Loyal To The Bear (Second Chance Shifters 2)

A
loud cry
emanated from the basement of Lee James Boggs’s Boston home. He was finishing up making dinner when the startling noise shattered the silence and pulled him from his thoughts.

He set down the large silver knife he was using on the cutting board and walked over to the open window. It was early evening, and a beautiful golden sunset was forming in the sky. He wasn’t interested in the sunset, though. He quickly searched the sky, and a slow smile spread across his sharp features when he spotted the outline of the full moon.

He walked back over to his cutting board and slightly hummed to himself. He was ecstatic that tonight was finally the night of the full moon. It was the one night a month when he was able to complete his life’s work.

He picked up his favorite silver knife and started cutting again. He loved that knife. Not because of the fact that the blade was made from pure silver, but that it was the perfect weight for him to swiftly cut. The knife never failed him, and with the full moon happening and his special guest, he knew that tonight would be absolutely perfect.

The cry emanated from his basement again, and his happy mood vanished. If the noise didn’t stop, his neighbors would call the police, and his perfect night would be ruined. He slammed down the knife and stalked towards his basement door. The old rickety stairs creaked as he briskly walked down them. His unfinished basement was dark and had a pungent smell, but he didn’t mind. He knew exactly where the noise was coming from.

He walked into the corner, reached down, and grabbed a fist full of hair. He tugged it forward, pulling his captive’s face out of the darkness and forcing her to look at him. Her skin was damp with sweat, and tears stained her cheeks, causing her makeup to run. The rope her arms were secured in creaked, and she struggled to get away from him. A slow smile spread across his face, and he started to chuckle.

“There is nowhere for you to go,” he said.

“P-please just let me go,” she begged. “I am not what you think I am.”

Anger flared inside of him. Of course she would try to lie to him. He knew better, though. Shifters would always lie to save their own skin.

“I know exactly what you are,” he said. “You are evil. You are something that should never exist. And the rest of the world will soon see how evil you are, once they find you.” The girl let out a low cry and Lee laughed. “Now shut up, or I’ll be forced to start our evening earlier than planned.”

He pushed her head back away from him and walked back up the stairs, slamming the basement door shut. Her muffled cries grew quieter, but he knew he would need to find a new space to do his work in soon. His unfinished basement was great, but it was only big enough for one. He wanted to have more.

Lee walked back up to his cutting board and resumed slicing with his favorite knife. This abomination will be taken care of tonight, he thought. Then the whole world will know what pure evil she really is.

C
arly brushed
her hands through her wavy blonde hair one more time and glanced at herself in the mirror in the makeup room. Her red lipstick accentuated her pouty lips, and her generous curves looked great in the pencil skirt and blouse wardrobe had picked out for her. She glanced up at the feed of the broadcast and knew she had a few minutes to kill before her weather forecast on News Channel 8.

She clutched her coffee mug and sighed when she realized this was already her third cup this morning. Even though she had moved to Boston four years ago to take a job as a meteorologist for a local news station, her body had somehow never gotten used to the early morning shifts.

She glanced at the feed again and smiled when she saw her best friend, Avery Knox, reporting. Since arriving in Boston from San Francisco, she and Avery became close friends working at the station together. Avery had taken Carly under her wing and constantly made fun of her complaints about the frozen tundra that was Boston during the winter. Carly longed to be back in San Francisco, closer to her mom, but she knew it was the right decision for her to leave. Even though San Francisco was her home, everything reminded her of
him
, and he was no longer allowed to be in her thoughts.

“This just in, we have some breaking news.” Carly shook her head quickly to stop the thoughts of his beautiful brown eyes, and she reached for the remote to turn the volume on the feed up.

“This morning, the Boston Police Department found another victim of the Shifter Killer,” Avery announced. “The victim was a 28 year old woman found near the Freedom Trail this morning at 5 o’clock am. The woman was found with wounds on her wrists and neck. Like the other four victims, ‘Death to all shifters’ was written in what is assumed to be the victim’s blood on the ground near her body. The Boston Police Department, along with the new Search and Rescue team, is currently working on leads as to who this shifter killer is to bring them to justice.”

Carly muted the feed and a cold shiver ran through her body.
Shifters
, she thought.
How am I always surrounded by them?
She forced her eyes shut to will away the frightening memories that she knew would inevitably come.

The campfire was roaring, and her father and mother had busted out the marshmallows for s’mores. She could see their huge smiles, and Carly felt a pang, remembering that her mother used to be that happy. It had been a surprise camping trip for her fifth birthday since Carly had loved being outdoors. Carly was happily sitting between her mother and father while burning her marshmallow on the stick.

A loud rustle in the bushes caught Carly’s attention, and she scooted closer to her father, hoping it wasn’t a wild animal. Her father looked down at her, smiled, and wrapped his arm tightly around her. The rustles in the bushes grew louder and Carly’s father began to take notice. He instructed Carly’s mother to pick her up and take her to the car.

Suddenly, a crazed man burst through the clearing and started yelling. He was tall and slender, and had yellow eyes that darted between Carly and her parents.

“Give me the child!” the man demanded.

Carly’s mother quickly backed away, holding Carly, as her father used his police training to try and calm the man down. But he wouldn’t listen. His rants about needing to take Carly became incoherent, and he violently fell to the ground. Carly could hear his bones crack, and she shoved her head into her mother’s neck and started to cry. When it grew quiet, she peeked through the strands of her mother’s hair and watched as her father leaned down over the man to try and help. To Carly, it looked like he was dead. When her father gently touched the man’s shoulder, a loud roar came from the man’s throat, and he amazingly transformed into a huge cougar. The cougar swiped at Carly’s father, knocking him down on the ground. Carly let out a loud wail when she saw the big cat drag her father’s limp body out of the clearing.

“Carly, you’re on in the next segment.” Carly jumped in her seat and almost spilled her coffee all over her blouse. She looked up and realized she was no longer five and at the campsite with her parents. Her producer, Jenny, placed a hand on her shoulder and looked down at her with concern.

“You all right?” Jenny said. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“I’m fine, Jenny,” Carly said. “You just startled me, that’s all.” Jenny smiled, and Carly quickly stood up and glanced at her appearance again in the mirror. She quickly patted her cheeks to regain some of her color and tried to force the terrible memory from her mind.

A
fter her weather broadcast
, Carly taped a few segments for the evening news and tracked the weather patterns that were coming in the next week. Carly truly loved being a meteorologist. Science had always interested her as a kid, and when she took a meteorology class at San Francisco State, she knew she was hooked.

Carly was just packing up her things to head home when she heard someone behind her. She quickly jumped back and Avery grabbed her before she toppled over.

“Whoa, Carly, it’s just me,” Avery said, with concern written all over her face. Carly cursed under her breath and tried to regain her composure. She hated that the Shifter Killer and the constant reporting on shifters had made her fears control her thoughts again.

After the accident, Carly’s life had drastically changed. Her mother, Amanda, who was normally a free spirit, seemed to lose a part of herself, becoming paranoid and fearful of going outside. Her condition worsened, and she was forced to quit her teaching job and stay at home where she felt safe. After this, Carly had to grow up quickly in order to support herself and her mother.

Even though it was a shifter that had killed her father, Carly’s mother never seemed to blame shifters for their loss, which was something Carly never could understand. Her mother was more afraid of everything else, instead of the one thing that had destroyed their life.

When her father had been killed, shifters were not common knowledge. When the police, Carly’s father’s squad, had come to investigate the incident, no one believed their story. The police said that they must have imagined the man, that it was a cougar all along.

When Carly was ten, a local news story spread like wildfire, of a shifter changing forms. Her friends and what was left of their family finally started to believe their story. Several years later, researchers scientifically proved that shape shifting was possible, and that it was caused by a genetic mutation. Shifters were now fairly common in society, but Carly was still afraid of them.

Since the accident, Carly had tried to come to terms with what had happened to her family. Because of the trauma she had endured, it had always been a struggle for her to accept shifters in human society. Unlike her mother, Carly wasn’t afraid of the world around her. She was afraid of just one thing.

Carly thought something had snapped in that shifter’s mind when he killed her father. His anger and rage were out of control, and because of that, she did not trust that other shifters would not eventually snap as well.

With shifters now a part of society, Carly had always made a point to stay away from them because she was fearful of what they might do. She had been fairly successful at this until she met her ex, Henry Greene. She had had no idea that he was a shifter. She thought he was just the cute boy down the hall in her dorm at San Francisco State.

She was moving into her dorm when he had knocked on her door. Carly’s roommate hadn’t arrived yet so she thought it was her. When she opened the door, she was met with a tall, burly guy, with shaggy black hair, strong features, liquid brown eyes, and a trim beard. And damn, did she think he was cute.

“Oh,” Henry said. “I’m guessing I’m not at the right room, unless housing somehow mixed up and put me with a gorgeous girl.” He smiled. “I’m Henry Greene.” He reached out his hand.

“I’m Carly Tate,” she said. She had grabbed his hand and felt sparks course through her body. From that moment on, they were inseparable.

Carly and Henry were perfect for one another in every way. In other relationships, Carly always felt that she had to make them work or that she had to always impress them. With Henry, everything just came easily. She was able to be the closet nerd that she was and still dress up when she wanted to, without him questioning it. Their relationship was going so well that they even started discussing marriage once they graduated. Then, Carly found out everything in their relationship was a lie, and instead of talking with him about it, she did the only thing she could do. She ran.

“These shifter stories are hitting a little too close to home, aren’t they?” Avery’s voice brought Carly out of her thoughts. Carly slowly nodded and followed Avery out of her office. Avery was the only other person besides her mother that knew all about Carly’s past.

When Carly arrived in Boston, she was a complete wreck, and Avery had been the one person that was able to pull her out of her funk and make her feel alive again. For three years, Carly was able to somewhat push Henry out of her mind. But it all rushed back when he showed up at her doorstep.

It had been a particularly dreary day in Boston. Carly was walking back home from work and stopped short when she saw a familiar frame standing outside her apartment building.
No… It can’t be him
, she thought. He wouldn’t be stupid enough to come all this way for nothing. As she walked closer, her stomach started doing backflips, and her heart felt as it would beat out of her chest. The shape of his strong shoulders and back were all too familiar, and as she noticed, so was the worn leather jacket he always wore. Her heart skipped a beat. It was him. Henry had found her and was now standing outside of her building.

Anger started to bubble up inside her.
How dare he come here? I told him that I never wanted to see him again.
Carly let out a long breath. She had no need to talk to Henry, so she decided to try and brush past him, ignoring him the best she could. Putting her head down, she walked quickly toward the door, hoping that he suddenly have a case of amnesia and not remember who she was. No such luck.

“Carly, wait!” Henry called after her.
Shit
, she thought, as she stopped short in front of her door. She felt his strong presence behind her and gripped the door handle to make sure her knees didn’t give out.

Henry’s breath fell against Carly’s neck, sending goose bumps spreading across her body. Carly knew she needed to put space between them, but a part of her didn’t want to. She hated how he made her question herself.

As she felt Henry’s strong hand encircle her wrist, a pulse coursed through her, and she longed for the relationship that they once had. Things had been so easy between them. They just clicked. Then it all went to shit.

Henry gently tugged on Carly’s wrist, and Carly slowly turned around to face him, but she couldn’t look into his deep brown eyes. She knew that if she did, she would lose all of her strength. She heard Henry clear his throat and wondered if this was as hard for him as it was for her.

“I couldn’t stay away from you any longer, Carly,” Henry said. He was the first and only man that she truly let in. Since she stormed out on him after finding out what he was, she had never been able to find the same connection with anyone else. Carly hated herself for feeling the way she did, however. Despite trying desperately to convince herself otherwise, she knew a part of her belonged with Henry. Why did he have to be the one thing that she was afraid of? How could someone so kind and loving be the same thing that ripped her family apart?

“I told you, when you called me after I left, that I never wanted to see you again,” Carly spat. She watched as Henry’s eyes filled with sadness, and a part of her wished she were not the cause.

“You lied to me about what you really are,” Carly said.

“I never lied to you, Carly,” Henry said, as he reached for Carly’s shoulder. She cursed under her breath when she felt her body lean in to his touch. He looked back up at her and shrugged his shoulders in defeat. “ I just never told you the full truth.”

Carly pushed his hands off her arms. Her skin immediately felt cold at the loss of his touch, but she stubbornly ignored it.

“Not telling me the whole truth is the exact same thing as lying. You are a monster. Just like the one that killed my father. I want nothing to do with you.” As the words left her lips, Carly knew that it was a lie. Carly wanted nothing more than to feel Henry’s lips on her own and to forget the past that haunted her. But she couldn’t forget. Her father had given his life trying to protect Carly and her mother, and he would be rolling over in his grave if he knew that the thing he was trying to protect her from happened to be the love of her life.

Henry dropped his eyes and Carly could see the sadness quake over his body. She was hurting him, just like she was hurting herself. But she couldn’t look past what he was. Despite her unrelenting love for Henry, she knew that if she continued their relationship, she would not be truly living her life. She would be living in constant fear, and she knew she would eventually grow to hate him for it. Her fear of Henry’s bear taking over would consume her. He would eventually become the thing she hated. Carly could not bring herself to forgive him for something another shifter had done.

Carly took in a shaky breath and stepped back from Henry. “You shouldn’t have come here,” she said. “I still feel the same as the night I left four years ago.” Henry looked down again and hunched his shoulders.

“I know I shouldn’t have,” he said. “It was killing me not to be near you.” A mixture of anger and sadness bubbled up inside Carly.

“It was killing you to not be near me?” Carly knew she needed to make it clear to Henry that the damage was done in their relationship. She would never be able to love him again. “When will you get it through your thick skull that I don’t want to be near you anymore? Your kind ripped apart the small family that I had, and I’ve been dealing with the backlash ever since.”

Henry looked completely defeated, but Carly knew she needed to remain strong, at least until Henry left. She couldn’t feel sorry for the sadness and hurt in Henry that she had caused. She would remain strong in front of him now, then later, she could break down in her misery of loving someone that she was afraid of.

“I’ll keep my distance,” Henry said. “It was never my intention to hurt you. I hope you know that.” Henry reached up again and pushed a strand of wavy blond hair behind Carly’s ear.

Carly desperately wanted to allow his hands to linger on her skin, but she knew she could not let her feelings take hold. The wall that she had built around her heart was starting to crumble, and being this close to Henry was making it worse. Carly quickly turned on her heels and stalked into her apartment building, running away from the one man that she truly loved.

“I know we aren’t supposed to talk about him,” Avery said, pulling Carly back to reality, “but I think in light of all the events happening in this city, it might be good to.” Carly gave Avery a stern look that made her throw up her hands in surrender. Carly had not spoken to Henry since the night he showed up at her apartment. She had seen him around a few times and had successfully been able to sneak by him without him noticing. She did not think she could look into his eyes again—she still wanted him too badly.

“Okay, I can take a hint. All I’m saying is you need some sort of closure with him, Carly. He moved to Boston a year ago, and you asked him to leave you alone. But I know deep down how hard that’s been for you. It’s not easy to walk away from the love of your life.”

Carly knew Avery was just trying to help, but there was no way anyone could help her. Her heart and her mind were at constant odds with themselves. As much as she wanted to move on, she was never fully able to. Henry had somehow captivated her heart. When she found out what he truly was, her distrust and fear of shifters clouded her mind and she did the only thing she could do. She packed her things and moved across the country. How could she ever love someone that was the exact thing that she feared?