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  Published by The Hartwood Publishing Group, LLC,

  Hartwood Publishing, Phoenix, Arizona

  www.hartwoodpublishing.com

  Grizzly Survival

  Copyright © 2017 by Becca Jameson

  Digital Release: November 2017

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination, or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  Grizzly Survival by Becca Jameson

  Gavin Wright is human. He is also not out. He has no intention of ever coming out. He’s unwilling to face the condemnation. Lucky for him, he’s had the privilege of hiding his true self inside a fake relationship with his best friend, Paige, for ten years.

  Dale Gerben is a grizzly shifter. As such, he has the ability to sense things humans cannot. Therefore, it comes as a surprise to him that Gavin thinks he’s so well hidden from the world. He isn’t hidden from Dale. And Dale is up for the challenge.

  It’s a summer fling. No one in the human world will find out. Dale needs someone to help him heal old wounds, and Gavin needs someone to show him what he’s capable of if he’d just trust himself.

  No one needs to get hurt. Until they do…

  The odds are not in their favor. It’s forbidden to change a human into a shifter. It’s challenging to maintain a life-long mixed relationship. Gavin has doubts. Dale has secrets.

  Two young girls are missing. There’s an accident. A race against the clock.

  Neither man will ever be the same.

  Dedication

  To my mom, whom I speak with several times a day. She’s one of my best friends even though we never speak of my career or my writing! Little parts of her are dribbled throughout this book quite by coincidence. It wasn’t intentional, but there she is between the pages. She not only served certain breakfasts on certain days of the week when I was growing up, but she also has a pink room my father would have tolerated if he were still living. Love you, Mom.

  Chapter One

  The moment Gavin Wright stepped outside onto the half-finished deck, he knew his life was irrevocably changed. If he were honest with himself, he’d known as much even before he opened the glass door that led to the most amazing view he’d ever seen in his life.

  Sure, the snow-capped mountains dotted with clusters of evergreens that stretched for miles in every direction were spectacular. The home, which belonged to Wyatt Arthur, was tucked away inconspicuously in the Rocky Mountains along the southwestern edge of Alberta, Canada. But what really caught Gavin’s eye was the man leaning over the deck.

  The man Gavin had been staring at for several minutes through the enormous picture window that lined the back of Wyatt Arthur’s house.

  The man currently causing Gavin to have the biggest hard-on he could remember in recent history.

  He had one booted foot lifted to rest on the edge of the deck. A worn leather tool belt hung low on his jean-clad hips. And the tight black T-shirt stretched across his abs should have been illegal.

  Gavin had yet to see the man’s face, and he didn’t need to. There wasn’t a chance in hell any part of this perfection could possibly be anything less than jaw dropping. His arms and hands were dark, not just from the sun, but undoubtedly from at least some percentage of First Nations blood in him. His hair was thick and black and long. It was pulled back in a ponytail at the base of his neck, but half of it had escaped the band to fall haphazardly across his face and over his shoulder to dangle in front of his chest.

  Time stood still while Gavin took him in. It was only a fraction of a second, but it seemed like longer, and Gavin knew it was a moment he would never forget.

  When the man lifted his face, Gavin silently gasped.

  Oh, yeah. God’s gift to men. Or women. Please let him be gay… What were the chances? Wait. What the hell am I thinking? I can’t hook up with anyone in this small town. I’m only here for the summer. There’d be no way to keep it private.

  The man’s expression was hard, startled. His eyes were as dark as his hair, his face sun-kissed a deep brown with a tinge of red from working outside. Tiny wrinkles spread from the corners of his eyes as he scrunched them to stare at Gavin.

  The hammer he held slid through his right hand as if he’d forgotten he was holding it, but he gripped it tighter at the last second, keeping it from dropping onto the deck. After a moment, his face softened, and he cocked his head to one side, lifting a hand to block the sun’s morning rays from his vision. “Are you lost, pretty boy?”

  Ordinarily, if anyone spoke to Gavin that way, he would lose his shit, partially because the terminology was nearly always meant as an insult and partially because Gavin’s spine was accustomed to stiffening anytime anyone accused him of being gay. He’d spent his entire twenty-four years denouncing that truth and defending himself against homophobic insults.

  But this man, this perfect example that God was alive and well in the universe, he could call Gavin anything he wanted. Somehow the words he’d spoken didn’t come out as an insult at all. In fact, from his lips, they were an endearment.

  Gavin smirked, finding the muscle strength to shuffle forward. “Not lost. No. Just here to pick up my girlfriend.” The words were out before Gavin realized how preposterous and confounding they sounded.

  The man lifted a brow. “Girlfriend,” he repeated, as if the notion were ludicrous. And it was, but Gavin was so used to considering Paige Osborn his girlfriend that the title slid right off his tongue without hesitation.

  “She, uh…”

  The darker man glanced past Gavin toward the back of the house, and then he shook his head and smirked. “No heterosexual man in his right mind would leave his girlfriend alone in a room with Wyatt Arthur for a single moment, let alone hours. She’s been in there a while. You just arrived and came straight outside.” He lifted a brow.

  Gavin shivered a bit at how quickly this man pegged him correctly. He wanted to look away, save face or something, but he couldn’t bring himself to drop the stranger’s gaze. Instead, he continued to approach him as if drawn magnetically to the edge of the deck.

  The man extended a hand. “Dale Gerben.”

  Gavin took his hand as he fought to recall what his own name was. Dale’s grip was firmer than Gavin’s. Just right. His hand was larger, rough with calluses from working construction. His darker skin covered with a light sprinkle of dark hair made Gavin lick his lips.

  “Do you have a name?” Dale asked, still holding on to Gavin.

  Gavin jerked his attention from their combined hands to Dale’s face. “Gavin. Sorry. Gavin Wright.”

  Finally, Dale released him, though Gavin half wished he hadn’t. This close Gavin could see that Dale was older, at least thirty. His First Nations heritage would keep him permanently young, but the wrinkles in the corners of his eyes spoke of maturity and wisdom.

  Gavin was only twenty-four and cursed with one of those faces that would get him carded on a regular basis for years to come. He wore
his brown hair cut stylishly and kept a well-trimmed beard to add to his years, but there was no hiding his youthful looks.

  Dale stood in the grass off the end of the deck, but considering how many inches he had on Gavin, his position put the two of them at eye level. He straightened to his full height and adjusted his tool belt. He glanced at the wall of glass that comprised the back of the house again. “I assume this girlfriend of yours is Paige Osborn?”

  Gavin furrowed his brow. “Yes. How did you know?” Gavin’s first thought was that perhaps Dale was a bear shifter like he knew Paige and Wyatt to be, but then he came to his senses and realized she easily could have been introduced to Dale before Gavin arrived at the house minutes ago.

  He shrugged. “Word gets around. I heard she was coming to town to do some sort of research.”

  “Oh, right. Yes. She’s finishing her masters in urban anthropology from the University of Calgary. They sent her here for the summer to do a study about why the citizens of Silvertip are stronger, healthier, and live longer.”

  Dale smirked again, his chest heaving a bit. Surely he was a shifter too if he realized how absurd the study was. Not to mention, Paige had told Gavin most of the citizens of Silvertip were grizzly shifters. Already, after one day, Gavin was a little stressed every time he met someone new. As a human, he had no way to determine who was a shifter and who wasn’t.

  Paige, however, could scent her own species, as could any bear shifter.

  There weren’t many shifters living in Calgary, so Dale had rarely thought much about their existence on a daily basis, other than the fact that his best friend was a shifter.

  “How do you know Paige?” Dale asked, cocking his head to one side.

  Gavin had trouble keeping his gaze directed at the man’s face. What he wanted to do was freeze-frame the moment and soak in his broad chest, narrower waist, and damn fine thighs.

  “Gavin?”

  He shook himself, trying to remember the question. “She’s my girlfriend. I told you that.”

  Dale chuckled now. “Right. Well, your girlfriend has left the house and is now sitting in your car out front. I think she’s ready to leave.”

  Gavin jerked his head over his shoulder, though from the deck there was nothing to see behind him. He couldn’t possibly know if she was in the house or out front by looking. How did Dale know?

  Yep. He had to be a shifter. And it was going to take some time to get used to realizing that other people around him besides Paige would have extraordinary abilities Gavin would never understand.

  Gavin pulled his phone out of his pocket and found a message from Paige.

  I’m in the car.

  “Looks like you’re right. Guess I better go.” He was disappointed that he didn’t have more time to stare at Dale. He’d like nothing more than to pull up a chair and watch the man work. Not that he could do that under any circumstances, but a guy could dream. He wasn’t surprised she was in the car. After all, she’d texted him less than an hour ago, asking him to come get her.

  Gavin stopped breathing two seconds later when Dale reached out, took his phone out of his hand, and began to type. When he handed it back, he winked. “Call me.”

  The world stopped spinning for several moments. Was it possible this god of a man was also gay and had just propositioned Gavin? Yep. There was no mistaking the gesture.

  Gavin’s heart raced, and it was all he could do to keep his hands from shaking as he tucked the phone back in his pocket.

  Dale stepped back. “You don’t have to go through the house if you don’t want.” He pointed to the right. “You can round the side to the driveway. I’m sure Wyatt won’t be the best company right now.”

  Gavin nodded. Why did it seem like Dale knew things by conjecture alone?

  Yeah. No doubt about it. Living in Silvertip for the summer was going to be…interesting. And Dale Gerben just made things that much more interesting.

  Chapter Two

  Gavin didn’t place that call to Dale for twenty-four long hours. For one thing, he’d been uncertain about the sensibleness of doing so. For another thing, he’d been busy dealing with a very stressed Paige, who spent the last day pacing around the tiny apartment they were renting for the summer, fretting over her relationship with Wyatt Arthur.

  She’d only met the man a handful of times when he’d been in Calgary on business a few months ago, and although she was reluctant to admit it, she was attracted to Wyatt in that weird way Gavin was learning shifters got when they met “the one.”

  Gavin and Paige had an agreement, however. They’d spent the last ten years upholding a mutual arrangement that benefited them both. Gavin didn’t want anyone to find out about his sexual orientation, and Paige didn’t want anyone to hit on her—ever. They had bonded over this knowledge at the age of fourteen and then stepped the game up a notch two years ago by declaring themselves a couple.

  They were anything but girlfriend and boyfriend. Gavin wasn’t the least bit interested in women and never had been. Paige had a past that kept her shut down to the advances of men for life. Or so she’d insisted for ten years.

  Gavin had his doubts about her continuing this farce for the last few months. She obviously had a thing for Wyatt, and Gavin wanted her to give the man a chance and move on with her life. She insisted she had no interest and would never break her vow to stay with Gavin.

  The truth was Gavin knew in his soul he would have to come out eventually. He wasn’t even close to ready yet, but he was capable of surviving a fake breakup from Paige. His parents might not survive, but Gavin would.

  He nearly groaned every time he imagined telling his mom and dad his relationship with Paige was over. Doing so wouldn’t specifically out himself as gay. He knew that. But Joan and Percy Wright had believed Paige and Gavin would marry and live happily ever after for many years. After all, they’d been inseparable since the two of them met as toddlers living only a few houses from each other on the same street where they grew up.

  Paige’s parents would surely be less shocked. They were both shifters. Though they were supportive of Gavin’s relationship with their daughter, it shouldn’t come as a surprise when she eventually met and bound herself to a grizzly. The terminology, binding Paige called it, was still foreign on Gavin’s tongue, but ever since Paige had found out about this summer internship a few months ago, he’d gotten quite an education from the couple of grizzly shifters currently living in Paige’s parents’ home while Stanton and Oleta Osborn were away on a sabbatical.

  Alton Tarben and Joselyn Arthur had moved to Calgary a few months ago from Silvertip. Joselyn was Wyatt’s sister and therefore the reason Paige had accidentally happened to meet Wyatt in the first place.

  Gavin shook himself back to the present. He was standing in his small bedroom in the incredibly cramped apartment staring out the window, his phone in his hand. Paige had gone to Wyatt’s parents’ home for dinner.

  He closed his eyes to avoid noticing how unbelievably boring this place was. Beige everywhere—carpet, paint, furniture. It made him cringe.

  Finally, unable to bring himself to call the man who had occupied his every thought for twenty-four hours, he decided to send a text.

  Hey. This is Gavin. From yesterday. Just wanted to say it was nice to meet you.

  He hesitated several moments before forcing himself to hit send. Did he sound too eager or ridiculously formal? Too late now.

  He realized he had been holding his breath when three dots popped up to indicate Dale was responding.

  Hi, Gavin from yesterday. It was nice to meet you too.

  When Gavin read those words, he didn’t know what to do next. Send another text? Leave it alone? He wasn’t in the habit of being forward with men. In fact, he rarely took the initiative to start something with anyone at all. He could count the number of hookups he’d had on one hand, and he’d had only a handful of relationships—all of which were short lived. There weren’t many men who were willing to continue dating
him after finding out he refused to be seen in public with them and had no intention of coming out of the closet.

  Thank God those three dots appeared once again, sparing Gavin from having to respond.

  Are you busy tonight? I was thinking of grilling if you’d like to join me.

  Gavin’s cock stiffened. It had been hard from the moment he’d met Dale, but that text pushed it to new limits.

  Not only was Dale clearly making a move, but he also didn’t ask Gavin to meet him in public. There was a God.

  I could do that. What time?

  He waited only seconds before getting a response.

  Seven okay with you? It will give me time to finish working at Wyatt’s for the day and get home and shower.

  Nope. Apparently, Gavin’s dick hadn’t reached it maximum stiffness because the thought of Dale in the shower made him have to reach down and adjust himself before he could respond.

  I’ll see you then.

  Wait. He had no idea where Dale lived, and he wasn’t about to find out from Wyatt. Luckily he was once again spared embarrassment when Dale sent another text with his address.

  There wasn’t just one God. There were apparently many.

  »»•««

  Dale had just finished making several hamburger patties when he heard the sound of a motorcycle pulling up out front.

  A bike? He hadn’t pegged Gavin for a biker.

  Sure enough, when he opened the front door, he was glad he stood in the frame because he needed to grab the sides and brace himself against the scene in front of him. Gavin—all five foot nine of him—was swinging his leg over the side of a sleek, black Chieftain Classic. He wore jeans, black boots, and a thick black leather jacket. As he pulled his helmet off his head, shaking out his hair, Dale’s cock jumped fully to attention.

  Damn.

  Holy shit.

  After spending the last few hours of work giving himself the pep talk of a lifetime, everything he’d convinced himself of blew out the door. He’d nearly nailed his own thumb to several boards in his distraction after exchanging texts with this kid, stopping several times to take deep breaths and tell himself this evening was nothing more than a hookup.