5
Max
Max paced his office.
He’d just gotten off the phone with Sam Rattle.
Sam and his brother Clyde were none too pleased to hear that Oberon Logging was not interested in doing their harvesting. The two had all but said they were planning to drag Max’s good name through the mud around town.
Max hoped that any listeners would consider the source.
He stepped through a rectangle of moonlight on the floor and felt a shiver of recognition.
The bear was awakening in his head. He’d been pawing around more often lately, snuffling like he was looking for an opening in Max’s control.
Suddenly he thought of the letter again.
The coming moon is the 300th since a staying spell was put on your bear to help curb your shifting until you were old enough to control it…
His parents always told him he probably wouldn’t begin to actually shift until his late twenties. He’d never thought to ask why.
The room suddenly felt warm.
Max loosened his tie and unbuttoned the top button of his shirt. He didn’t often dress formally, but today he’d had a big meeting with potential clients and had to dress the part.
He was deciding between unbuttoning a second button and just going upstairs to change when the bear stilled in his head, drawing his attention to the hallway outside his office.
Someone was there.
A familiar scent tickled his nose just before the knock on the door.
“Come in,” he called out.
The door swung open and there she was.
Sarah Bennett…
It had been a long year, but she gazed up at him with the same luminous emerald eyes. Her pert body released waves of rainy scent. If anything, she was a bit curvier than last time - mouthwateringly curvy.
The bear leaped in his chest, cavorted and preened before her.
Max himself wanted to embrace her, tell her how glad he was to see her, beg her never to leave again.
But he fought for control.
“Miss Bennett,” he managed, through a tensed jaw. “I didn’t expect to see you for another twenty years at least.”
She recoiled slightly as if he had slapped her.
The bear roared with frustration.
Sarah pursed her lips and stepped forward again, feet slightly apart as if she were about to punch him.
“I’m here because I understand you’ve sold off half your company,” she retorted. “I thought I had met with the owner of Oberon Logging last year, but I see I’ll have to begin my work all over again.”
“I sold a forty percent share of my company to a friend,” he said, seething inside. “I still control the business.”
“For now,” Sarah said coolly. “May I have the contact for your friend?”
“You may not,” Max replied. “I won’t have her disturbed in the evening by someone who isn’t a client yet.”
“When will she be available for a conversation with a potential customer?” Sarah purred.
When hell freezes over.
“If you have any questions you can run them by me,” he said. “I’ll be sure to get back to you once I confer with Angela.”
“I’ll come back in the morning to see her myself,” she replied, turning on her heel.
“Why are you really here?” he asked.
She paused long enough for him to hope she might answer.
Then her cell phone rang, breaking the silence.
Sarah marched out of the room and down the hallway.
Sarah, wait, please, he begged her in his mind.
But he suspected that running after her now would only make things worse.
She would be back tomorrow, she had said as much. He would find a way to patch things up with her when they had both cooled off a little.
The bear chuffed impatiently in his head, straining against the confines of his mind.
Down, boy. We’ll talk to her tomorrow.
The bear moaned. He had no interest in talking. He wanted only to claim their beautiful mate. His human side would be allowed to chatter endlessly with her if he wanted, once she was safely theirs.
That’s not how it works.