Juliet Hernandez. The most beautiful woman Levi had ever seen. She was the woman he was matched with on Corey’s new dating website. He’d taken the chance to message her the night before and they’d messaged back and forth for hours until she finally said she had to sleep. Whatever secret sauce was in Corey’s algorithm, Levi could tell it was working.

During the course of their text conversation, he’d learned a lot about her. She worked as a graphic designer in a job she didn’t love, even though she loved what she did in general. He’d told her about his military career and the lodge and she’d asked him questions about what it was like to be a bear. He didn’t mind answering those questions, not when they came from Juliet. Usually, he would brush someone off if they asked about the life of a shifter. But something about her made him want to share those things with her.

In the few hours they’d texted each other the night before, Levi had come to feel a deep sense of connection to the curvy little human. He had no idea why. Was it because they’d both said they’d be a squash if they were vegetables? Or maybe he was just fascinated with the idea of finding his fated mate. Any of that could be possible. Regardless, he knew he was physically attracted to her. She was everything he liked in a woman. Sweet, smart, curvy, open to his bear.

When he finished dressing for a day of running the lodge, he picked up his cell phone and put it in his pocket, resisting the temptation to text her. He didn’t want to appear too desperate. As he walked down the hall to the elevator, he felt his phone buzz in his pocket. He took it out as the elevator doors swished open and he walked inside.

On the way down to the lobby, he discovered a new message from Juliet.

Good morning, it read.

Good morning, he responded back. How is life in the city?

Good coffee, she texted.

The elevator door opened with a ding, and he walked out into the lobby of his lodge. Levi approached the registration desk, which was momentarily free of guests, and asked his human receptionist Kelly for the morning’s updates.

“We’ve had an inquiry about a wedding party. The bride is interested in using the atrium for the ceremony.”

One of the reasons Levi had bought the lodge was the huge indoor greenhouse they called the atrium. It housed a vast array of plant life that could never thrive in the mountain climate without it. There were palm trees, orchids, and a waterfall, all thriving under a glass dome that looked out onto the snow covered mountains and the lake below the lodge. Levi wasn’t a professional gardener, but he took joy in overseeing the cultivation of tropical plants with his horticultural crew. It added a sense of peace to his life that he needed after all his years of serving in the military and fighting a human war.

“When did she want to book?” he asked, wanting to respond to Juliet’s text at the mention of a wedding.

“In a few weeks.”

“That soon?”

“I guess they don’t want to wait. The entire wedding party would come and the bride and groom would both have bachelor and bachelorette parties here at the lodge.”

“Will we be able accommodate them on the dates she’s looking at?” Levi asked, skeptical that they would have enough room in the lodge for so many guests and several wedding parties.

“Since the ski season will be winding down by then, yes. We don’t have a lot of bookings during those dates.”

“Very well. Let her know we would be happy to accommodate her and her guests.”

Kelly nodded and began typing an email as a couple in snow jackets walked up to the reception desk. Levi walked down the hall to his office, his fingers itching to send Juliet another text. When he sat down in his high-backed leather office chair, he pulled out his phone and thought about what to say. Juliet was obviously not happy about something. She didn’t go into detail about what was happening at her job, but he could already tell it was leaving her dissatisfied. The thought of Juliet dissatisfied did something to him that made him uncomfortable. Why? Could this human woman really be his fated mate?

He wouldn’t know for sure until he’d smelled her. He knew he liked her looks. Really liked them. Her profile picture was of her at her office desk. It angled from above and showed an ample view of her cleavage in a modest scooped-neck shirt. It made him involuntarily stiffen. She had the most gorgeous figure and full, ripe, kissable lips. He flicked through his phone and brought up that photograph again. His inner bear began to race ahead of him, showing him images of those lips closing around his hardening rod. He growled at himself and put down the phone. It wasn’t professional to be aroused at work. He had a business to run, a staff to supervise, and possibly a wedding to plan.

Clicking onto his computer, he went to his bookkeeping software and studied his profits and losses for the last month. Corey had been responsible for installing all the software that ran his lodge, but Levi was the one who ran everything. The lodge was doing well. He’d had a good profit last quarter, and it looked like there would be even greater growth this quarter. Word had gotten out about new management, and people all over Oregon and the West Coast came to vacation at his lodge. They enjoyed the excellent service, comfortable rooms, and gorgeous views.

This was what made Levi the most excited and content in his life. But it was also the thing that made his bachelor status the most distressing. He needed someone to share all this abundance with. Without a mate, none of this meant anything. He wanted to build a legacy for his cubs, but he had no cubs. So what was the point of building anything at all?

Levi picked up his phone and quickly sent Juliet a text.

We have better coffee on Fate Mountain.

He looked at the message and hesitated. It almost seemed like an invitation. He clicked off the phone without sending it and stood from his desk.

Everything that he had learned about Juliet in the last day, he definitely liked. There was something about her, something sweet and sensitive that connected with the alpha bear inside him. At the same time, he knew this woman was human. In his experience, humans and shifters didn’t mix well, especially romantically.

In all his years in the military, he had learned exactly how prejudiced humans could be. He had dated a human woman fairly seriously while he was serving in the war. Many shifters were on elite fighting forces like his own crew had been in the Navy SEALs. But that didn’t stop the human servicemen from aggressively attacking any shifter who dared to date a human woman.

Despite his rank and his physical prowess, a group of heavily disguised human men had pulled him out of his bunk one night. As they beat him senseless, they made it clear that the reason behind the attack was his relationship with the human woman.

After that night, she wouldn’t speak to him. She didn’t say specifically why she didn’t want to see him anymore. Nevertheless, Levi knew that they’d done it out of hatred and fear.

Human men just couldn’t measure up to shifter males when it came to strength, speed, or agility. Shifters even had heightened senses that humans would never understand. As long as Levi could remember, there had been serious backlash against his kind. Most shifters didn’t see humans as inferior, but that didn’t keep the humans from hating them anyway.

Even though the climate of the culture had changed since the war, Levi still had the scars from the brutal attack that had almost left him for dead. If not for his shifter healing ability, he probably wouldn’t have made it.

He’d been cut up with razor-sharp knives, and all of his ribs had been broken. He’d even been stabbed in the gut. His wounds would have killed any human, but Levi had managed to crawl to the med tent and get the help he needed to recover. Within just a few weeks, he was back out in the field leading his crew, but that was the last time he had tried to date anyone, shifter or human.

Since returning from the war a year ago, he’d built his business and worked with his crew on search and rescue missions. For the most part, that had filled the hole in his soul that could only be filled by a mate and a family. Yet, the more settled and more successful Levi became, the more apparent it was to him that his work and his rescue missions would not fill that hole forever. The need for a mate was growing stronger every day.

As he walked around the indoor swimming pool in the basement of the lodge, he inspected the cleaner that needed to be replaced, according to his maintenance team. After assessing the cleaner, he picked up his phone and sent a text to his maintenance crew that he was approving the funds for the repairs.

After he was done sending the work text, he opened his Mate.com dating app and finally sent the text he had been hesitating on all morning.

A few minutes later, a text popped up on his screen from Juliet.

What is the best place for coffee on Fate Mountain?

Now Levi had to decide if he was going to tell her that the best place for coffee on Fate Mountain was, in fact, his lodge. The café manager took great pride in ordering the best beans in the region and training the staff to pour immaculate shots of espresso.

If he told her the best place for coffee was his lodge, what was he insinuating? That he wanted her to come here and drink it? That he wanted her to come here and taste his espresso? That he wanted her to come here and taste him?

Something inside him quivered at the memory of the pain he’d felt the last time he’d dated a human woman. He put his phone away, trying to focus on other things besides Juliet and the temptation that she represented.