Grizzly Flying Free (Air Bear Shifters Book 2)
Read Grizzly Flying Free (Air Bear Shifters Book 2) Online
Authors: Sloane Meyers
Grizzly Flying Free
Air Bear Shifters, Book 2
By Sloane Meyers
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Similarities to actual people or events are entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2016 by Sloane Meyers. All rights reserved.
Lexi Shaffer pulled her baseball cap low over her eyes as she stepped out of the taxi at La Guardia International Airport. Without looking up, she made her way toward the entrance, moving as quickly as she could through the thick crowd. She heard voices behind her calling out her name, and several pops sounded off as the paparazzi started doing their best to capture a shot of her before she could make it safely past security.
Lexi had hoped that she would be able to avoid drawing attention to herself by taking a plain old cab to the airport instead of a chauffeured limousine, which until now had been her usual ride of preference. But, apparently, some of the paparazzi were still stationed outside of her condo building around the clock, because they had seen her slip out and slip into the taxi.
Lexi had never wanted to be famous. She had wanted to be a successful dancer, and she had knocked that goal out of the park. She had studied at the best ballet schools, and had performed for the New York City Ballet before making the leap to Broadway. She was well known in dance circles, but she was not a household name by any means. That changed, though, the day she met Hollywood’s It Man of the moment, Greg Welch. Lexi had found herself in the middle of a whirlwind romance with him, complete with trips to exotic locations and VIP passes to award shows. She had lived a life that felt like a dream, and, quite honestly, felt a little uncomfortable at times. Lexi didn’t like standing on a red carpet, hanging off of her handsome boyfriend’s arm and feeling like a trophy on display. But she had figured it was a small price to pay to get to spend time with an amazing man who loved her and kept her life filled with constant adventures.
That dream life had ended abruptly, however, when photos surfaced of Greg getting a little too cozy with a supermodel near the set of his latest movie. Lexi had been standing in the checkout line at the corner market near her condo when she discovered the news. Standing there with a box of gluten free cereal and a ripe bunch of bananas, she unexpectedly found herself staring at a “breaking news” cover of a gossip magazine, with pictures of her cheating boyfriend splashed all over it. Greg was filming out in the wilderness of Utah, and apparently he had found a way to make the time pass a little more quickly. Why had no one warned Lexi?
Tears stinging her eyes, and with a horrible, empty feeling in the pit of her stomach, Lexi abandoned her cereal and bananas at the checkout counter and ran home. She pulled out her laptop and Googled Greg’s name, only to find that all of the gossip websites were quickly jumping on the news of his cheating.
The next few weeks had felt like a nightmare. When Lexi called Greg to confront him, he didn’t even try to deny it. He said he was a man and had needs, and if Lexi wasn’t willing to come visit him on set in Utah, then he was going to find other ways to take care of himself. Never mind the fact that Lexi was committed to performing in a Broadway show for the next two months, at least, and couldn’t leave New York right now. Lexi had yelled and cried and called Greg every name under the sun before saying they were done, but Greg had just laughed.
“You won’t be able to stay mad at me forever,” he’d said. “I’m too good, and you know it.”
Disgusted, Lexi had changed her phone number and cut off all contact with Greg. But she hadn’t been able to cut off contact with the paparazzi. Greg knew how much she hated being followed by photographers, so he kept feeding them rumors about her to keep them following her and making her life miserable. Stories appeared in celebrity magazines about Lexi partying late into the night at clubs, even though Lexi only set foot outside her door to go to work. The rumors were untrue and unfair, but there wasn’t much Lexi could do except ignore them and hope they would go away soon. Lexi couldn’t believe that someone she had thought was so amazing had turned out to be such a selfish, petty excuse for a human being.
If she was honest with herself, she should have seen the writing on the wall. She had been so caught up in the adventure of dating a celebrity that she had chosen to overlook the obvious warning signs. He had always put himself first, and she had let him because she had been so dazzled by his charm.
As her Broadway run came closer to an end, Lexi’s thoughts turned more and more frequently toward escaping. She wanted to get away from New York City, from the glitz and glamour and the prying eyes of thousands of passersby on the street each day. She wanted to go somewhere that it wouldn’t be so easy for the paparazzi to seek her out and harass her with their zoom lenses and bright flashes.
She wanted space. Her whole life, she had given up space in the name of advancing her dancing career. But she had accomplished all that she wanted to accomplish. Sure, there would always be more she could do. She could snatch up another Broadway role, or star in more shows at the New York City Ballet. She could take a position teaching ballet at a prestigious university, or become a judge on one of the ever-popular reality shows about dancing. But, when Lexi was honest with herself, she knew she didn’t want any of that. She wanted to go somewhere that she could just live life, and could dance again for the joy of it—not for a show.
Lexi had no idea where that escape might be. She had tossed around several ideas in her mind. She contemplated a chic European city where she could disappear into cafes and spend her days working on the blog she’d always wanted to start but never found the time for. She researched cozy, Pacific Northwest towns where she could breathe in the salty, damp ocean air while browsing weekend Farmers’ markets. She even looked into buying a villa in Costa Rica, where she could enjoy fresh tropical fruit and enjoy the relaxed pace of Latin American life.
In the end, though, she had made her choice based on a gut instinct that overtook her while she was watching TV late one night. She had arrived home from a performance and found herself unable to sleep. After tossing and turning in bed for an hour, she decided to get up and flip through channels. She landed on a National Geographic special about Alaska, and she soon found herself mesmerized with the natural beauty of the state and the sense of community that all of the Alaskans being interviewed seemed to have.
In an uncharacteristic fit of spontaneity, Lexi had pulled out her laptop and purchased a one way ticket to Alaska for the week after her current Broadway contract ended. She had no idea where she would live, or what her plan would be when she arrived, but she felt a stirring deep within her soul whenever she thought of Alaska. Somehow, she knew that she was meant to be there, so she bought the plane ticket on faith.
Over the next few weeks, things fell rapidly into place. Lexi found and leased an apartment in the city of Kodiak, and even found a building she could rent to use as a dance studio. She had no idea how much of a market there was for formal ballet training in Kodiak, but she figured
someone
would be interested in working with her. She loved kids, and hoped she would have a chance to contribute to the education of at least a few of the next generation of ballerinas.
She didn’t tell anyone about her plans. She refused to even consider any of the offers that started coming her way for post-Broadway jobs, and she began selling or donating the majority of her possessions. She had acquired so much stuff over the years, and just letting it go felt freeing. She sold all of her furniture, reasoning that replacing it once she arrived in Kodiak would be easier and cheaper than shipping things, anyway. As her last day in New York City approached, Lexi felt the excitement of starting over beginning to overtake her. She almost forgot about the annoyance of the paparazzi. Almost. Their presence around her condo had lessened over the last few weeks. Even they were beginning to realize that the stories Greg was feeding them about her weren’t true. The truth was that there wasn’t much exciting about Lexi’s life. Now that she was no longer dating a celebrity, and wasn’t interested in staying in the spotlight with her dancing, the paparazzi were beginning to move on to the next flavor of the moment.
Still, a few of them must have been watching her. Maybe it was a slow week, scandal-wise or something. But for some reason, they still cared enough to watch her and to want to know where she was going when she arrived at the airport in a taxi.
Which was how she found herself, at the current moment, shielding her face as she fought her way into the airport terminal.
“Lexi! Lexi, where are you going?” one of them asked.
“Are you going to see Greg?”
“What’s next for you now that your Broadway run is over?”
“Do you believe the rumors that Greg is going to ask his new girlfriend to marry him?”
Lexi ignored all of the questions, and pushed her way through the crowd of lenses until she made it to the security checkpoint, where the TSA agents began yelling at the photographers that cameras weren’t allowed in the security area. Lexi quickly jumped into the VIP line, clutching her carryon and preprinted boarding pass as she escaped beyond the reach of the cameras. One leftover benefit of her time with Greg was that she had racked up thousands of frequent flyer miles by flying all over the world with him. She still had preferred status, and enough points to purchase a first class ticket to Alaska. And since she was shipping the rest of her belongings to Alaska ahead of her, she didn’t have to worry about going to the airline counter to check in a suitcase.
She knew that pretty soon her airline points would run out, and her days of luxury flights would be over. But she didn’t care. She didn’t care that much about traveling anymore. She just wanted to settle down somewhere safe and quiet. Somewhere far away from the prying eyes of everyone who thought they knew her.
Because the truth was that no one knew her. Some days, Lexi wasn’t even sure that she knew herself anymore. The only thing she knew for sure was that she loved to dance. And her favorite time to dance was when no one else was watching.
It had been far too long since she’d done that, and, as her flight to Alaska rose above the New York City skyline, Lexi vowed that the first thing she was going to do when she reached her new home was dance her heart out for an audience of zero.
Anderson Rowe rubbed his temples in frustration as his six-year-old daughter, Silver, made a pouty face in his direction. She had perfected the art of a perfect pout, turning the corners of her lips downward and allowing her bottom lip to protrude just enough to make her look sincerely sad without being too overdramatic. Some days, her antics made Anderson laugh, but today was not one of those days. He had recently taken over the duties of second in command of his clan, and he was finding the duties of second to be more demanding than he had anticipated. Not that Anderson was complaining about the opportunity. He loved his clan, the Frost Peak Grizzlies. Their alpha, Sawyer, was one of his best friends. Anderson and Sawyer had already worked together for years as pilots for their air tour company, Frost Peak Tours. Until very recently, another one of Anderson’s good friends, Chance, had worked for the tour company as well. But Chance had decided he needed space, and had flown off to California to work as a pilot for a clan of smokejumping black bear shifters. Chance’s departure had left Anderson as second in command, and had left the tour company short a pilot. Anderson and Sawyer were both busier than they had been in a very long time, and Anderson was feeling the pressure to step up and take as much off of Sawyer’s plate as he could.
Add to all of that the stress of single parenting, and Anderson wasn’t in the mood for Silver’s pouty-faced pleas, no matter how adorable they were.
“Please, Daddy!” Silver was saying, crossing her tiny arms and letting her lip quiver with emotion. “I promise I won’t ask you for anything ever again if you just let me do this one thing.”
Anderson sighed. “I highly doubt you’ll be able to make it the rest of eternity without asking me for anything else, honey,” he said. “And, anyway, my answer would still be no. I know you love dancing, but I’m not letting you go off to Kodiak by yourself for a month. Six years old is way too young for that.”
“I won’t be by myself, Daddy. The program website says there is at least one adult for every five students. And besides, I’m a big girl. I know how to take care of myself.”
Anderson couldn’t stifle a laugh. “Silver, honey, you’re six.”
Silver’s only response was to furrow her brow angrily at her father. Anderson rubbed his forehead again, wishing for the millionth time that Silver’s mother was still around. She had died tragically while giving birth to Silver, leaving Anderson with not only a hole in his heart from her loss, but also with a complete sense of bewilderment over how to handle his baby girl. The feeling of bewilderment only grew as the years started ticking by. Silver was spirited, like her momma had been, and didn’t like taking no for an answer. At the tender age of six, she somehow had already mastered the art of asking for forgiveness instead of permission when she wanted to do something that she knew her father was unlikely to approve of.
But Silver’s latest wish—to spend a month in Kodiak at a dance camp—was something that required her father’s money and approval. And Anderson wasn’t too keen on letting his young daughter go off on her own for a month, no matter how much adult supervision there would be or how good the dance instructor was. Silver raved on and on about how Lexi Shaffer was the best ballerina of the century, and how this was a once in a lifetime chance. But Anderson wasn’t convinced. He had Googled Lexi Shaffer last night, and had read a bunch of stuff about how she dated some big name actor and then went crazy after that, going to nightclubs and drinking too much in order to get over her famous boyfriend after he cheated on her. Anderson was insanely protective of his daughter, and Lexi not only sounded irresponsible, but she also sounded like a bad influence. Anderson knew that the celebrity gossip sites probably over-exaggerated Lexi’s drinking escapades to draw in readers, and he knew that Lexi was supposedly in Alaska to escape from the crazy, fast-paced lifestyle she had been living in New York City. But he wasn’t convinced that Lexi had reformed herself enough to be trusted with the most precious thing in the world to him—his daughter.
“I’m sorry, Silver. You can pout all you want to, but I’m not going to change my mind,” Anderson said. “Now, come on. I have to drop you off at your Auntie Grace’s house so I can get to work.”
“You’re always working these days,” Silver said. “I never see you. It’s so unfair. If you’re going to be gone all the time, you could at least let me go to Kodiak for a month.”
Anderson felt a small twitch of amazement at his daughter’s reasoning skills. How could a six-year-old negotiate so skillfully? Silver was right. He had been working like crazy lately. He felt guilty over it, but he didn’t have much of a choice. It was the height of tourist season, and the tour company was short a pilot. Things would slow down when the winter came. In the meantime, Silver would just have to be happy spending more time with her Auntie Grace, who was technically her great aunt, and the only other family Anderson had left in the world.
“Come on, Silver. We’ve been over this. I know you miss spending more time with me, but things are busy right now. I’ll make it up to you over the winter, I promise.”
Anderson scooped up his daughter in his strong arms, kissing her head as he carried her out the door and prayed that she would somehow come to understand that he was doing the best he could.
* * *
“Dude, just let the girl go. What could possibly happen to her in Kodiak under adult supervision? It’s a completely tame city. She’ll be fine, and she’ll only be an hour flight away.”
“You don’t understand,” Anderson said, setting his lips in a tight line and refusing to look Sawyer in the eye. “She’s too young.”
“I don’t understand?” Sawyer asked, his voice skeptical. “Look, Anderson. I know I’m pretty new at this whole fatherhood thing, since Ella is only two months old. But I would give my life for her, and the thought of losing her takes my breath away. I get it. But you can’t keep your daughter from living her life because of your fear. That’s no way to live. Silver loves to dance more than anything. It’s the one connection she has to the mother she never met. Let her go. She’ll be fine.”
Anderson slammed his pilot bag down on the desk in the corner of the hangar, angrily rifling through it as he searched for his logbook. Silver’s mother had been a talented dancer. Not just in ballet, but in every dance discipline you can imagine. Silver had inherited her mother’s talent, but Anderson had a hard time watching her dance. It was too painful, to feel like he was watching his deceased wife all over again. He did his best to support his daughter’s love of dance, but he’d be lying if he said it wasn’t a struggle for him. He knew deep down that he needed to get over his ridiculous mental hang-ups, but so far he’d done a pretty piss poor job of that.
Sawyer was right, but Anderson didn’t want to admit it. The odds were overwhelmingly good that Silver would be just fine if she spent a month without him in Kodiak. Anderson, on the other hand, was likely to have a nervous breakdown before that month was over. But Sawyer had a point that it was just an hour flight. If Anderson really couldn’t take it anymore, he could always hop on a plane and fly out to see her. That was one of the benefits of being a pilot with free access to a small fleet of private planes.
“Just think about it,” Sawyer said, breaking into Anderson’s turmoiled thoughts. Anderson grunted in response, then grabbed his pilot bag and slung it over his shoulder. He would finish his logbook later when Silver was in bed. Right now, he wanted to go pick her up from Auntie Grace’s so he could have dinner with her. And he didn’t want to talk to Sawyer anymore. He loved his alpha, but he couldn’t help feeling annoyed at the way Sawyer was dispensing advice. Sawyer had only recently become a father himself, and, while Sawyer was a good man, he didn’t understand much about raising a spirited six-year-old. Or about losing your wife in childbirth. Anderson didn’t want to get in a fight with his best friend, though, so he left the hangar as quickly as possible.
When Anderson arrived at Auntie Grace’s house, he found Silver carefully tending to a bucket of minnows. She was talking to them, throwing food in the bucket and calling the fish by name. Anderson felt like his heart might literally explode with love as he watched her work. When she finally looked up and saw him, she squealed and ran into his arms, seeming to have forgotten their argument from earlier that day.
“Daddy, daddy, come see! I caught a bunch of minnows from the stream. They’re all silver, just like my name. Auntie said I have to put them back before I go home, but she said I could at least wait until you got here to show you!”
Anderson smiled and bent down to look at the minnows. Their shining, silvery bodies darted nervously about the bucket. Anderson imagined they must be awfully confused by the confined space, after spending most of the short lives in a wide-open stream.
“They’re beautiful, honey,” Anderson said. “Come on. Let’s put them back in the stream so they can swim freely.”
Silver didn’t protest as Anderson picked up the bucket with one hand and reached for his daughter’s hand with the other. They walked silently together to the stream that ran behind the cabin, and Silver watched as Anderson gently lowered the bucket into the stream and let the minnows swim away.
The minnows darted away joyously, the late afternoon sunbeams reflecting brilliantly off of their scales. Silver squealed in delight, jumping up and down and clapping her hands as she watched the minnows swimming. Anderson ran his fingers through his hair and let out a long, resigned sigh. He knew deep down that he couldn’t keep his precious daughter in a protective bubble forever. Sooner or later, he’d have to let her break away. As much as Anderson hated to admit it, and as terrified as he was at the thought of sending Silver away for a month, maybe Sawyer was right. It was time to let his daughter swim free. Just like the minnows in the bucket, she’d be happy and more fulfilled with wide open spaces.
Anderson continued to watch Silver bouncing around the edge of the stream for several more minutes, knowing deep down that she was going to get her way. Looks like his heart was going to be heading off to Kodiak without him.