Bearly Hanging On (A Werebear Shifter BBW Romance) (Laid Bear Book 3) (11 page)

Chet heaved a mournful sigh as he jammed the letters back in their envelopes and handed back the bundle.
 

“That’s the thing. She’s not waiting for me. You didn’t see her face, Sandy. You didn’t hear what she said. You don’t know. If she hasn’t come around by now, I don’t know what else I can do to convince her. I can’t take a mate by force, you know, even if I wanted to!”

“But have you talked to her since the other night? She might just need a nudge in the right direction.”

“How am I supposed to do that? Uncle Max watches me constantly and it’s not like I can just call her up. Her grandparents don’t want us seeing each other either. And that’s all assuming she even wants to see me, which she obviously doesn’t. She knows my number, and she could always call at the office. Besides, my ceremony is tomorrow. I heard Aunt Clea making arrangements to ship me home to Malibu the next day. It’s over, Sandy.”

Sandy’s cheeks grew red with frustration. “How can you just give up on love, Chet? How can you give up on
her?!”

“
WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?!”
he roared at full volume. He couldn’t take it anymore. Did she not understand that he’d considered every angle of this situation? Did she think he
wanted
to give up? Didn’t she get it that it killed him inside to realize they could never be together?

“Maybe your Russian friend can be with whatever guy she wants, but we don’t live in the Soviet Union, if you hadn’t noticed. Let’s pretend for a minute that Crystal
did
want to be with me — and that’s a big if. What then? We skip town and run away together? Cut off our families entirely? Never be initiated into the clan? Become exiles? Does that sound like a fun life to you, Sandy?”

“But you’d have each other, Chet. Don’t you see? You can endure anything life throws at you when you’ve found your fated mate. It’s the power of love!”

Chet rolled his eyes. “This isn’t a pop song, Sandy. This is real life. As much as it kills me to admit it, your dad was right. It would be unfair of me to ask Crystal to give up her life like that. You have no idea how much she loves her grandparents. I couldn’t ask her to turn her back on them. I wouldn’t let her.”

“But you’re fated—“

“I know that, but she’s human. They don’t feel it the way we do. She has no clue how rare our connection is.”

The sound of footsteps padding down the hall caught their attention. Placing a finger to his lips, he pushed Sandy into his closet, faintly amused that he kept his smelly socks and dirty underwear piled up in there. “Grody,” she whispered as he eased the door closed and snatched up his tennis ball.

As his bedroom door was thrown open, he started throwing the ball at the wall again, his mask of depression not that difficult to put on.
Thump-thud! Thump-thud! Thump-thud!

His uncle stood in the doorway, looking around the room. “Who were you yelling at, Chet?”

Chet humphed in response. “The universe.” His voice was a cold, deflated monotone.
 

Thump-thud! Thump-thud!

Uncle Max blew out a lungful of air and pinched the bridge of his nose, no doubt exhausted by Chet’s broken heart.
Sorrrr-yyyy!
Chet thought sourly.
 

Thump-thud!

“Could you stop with that already? It’s driving your aunt crazy.”

Thump-thud!
On the return, Chet palmed the ball and traced its white outline, intent on not looking at his uncle.

“You ready for the big day tomorrow? You’ll finally be a full-blood member of the Skookum Clan. Exciting stuff!”

Chet tried for a smile but even he could feel how weak it was. “Sure.”

Uncle Max sighed again and shook his head as he turned to leave. “Well, try to get some sleep, okay?”

“Sure.”

His closet door eased open and Sandy’s green eyes peeked out. Tiptoeing to the door, she pressed her ear to it, listening for her dad. Once she was certain he was gone, she half-opened the door before turning back to Chet. “It doesn’t have to end like this, you know.”

He’d run out of energy to get angry or upset or sad. His emotional gas tank was on empty and there was no fill-up station in sight. He couldn’t even muster the strength to point, he just said, “Out.”

“Now Sandra Jean Pearce, don’t you so much as
think
about getting out of this car, do you understand me, young lady?”

“Got it,
Mom.
Geez!” Sandy crossed her arms with a huff and slumped back into the passenger seat of her mom’s Caddy, glaring out the window at the liquor store.

“I’m serious. I’ll be back in five minutes. If I even
suspect
you got out, I’ll tack on another month.”

“I told you I got it!” She used the special high-pitch screech reserved for really special occasions, like when her parents were being total nimrods. Only teenage girls could access that particular frequency and no parent was immune to it. Especially werebears, with their extra-sensitive hearing. The trick was not to overuse it or it lost its power.

“Okay, okay,” her mom said as she scrambled out of the car and slammed the door. Sandy smiled to herself at her mother’s discomfort.

But the smile faded quickly. This whole Chet and Crystal thing really had her buggin’. It was all her fault they weren’t together right now doing the nasty and making lots of cute little cubs for her to dress up. She had to fix it but couldn’t figure out how.

She’d snuck into her dad’s study and used his private line to call her human friends a few times but none of them would take her calls — skanks — and Crystal’s grandparents weren’t listed in the phone book. Add to that the fact she was grounded for life, and there was no chance for her to make it right. She was out of ideas.

As her mom scurried up the sidewalk to the liquor store, a finger wiggling in her ear in an effort to stop the leftover ringing from Sandy’s screech, fate decided to cut the teen some slack. In her rearview mirror, she spotted Crystal walking up the street. She didn’t look as cute as Sandy remembered — her skin was a weird gray color, her hair was tucked under a faded Pearce Forestry baseball cap and she was in some super-schlumpy sweats. It looked like she was trying to hide or something.

Her mom said she couldn’t get out of the car, but she didn’t say anything about talking with anyone. Jabbing the button on her armrest, she got her window down just as Crystal was passing by, oblivious.
 

“Psst, Crystal!” Sandy waggled her fingers when Crystal turned toward her. “Got a minute?”

Alarm grew in Crystal’s eyes and a hand shot up to push her hat lower on her head. Looking around frantically and seeing no one else, she edged closer to the car. Sandy spotted the instant she recognized the car as the one Chet had driven on their last date.

“H-hi, S-Sandy,” she stuttered, poor thing. Sandy would have to work hard and work fast to get it all out before her mom came out.

“Hey. Listen, Chet and I have been on lockdown all week and I only have a minute. I know things are totally shitty right now but you need to listen to me. Okay?”

Crystal blinked and Sandy took that as a yes.

“We’ve all been told our whole lives that werebears and humans can’t mate…marry…whatever. We’re told all sorts of horror stories but it’s all a lie. There are whole towns filled with nothing but mixed pairs who live happily ever after. Do you understand?”

Crystal blinked, so Sandy continued.
 

“I don’t know how it is for humans, but us
weres
have this, um, thing where we can tell almost instantly when someone is our fated mate. Not everyone finds their fated mate but I believe it’s possible for all of us. Chet felt that for you. Believe it or not, you
are
his fated mate, and he will never have another.”

More blinking, this time with tears forming in her lashes.

“I know you love him, too. He told me you felt the same way. He’s completely shattered, Crystal. When he got here, he was this snobby asshole who was kinda funny. Then you guys got together and he became cool. Now he’s a pathetic shell of what he used to be. Honestly, I’d rather have the first Chet back than have him live in the hell he’s in now.”

Crystal was trying to form words, but Sandy didn’t have time to answer a bunch of silly questions so she barreled on.

“His initiation into the clan is tonight at seven, all the way at the end of Skookum Road. Once he becomes a full member of the clan, hooking up with a human would get him expelled, kicked out. But if he’s still a juvenile, if he’s never actually initiated…don’t you see?”

More blinking, this time very confused.

“If he’s not a member of the tribe when you guys run off together, he can’t be officially expelled! I mean, don’t kid yourself, no one would talk to him, but it wouldn’t be, like, official. Maybe it sounds kinda the same but, trust me, it’s not.”

Crystal looked stunned. She opened her mouth to say something at the exact moment Sandy’s mom came hurrying out of the liquor store.
 

“You there,” she called. “Shoo! Go on now, shoo!”

Good grief, this chick blinked a lot! But as soon as she saw Clea bearing down on her, she clamped her mouth shut and tore off down the street without looking back. Sandy let out a big gust of breath, hoping some of what she’d said had sunk in.

“Settle down, ladies and gentlemen! The ceremony is about to begin!” A great gruff bear of a man was standing in the center of the circular clearing, raising one hand as twenty or so teenage guys and girls greeted each other with hugs and slaps on the back. They’d grown up together, so seeing each other after weeks of isolation was a party in the making.
 

For Chet, it was downright uncomfortable. He didn’t know a single soul in his ‘graduating class’ and they all gave him sideways glances when they noticed his presence as they formed a circle around the clan elder. A couple guys even gave him the evil eye, though why he had no idea. Maybe they’d heard about his dalliance with a human. Or maybe they were just assholes. Either way, he felt no kinship with these werebears who were supposed to form a tight bond with him tonight.

About a hundred adults wearing rough, brightly colored ceremonial capes ringed the clearing, like they were standing guard. From what, Chet could only wonder. Humans were practically enslaved by Pearce Forestry and they were the only
were
clan on the island.
It would make for good TV, though
, he thought cynically.

As the group of young men and women quieted down, the elder touched a torch to the pile of wood in front of him, setting it ablaze. A thick cloud of smoke whispered around the clearing, the cloying stench of incense settling on him. It was still pretty light out, and would be for a couple hours, so why they needed the fire was lost on Chet. It was probably to build excitement, or maybe the ceremony lasted well into the night. He didn’t know and, he was disheartened to realize, he didn’t really care. He didn’t care about much of anything lately.

“Tonight is the night when the Skookum Clan welcomes twenty-one new members into its fold! The grand traditions of old stay alive with the young! Only in this way will the clan survive! We are strong! We are one!”

The elder, who everyone but Chet seemed to know, never stopped shouting. It seemed unnecessary, given there were only twenty other initiants. But it really got the rest of them charged up.
 

Everyone but Chet started chanting, “We are strong! We are one!” over and over again. It had to be the clan motto or something. He didn’t want to look like the idiot who wouldn’t join in, so he started mumbling the words to at least pretend they meant something to him.
 

He was supposed to be excited about tonight. Every young werebear looked forward to their initiation, talking about it endlessly with their friends, guessing what exactly went on. It was to be his final rite of passage into adulthood, but this whole song and dance had so far left him disenchanted…bored, even. Holy hell, how long was the chanting going to go on?!

The elder finally lifted his torch to stop the noise. “From cub to elder, we gather tonight to bring our sons and daughters together in an eternal bond! From tonight henceforth, they shall be called ‘brother’ and ‘sister’, fighting together to keep our path true and bloodlines pure!”

A roar of approval rose up around around Chet, startling him. The words he’d heard throughout his life, the mantra by which everyone he knew lived, suddenly took on new meaning. No longer was it half-meaningless hype meant to rally
weres
together. Now it sounded like hate-filled propaganda.
 

“United we can weather any storm! United we will grow stronger and overcome any obstacles! Our enemies will never defeat us if we are united!”

The fervor glowing in each face in the circle disturbed Chet. Was he the only one really understanding the words being spoken? Did they not hear the racism — or species-ism, in this case — in the elder’s words? Clearly, the ‘enemy’ was the human race. For the first time, he really listened and was horrified at what he heard.

Werebears and humans didn’t need to live separately from each other. Sandy had shown him proof that humans and
weres
could have perfectly healthy families. And more than anything, he wanted to have that life with Crystal. It just about killed him that she didn’t.

Sleep had completely eluded him after Sandy snuck out of his room the night before, his brain running in exhausted circles after its own tail trying to figure out what he should do. His heart said to do whatever it took to make Crystal his own, even if it meant being banished for the rest of his life. But another part of him rebelled against the very idea. Even his bear whimpered in response to never seeing his family and friends again.
 

But Crystal…

Her ice blue eyes flashed in his memory, drawing a groan of longing from his bear. He glanced around quickly to make sure he hadn’t done it out loud, but no one was looking at him funny so he was safe.