Mating The Bear: BBW Paranormal Bear Shifter Romance (Gray Bears Book 3) Read online

  MATING THE BEAR

  By

  Natalie Kristen

  BEAR HEAT series

  Bear's Bride (Book 1)

  Bear's Kiss (Book 2)

  Bear's Claim (Book 3)

  Bear's Baby (Book 4)

  Bear's Heart (Book 5)

  GRAY BEARS series

  Marrying The Bear (Book 1)

  Loving The Bear (Book 2)

  Mating The Bear (Book 3)

  Tempting The Bear (Book 4)

  Coming Soon!

  Copyright © 2015 Natalie Kristen

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the author's written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are used fictitiously or are the products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual locales, events, establishments or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  About this Book

  Suzanne Vela is a big girl with striking violet eyes and she's always been made to feel bizarre, not beautiful. She longs to meet the man of her dreams and live happily ever after with him, but she is so damn tired of dating.

  She has just moved to a quaint, quirky small town and she hopes that she has finally found a place she can call home.

  Mason Gray works with his brothers at Gray's Domain, a construction company and is a member of the small volunteer firefighting force in Shadow Point. When he saves a woman from a burning house, he realizes that there is something strange and special about her.

  She has been drained of nearly all her blood. She should be dead, but she is clinging on tenaciously to life.

  Suzanne is stunned to find that she isn't dead. A brave, handsome firefighter risked everything and did the impossible to save her.

  Suzanne finally learns who and what she is.

  There is power in her blood, and she will use that power to fight for a happily-ever-after with the man of her dreams.

  * * * * *

  CHAPTER ONE

  Neveah Wright grabbed her best friend by the collar and hauled her back to the restaurant window. “Come here, Glynda!” she hissed.

  “What's the big idea?” Glynda scowled at her, adjusting the collar of her coat fastidiously. “This coat's new,” Glynda huffed. “Elle and Alisa just bought it for me.”

  “I know, I know, they bought me these lovely gloves too—which I just used to yank your collar,” Neveah snapped. “Stop fussing, will you? Just look. In there.”

  Glynda Gray peered through the restaurant window and turned to her friend with a sly smile. “Yes. I see her.”

  “The one with the stunning violet eyes?” Neveah said excitedly, pressing her nose to the window as well.

  “Yes, yes, she's the one. She's perfect...” Glynda cooed.

  The two silver-haired witches beamed and continued staring at the unsuspecting young lady in the restaurant.

  “...for our Mason,” Neveah breathed.

  Mason was one of her grandsons. Well, one of Glynda's grandsons to be precise. But Neveah had helped her best friend raise those four rambunctious bear cubs after their parents passed away. The Gray boys called her Grandma Neveah, but it soon became just Ne-ma. They were Gramma and Ne-ma to Tristan, Aidan, Mason and Jackson Gray.

  “She doesn't look too happy,” Glynda commented, making a face. “It looks like a bad, boring first date to me.”

  “Yeah, she should just ditch him...”

  “...and make the wish!” they said together.

  Glynda rubbed her hands together, her green eyes sparkling with mischief. The two of them were witches but their four grandsons were bear shifters. Neveah and Glynda knew of shifters who searched their whole lives for their true mates and never found them. They didn't want their boys to suffer such a terrible fate.

  So they'd cast a spell for their grandsons. It was a harmless, dormant, happily-ever-after spell. They weren't meddling, just helping, they reasoned.

  If a female who was a true mate to one of their boys made a wish to find her true love, the spell would be triggered and their paths would cross one way or another. Gramma and Ne-ma were just making it easier for their boys to find their true mates. It wasn't as if they were foisting anything on anyone or forcing someone to do something against their will. That would be bad magic. And Glynda and Neveah were good witches. Well, their intentions were always good. It wasn't their fault if some spells went awry.

  So far, Tristan and Aidan had found their true mates. Their mates had made the wish and unleashed the magic of true love. And Glynda and Neveah couldn't be happier for them.

  The pretty young women was sitting at a corner table with a sleazy-looking vampire. Glynda wanted to march into the restaurant and drag the vamp away from the table and literally kick him to the curb.

  “Free will, Glynda,” Neveah muttered, blowing out a breath. The restaurant window fogged up and she cleared it by making little squiggles with her finger. “She has to make the wish of her own free will.”

  “Free will could use a little help,” Glynda said, as she watched Neveah's finger squeak over the glass. Her face brightened suddenly. “That's right! That's it, Neveah! You just gave me an idea! Ha!” Glynda pressed closer to the window and began to blow furiously over the glass.

  Neveah blinked once, then broke into a grin.

  She knew what her friend was doing immediately. They'd known each other since they were kids and they were closer than sisters. They even fought and squabbled like sisters.

  A few passers-by stopped and stared at the two little old ladies blowing on the restaurant window and fogging it up with their breaths. But no one stopped them. Some looked on in amusement at the eccentric, giggling witches and smiled.

  When the window was sufficiently fogged up, Neveah took off her glove and wrote the letters backwards on the glass with a finger. It was backwards to her, but the young lady in the restaurant would be able to read the words just right.

  “Come on, hurry up,” Glynda said impatiently.

  “There. Done.”

  They peeped through the window again. They saw the young woman look up and stare at the words on the window.

  Make A Wish.

  The woman looked startled, but even before the words faded from the glass, Neveah and Glynda had already vanished from the restaurant window.

  The fog on the glass disappeared, leaving a clear view of the street outside. There was no sign at all of the two silver-haired witches.

  It was almost as if they were never there.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Suzanne Vela unlocked the door to her little cottage and stepped into the house. She stepped out of her heels and threw her handbag onto the couch.

  “Another one bites the dust,” Suzanne mumbled, massaging her temples. “Dating sucks.”

  She unzipped her figure-hugging dress and stepped right out of her dress in the living room. In just her lacy underwear, she padded to the kitchen and took a long drink of cold water. There was nobody to see her anyway. Her closest neighbor was a mile down the road. Her house sat at the very edge of town. Only a badly paved, half-completed road led up to her house, and her backyard was the dense evergreen woods that bordered the small town of Shadow Point.

  Suzanne mulled over her string of disastrous dates and considered withdrawing from the matchmaking service that her colleagues had signed her up for. Her new colleagues were a nosy but w
ell-meaning bunch. Matchbox Inc., the busiest matchmaking agency in town, had come highly recommended. But so far, all her first dates had flopped. She had not been on a single second date. It was depressing, kind of.

  She was putting her glass in the sink when a streak of lightning flashed outside her window. Frowning, she scurried to the window and peered out.

  Ominous storm clouds were swirling overhead. “Ah shit! The roof is going to leak again,” she muttered.

  Suzanne grabbed the pails from under the sink and placed one in the kitchen and one in her bedroom. Whenever it rained, it would rain inside her house too. She had bought this rundown cottage at a steal. It was only after she'd paid the deposit that the agent let slip that she was the only person who had come out to view the property. No one was interested in a tiny, ramshackle cottage in the middle of nowhere.

  The house down the road from her belonged to an old couple who had lived there their whole lives. They had warned her about the wild animals in the forest and advised her to keep a gun under her bed. But Suzanne wasn't afraid of the woods. In fact, she liked living close to nature. It was almost as if the woods called to her.

  Suzanne placed the buckets under the water stains in the ceiling and waited for the rain. But the sky seemed to have changed its mind. It wasn't going to be a cold, wet night after all.

  As she looked out of the window, the clouds parted and she glimpsed the stars shining brightly behind the blanket of clouds. It was a beautiful sight, and despite herself, she smiled as she gazed at the twinkling stars.

  Suzanne sighed and went to her tiny bedroom. She stood in front of the full-length mirror and stared at her generous, curvy figure.

  Her aunt Delilah used to pass cutting, scathing remarks about her weight and appearance. Suzanne stepped back and squinted at her reflection, appraising herself objectively.

  She had a full, buxom figure, pale skin, jet black hair and deep violet eyes. Suzanne canted her head, trying to recall her mother's looks. Her mom had died when Suzanne was four, and her Aunt Delilah, who was her mother's elder sister, had raised her. Her Aunt Delilah wasn't cruel to her, but she wasn't the most loving aunt. She was critical, and rather...wary of Suzanne.

  Suzanne bit her lip and sat at the edge of her bed. She had never met her father, and her aunt refused to speak of him. Aunt Delilah would only say that her sister, Deanna had been seduced by an unnatural being. Deanna's offspring was likewise unnatural and offensive to her. Her aunt saw her as some kind of freak.

  Suzanne had seen her mother's photographs. Her mom had black hair and dark brown eyes, like Aunt Delilah. Her mother and aunt were tanned and thin. But Suzanne had pale, almost translucent skin and was plump and curvy. And no one she knew had glowing violet eyes like her.

  She wasn't sure what Aunt Delilah meant when she said that her dad was an unnatural creature. Was her aunt just mad that the creep had knocked her younger sister up and abandoned her? Or was her dad...a paranormal?

  Suzanne never had the chance to ask her mother, and her aunt would turn away and clamp up whenever Suzanne broached the topic of her heritage.

  Even though Aunt Delilah was a cantankerous, critical woman, she had brought Suzanne up. Suzanne had stayed with her and nursed her until she passed away a year ago. Cancer had eaten away her aunt's body and mind, and almost every penny in Suzanne's savings account. But even though Delilah couldn't bring herself to bestow love on her niece during her lifetime, she bequeathed her house to Suzanne upon her death.

  Suzanne buried her aunt beside her mom. She had walked to the cemetery one cold winter morning, clutching her suitcase and stood in front of the two simple headstones. Delilah Vela and Deanna Vela, beloved aunt, mother, sister.

  They were gone. The only family she had ever known.

  Quietly, she said her goodbyes to them, dried her eyes and left.

  Mom, Aunt Delilah, I'm leaving and I don't know when I'll be back.

  When Suzanne walked out the cemetery gates, she didn't look back.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Suzanne had sold her aunt's house and moved to Shadow Point. It was time she lived her own life.

  Shadow Point was one of the few towns that had more paranormal than human inhabitants. There were shifters, vampires, witches, fae folk, and some human families living in Shadow Point.

  Suzanne felt an odd attraction and fascination with the small remote town. It was quaint and quirky, and she liked the atmosphere and the vibe. The residents weren't suspicious of strangers and were largely open-minded and welcoming.

  The sad fact was that her own aunt had been more suspicious of her than her new neighbors in Shadow Point.

  But her aunt was gone. And Suzanne didn't want to feel inferior and guilty all her life. Her Aunt Delilah seemed to cringe whenever she looked into Suzanne's uncanny violet eyes, and she would make a sound of disapproval and disgust whenever Suzanne had a second helping at dinner or finished a tub of ice-cream in front of the TV.

  Suzanne had felt like a freak, a fat, unattractive freak in her aunt's house. She couldn't continue living in that house even though her aunt had bequeathed it to her. She was grateful to her aunt for bringing her up, but she had to live her own life now. She sold the house, and with the proceeds, she'd bought this tiny, crooked cottage.

  She got a job at a small accounting firm in town and every day, she would drive more than an hour to get to work. But she enjoyed the drive. There was no traffic and the scenery was peaceful and beautiful. The only sound she heard was the rattling and spluttering from her rusty third-hand car.

  Suzanne shook herself out of her reverie as she slipped into a big comfy t-shirt. She went to check her doors and windows before getting ready for bed.

  She felt exhausted. She liked her new town and her new job, but her social life wasn't anything to shout about. Frankly, she was tired of going on all these dates. Dating was just plain exhausting.

  Matchbox Inc., had set her up with some nice guys, but she didn't really hit it off with any of them. There were the nice but bland dates, and there were the uncomfortable, downright creepy dates.

  Like tonight's date.

  The guy she met tonight was a vampire. Balestair's questions over dinner had been strange and kind of intrusive. He'd asked her if she was really fully human. What kind of a question was that?

  Well, of course she was. That was what she had written in the agency's form. She had no reason to believe otherwise. She didn't know who or what her father was, and anyway, she had been raised as a human. She had gone to a full human school, lived in a human community and she had no paranormal powers.

  But Balestair had persisted. He even had the gall to insinuate that she was lying. And he had tried to get in the car with her even after she told him that she was tired and wanted to go home, alone.

  But it was his reaction to her paper cut that had really weirded her out.

  Balestair had grabbed her bleeding finger and sniffed curiously, his eyes widening with disbelief and amazement. To top that off, he had stuck her finger right into his mouth. Ick!

  “Your blood,” he'd moaned as his eyes rolled back A convulsive shudder coursed through his body and when he looked at her again, it was with scheming, predatory hunger. “Not...human.” His smile sent a chill down her spine. “Not fully.”

  Suzanne shook her head with a grimace and resolved not to think about her horrible date. She might have nightmares tonight.

  Flicking off all the lights in the house, she went to the bathroom and squeezed out extra toothpaste. She began to brush with a vengeance, scrubbing and rinsing thoroughly to get rid of the bad taste in her mouth. Great, now she could add Creepy Vampire to her list of bad dates.

  Suzanne wiped the water droplets off the mirror and frowned into her large violet eyes. She stared down her curvy, ample figure and chewed her lip.

  This dating thing just wasn't working for her. But it had nothing to do with her looks or her size. She just hadn't met
the right man, her dream guy.

  Unlike her Aunt Delilah, no one here had made any comments about the strange color of her eyes or her big girl size.

  Suzanne climbed into bed and pulled the thin covers up to her chin. For a moment, she wondered what it would be like to have someone share her bed, her life. She had been with a few men, but she had never brought them home to meet her aunt. Why bother?

  Her aunt would disapprove of them and Suzanne already knew at the beginning of their hook-up that it was going to be just a fling. It wasn't going to be anything deep or permanent.

  Some people were lucky in love, and some weren't.

  She tossed on her side and gazed out the window. “Why can't I find the man of my dreams and live happily ever after? It's happened to everyone else. How I wish it would happen to me,” she whispered.

  The stars winked at her as she sighed and closed her eyes. She had been a big disappointment to her aunt. Maybe her life was doomed to be one big disappointment as well.

  With a tired, aching heart, Suzanne burrowed under her pillow and didn't hear the soft step at her door.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Mason Gray made a face at his brother and sister-in-law as he walked to the door. Aidan and Elle couldn't seem to keep their hands and lips off each other.

  “Hey, don't leave me alone with them,” his youngest brother, Jackson, implored.

  “Sorry, you're on your own, buddy,” Mason smirked.

  Jackson groaned and covered his head with a cushion. “Go back to your room, guys. Let me watch my movie in peace. You're distracting me with your noisy smooching!”

  Aidan lifted his head from Elle's neck to frown at the TV screen. “But you've watched this movie a hundred times!” Aidan said to his baby brother.