Page 6 of Bear and Book

“This was your dream, Elias,” I muttered. “You dragged him along for the ride. Not the other way around.”

It wasn’t even really bitterness, not anymore. Just tired honesty. I’d grown up with a single mom who worked two jobs and didn’t have time for babysitters.

She used to drop me off at the library every Saturday morning with a peanut butter sandwich and a worn copy of The Wind in the Willows already tucked under my arm.

The librarians knew me by name. They gave me old paperbacks no one else wanted and let me sit behind the checkout desk when I wanted to feel important.

Books were my refuge. Always had been.

Jason… he liked them, sure. But not like I did. He liked the idea of a bookstore, liked talking about it like we were some eccentric small-town couple with an aesthetic.

Maybe he even believed in it for a while. But the truth? The dream had always been mine. He just went along for the ride.

I let him. That was on me.

Thunder rumbled in the distance, soft and lingering like the storm wasn’t quite done with us yet. Water dripped from the ceiling into a plastic bin I’d shoved under the leak an hour ago.

The sound was steady. Maddening. Like a metronome ticking down toward the inevitable.

I reached for the broom, grabbed a mop with my free hand, and stared down the mess like it had personally insulted me.

“I need help,” I said out loud.

The words tasted bitter, but true.

I didn’t know who the town would send, or if anyone would come at all, but the emergency bulletin board had said help was going out to damaged businesses today. I’d tried not to hope.

Too late for that now.

I swept up a broken mug, mopped up a patch of puddle, and cursed under my breath when the mop caught on the edge of a book cover and nearly tripped me. Graceful. Real impressive, Elias.

The bell above the door had stopped working, but I still looked up when I heard it open.

Heavy footsteps. The distinct sound of someone far too large trying to tread gently. And then a voice, warm and eager and stupidly cheerful, cut through the gloom like sunlight.

“Whoa. This place smells like wet paper and sadness. You must be Elias!”

I turned.

And there he was. A bear shifter. Big. Ridiculous. Dripping wet and tracking mud across my Persian rug with no idea the kind of sacrilege he was committing.

And smiling. Like helping clean up my mess was the highlight of his day.

God help me. They sent me a golden retriever in bear form.

“Shoes. Off. Rug,” I said through clenched teeth.

He blinked down at his feet. “Oh sorry! Didn’t even think. Whoops.”

He tugged off his boots, holding them in one hand like a kid caught sneaking in the house after curfew. “Didn’t ruin anything, did I?”

“You stepped on an antique Persian rug with enough mud to plant a vegetable garden. You tell me,” I told him.

He grinned like I’d paid him a compliment. “Okay, mental note. Rugs are sacred here,” he said.

“Among other things,” I muttered, pushing the broom aside and stalking toward the pile of soaked cardboard boxes I’d given up trying to salvage.

He followed, of course. Because why wouldn’t he.