Little Red Riding Bears: A BBW Bear Shifter Paranormal Romance (Bear-y Spicy Fairy Tales Book 2) Read online

  Little Red Riding Bears: A BBW Bear Shifter Paranormal Romance

  Bear-y Spicy Fairy Tales, Volume 2

  Sable Sylvan

  Published by Sable Sylvan, 2015.

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  LITTLE RED RIDING BEARS: A BBW BEAR SHIFTER PARANORMAL ROMANCE

  First edition. July 8, 2015.

  Copyright © 2015 Sable Sylvan.

  Written by Sable Sylvan.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Photo Attribution

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Epilogue

  Sneak Peek: Shifterella and the Billionaire Bear

  About The Author

  Photo Attribution

  The photo of the three bears on the cover was originally titled “The Three Bears” and was taken by Chris Shervey and released under the Creative Commons License 2.0, Attribution .

  Prologue

  Twenty Years Ago

  Meredith Baxter had wandered away from her family at the Fourth of July picnic and gotten lost in the woods. At first, it had been fun: she was playing Hansel and Gretel by herself, but soon, when she found no gingerbread house, just a clearing in the woods, she realized she had no idea where she was, and she missed her parents. She started to cry...but a large bear approached her. Meredith giggled: she loved bears. Her favorite toy was her own teddy bear, her best friend, Alexander B. Bear.

  The bear let out a muffled sound and another bear, smaller, came out of the woods and the two bears talked a bit before they worked together to get the young human up on the big bear’s shoulders and walked the human back out of the woods to a clearing where they’d seen humans.

  Meredith giggled as she was taken through the woods, fireflies illuminating the secret paths through the woods, paths called “shifter paths” as only the shifters of the woods could smell out the paths, which were hidden beneath the undergrowth. It was rare a human was privy to these secret paths...as rare as it was for a human to get lost so deep in these forests.

  The bears walked out towards a clearing: the smaller bear had sniffed out the way that Meredith had gone and tracked her old path. The small bear did something Meredith had never seen: turn into a human, a woman with long blonde hair that covered her body.

  “We found her,” called the woman, and Meredith’s mom ran up, her face covered in tears.

  “Thank you so much,” said Meredith’s mother to the tall naked woman who was making her way to her abandoned pile of clothes.

  “Don’t mention it,” said the woman, walking with Meredith and her mom to the picnic table where she’d left her clothes and getting changed quickly back into her garments before they rejoined the party. “She was just in the clearing. You were lucky there were shifters at the party though, especially bear shifters.”

  The woman’s husband stayed in bear form and the group all walked back to the town picnic. It had been easy for Meredith’s mom to lose track of her before given how crowded the picnic at the park was. The woman and the bear walked back with the Meredith and her mom to the picnic blanket where Meredith’s dad and grandma were waiting.

  “It’s good to see you again, honey bee!” said Grandma Baxter. “What do you say to the nice bears?”

  “Thank you,” said Meredith with a giggle. “Sorry I got lost...mommy, can I ride the bear again, please?”

  The bear let out a small roar.

  “If it’s okay with you, she can play with our camp for a bit: we’ll keep an eye on her while she plays with our group,” said the woman.

  “That sounds like a lovely idea,” said Meredith’s mom, leaving the group with Meredith who rode on the bear shifter’s back, her hands full of thick grizzly fur.

  At the bear camp, Meredith made fast friends with three of the boy bear shifter cubs who all happened to be her same age: they were playing tag and she ran around and around with the cubs. They weren’t like the boys at her school who were mean and pulled on her hair, although there weren’t any bear shifter boys back at her school in Los Angeles. The boys all played fairly, until the kids were tired out and they all sat on the grass and talked.

  “Meredith...will you marry me?” asked one of the boys, who had made a small ring for her out of grass. The ring was clumsy and cute.

  “That’s no fair, Brandon,” whined another. “Meredith, will you marry me?” He made a small ring out of grass around her finger too and tried to make it stick by tying a loose knot.

  “Well, if you two get to marry Meredith, I want to too,” said the third cub, indignant. “I want a wife too! Meredith, will you marry me?”

  “Yes,” said Meredith with a giggle. Nobody at her preschool or kindergarten had wanted to marry her before and now she had three husbands to play with.

  “Good,” said Brandon, giving Meredith a sloppy kiss on the cheek.

  “Eww!” said Meredith, wiping the kiss off. “That’s so gross!”

  “I think so too,” said Brandon. “Let’s go play hide and seek!”

  Meredith played hide and seek with the boys in the park until it got dark, and the fireworks show started. She held hands with two of them as the fireworks went off, but as the show went on, Meredith found herself more and more tired, and the next thing she knew, she was being tucked into bed back at Grandma Baxter’s house, and her mom gave her a kiss on the head.

  Meredith cuddled close with her teddy bear and thought about how fun it had been to play tag and hide and seek with her new friends, and how awesome it had been to ride a bear.

  Little did she know that twenty years later, the phrase “ride a bear” would mean something entirely different to her.

  Chapter One

  Present Day

  Meredith stormed up the stairs to the green and black Victorian house, which practically blended into the background of tall Oregon pines and fog and rang the doorbell once, then twice, then moved onto knocking angrily at the door.

  A tall man opened the door roughly mid knock, nearly ripping the door straight off its hinges, and Meredith didn’t have time to pull back before her fist had hit his chest...hard. His chest was firm, broad, and a swath of crimson red hair covered the space over his heart, right where Meredith had hit him.

  Twenty-five Meredith had come to the house with a mission: to tell off the landlord who had raised her grandmother’s rent in the lease for the coming year. She hadn’t expected the landlord to be over seven feet tall, taking up most of the tall door frame, and looking down at her with grouchy eyes that were still adjusting to what little sunlight was left shining down on the Pacific Northwest this December.

  She also hadn’t expected him to be clad in only a pair of boxer shorts, which weren’t leaving much to the imagination, or for him to be absolutely jacked. His strong arms were on display as he reached back to scratch an itch on his lower back and then reached up to push his scraggly hair out of his eyes. On his hands were five large splotches, dark brown against his pale skin. There was no mistaking them for anything but a bear shifter’s paw marks, the marks that appeared on their skin once they turned eighteen, marking them as bear shifters.

  He looked down at the small human: curvy, yes, but short, a mor
sel compared to him. He snarled and Meredith swore she saw his grey eyes flash a bright white as he said, “This better be important. Some people are trying to get some sleep around here.”

  Meredith’s cheeks had turned as red as her hoodie. “I’m...” she started, staring at the man in front of her. “I’m looking for the owner of Joyce and Brothers Realty. Is he home?”

  “You’re looking at him,” said the young man, who couldn’t have been old enough to run the company. “Brandon Joyce. You know, like...‘Joyce and Brothers’ Joyce?”

  Meredith looked the man over: he had a barrel chest, firm biceps, and taut, muscular shoulders. It was obvious what this man was: a bear shifter. “Well, Mr. Joyce, I’m having an issue regarding your lease.” Meredith had forgotten about the speech she’d prepared in the car, reciting it over and over in her head, prepared to give some old man a piece of her mind.

  “Can it wait until spring?” asked the man, scratching at the scraggly beard he’d developed over the last few weeks. “The other bears and I are hibernating.”

  “No, Mr. Joyce, it cannot wait,” said Meredith, walking past him into the house, which looked more like the inside of a frat house than the headquarters of a rental business. “My name is Meredith, Meredith Baxter, and my grandmother, Janice Baxter, rents one of your houses.”

  “Baxter, Baxter...your grandmother lives at ten Cunningham Drive, right?” asked the bear shifter as he followed Meredith in and took a seat in the living room in a large leather chair. Any other woman who came up to his door complaining about a lease during the middle of his hibernation would have been turned away, but Meredith...he could already tell Meredith was different. She had spunk and sass in spades, but her bouncy curves and curls had really caught his eye. “Is there a problem with the house? I assure you, your grandmother has been the perfect tenant.”

  “Of course she’s been the perfect tenant, have you met the woman?” asked the fiery redhead angrily as she sat down on a dark leather couch, moving a dirty gym sock out of the way. “But apparently, her lease for next year states that she’ll need to pay almost twice what she’s currently paying per month.”

  “I don’t remember doing that, but maybe one of the other boys did it, your grandmother’s lease had...flown under the radar,” explained Brandon. He could tell that the curvy woman was as disgusted with the house as she was angry about the lease from the way she frowned at the various mess piles around the room. “We reviewed the lease this year, and realized that the rent did not match the market rates for the area. Maybe one of the other guys raised the rent, but it wasn’t me.”

  “What happened to the man that used to run the leasing company? Ezekiel Joyce?” asked Meredith. “I want to speak to your boss.”

  “Ezekiel Joyce was my grandfather,” said Brandon. “And he’s passed.”

  “Well, I’m very sorry for your loss, but your grandfather and my grandmother had a deal,” said Meredith. “He rented the house to her for a fixed rate, and it’s unrealistic for you to raise the rent and expect her to be able to pay the difference. She’s an old woman. Where’s my eighty-five year old grandmother going to get the money for rent from?”

  Brandon opened one of the file cabinets by one of the desks in the messy living room and flipped through the files until he found the one for 10 Cunningham Drive, Port Jameson, Oregon. He scanned each page twice. The copy was perfect, unwrinkled: Brandon frowned, usually he made the copies and handled the paperwork, and this one was a little too neat, free of any rips, wrinkles, creases, or coffee stains, but it was definitely one of their leases. Scott or Nathan must have written the new lease up. “Ms. Baxter...there’s nothing in here about their arrangement,” said Brandon. “And frankly, with no written proof about the arrangement, there’s no way for you to prove your grandmother has any claim for lower rent.”

  “So what, my grandma’s going to have to move because your grandpa forgot to write something down?” asked Meredith angrily, pounding her fist into the arm of the couch, her fist sinking into the soft leather with ease and with a thud.

  “It’s the middle of winter, and we’re bear shifters, sugar,” said Brandon, loving the way that the word sugar sent a shiver down Meredith’s spine and a blush into her cheeks that was redder than any blush the winter wind could draw out of them. “So if you want to strike a deal with this bear...well, I hope you brought some honey.”

  “And exactly what kind of honey are you looking for, Mr. Bear?” asked Meredith.

  “I’d ask for a date, but I’m a bit too grizzly to be good company for anyone,” retorted Brandon. “I’ll settle for a housekeeper, for two weeks.”

  “A housekeeper?” asked Meredith.

  “That’s right, a housekeeper,” said Brandon. “The boys and I aren’t this messy during the rest of the year, but when we hibernate, we only get up when we have to...like when people ring the damn door bell about a change in their leases. Anyways, we make a mess over the winter, and we clean it all up in the spring. This year, I’m too busy with the properties to whip my friends into shape to help with the spring cleaning, so I’d rather you just get the house ready. Get this house in tiptop shape by the start of spring, and your grandma’s rent won’t get raised. You’d have a room to yourself and could come and go as you please.” It was a half-truth: Brandon did want the house cleaned, but not as much as he wanted Meredith to stick around.

  “And the rent won’t be raised, ever?” asked Meredith.

  “Ever,” agreed Brandon.

  “Who are these...friends of yours?” asked Meredith.

  “The men I consider brothers,” explained Brandon. “We’re not related by blood, but we’ve got a...special relationship.”

  “So you’re gay?” asked Meredith.

  “No,” said Brandon. “It’s...complicated. But housekeeper: are you in or are you out?”

  “I’m going to need some time to think,” admitted Meredith, getting up from the couch...but as she got up, her heel hit a slimy sock, and she started to slip, backwards, onto the floor.

  Even though he’d been woken up from his hibernation less than an hour ago, Brandon still had animal fast reflexes, and he lunged, taking Meredith in his arms mid-yelp, his arms wrapped around her curvy waist as he pulled her up, her feet entirely off the floor.

  Looking down at the woman in his arms, her eyes wide and scared at first, Brandon’s bear roared at him, telling him to take Meredith right up to his room, where they both belonged, to fill her with a litter of pups for the fall, but Brandon shushed the bear: there was no knowing if Meredith even was his fated mate yet. The signs were all there...but until they’d done the deed, Brandon wouldn’t know for sure if Meredith was his one and only true love.

  Brandon pulled Meredith up, but Meredith struggled, “Darn it, I can do it myself, Brandon,” she said crossly, but in her struggling, she turned, facing Brandon...whose head was enough to hers that their lips brushed once, and then, pushed together, Meredith’s velvety lips pressed against Brandon’s rough chapped lips.

  Meredith held onto Brandon, ostensibly for support, but she felt his strong muscles ripple against her hand...and she couldn’t help but feel more of his body, and Brandon, in response, pressed his hand to her curves, feeling Meredith’s supple curves in his hands, her plushness more appealing that the soft pillow upstairs waiting for him to go back into hibernation. The rough pads of his paw marks rubbed against her skin like hard calluses.

  Brandon kissing her back made the moment all the more real, and Meredith pulled away. “That...that was a mistake,” said Meredith. “No, an accident, there wasn’t enough intent to make that a mistake. A fluke.”

  “Or a sign,” said Brandon. “Destiny. Fate.”

  “Nope, I’m gonna go with fluke,” said Meredith, still making her way to the door. “Fluke, mistake, accident. Fluke, mistake accident. I don’t know what kind of woman you think I am, but I’m no floozy, and I don’t go around kissing men I just met.”

  “Wait!”
called Brandon, but Meredith was already walking out of the house and towards the porch.

  Meredith turned around at the bottom of the stairs. “I don’t know what kind of a company you run here, Brandon, but I’ll be back, and with a vengeance.”

  Brandon couldn’t help himself from laughing: the sight of curvy Meredith, hands on her waist, frowning at him, was adorable to the point of ridiculousness. “Alright, Mrs. Baxter...I’ll be looking forward to your return,” he said.

  Meredith frowned as she shouted back, “Wh-whatever!” She turned, wishing she’d had a better comeback line, as she walked back to her grandmother’s house through the snow. Who did that bear shifter think he was, holding her like that? What kind of man just kissed a woman back like that, with that much...passion?

  Meredith touched her lips on the walk back down the hill where the bear shifter families lived. She could still feel the way that Brandon had managed to roughen up her lips and his taste lingered in her mouth.

  ***

  Meredith got home and found Grandma Baxter in the kitchen, working on dinner. “I’m home, Grandma,” said Meredith, putting her bag down and hanging up her coat. “Whatever you’re making smells good.”

  “I spent the whole day doing a big batch of baking. How was your meeting with the Joyce boy?” asked Grandma Baxter, stirring the stew that was simmering on the pot. Meredith had gotten her curves from the Baxter side of her family, and she resembled a young version of her grandmother, who was also petite, curvy, and whose fiery red hair had gone pink with age.

  “Not great,” said Meredith as she set the table. “He agreed to lower your rent...but only if I do something for him.”

  Grandma Baxter chuckled. “Like take you out on a date?”

  “Grandma!” started Meredith. “...how did you know?”

  “Oh, those Joyce men love us Baxter women,” said Grandma Baxter. “But to the best of my knowledge, they’ve never got a single paw on one of us. So you accepted, right?”