The Baby Shift: Oregon
Shifter Babies Of America 19
Becca Fanning
Copyright © 2019 by Becca Fanning
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.
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Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Also by Becca Fanning
Chapter 1
“Tuck!” Harvey Christian yelled at Tucker Ponsonby as he approached the open bar. “Where’ve you been? I haven’t seen you since the ceremony ended an hour and a half ago.”
Next to Harvey was his fiancé, Anita. They met when Harvey started working at Anita’s construction site in Portland, Oregon, where Harvey and Tucker now lived. After a whirlwind romance, they had gotten engaged last month on a cruise to Hawai’i.
The sight of them together, so happy and in love, turned Tucker’s stomach.
“Oh, you know, making the rounds,” Tucker said, shrugging his shoulders as he looked over at the bartender, signaling for another gin and tonic—this one a double. His fifth, to be exact.
Without alcohol, there’s no way to get through a friend’s wedding when you’re the only single friend left. Tucker was planning to get good and drunk, but sadly, all the fried appetizers and breadbaskets scattered around the room were seriously impeding him. He was hoping by the time he saw Harvey and Anita, he would be smashed, but he was only slightly tipsy—not even remotely drunk enough to forget the raging crush he’d had on Anita for the last six months.
“It’s so beautiful in here, isn’t it?” Anita asked, gesturing around the white tent strung with soft white twinkle lights, sheer white gauze-y fabric, and candles. It lent everything a soft, romantic glow, and the flickering candle just to Anita’s left elbow shadowed her face in hues of orange and gold, setting off her naturally tan skin. Skin that Tucker had imagined running the pads of his fingers over countless times in the past six months. He knew from the brief touches they’d shared—hugs, a casual hand on the arm—that Anita’s skin was smooth as silk and smelled faintly of lilacs and citrus. She was delectable, but sadly, she was all Harvey’s.
Tucker had to avert his eyes as he answered her question. He knew if he took just one second to look deep into the depths of Anita’s rich, chocolate brown irises, he would be lost, dumbstruck, mute, incapable of anything resembling appropriate friend-to-friend’s-fiancé interaction.
“Yup, Monica definitely has a way with decorating,” he said, referring to the bride’s sister.
Anita nodded and smiled at him, causing Tucker’s stomach to swoop up and down like a ride on a rollercoaster, which he supposed he was, sort of. A rollercoaster of emotions—the happiness at her presence and the heart-wrenching sadness that comes with being at yet another wedding—this time between Anita and Harvey— solidifying that Tucker was going to end up alone — just another bachelor growing old with a dog at his side.
He was therefore grateful when the bartender handed him his gin and tonic; it gave him something to focus on other than the beautiful woman standing in front of him. The gin was top-shelf and smooth going down, matched perfectly with the light sweetness of the tonic and the subtle kick of the squeezed lime. Tucker loved it when bartenders took the time to actually squeeze the lime juice into the cocktail. In his opinion, it made all the difference.
“On the G&T’s again, I see,” a voice said from behind him, and Tucker turned away from Harvey and Anita to face his friend and the groom of the day, Eli Kingston.
Tucker had spent most of his childhood thinking he should hate Eli, for his wealth, his privilege, the way everything seemed handed to him on a silver platter. But, over the past few years, as he’d gotten to know Eli, he’d learned that Eli was perhaps the best friend a man could ever have. Eli had helped Tucker and the other members of the wolf gang he had been a part of, which included Harvey, to completely reinvent themselves. Three years after meeting Eli, each of them now had gainful employment and, except for Tucker, healthy relationships with women or men they truly loved. And each of them had Eli to thank for it all. Which is why Tucker, who was not generally a hugger, except of beautiful women, walked over and embraced his friend wholeheartedly, back slap and chest touching and everything.
“Congratulations, man,” Tucker said to Eli as they parted. Eli was still beaming, which he’d been doing since Tucker and the boys had helped him get ready that morning. When Tanner had asked Eli if his face hurt from all the smiling, Eli had, while still smiling, shook his head and said, “How can I not smile on the day I’m marrying the love of my life?” And Tucker had realized, for perhaps the thousandth time since seeing Eli and his new wife Amelia together, what he wanted was that exact happiness, contentment and love in his life, and he would do his damnedest to find it. If it weren’t going to be with Anita, it would be with someone else.
And because Eli was Tucker’s best friend, he knew what Tucker was thinking as they stepped back. “Don’t worry, man. She’s out there. She might even be in this room,” Eli said, gesturing behind him to where all the wedding guests were milling about, making small talk and munching on hors d’oeuvres while waiting for the call to dinner.
Tucker shrugged and nodded, but he was doubtful. He’d already done a thorough scope of the available women at the wedding when he was standing at the altar as a groomsman earlier that day, and the only women who had sparked his interest was, predictably, Anita. No one else could hold a candle to her.
“I mean it. Go do some mingling. Never know who you might meet,” Eli said, winking and clapping Tucker on the shoulder as he walked toward Harvey and Anita to say hello.
Tucker grabbed his drink and made his way toward the dance floor, where groups of people were standing around, sipping glasses of champagne that waiters were carrying around on large, silver trays. Tucker hated champagne. Loved baking with it, reducing it into a complex syrup that transformed buttercream and or even caramel, but god, he hated drinking it. Too many bad memories of cheap bottles of Andre smuggled into the fields behind his high school as a teenager.
To his right, Tucker spotted Monica and her boyfriend, Will, and began walking toward them. Like him, Will was a werewolf, and had therefore become a fast friend to him and the other guys once they’d set their sights on getting their lives in order. Will worked as a werewolf researcher down at the university hospital and was always discovering new and interesting things about their breed. A conversation with him might be the highlight of Tucker’s night, honestly.
Tucker was making his way toward the couple when someone bumped into him. His glass fell from his hand as a head of blonde curls crashed into his line of sight. Without even thinking, Tucker grabbed onto the woman’s arm and yanked her away from the shattered glass.
“Watch out!” he yelled, at the same time as she yelled “Oh shit!”
Heads turned to look at them. Tucker was straightening and helping the blonde, whose face he still hadn’t seen, to stand. One foot was bare, the other encased in a sexy red heel attached to the most graceful calf he had ever seen. Looking further up, he saw a hot pink dress, a small waist, round, luscious breasts, a long neck and, finally, a face so beautiful it literally took his breath away.
Tucker felt like he’d been punched in the lung. This woman was…she was an angel. Not meant for this world. A round face w
ith apple cheeks was smiling at him with lips so full and richly red that he was shocked to realize she wasn’t wearing any lipstick. Tortoiseshell brown glasses lined her eyes, somehow making the green of her irises even more pronounced. Her skin was like peaches and cream, and because he still hadn’t let go of her arm, he knew that her skin was soft and silky and begging to be caressed.
“I’m so sorry! Fuck, I’m so late, and I was rushing to go see Amelia and only had one of my heels on because I had to change right after my shift at the coffee shop and now I’ve spilled your drink, and my hair probably looks insane and…” And then the woman, who had been talking at Tucker’s chest, which was eye level with her, looked up and went quiet.
Chapter 2
Hadley Rose had spent most of her life assuming that the romance heroes she read about every spare moment she got—the muscled, masculine knights and dukes who looked tough on the outside but underneath had hearts of gold and cocks to match—were based solely in fiction. At 29, she was perfectly fine never finding the love of her life. She had baking and running, and a very nice one-eyed cat named Richard the Third who kept her company on cold nights when the world seemed scary and lonely.
But when she looked up into the face of the unknown stranger who had saved her from stepping on glass with bare feet and injuring herself at a wedding she was already seriously late to, she decided that maybe not all of those heroes had been wholly fictional. Because standing before her was the man of her dreams, the man she had spent literally years assuming did not exist. This man was tall, with dark blonde hair that set off his golden-brown eyes, a surprisingly lush mouth, a jaw so sharp you could cut glass with it, and a body that just wouldn’t quit.
The Man of Her Dreams was tall with broad shoulders and taut arm muscles clearly visible through his light blue chambray shirt. Through his army-green khakis, she spied built thighs and, if she was not mistaken, a sizeable cock straining against the metal of the trousers’ zipper. The shoes were nice, but Hadley didn’t care about those. Because at that moment, her eyes kept flicking between the face and the cock. Face. Cock. Face. Cock. Which was more perfect? She’d have to see the full package to decide.
“Oh my god, Hadley, are you okay?” Amelia asked from somewhere to Hadley’s left, and she looked over to find her friend inching around the waiters cleaning up the glass she had unwittingly broken.
“Huh?” she asked, momentarily confused. Of course, she was not okay! Did Amelia see the man currently holding tightly to her arm? No heterosexual female in her right mind would be okay in proximity to the fine specimen next to her. He was a black bottom cupcake and red velvet cake and a side of cheese fries neatly arranged in one package; her favorite things coming together to delight her and surprise her and make her really, really fucking hungry. And this was not a gastronomical hunger. Oh no. This was sexual hunger, the kind that shocked grandmothers and necessitated R-ratings on movies.
“Are you okay?” Amelia repeated, and this time Hadley heard her, but only because Mr. Perfect standing next to her squeezed her arm and reminded her that she was not in fact in a time warp where only she and the man next to her existed. No, she was in fact at a colleague’s wedding and had just caused a huge scene.
“Yup! Fine! Sorry, early morning baking and then we got a sudden last-minute cake order my boss begged me to do and then before I knew it, it was 3pm and I hadn’t done my hair and couldn’t find my eyebrow pencil.”
Amelia nodded sympathetically because this was typical Hadley. Doing too many things at once was her modus operandi. She wasn’t even supposed to work at the coffee shop that day—Sundays were for writing her weekly baking column for the arts newspaper Amelia was the editor of, but the other baker had called in sick, and Hadley didn’t want the good people of Portland going without Hunny Bee’s signature cinnamon rolls on such a beautiful autumn morning.
“Well, I guess this is a good time to introduce you to Tucker Ponsonby. Tucker, meet my colleague Hadley. She writes the baking column for OregonArts. I was hoping to get you two chatting,” Amelia said, then turned back to Hadley. “Tucker is a baker for Gateau, one of—”
“Portland’s best wedding cake salons. I know. I follow you guys on Instagram. Are you their head baker? Because if so, I think yours is the best buttercream I’ve ever tasted. My friend got a wedding cake from you guys last year, and holy shit, that icing was inspiring. Who knew earl grey and orange would go together so well? You’re seriously talented,” Hadley said to Tucker, hoping that she was a normal amount of excited for someone in the industry meeting a fellow baker they admired. Could Tucker tell she was also excited because he was the most perfect specimen of man candy she had ever seen, and she would like nothing better than to lock him in a broom closet and suction her face to his?
Tucker smiled at her and— umph — that smile. It did things to her. To her heart and her stomach and the area currently hiding behind the granny panties she was wearing because it was Sunday, and Sunday was, traditionally, not only a column-writing day but also laundry day.
“You a baker, too?” Tucker asked, and Amelia cut in before Hadley could say anything. Which turned out to be a good thing, because she needed a few moments to collect herself. While Amelia told Tucker that Hadley made “the best s’mores cinnamon rolls you’ll ever have in your life,” a fact that Hadley would not dispute, she put on her other shoe, smoothed her hair, whipped away any stray eyeshadow particles that might have fallen onto her cheeks, and checked that her earrings were stable in her ears. Check, check, and check. All in order. Now, if only her heart would get with the program and go back to its normally scheduled programming instead of beating a thousand miles per minute.
“I’ll have to visit you there sometime. Cinnamon rolls are my weakness. Doesn’t matter where I go, 7-Eleven or Walmart or La Brea—I have to buy one.”
Hadley nodded and tried not to notice Amelia slowly walking past Tucker and turning around to give her a thumbs-up and a mouthed “hit that!” God, if only. Wouldn’t that be a dream come true?
Chapter 3
Three hours later, Tucker was fairly certain he had met the woman of his dreams. Hadley Rose was funny, smart, beautiful, sexy, and a baker to boot. She knew the exhaustion that came with their craft, the long days of getting up at 3am to check on breads and cakes and the late nights spent crafting sugar flowers or, in Hadley’s case, homemade sprinkles for Hunny Bee’s funfetti cookies. She also knew the enormous high that came from someone enjoying their food, seeing the smiles on kids’ faces as they munched on a freshly baked chocolate chip cookie or the looks of pure delight on a couple’s face when they took their first bite of wedding cake. They also traded culinary school horror stories—it turns out that Tucker was not the only person to nearly chop his finger off his first week at the Culinary Academy.
“Oh man, Chef was so mad. He told me I was too klutzy to be a pastry chef, that I’d never make it and no one would hire me, but by the end of the semester, I was churning out better mirror glaze than anyone else,” Hadley said as she raised her glass of champagne to her mouth. Tucker loved the little droplet of champagne the glass left on her lips after she’d taken a sip, and he couldn’t help imagining leaning in and licking it off her. He’d get over his champagne aversion for this beauty.
“So, what brought you to Portland? That accent sounds a bit more Midwestern to me,” Hadley said as she broke off a piece of bread and chewed. The second course had just been served, a roasted red pepper hummus with freshly made pita bread and coal-roasted zucchini. Tucker had suggested one of his buddies from CA to Amelia and Eli when they were looking for caterers, and Patrick had delivered. This was some of the best food Tucker had ever had, catered or otherwise.
Tucker hadn’t heard Hadley at first, too focused on her mouth as she chewed, the way the movement of her jaw caused her cheeks to squish up against her glasses in a way that was somehow both adorably cute and unbelievably sexy. But when she stopped chewing and looked at him expectantly, T
ucker realized she was waiting for an answer. “Sorry, got distracted for a second. What was your question?”
“Distracted, huh? I caught you staring at my mouth, but no way, are you stealing any of this pita bread from me, Tucker. It is all mine, gloriously mine.” Tucker breathed a sigh of relief that Hadley thought he was staring at her out of a different kind of hunger. “I asked what brought you to Portland since you sound like you’re from the Midwest originally.”
And with that, the hard-on that Tucker had been sporting for most of the evening went soft, because suddenly, Tucker wasn’t thinking about sex with Hadley anymore. No, he was thinking about telling Hadley that what had brought him to Portland was allowing a werewolf he used to consider his rival to help him rebuild his life. And about how disgusted Hadley would be when she realized that he wasn’t fully human. And how she would then get up and run away, leaving her pita bread behind, which he would then eat absentmindedly as he contemplated how to stand being this lonely for the rest of his life.
But Hadley must have noticed his discomfort, because she reached over and put a hand on his arm, saying, “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to. I was just curious, but we can talk about something else. Have you seen that new piping bag technique that’s making the rounds on Reddit baking forums? Like, whoever thought you could just make them out baking paper? Genius!”
The fact that Hadley had realized he was uncomfortable and then immediately changed the subject, not caring that Tucker was sitting there like a mute statue, made his heart beat just a little faster. This girl, she really was it. If only he were a different man, he’d be perfect for her. Because there was no way she’d be looking at him with what seemed to him the beginnings of warmth and affection if she knew he shifted into a werewolf at least three times a year.
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