Bear With Me by TJ Cross

Author:TJ Cross [Cross, TJ]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2016-01-06T23:00:00+00:00

AUGUST

I was more than a little excited when Rhys offered to drive. For starters, as much as I loved my car and loved the feeling of driving, sometimes I just wanted to sit back, watch the scenery, and relax. And besides, it was kind of hot watching him handle the stick.

Rhys said that he’d spent some time in Europe a few years back and had done some sports car racing over there. He’d driven an orange Ferrari for some uber-rich Italian guy that he’d seduced. The last part I didn’t necessarily need to know, but that didn’t stop me from being a little impressed. Apparently, he’d been globe-trotting for the better part of his life. Which, honestly, made sense.

While I didn’t know much about tiger shifters, I did know something about tigers themselves. Tigers were solitary creatures, often spending their time wandering alone. They rarely, if ever, settled down in one place or with one person. It made sense that tiger shifters would be similar. After all, I was more like a bear at times than I cared to admit. Fortunately, Rhys didn’t seem to mind that. Not yet anyways.

And hopefully never, I thought. All things considered.

To be honest, I hadn’t expected him to let me join him on the road. I half-expected him to dismiss my declarations of Fate, but he hadn’t. He knew, just as well as I did, that this feeling was unmistakable. It was raw, primal, and real, and there was nothing that could stand in its way. That’s how fated mates worked, after all. Or so I’d heard.

Back in Black Canyon, fated mates weren’t even considered. There’d been a time, sure, long ago when the bear clans mated by choice, rather than through prearranged ceremonies. At some point, however, the wealthier clans had decided to play God, and the rest was history.

I sighed, thinking back on it. My father, I imagined, would be furious if he knew what I’d been up to. If he’d known that I’d found my actual mate, rather than the one he’d decided that I’d have. Not to mention the fact that I was performing all sorts of “abhorrent” behaviors.

Ouch. The memory of him saying those things to me still stung, even now, a few days after having abandoned my ancestral home. It was one thing to disapprove of my sexual preferences, it was something else entirely to tell me, to my face, that I was behaving the same way an abomination might. I couldn’t help it, couldn’t change it. I was who I was. And he’d never understand.

I shook my head, dismissing the thoughts and turned my attention to the world outside my Camaro.

We were driving north, still east of the Appalachian Mountains and nearing the northern Virginia border. The scenery was beautiful, complete with wondrous green hills and trees that seemed to go on forever. It was the furthest I’d ever been from home, and the further we drove, the more at ease I was with my decision.

“Are we headed anywhere in particular?” I asked after a while, my stomach starting to growl.

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