Taylor woke slowly. She’d make a latte with her Verismo, then swing by Starbuck’s on the way to the station. Maybe she’d pick up a blueberry muffin.

She opened her eyes and stared out the window at the falling snow. Not her window. Her window looked out over the city from the fourth floor of her townhouse. This floor-to-ceiling window looked out over a snow-covered forest.

She pushed up on her elbow, and yesterday’s events came back in a flash. She was in a cabin. Brayden’s cabin.

Holy heck. A complete stranger. I might be losing it. But there had been a snowstorm. She’d had a perfectly good reason for spending the night with a strange man in the middle of the woods.

Though she had to admit the snow was beautiful, there was a slight problem. She was stranded here with no clothes. No makeup. Nothing.

She reached over and picked up her phone. Not even any phone service.

Laying back down, she groaned. A wild goose chase-- That’s what Michael had sent her on. Now that she thought about it, she had seen him with Maribelle quite a bit lately. With her out of the way, Maribelle had a better chance at getting the anchor job.

She sighed. Now that she was here, she realized how ridiculous it was to think she could get a story about shapeshifters. If there was such a thing as shapeshifters, they weren’t going to come out and make themselves known.

As she lay there staring out the window, wondering what she was going to do about her current predicament, she watched a bear walking toward her. A bear wearing a… bag over his shoulders.

She blinked. And sat up.

A bear carrying a bag? It wasn’t a backpack. It was more like a burlap haversack. As she watched, the bear ambled toward the cabin. She leaned back against the pillow and pulled the blanket over her nose. She lay very still. Could a bear break through a window?

As the bear walked past her window, it turned and looked right toward her. She squeezed her eyes closed.

Maybe it wouldn’t see her.

After a minute, she opened one eye and peeked out the window. The bear was gone. She breathed out slowly. This place was crawling with bears. No wonder there were so many legends revolving around shapeshifting bears up here.

Then she heard a noise in the other part of the cabin. It sounded like a door opened and closed. Then something fell. Had the bear gotten inside the cabin?

She didn’t dare move. She just lay there listening for any sound.

When someone knocked on her bedroom door, she muffled a screech. Bears don’t knock.

When she didn’t answer, the door opened, and Brayden peeked inside? “Are you okay?”

She nodded. Then cleared her throat and lowered the blanket.

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“A bear.” She nodded toward the window.

“Oh.”

“I didn’t know there were so many bears around here. I thought they were hibernating.”

“I don’t know. Bears are funny sometimes.”

Taylor had no idea what that meant. She almost asked him about the haversack the bear had worn. But decided it was too far-fetched, and he might think she’d gone insane. So, she kept that to herself.

“Are you hungry?” He asked. “I have some fruit.”

“Sure. Coffee?”

He smiled. “Of course.” He tossed her a sweatshirt. “I’ll be in the kitchen.”

She pulled the sweatshirt over her head, and it reached to her thighs. It smelled like him. Woodsy and a little like vanilla and lavender.

A few minutes later, she sat at the little table in front of the window while he made coffee. It wasn’t a Verismo latte, but he added lots of creamer at her request. While she sipped her coffee, he put together a plate with grapes, oranges, and strawberries.

As he set the plate in front of her, his cell phone rang. Interesting how he had phone service, and she didn’t. He wandered off to handle what sounded like a business call. She finished her coffee, ate her fruit, and went in search of a shower.

As she left she kitchen, she noticed a rack with his coat hanging by the back door.

Nestled between his coat and a green plaid scarf was a burlap haversack.