Claimed on Bear Mountain Read online

  Claimed on Bear Mountain

  Bear Mountain Shifters, Book 2

  By Sloane Meyers

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Similarities to actual people or events are entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2019 by Sloane Meyers. All rights reserved.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  More Books by Sloane Meyers

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  Hardly a day passed that Scott Mitchell didn’t have to put his brute strength to good use, and today was shaping up to be no different.

  The line outside of Pine Springs Club Euphoria, the most popular nightclub in Pine Springs, was even longer than usual tonight. This meant that the inevitable brawls that broke out among the drunken tourists were bound to be even more plentiful than usual tonight as well. Scott didn’t mind. He was itching for a fight.

  Lately, he’d been feeling restless. It wasn’t easy to watch as his best friend, Joel, found a lifemate and started a family. Scott was happy for Joel, of course. But that didn’t stop him from wondering when it would be his turn.

  Luckily, Scott’s job as a security guard at Club Euphoria gave him a good excuse to put all his restless energy to good use.

  Scott glanced across the crowd of tipsy tourists, his eyes daring one of them to cause trouble. He cracked his knuckles, and wondered who would be the first one to get a taste of those knuckles tonight.

  Scott had been working at this club during the summers for the last several years. He lived up on Bear Mountain, along with several other bear shifters. The bear shifters all liked being able to keep to themselves up on the mountain, and not having to worry about someone discovering the inner beasts within them. Full humans didn’t usually take too kindly to learning that bear shifters existed. It was better for everyone that the humans of Pine Springs remained blissfully unaware.

  But even though Pine Springs wasn’t Scott’s favorite place, he was glad the town existed. The tourist crowds that came here provided jobs, and those jobs had allowed Scott to save up quite a bit of money. Now, if only he could find a lifemate with whom to share that money.

  “Hey, leave her alone!”

  The sudden, angry shout brought Scott back to the present moment. He looked toward where the shout had come from, somewhere near the back of the line. His instincts were instantly on high alert, and he scanned to see who the voice had belonged to. For a few moments, he didn’t see anything suspicious. But then, the voice rang out again.

  “Dude, she told you to leave her alone. Now leave her alone!”

  Scott’s eyes landed on two angry men with their faces mere inches apart. Trouble was brewing. One of the men was a tall, muscular tourist who was wearing a fitted T-shirt that showed off his biceps. Those biceps were huge, and might have intimidated even the other security guards. But Scott wasn’t easily intimidated. His bear within him gave him a superhuman amount of strength, even when he wasn’t in bear form.

  Scott looked over at the other security guard who was working with him that night. “Want me to handle this?”

  The other security guard gladly nodded. He wasn’t a bear, and he was one of the newer guards. Undoubtedly, he was a bit nervous about the possibility of facing down the man causing the ruckus.

  Scott, on the other hand, was looking forward to roughing this guy up. He cracked his knuckles again, then quickly started walking toward the back of the line.

  “Hey!” Scott yelled out in a loud voice. “What’s the trouble back here?” He left no doubt in the tone of his voice that whatever the trouble was, it better be over quickly. Sometimes, just using this tone of voice was enough to stop whatever fight was about to break out. But Scott had a feeling that threatening words weren’t going to be enough here. The man with big biceps turned to look at him and scowled, spoiling for a fight.

  “This ain’t none of your business,” the man insisted.

  “You’re in line at my club,” Scott said. “So this is definitely my business. I’ll ask you one more time: what seems to be the problem here?”

  The man only scowled at him, clearly not intending to answer. But the other man in the confrontation spoke up. “The problem is that he won’t leave this poor woman alone.”

  The first man scowled at the second man. “She’s perfectly happy with my attention. You mind your own business.”

  With that, the first man turned and reached out for a woman standing slightly behind him. The woman shrieked and tried to take a step back, but the man was too quick. He grabbed her easily.

  The first thing that registered in Scott’s mind was the way the man’s burly fingers closed much too tightly around the woman’s arm. That was sure to leave some bruise marks. The second thing that registered was that this was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. When his eyes met hers, he was startled by the way her gaze seemed to draw him in. Her eyes were a shade of blue that reminded Scott of some of his favorite spots on the mountain where wildflowers grew.

  But it wasn’t just her eyes that were beautiful. Her hair looked like it was made of gold. It hung around her face in cascading waves that practically begged Scott to reach out and run his fingers through them. Her body was all curves. She wore a flowing blue dress that matched the blue of her eyes, and Scott couldn’t tear his eyes away from how perfectly the dress skimmed over her full curves. Scott could easily see why the burly man in front of him was trying to make a pass at the woman. But there was no way Scott was letting him get away with this.

  Not when the woman belongs to me.

  The sudden thought hit Scott like a punch in the gut. He tried to push it away as ridiculous, because that’s exactly what it was: ridiculous. Scott was on the prowl for a lifemate, yes. But not for a lifemate who was a full human. Sure, his best friend Joel had found a full human lifemate, and things were working out well for him. But that was Joel. He’d always been a bit different. For Scott, the very thought of trying to explain to a human that he was a bear shifter sent him into a cold sweat. And yet, he could not deny the way his bear was suddenly, inexplicably going crazy within him.

  Mine, his inner bear roared.

  Scott made the mistake of glancing at the woman’s eyes again, and that’s when his protective instincts completely took over. He would wrestle with the fact that his bear was interested in a full human later. Right now, he needed to help that woman.

  He needed to help his mate.

  Scott tried not to think about the fact that his bear wanted to mate with the woman. Instead, he focused fully on facing down this man who for some reason thought it was okay to squeeze the life out of the woman’s arms.

  Scott cracked his knuckles loudly again, and got right in the man’s face. “Get your hands off of her before I tear them off.”

  The man laughed and squeezed the woman’s arm even tighter, causing her to yelp with pain. He sneered at Scott. “I’d like to see you try.”

  “Gladly,” Scott said.

  With no further discussion, Scott balled his hand into a fist, wound his arm back, and landed a punch squarely on the man’s nose. The man howled in pain, and let go of the woman, stumbling backward. Scott had heard the sickening crack of bone, and he was pretty sure he’d just broken the
man’s nose. But even that wasn’t enough to stop the man. After a few moments of recovering his composure, the man lunged toward Scott.

  Scott was glad for that. He was all too happy for an excuse to rough the man up a bit more. With a roar, he met the man’s attack with a formidable counterattack. Within moments, the two of them were locked in a brawl, tumbling around on the dusty sidewalk as women screamed and men started whooping and cheering.

  The man Scott was fighting was surprisingly strong for a full human, but he still wasn’t strong enough to take down a bear. Scott landed several punches that caused the man to howl in pain. But even though the man was clearly losing the fight, he didn’t give up easily. Rather, he seemed determined to fight to the death.

  So be it, Scott thought. His ass will be the one dying.

  Scott continued to pummel the man, until the voice of his boss, the club’s owner, broke through the noise.

  “Scott! Scott!”

  Scott felt a hand on his shoulder pulling him back, and he knew it belonged to his boss. As much as he would’ve liked to keep beating up on this guy, he knew his boss wasn’t happy with the way he was acting right now. His boss didn’t like it when any of the guards used more force than was necessary to subdue an unruly patron. He said it was bad for business, and it probably was. But Scott wasn’t one to back down when his lifemate was being threatened.

  Lifemate.

  The word echoed in Scott’s very soul. He felt confused and unsure of himself. He must be misreading what his bear was telling him. But how could that be? Scott had always been under the impression that his inner beast would not make a mistake about who his fated lifemate was. He must have had the wrong impression, because as beautiful as this woman was, she wasn’t his lifemate.

  She was a human, and high maintenance from the looks of it. She was wearing trendy clothes and a bit too much makeup, and she didn’t look like the type who would enjoy life on the mountain.

  And there was no way Scott was going to give up life on the mountain.

  “Scott!” The sound of his boss’s voice once again broke through to him, and Scott allowed his boss to pull him back away from the man who was now a bloodied mess and screaming obscenities at the top of his lungs.

  Scott met his boss’s disapproving stare without flinching.

  “He was physically attacking that woman,” Scott said in his defense, pointing over at the woman. The woman was still standing there, watching with her hands clasped over her mouth in shock as tears ran down her face. Scott had to fight the overwhelming urge he felt to run to her and pull her into his arms.

  “It’s true,” another of the bystanders said from the crowd. “That guy was really hurting this woman.”

  Scott was thankful that someone had spoken up. His boss still didn’t look happy with him, but he looked a little less like he was about to fire him on the spot.

  “Why don’t you take the rest of the night off, Scott,” his boss said. “Go home and get cleaned up and get some rest.”

  Scott wanted to protest. He didn’t feel that he’d done anything wrong, and he hated to lose the money from his shift tonight. But he didn’t want to push things. His boss was usually a reasonable guy, and Scott thought the man liked him well enough.

  But right now, his boss was clearly angry with him, and Scott figured it was better to lose one night’s pay than to lose the job entirely. Scott nodded and started brushing off the dust that had attached itself to his clothes from the street.

  “Alright. I’ll head home and come back for my shift on Tuesday.”

  To Scott’s relief, his boss nodded. Scott was definitely still employed here, since his boss hadn’t told him not to come in for his next shift. Scott shouldn’t have been that surprised. He was the strongest of the security guards here by far, and his boss needed him. Club Euphoria depended on a sense of security to keep customers coming back.

  Scott watched as his boss went to talk to the angry man Scott had just beaten up, informing the man that he would need to leave the club and not come back. While the man argued with his boss and threatened to sue—something patrons always threatened but never actually did—Scott turned to look for the woman. Even though part of him thought it was better to just get going and not speak to her, another part of him had to know her name. He figured it would be polite to at least ask her if she was alright, wouldn’t it?

  But when Scott scanned the crowd again, she was gone. He tried to ignore the wave of disappointment that washed over him. Telling himself that it was just as well, he quickly went back into the club, got his keys and wallet, and headed to his truck.

  He made the drive back up to his mountain cabin in silence, not even turning on the radio. He told himself it was just as well that he hadn’t had a chance to talk to the woman. After all, like he’d already told himself a hundred times tonight, there was no way she was his lifemate.

  But despite telling himself this over and over, and despite trying to ignore the way his bear clawed at him from within, when Scott finally fell asleep that night, the woman’s face filled his dreams.

  Chapter Two

  Scott didn’t sleep well that night. Something about denying what his inner bear was trying to tell him caused a lot of anguish, and he found himself tossing and turning between dreams of the woman from the club. Because he usually worked until the wee hours of the morning, Scott was accustomed to sleeping in every morning. That morning, he kept trying to sleep until about ten o’clock, when he finally admitted defeat. All he was doing was wasting away a perfectly good day lying in bed.

  He got up, opened the blackout curtains in his bedroom to see brilliant sunshine, and decided to go to the Bear Paw Diner. He needed at least a gallon of coffee. Getting through this day was going to require a lot of caffeine, and he felt thankful that at least it was Monday and he didn’t have to work tonight. Hopefully by tomorrow night he would be able to get some sleep.

  It was about ten-thirty when he arrived at the diner. Bear Paw Diner was the most popular place to hang out on Bear Mountain. Everyone in Bear Mountain Village went there at least once a week, and many people ate there almost every day. The owner, Poppy, cooked great food and sold it cheap. Besides that, the diner was the best place to catch up on town gossip, or to hear whether anything interesting was going on down in Pine Springs. All the bear shifters liked to keep track of what was happening in Pine Springs—you never wanted to be caught off guard hearing that someone down there was onto the fact that the people on Bear Mountain were shifters.

  Thankfully, when Scott arrived at the diner, the morning rush was over and the restaurant was almost empty. Normally, he liked gossip as much as the next guy. But today, all he wanted to do was to sit in peace and drink coffee until more caffeine was flowing through his veins than blood.

  But he should’ve known better to think that he would be able to sit alone and drink coffee. Poppy was notorious for noticing when something wasn’t quite right with someone. And today, it didn’t take a very observant person to notice that something was off with Scott.

  “You look like shit,” Poppy said as she set down a mug of coffee in front of him. Scott took the mug and drained half of the coffee in it before he answered.

  “Rough night,” he said gruffly, and hoped that Poppy would leave it at that.

  She didn’t.

  She cocked her head sideways and gave him a searching look.

  “Lots of fights?” she asked in a tone of voice that said she knew it was more than just a normal night of fights that had Scott acting so upset.

  “Yeah, something like that.”

  Poppy arched her eyebrow in a way that said she clearly wasn’t fooled. Scott considered what he should say for a moment, and half hoped that Poppy would take off to help another customer. But there weren’t many other customers in the diner right now, and so there wasn’t much to distract Poppy from standing in front of him, waiting for him to explain.

  Scott looked up at her and sighed, but Poppy di
dn’t blink. Scott had to hand it to her. He didn’t know how it was possible for someone to be both obnoxious and endearing at the same time, but Poppy managed it. Sometimes, he couldn’t stand how nosy she was, but he knew she meant well.

  She also never cared what anyone else thought of her, and he respected that. Even though everyone on the mountain wore outdoorsy clothes in muted colors, Poppy could frequently be seen in brightly colored dresses, usually with bold floral prints. In the winter, she still wore the dresses—she just wore them over fleece leggings.

  Someone once asked her why she insisted on dressing like she was heading for a tropical vacation, and she hadn’t even flinched or looked embarrassed when she shrugged and said that given her size, the dresses were more comfortable than anything else. Poppy not only cooked a lot of food, she ate a lot of food. But she made no apologies, and often referred to herself as round and cuddly without turning the slightest shade of pink. Right now, her brown eyes were focused on him as tendrils of her dark brown hair fell untidily around her face. She’d had a busy morning from the looks of it, but she never seemed tired.

  Scott was tired. Exhausted, even. He didn’t have the energy to try to hold off Poppy, and what was the point, anyway? She had her ways of finding things out, and even if he refused to talk to her, she’d eventually know the whole story. Besides, maybe getting her advice wasn’t such a bad idea. Poppy had seen a lot of life in her years working at the diner, and she had an uncanny ability to see the solution in even the gnarliest of problems. Scott took a deep breath, took one more sip of his coffee, and then started speaking.

  “Last night a woman showed up at the club who made my bear restless.”

  Before he could say anything else, Poppy leaned forward with interest. “Your lifemate, perhaps?”

  Scott shifted uncomfortably in his seat. He hadn’t expected Poppy to go that directly to the point, but he shouldn’t have been surprised. After all, his own best friend had just taken a human lifemate. It wouldn’t be that much of a stretch for Poppy’s mind to make the jump into assuming that Scott’s lifemate might also be human.