grinned. “Hottie’s back for you.”

  I knew it was Alexei before I even looked. Sure enough, he was leaning against the end of the bar, looking every bit as handsome as I was trying to forget he was. He made it impossible.

  The bar wasn’t packed, but it was busy enough that I had to stop and pour drinks twice before I reached him. I was nervous. I’d left abruptly earlier and I was embarrassed. Who knew what he thought of me?

  I had to remind myself that I wasn’t supposed to care.

  “Hey.” He leaned towards me, his face drawn into a tight smile. It looked like he’d combed his hair. It was neatly brushed back from his face, a contrast to the shadow of stubble on his face that hadn’t been touched. He was in a button-down shirt, jeans, and work boots. He looked like he’d just come off a modeling shoot and I loved it.

  I swallowed an excessive amount of drool and reminded myself once again that nothing was allowed to happen between the two of us. “Hi.”

  He leaned even farther across the bar and his hand came up to gently brush a strand of hair out of my face. “Did I mention earlier that that dress is killer on you?”

  I wanted to turn my face into his hand, but I resisted and he pulled it back into his own space. “You don’t give up.”

  “Never.” He rested his elbows on the bar and his smile was just as tight as ever. “You okay?”

  I shrugged. “I’m fine.”

  “You don’t look fine. You look like you could use a drink yourself.”

  I saw a hand go out with an empty glass down at the other end of the bar and nodded at it. “Sorry, I have to work.”

  It went like that for about an hour. He nursed the one beer he’d ordered and tried to talk to me between customers. He seemed genuinely worried about me and it was hard to face.

  “What’s a guy gotta do to get some attention around here?” Alexei grinned at me over his beer, the look on his face more determined than happy. “I mean, I dressed up for you.”

  I took his warm beer from him and gave him a cold one. “Is that all for me?”

  He unbuttoned another button on his shirt then gave me a sexy, exaggerated pout like he was on the cover of GQ or something and winked. “This better?”

  I rolled my eyes. “You can’t possi
bly like this.”

  “Being ignored by the prettiest woman in the bar while I make a fool of myself to make her smile? What’s not to like about that?”

  “I’m fine, Alexei. Go home.”

  “Not without getting a genuine smile from you.”

  “Look, I’ve had a shit day. It’s not a big deal. People have them.”

  “I know people have them, but I don’t like that you’re having one. I don’t care about anyone else.”

  I stopped mid-pour of a tequila shot. Looking up at him, I couldn’t help tilting my head to the side and trying to see him clearer. Had he just implied that he cared about me? Naw. He didn’t know me.

  “I’m not giving up. I’ll dance on this damn bar if I have to.”

  “You can’t dance on the bar.”

  “I can.”

  “It’s against the rules.”

  “Do I look like I follow rules?”

  I sighed. “Alexei, you don’t have to worry about me.”

  He stood up and grabbed the edge of the bar. “You’re really gonna make me do this?”

  “You’re not getting up there.”

  “Watch me.”

  16

  Alexei

  Heidi slapped her hands over her eyes when I swung up onto the bar and stood to my full height. I knocked my head on the ceiling, and a few colorful toothpicks fell off, but that didn’t stop me. I wasn’t going to stop until she smiled and I saw the pain in her eyes fade. If I knew one thing, it was that she didn’t deserve her suffering and I’d do everything in my power to take it from her. That was two things, but I knew them both.

  “Turn up the music!” I’d never danced on a bar before. But, hey, I’d try almost anything once.