Her Reluctant Bear: A Hot Paranormal Fantasy Saga with Witches, Werewolves, and Werebears (Weres and Witches of Silver Lake Book 5) (20 page)

“Let’s get you some.” They hightailed it over there. Brian then reached into his pocket, withdrew his wallet, and paid the man who handed her the foot tall sugary confection.

“You aren’t getting any?” she asked.

“I’ll try a bite of yours first, if that’s okay?”

“Absolutely.” He leaned over and together they chomped on opposite sides of the sweet. Brian must have never eaten something like this before, because the sticky wisps of sugar coated his cheeks and lips. Jillian laughed. “You’re a mess.”

“What’s this stuff made out of?” he asked peeling what he could off of his face. For a moment Jillian feared he’d become angry, but soon he laughed. “I think I’ll stick to fudge.”

“Good plan.”

She’d never seen him so relaxed. Hopefully, their new relationship had a hand in that.

“Come on, let’s explore,” he said as she scarfed down her new treat.

The bright sun had warmed the air to temperatures in the high fifties or low sixties, and she couldn’t ask for a nicer day. Brian led her over to the ring toss station where a large rack of stuffed animals sat off to the side. Two teenage boys were each trying to win an animal for the two girls with them, and Jillian smiled at their enthusiasm.

“Which one do you want?” Brian asked.

“I don’t need a stuffed animal.”

“How about if I want to win one for you?”

She smiled. “Then I’ll treasure it for life.”

After the teens finished showing off, they left. While only one of the girls won a stuffed unicorn, both girls seemed impressed with the boys’ efforts.

“Four tosses for a buck!” the gamer told Brian.

He fished out a dollar and handed it to the bearded man. For Brian’s sake, Jillian hoped he won. The first toss bounced off the glass, but Brian didn’t appear worried.

“That was practice,” he told her.

The second toss hit the mouth of the bottle, rattled, teetered, and then landed around the neck. Brian held up his hands in victory and Jillian clapped.

“That was awesome! And you said you didn’t play sports.”

“This is hardly a sport.”

To her it was. She was so excited for Brian. In the last few days they’d talked a lot about what it was like growing up without his parents around, and he seemed to have come to grips with everything. He’d told her about some tales of fun things he did at the institution, but for the most part there wasn’t much joy in his life. It had made Jillian want to hold him forever.

“You get two more tosses,” the gamer said.

Brian glanced over at her and grinned. “Pick out something big.”

She was about to say she’d wait and see if he landed either of those two, but Jillian kept quiet. “Good luck.”

The next toss ringed another bottle, but the last one missed. He puffed out his chest. “Hey, I got two!”

“You were awesome.” Jillian picked a rather large stuffed bear, surprised at how excited she was at the gift. “Growing up, we didn’t have many toys.”

“I’m glad I could win it for you.”

“Me too.” For the next half hour, they sampled way too much fair food, and then Jillian announced she’d reached her limit.

“I can’t eat another bite either.”

For the next hour, they wandered about the carnival, checking out the booths, and watching exhibitions. Brian’s favorite was the man using a chain saw to carve totems while hers was the woman painting portraits in about five minutes. No matter where they were or what they saw, Brian seemed so happy, and she couldn’t have been more thrilled.

“Hey, Brian,” a pretty woman said coming toward them. If she hadn’t had a handsome man on her arm, Jillian would have been jealous. The cute woman had short blonde hair streaked with purple and black highlights. “I don’t think you’ve met Jackson yet.”

“No, I haven’t.” They shook hands.

Jillian introduced herself, wondering where Brian had met them. Both were shifters, that much she could tell.

“Jackson is Kalan’s brother,” Brian told her.

Ah, yes. Ainsley was the shifter who’d stopped by Elana’s house the night Jillian had dropped the You’re-A-Shifter bombshell. And she was the one who’d recognized Brian was a bear.

“Nice to meet you. Thank you for helping Brian out the other night. I wasn’t very subtle with my revelation, but you confirmed what I was trying to tell him.”

Ainsley smiled. “You must be Dalton’s sister.”

“Yes.” The woman was good, if she could tell the two of them were the same breed.

Jackson tightened his hold around Ainsley’s waist. “We’re having a big birthday bash in about a month and hope you two can join us. Ainsley never celebrated her own birthday growing up, and since our birthdays are only a week apart, we’re having a joint celebration.”

That was so sweet of them to ask. Brian squeezed Jillian’s hand as if he wasn’t sure he wanted to be around so many people.

“We’d love to, thanks,” Jillian said without conferring with Brian. He’d been making steady progress in dealing with people and she was confident he’d be fine.

“We’re headed off to grab something to eat. Nice meeting you,” Jackson said. “We’ll be in touch about the date.”

“Great,” she said. Once they disappeared, she moved in front of Brian. “Are you okay with going?”

“As long as you’re by my side, I’ll be fine.”

“Always.” As soon as she said that word, Jillian realized she’d have to leave at some point, and hoped it wasn’t during their birthday bash. “Just so you know, I’ll have to take a trip back to Los Angeles at some point. I need to turn over my practice there to one of the associates and sell my house.”

“So you’ve decided to stay?”

“Yes. We’re a team now.” Brian grinned and her heart soared.

With his arm around her waist, they continued to check out what the carnival had to offer. “Hey, there’s a skating rink.” Brian pointed to a large white tent.

“You skate?” she asked.

“We had an ice skating rink near the institution. The caregivers took us over on weekends.”

“Lucky you. I’ve never skated,” she said.

“What? Are you kidding? Come on, you’ll do great.”

No, she wouldn’t. Jillian was comfortable in the ocean, assuming she wore a wet suit, and while she’d never surfed, she suspected she’d be rather good given her excellent balance.

Brian seemed so excited to show her the rink that she couldn’t turn him down. As he led her over to the large tented arena, he carried the bear he’d won for her. The generators used to keep the ice solid, rattled loudly off to the side. She was glad to step inside where about fifteen kids and their parents were skating to an up-tempo song. Most were good skaters, but a few looked like this was their first time. She’d probably look like them soon—wobbly and unsure—unless her tiger offered up some of her agility. In truth, Jillian didn’t really care what she looked like as long as she didn’t fall.

After finding out her shoe size, he rented them skates and then laced hers up.

“If I fall on my butt,” she said, “I won’t be a happy camper.”

“If you fall on your butt, I’ll be sure to kiss the bruise away.”

She laughed, always surprised at what came out of Brian’s mouth. That first afternoon when she’d met Elana for lunch, his sister had told Jillian how hard it had been for Brian to interact with people. Add in his anger issues and most people avoided him. When Brian came to Silver Lake though, he’d changed. Jillian suspected that his bear liked being around other shifters, and while she’d never felt the pull of Silver Lake, Dalton had told her the pink quartz lining the bottom provided strength to bears and wolves.

When Jillian asked Brian about his change of attitude, he’d attributed a lot to his sister’s love. For the first time in his life, he felt wanted.

Don’t cry. Just enjoy him!
her tiger said.

He held out his hand. “Let’s give this skating a try.”

When she stood, her ankles nearly buckled, and Brian steadied her. “Don’t let go,” she said.

“I won’t.”

Tentatively, she walked onto the ice and stood for a minute to watch the other skater’s techniques and to get her balance. The general movement of skating involved pushing off with one foot then gliding on the other, alternating as needed. “Why don’t you go around once and I’ll study how you do it.”

“You sure?”

“Yes.” Mostly, she just wanted to watch him.

He toed the ice and sped away from her. With sure, smooth strokes, he wove around some of the slower skaters, and even flipped around in mid stride to skate backward. She had no idea if bears were usually light on their human feet, but Brian sure was. When he came around full circle, she clapped. “You were awesome.”

Red tinged his face. “Thanks. I didn’t participate in any group sports, so this was my exercise. My therapist encouraged me to let out my aggression on the ice, as well as to build things with my hands in order to get in touch with my inner being.” He chuckled.

“I think your therapist was wise.”

“Maybe he was. After all, he suggested I come to Silver Lake and reconnect with Elana.”

“Definitely a smart man.” Jillian inhaled the cold. “Okay, let’s try this, but don’t laugh.”

“Never.”

With Brian holding her hand, he let her skate close to the railing in case she needed to grab onto something else. To her delight, after two times around the rink, Jillian let go of Brian’s hand and managed to keep upright. “I’m doing it!” she exclaimed.

“You sure are.” Brian flipped around and grabbed both of her hands then skated backward, pulling her along.

Jillian laughed at how much fun this was. As he wove them between the groups of people, her coordination grew. The best part about being here was seeing Brian have a great time. Jillian delighted in Brian being in charge of an activity for a change. Ever since she’d met him, she’d been the one forcing him to change and trying to shift. On the ice, Brian was the leader.

They’d almost returned to the starting point, when a unique shifter signature floated by her. At first, she ignored it, as many of the people at the rink were shifters, but for a split second, she caught
his
scent.

Brian slowed. “Are you okay?”

As much as she wanted to blow it off, she couldn’t. “Yeah, I’m good. Just a little tired that’s all. Do you think we could go?”

“Sure.” His shoulders sagged.

Brian led her over to the benches where they took off their skates. While he returned them, she glanced around for the scar-faced killer, but didn’t spot him anywhere. She hoped she hadn’t been imagining things. If Frank Whitlaw had found her, she needed to warn Brian. It was time to tell him everything.

‡

F
rank Whitlaw was
pissed. He’d blocked out four days to tie up loose ends, and now it seemed it might take longer. Figuring out a way to kill Jillian Garner should have been easy, but the woman was never alone. She worked at a local flower shop where some brown haired, tattooed woman worked right along side her. When Jillian left for the evening, she either went straight home to her cop brother’s house or hung out with that human friend of hers. From the way those two were holding hands at the skating rink, the man seemed to believe they were an item.

Frank knew better. Jillian was in Silver Lake merely to hide, probably believing once he was in jail, she could return home.
Guess what, Jillian Garner? You’re never seeing Los Angeles again!
He was leading the Dalia Swanson case and had done a masterful job of tainting the evidence, enough to throw off the best forensic team.

After watching Jillian’s movements these past two days, he needed to figure out a way to get her alone—and that meant dangling some bait in front of her so that she’d come running. Right before he killed her, he’d tell her what a snitch her dad had been. Frank would enjoy seeing her try to defend her righteous son of a bitch dad, but then she’d get what she deserved. It was just a matter of setting up a few things and then he’d be ready.

*

Relieved to be
away from the carnival, Jillian tossed her coat on the back of Brian’s sofa. “I needed to leave because there are a few things I have to tell you.”

He spun around, his eyes haunted. “Don’t tell me James confided in you that I can never shift and that we can’t be together.”