Bear Meets Bride: A Paranormal Bear Shifter Romance by Amy Star Read Free Book Online Page B

happened. After the poachers had shot what they assumed was a bear, they’d come ashore to claim their prize but Dylan had already reverted to his naked human form. Imagine the horror and surprise of discovering that they had shot a human man. No , it was worse than that. They had shot a bear who’d had become a man.
    To be shot and killed by a hunter was one thing. To have the secret emerge that there were shifters was even worse. A tapestry of worst-case scenarios ran through Sarah’s head in an instant, and she too felt nauseous. At their knees Chris let out a tired heart-breaking sigh. She looked at the wound, already black with dried blood. It had stopped bleeding, and she could find the exit wound – good , she thought. But there was no way to know how much blood he’d lost or if any major arteries or organs had been compromised by the bullet.
    “Have to get him back,” Dylan said, struggling through the pain in his head.
    “How?” she asked, her voice frantic. I’m more in shock than he is , she realized. “How?” she asked again, forcing herself to be calm.
    “Stubborn bastard,” Dylan wiped at the blood covering half his face. It had spattered onto his arm and chest and he looked like he’d just come out of a warzone. “He knows that the longer he stays in bear-form, the easier it will be to heal. Doesn’t matter… how much it hurts… he’ll stay like this… stubborn bastard.”
    Sarah balked. There was some truth in that. While as bears, shifters enjoyed a preternatural healing factor, several times that of a healthy human. She marveled at the presence of mind it would have taken, not just to hold shape in the wake of so much pain but to comprehend it as the best strategy for survival, even amidst the chaos. He’s not such a simple mind after all , she thought. He may have looked like a big dumb gentle giant but she suspected Chris was more astute than anyone would dare to guess.
    “Then we wait,” she said, and Dylan nodded.
    Chris merely let out another huff, as if to acknowledge them and closed his eyes against the tree trunk. Dylan grumbled and staggered off to the bushes, pulling his remaining clothes from a small hollow in a dead tree. He tossed his sweatshirt to Sarah, who gratefully covered herself, and pulled on his own T-shirt and sat down next to her. Chris’ big bear head and nostrils disturbed the dust at her thigh.
    “Will he…” she couldn’t bring herself to ask.
    Dylan’s arm brushed her shoulder and he held the tattered remains of her shirt to his forehead, trying to wipe away as much of the sticky red blood as possible. “He’s stronger than any of us,” Dylan said. “If anyone can survive, it’s Chris.”
    “I…” she bit her lip, and her eyes began to redden.
    “I know,” Dylan said, and there were no more words that either could share. Only the coolness of the canopy around them and the slow steady rhythmic breath of Chris at her feet.
    She leaned her head on his shoulder and held a palm to her chest to keep the sobs from overtaking her. This can’t be happening, she repeated to herself, but there was no part of her that believed it. Dylan reached around with his free hand and gripped her shoulder, pulling him closer against her. He smelled like the forest, deep and warm and familiar, despite the rank smell of blood that was everywhere. She closed her eyes and let him hold her. This can’t be happening .
    *
    It was late in the night when Sarah awoke. She couldn’t remember when it was she had fallen asleep. Everything had overloaded her, and she had submitted at last to the dreamless depths of a black sleep, filled only with the occasional recognition of Dylan’s warm body against her, or the panting of Chris in bear-form. She started when she realized Chris was no longer in front of them and the world was sideways.
    The muscles in her abdomen sprung her upright and she realized her head had been resting on Dylan’s lap. He was cross-legged, and his