Big Bear Problems: BBW Werebear Shapeshifter Romance Read online

  Big Bear Problems

  Sweetwater Brides

  Anya Nowlan

  & Rory Dale

  Contents

  A Little Taste…

  Copyright

  1. Jennifer

  2. Ethan

  3. Jennifer

  4. Jennifer

  5. Jennifer

  6. Ethan

  7. Ethan

  8. Jennifer

  9. Jennifer

  10. Jennifer

  11. Ethan

  12. Jennifer

  13. Ethan

  14. Ethan

  Epilogue

  Also by Anya Nowlan & Rory Dale

  One Last Prowl Excerpt

  Want More?

  About the Authors

  A Little Taste…

  “So, tell me more about how you like me,” she purred with a mischievous smile and ran her hand up Ethan’s thigh.

  Feeling his powerful muscles tense up under her touch made her quiver with anticipation. Ethan ran his fingers through Jen’s hair and gently caressed her cheek. His skin was rough, but the touch felt like heaven to her. His hand stopped on her chin as he leaned in and pulled her closer.

  “How about I show you instead.”

  As their lips met, Jen shivered with excitement and anticipation. His lips were strong and demanding, but gentle. She reveled in the taste and feel of the kiss, her lust now threatening to boil over. Her tongue forced into his mouth as if on its own volition and she mewled as their tongues mashed together, meeting and tasting one another for the first time.

  Breaking the kiss with a long moan, her nimble fingers went after his shirt, hurriedly undoing button after button. She sighed in awe as his chiseled chest was revealed to her, taut muscles bulging under his skin. Jen bit her lip and ran her hands up and down his chest, enjoying every moment of it, before finally moving downward and caressing his inner thighs. Jen could barely contain a gasp as she felt his huge cock, already hard under her touch.

  Copyright © 2015 Anya Nowlan & Rory Dale

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and any resemblance to any persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Big Bear Problems

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this work may be used, reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means by anyone but the purchaser for their own personal use. This book may not be reproduced in any form without the express written permission of Anya Nowlan and Rory Dale. Any reproduction or other unauthorized use of the material is prohibited without the express written permission of the author.

  Cover © Jack of Covers

  You can find all of the books here:

  Amazon Author Page – Anya

  www.anyanowlan.com

  Amazon Author Page - Rory

  Created with Vellum

  One

  Jennifer

  “Baby? You home?” Jen yelled as she burst through the front door.

  She tried to keep her voice as level as she could, but even she could hear it shaking. Her phone was clutched in her hand like it was her last line of defense, Felicia’s message still open on it. Her heart was beating out of her chest and she wasn’t yet sure if she was enraged or totally thrown by the fact that she was actually worrying about the relevancy of Felicia’s text.

  Jen paused in the hallway for a moment, looking down at her sandals. Should she take them off? Chad was super anal about keeping his apartment cleaner than a dentist’s office (of course, he was a dentist, so she could sort of see where he was coming from, but…).

  Fuck him, she thought with surprising clarity, and marched through the living room.

  There was another short hallway connected to the living room that led to the big marble-tiled bathroom and the bedroom fit for a king. Jen’s stomach dropped as she heard the unmistakable sounds of someone having far too good of a time. Her stomach churned as she glanced down on her phone. It was 7:30 in the morning and she was supposed to be in the office in half an hour. But instead, she was at her boyfriend’s apartment halfway across town, checking on whether or not her best friend was fucking her man.

  There was a tiny bit of her that still hoped that when she opened the door, she’d be greeted by the sight of her supremely boring and more than vanilla boyfriend watching some loud, raunchy porn on his MacBook. Jen paused at the door, feeling tears already start to pool in her eyes. She steeled herself and pushed the door open with determination.

  And there they were. Her best friend and her boyfriend, fucking one another like the planet was going to be wiped out by a comet and this was the last decent fuck they’d ever have. They were both standing on the bed with Felicia bent over and pushed against the wall and Chad pounding into her from behind. His completely unimpressive cock was slamming into Felicia’s wet snatch and his head was thrown back like he was mere seconds away from dying and going to heaven.

  Jen stood there, wordless, completely stunned. Her whole world ground to a halt and suddenly the only thing that existed was the fact that Felicia and Chad were fucking – right in front of her, on the morning after the night when Chad had said that he was feeling a little bit sick and she shouldn’t come over, lest she catch whatever he had.

  I’m a fucking moron, Jen thought, flabbergasted.

  Felicia noticed her first, and the bitch didn’t even have the courtesy to look surprised. Then again, why would she? It was her that had sent Jen a text saying, “You should check on your man”. Jen hadn’t exactly anticipated this, but in retrospect, she shouldn’t have been surprised.

  “Do you like the view?” Felicia asked between moans, licking her lips.

  Her perfect tanned body, slim and tall, looked good even when bent over at that unnatural angle. Her perky ass was pushed up and her round tits swung with each thrust. Jen couldn’t help but despise her a little for it.

  “Jesus fuck,” Chad stammered, noticing Jen standing at the door. “It isn’t what it looks like!” he exclaimed.

  That made her world move again, double-time. Jen found herself striding across the plush carpet right to the bed as if something not quite of her own will had taken control of her. She jumped up on it and shoved Chad so hard that he toppled off the bed, taking Felicia down with him – seeing as he was still balls deep in her cunt.

  “You… motherfucker. I should have fucking known,” Jen hissed, rage filling her from the top of her head to the bottom of her feet. “I should have known that you were a lying cheat. And YOU! I thought you were my fucking friend,” she snarled at Felicia, who was struggling to get up on her feet.

  “Bitch, if you don’t know how to give it to your man, you know he’s going to find it somewhere else,” Felicia said, rolling her eyes.

  Without thinking about it, Jen smacked Felicia so hard it made her hand hurt. Chad was an asswipe, plain and simple, but Felicia had gone out of her way to be an indescribable bitch and that was just… Jen didn’t even know what that was. She knew it pissed her the hell off, anyway.

  “I don’t have time for this shit. I need to go to work. Bye, Felicia,” she said, stomping off the bed and heading for the door.

  “Baby, we can talk about this!” Chad called, untangling himself from Felicia and attempting to get up on his feet.

  “The hell we can! We’re through. You can pound her as much as you want. I deserve better than you anyway,” Jen snarled, tearing off the engagement ring she had on her finger.

  She threw it at Chad and didn’t look back
as she just about ran out of the bedroom and through the apartment. All the while, she was waiting for the tears to come. And she kept waiting for them as she sped through Phoenix, taking the shortest way she could think of to her downtown office. But those tears never came. If anything, she felt a tiny bit relieved. Betrayed, yes. Angry as hell? Oh, you know it.

  But it was one of those times when she could honestly say that maybe, just maybe, after she had about 3 bottles of wine and an opportunity to calm down, she would be glad that she didn’t marry Chad fucking Weinberg and become the future mother of his probably equally as douchey offspring. That kind of asshole behavior had to be genetic.

  I’ll think about this shit when I get home, Jen assured herself, pulling into her parking spot at the huge office building.

  She stepped out of the car and found herself shaking as she walked towards the doors. It didn’t stop. She felt like she was vibrating all over as she took the lift and made it up and through the front doors of Pendlay & Co. Accounting just in time to catch the beginning of a staff meeting. It was anger that was making its way through her like some disease – anger at herself for being so blind for so long – gnawing at her mercilessly.

  The signs had been there, she just didn’t want to see them. The way he blew off their dates. The way he would have something so much more important to do all of a sudden. The way she kept finding stuff rearranged in his apartment or her things put away, hidden. But she hadn’t wanted to see.

  She was still deep in thought as she came to stand with the rest of her co-workers, all listening to what Rawley Pendlay had to say. He was always calling these meetings over petty little things like how much coffee people could have in a day or how it wasn’t appropriate to laugh too loud. Silly things that people took the time to listen to and then promptly ignore.

  But if Jen hadn’t been so distracted by her own thoughts, she would have noticed the dark look on Pendlay’s face and the fact that the rest of the management stood behind him, looking equally as uneasy.

  “I’ve gathered you all here today to share some unfortunate news. I know many of you have been with us for ten years, but Friday will be your last day here. While the company is not being shut down completely, we’re going to be moving most of the jobs overseas for financial reasons.”

  Jen snapped out of her thoughts. The crowd was deathly silent for a second that seemed to go on forever, and when they broke into loud chatter, Jen groaned audibly, hiding her face in her hands. Of course. This was exactly what would happen after her long-time boyfriend and fiancée gets caught cheating on her with her best friend.

  Her job of ten years, just disappeared.

  She watched everyone around her go into overdrive. Pendlay was shaking his head, trying, and mostly failing, to field questions as his workers got more and more upset. Jen knew she was supposed to help him – she was his executive assistant after all – but she couldn’t care for the life of her. Instead of trying to regain order and calm the crowd, she turned around and walked into her little office, closing the door behind her.

  “Miss Howell! Where do you think you’re going?!” she heard Rawley Pendlay call after her, distress evident in his voice.

  But Jen was beyond giving a crap. All she had known over the last ten years had been taken from her in the matter of an hour. The life she had so carefully crafted – poof, gone. She sat down heavily at her desk and fired up her laptop, not even sure what she was going to do. Out of habit, she browsed the new pins on Pinterest that she liked to skim each morning when she was having coffee. Mostly home décor and a motivational board for one day getting a little house in the middle of the woods – something that was impossible to do in Arizona.

  Jen slumped on the table, her chin rested on her hand. She felt drained, completely empty of all feeling. But as she scrolled through those pins, looking at the colorful pictures of beautiful ideas to create a lovely home, something in her clicked.

  This was her chance. Sure, fate had screwed her over, but it had also given her a chance to start new. Glancing up at the commotion outside her office, Jen allowed herself a little smile. She didn’t have the energy to get upset. No, she’d make something of this situation. Something good.

  Wyoming sounds like a nice place to settle down…

  Two

  Ethan

  “You’re starting to look like you came with the furniture,” Maisy complained, filling Ethan’s coffee cup again.

  “Well, I add to the visual appeal of the place,” he snorted with wry humor, lifting his cup in thanks.

  “Sure, sure. That’s what I need. Another heartbroken cowboy at my counter,” Maisy chuckled, putting the pot away and smoothing back her long blonde hair.

  She was in her late thirties and Ethan had known her all his life. They’d grown up in the sleepy little town of Sweetwater, and like many were ought to do around there, they never left. Sweetwater was as little as it got, but not a lot of people wanted to leave once they got to know the area. Maybe it was the pristine Wyoming wilderness or the fact that it really was just about the calmest place in the world, but whatever it was, once you came, you rarely left.

  Of course for Ethan, there were other reasons than simple sentimentality for not leaving the area. Werebears weren’t known for relocating very easily, after all. Which was sort of why he was at Maisy’s, moping the day away.

  “I’m not heartbroken,” he sighed, taking a bite out of his sandwich. “If I were, I think I’d be asking for a beer instead of coffee and telling you my woes, hmm?”

  “Can never be sure with you blue collar types,” Maisy grinned, winking cheekily at him. “Some of you have the most boring ways of getting over your sorrows.”

  Ethan shrugged noncommittally, chuckling. She wasn’t entirely wrong. He was, in a way, ignoring the problem that he could have been out fixing. His clan had been solid and together for a very long time. Few of them ever felt the urge to move out of the area that had been their ancestors’ and now theirs to control.

  The Grimpaws were the only werebear clan in the area. The only other larger shifter community were the Clearponds – a pack of wolves they’d never gotten along with. There were plenty of reasons for wolves and bears to not get along, but for the Grimpaws and Clearponds, it had always been about land and the ownership of it.

  Whoever owned the majority of the land in the area had a paw up on the others. For a few generations, it had been the Grimpaws running the game, but Ethan had a feeling that was not going to go over well for very long. The Clearponds had a new leadership. Young wolves were replacing the more levelheaded older wolves, and when youthful zeal and ego met, only destruction could follow.

  And just recently, a crucial piece of Grimpaw territory had been put up for sale and sold before Ethan had managed to do a single thing about it.

  So, here he was now, contemplating his woes and trying to figure out whether or not he was going to have to go to war soon. There was nothing much he could do before they found out who the new owner was, but from the fact that no Clearponds had come to rub his nose in it, he assumed the wolves hadn’t managed to snatch it. That was a relief, but it still meant some poor sap was going to get dragged into a conflict no one wanted to continue, and odds were good that that poor someone was going to be an unsuspecting city slicker.

  “I won’t argue with you over that,” Ethan admitted, sipping on his black coffee.

  “You damn well shouldn’t,” Maisy confirmed. “But okay, if your heart isn’t broken, then where is your woman?”

  “Excuse me?” Ethan queried, cocking a brow in amusement.

  I didn’t know I needed to prepare for an interrogation when I came to get breakfast!

  “You heard me. You’re handsome. You have a business. Lord knows you’ve been here long enough, and I’ve seen how some of these women throw themselves at you. So why haven’t you put a ring on one of them yet? You telling me you’re not a family kind of guy with those three brothers of yours all running around
Sweetwater like some GQ spread?” Maisy asked, stopping in front of Ethan and crossing her arms over her ample chest.

  “Well Miss Maisy, are you hitting on me?” Ethan joked, ducking smoothly as she threw the dishtowel at him.

  He caught it and handed it back to Maisy, grinning like a boy who’d gotten into the candy bowl.

  “You know as well as I do that I am happily married to Eddie, so you quit your smartmouthing, boy. Tell me now, what is your excuse for still running around like you don’t know how to propose to a good woman, hmm?”

  Ethan sighed, raising his hands in surrender. “Fine, fine, Maisy. I have nothing against family. You’re right, I come from a big one so I know the value of one. I guess I just haven’t found the right girl yet. But when I do, you can be sure that I’ll bring her around to get your approval before I stick a ring on her finger,” he said, chuckling.

  That deep baritone of his filled the diner and Maisy cocked her head, smirking. “Considering you know every woman around Sweetwater as well as I do, I get the feeling you’re either being too blasé about this all or I’m going to have to send you out of town to find that perfect woman of yours. You don’t see a lot of eligible young women moving to Sweetwater on their own, you know,” Maisy chided, waggling her finger at Ethan.

  The werebear sighed, shaking his head as he grinned. What would the town do without people like Maisy, always trying to make sure that the proud Sweetwater name carried on for generations to come?

  He was just about to snap back with something at least moderately witty, when his phone buzzed in his jeans’ pocket. Ethan fished it out and frowned, seeing an unknown number. Like Maisy had said, there weren’t a lot of people in Sweetwater that he wasn’t on first name basis with and he certainly never got calls from one.