A Change To Bear (A BBW Shifter Romance) (Last of the Shapeshifters) by A.E. Grace Read Free Book Online

visiting.”
    “Okay,” Terry said, and he heard annoyance in her voice.
    He looked at her, and relented. He may as well be fair. “It’s nothing really that interesting,” he said. “I’ve just got a bit of savings, and so I’ve been doing some traveling. I like to travel light. I don’t care about possessions, and I go where I want.”
    “You know,” she said, looking ahead. “I’m not forcing you to tell me stuff. We don’t have to talk about it. Or at all.”
    “Nah, it’s not like that,” Liam murmured. He looked at her again, waited for her eyes to meet him, and then he smiled. “I’m not trying to spoil the chat.”
    “If you say so,” she said, breathing out. “We’re nearly at the crossing, right?”
    “Yes. Got everything ready?” He asked her the question, ignoring that she probably thought he really had spoiled the moment.
    “Yes,” she said, tapping her chest. Two strings disappeared from around her neck into her top.
    “Keep everything there?”
    “No,” she said. She smiled, pursed-lipped, and Liam found it quite disarming. “Everything important is hidden away somewhere on my body.”
    “Nice.”
    “Nobody’s stealing my shit,” she said, laughing.
    But Liam had already stopped listening. The border crossing was close, and he was thinking about what he was going to do. Past the small building that regulated human traffic, Liam could see a wide cement road lined on either side by a tall fence topped with barbed wire, behind which was the kind of thick sub-tropical vegetation native to the region.
    “Hey, Terry,” he said.
    “Yeah?”
    “I’ve got to use the toilet. Meet me on the other side.”
    “Of what?”
    “The building,” Liam said, pointing at it and already beginning to walk away. “It spits you out right onto that big road and that’s where you walk across to Vietnam.”
    Terry looked at him for a moment, before agreeing. “Sure,” she said. “See you there.”
    “Cool.” He turned and made for the stall of what he knew would be filthy toilets.
     
    *
    The border crossing was heavily guarded, with armed soldiers, trained dogs, and outgoing x-ray machines for baggage. Terry was queuing up with mountains of people, many of whom were travelers and backpackers. A man in the line next to hers, rake thin and tall as a basketball player, smiled toothily at her.
    “Traveling alone?” he asked. He leaned over her a little.
    “No,” Terry said, but she nodded her head, blinking. “I mean yes, I am.”
    “You sure?” The man’s smile was mitigated by his gaunt, sunken cheeks, and jutting jowls.
    “Yeah,” Terry replied, nodding. She looked away from him, thinking that he definitely had the appearance of a seasoned backpacker. Long shorts that looked like they were once upon a time baggy cargo trousers; they had definitely been through better times. A black t-shirt with a stretched neckline and fraying edges that hung off his sunburned collar bones completed the look. Despite herself, Terry couldn’t help but roll her eyes a little (mentally, of course). She understood the allure of backpacking, in theory anyway, but she’d never get so careless with her appearance. It wasn’t a vanity thing, it was a pride and respect thing. If she was going to be traveling through foreign countries, she was damn sure going to represent herself, and by extension where she had come from, well, rather than leave a trail of onlookers gawking in disbelief.
    He also wasn’t getting her signals. “Where are you from?”
    “Um, that’s complicated,” Terry said, giving him a ‘sorry’ smile. She wasn’t going to get into that with a stranger. “But if it matters, I started off in London.”
    “Ah, London. Love London. Miss London.” He looked away, as though lost in reverie. “Was there last month.”
    “Is that right?”
    “Sure is. Went to a sick party.”
    “Sounds fun.”
    “You have no idea,” he blurted through a laugh.
    “How about