Bears & Beauties - Complete (2 page)

Replacing my bottle in the side pocket of my backpack, I heaved the bag back into its position on my back, and clambered off the boulder. Stretching my arms above my head, I took a deep breath and stared at my reflection in the water. My dark brown hair was utterly disheveled from all the hiking, even while still bound up in a pony tail. As suspected, my pink tank top was absolutely drenched with sweat, and my jean shorts were already torn from where I’d gotten caught up in a brier patch a ways back on the trail.

I shifted to the side a bit, examining my silhouette, and taking note of my curvaceous body. I’d never cut it as a stick-figure model, having more in common with Kate Upton in the curvy areas than Victoria’s Angels. Even with all of the hiking and kayaking I did, I’d never been able to burn away what other girls in my college classes had called “undesirable features”. I snorted at that, just as I had back then. I was proud of my body, and often felt sexy in my own skin. If a man couldn’t see beyond the bend of my curves, he wasn’t worth spending time with. Or, at least, that’s what my mother would have said.

I shook my head, dismissing the memories of snarky college girls, and turned away from the water. I was determined to keep moving forward and into the unknown. For all I knew, I was the first person in ages - maybe ever! - to tread along this part of the mountains, and that was an opportunity that I couldn’t pass up.

The sun was had reached its peak in the sky - I had set out early this morning, just after sunrise - when I happened upon an outcropping of boulders and stones along the mountainside. At first, I thought it little more than a wall of stone built into the mountain. Upon further examination, though, I quickly noted that not only was it not just a wall, it was a full blown cave, deep and dark as far as I could see.

My sense of adventure immediately perked up, and I found myself reaching back into my backpack in search of my flashlight. I found the light, a small, hand-sized, but military-grade light, and powered it on. The shadows immediately burst into light, and I stared as deeply as I could from the mouth of the cave.

As best as I could tell, the cave was completely barren, likely untouched for years or maybe decades. Glancing about and behind me for a second, I decided to venture into the cave. Once my curiosity got the best of me, I was hopeless.

I worked my way into the cave slowly, careful of snakes or other critters that might have found residence in the dank and musty darkness inside the mountain. My instincts were flaring up, begging me not to proceed any further, but I dismissed it as a fear of the unknown. I wanted nothing more at that moment than to find the end of the cave, to explore its depths to the fullest, and to claim some small victory of exploration for myself.

That’s when I heard the huffing and low growl that, as a product of the mountains, I was so familiar with. A glint of light in my peripheral caught my eye, and I turned to face it, jerking the flashlight out in front of me as I did. There, in the depths of the cave, not more than a hundred feet from me, stood a massive black bear.

“Shitfuck
,” I hissed as the hair on my neck stood on end. I stared, helplessly, at the bear for a long moment, its eyes locked on mine for what felt like an eternity. Gathering my senses, I started to back slowly away from the bear, doing my best to create distance before turning tail and running for my life. Before I could back up more than a few yards, though, the bear took a step forward, stood to its full height, and let out a long and ferocious roar.

I didn’t need any more encouragement than that, immediately turning and darting toward the mouth of the cave as quickly as I could. My bag, heavy with all of my hiking supplies, bounced cumbersomely on my back. I didn’t dare to look back, but I could hear the bear giving chase as I sped out of the cave and into the daylight. The bear’s low growl and huffing kept time with my own haggard breathing, and I knew that it was gaining on me. I remembered reading something once that said black bears could reach land speeds of up to thirty-five miles per hour. That was a good thirty miles per hour faster than I could manage, and it wouldn’t be long before the predator caught up to me. I had to do something.

I darted as for the stream, zigging and zagging through the woods as I did, almost stumbling on more than one occasion as I worked down the steep incline. The bear was nearly tearing at my heels, and I could almost feel it as it beat down upon the dirt behind me. Panic began to set in and the adrenaline that had propelled me from the cave to here was beginning to die out. If something didn’t happen, I’d be dead in minutes.

Without thinking, I slipped my backpack out from over my shoulders and tossed it over my head back toward the bear. With any luck, it would go after the bag. At the very least, I’d be significantly less encumbered, which should make fleeing somewhat less difficult. For a moment, it seemed like that had done the trick. The sounds of the bear chasing after me fleeted for a second as the predator attacked and destroyed my bag, emptying its contents almost instantly. Once the bear was satisfied that nothing of quality was in the bag, however, it resumed its pursuit.

When I heard the bear clambering after me again, I felt the first real pang of hopelessness claw its way into my mind. I’d encountered bears before - basically everyone in town had - but I’d never been pursued as heartedly by one before. Never had I felt in any
real
danger. I must have done something to seriously piss this bear off, then, because it was dead set on dragging me across the rocks.

Just then, I heard another sound approaching from behind me, off in the opposite direction of the bear. It sounded similar, in fact, to the bear pursuing me, but somehow larger and more ferocious. Without thinking, I turned my head toward the sound, just in time to see another, even larger black bear speeding across the mountainside toward me. Cursing my luck, I doubled down on my speed and sprinted down the mountain as quickly as I could, my breath all but lost in the activity.

My foot suddenly hit something hard and my body jerked forward and toward the ground. Almost by reflex, I curled up into a ball and rolled forward, head over heel, as I crashed down the mountainside. My body bounced and collided with dirt and stone as I continued rolling forward, my world transformed into a swirling spiral of tree-sky-dirt-tree. I found myself unable to breath, the air long since knocked from my lungs, and I knew, in that moment, that I was going to die. If the fall didn’t kill me, the bears would.

That’s when I collided with large boulder, my head slamming backward against the rock as my back came to a rest against it. Sheer agony wracked through my body, and I felt a trickle of blood flowing down the back of my head. My vision swam, and in the distance I could make out a large figure racing toward me.

The world faded into black.

Chase

“She’ll be alright?” I asked the woman at the nurse’s station, gesturing with my thumb toward the room behind me.

The woman looked at me suspiciously for a moment before nodding. “Should be fine. A few scrapes, scratches, and bruises, but she’ll be fine.”

I thanked the woman then walked back toward the door to the hospital room, peeking in from just beyond the doorway. I thought back to how I’d found the woman, being chased by a massive black bear down the mountainside, and shook my head. Had I not been out there exercising my own bear, she’d be dead. Hell, it was a wonder she wasn’t dead anyways. Most people don’t take a tumble down the mountainside and live to tell about it, much less resume consciousness. And yet, here she was. Alive, awake, and surrounded by family.

After I’d chased off the woman’s pursuant, I’d raced after her down the mountain, hoping to stop her tumble before she reached the stream below. I’d figured that, in her condition, she’d probably have drowned in the waters while still unconscious. Through a stroke of ill luck, however, she’d ended up slamming into the solitary boulder along the stream’s bank. By the time I’d gotten to her, she was already unconscious. I’d immediately shifted back into human form and checked her for any life-threatening wounds, before sweeping her into my arms and rushing her as quickly as I could to the local hospital. If I hadn’t been able to tap into my bear’s reserves of strength and speed, I’m not sure I could have made it. The nurses had recognized the woman immediately, identifying her as Andrea Sloane, and had reached out to her family. As far as I knew, the woman was completely unaware of my presence, or of my role in her rescue. Which, honestly, was probably for the better.

I turned away from the room and started toward the hospital’s exit. Ever since arriving in Boone, I’d felt more free and relaxed than I had in ages. My bear seemed pleased for the first time in over a decade, and I could feel the mountain air working its wonders on the stress that had built up so intensely back in New York City. Even one run through the mountains had been enough to detox every bit of pent up rage that I’d been building up over the years. It was, to say the least, satisfying.

Just as I was nearing the exit, a woman’s voice called out to me. “Hey, you!”

I turned to see the woman standing in the hallway, her hospital gown clinging around her body. Even in the gown and with the head bandages, the woman was unmistakably gorgeous - something that I hadn’t noticed in my rush to get her to the hospital. She had brilliant and piercing emerald eyes that almost melted me where I stood, and a body that curved in absolutely the
right
way. My mouth watered a bit as I stared at her, and my bear rumbled a silent roar of desire.

“You think you can just walk away after this?” The woman called out, storming toward me and turning heads all around the hospital’s narrow hallway. A pair of heads peeked out from the woman’s room, that of her parents, and stared at me with widened eyes.

“Excuse me?” I offered, arching an eyebrow as I gazed upon the gorgeous woman before me.

The woman reached me much more quickly than I would have guessed she could in her battered condition. She stood in front of me for a long moment, her eyes drilling up into mine, and her jaw held firm as though in an act of defiance. Then, without warning, she reached forward and wrapped her arms around me, embracing me in a tight and almost painful hug.

I stood there, taken off guard and unsure of how to respond. The warmth of her body send bursts of electricity through my body, and I suddenly felt as though
nothing
in the world could go wrong. Without realizing it, I wrapped my own arms around her, reciprocating her tight embrace, and taking in the fullness of her scent. She smelled just as wonderful as she looked, and the primal nature of my bear threatened to emerge in that perfect moment.

“Thank you,” the woman murmured through tears I hadn’t realized she’d been crying. “Thank you, thank you. Whoever you are, thank you. I thought I was dead.”

I patted the woman on the back, then released her from my arms and she took a step backward. I offered her a hand and my best smile before speaking. “Chase,” I said. “And you’re welcome. I’m just glad I was there to help.”

The woman put her hand in mine, all but devastating my senses as her smooth skin electrified my mind with its touch. “I’m Andrea,” she said. “I don’t know how to begin to thank you. Honestly.”

I shook my head at her, smiling. “It was my pleasure, Andrea. Really. Right place, right time, is all.”

Andrea stared up at me, a smile forming behind her eyes. “Still,” she said, clearing her throat. “You at least have to let me buy you dinner. It’s the least I can do.”

I stared at her for a moment, realizing that her hand was still in mine, and nodded. There was no way I could turn this woman down, even if there were other, more pressing matters, to attend to. I released her hand and grabbed my wallet from my back pocket, fishing out one of my business cards and handing it to her. “Just call me when you get out of here,” I said. “I’ll look forward to it.”

Then, without another word, I backed away from Andrea and started toward the exit before she could read the card. Just as I rounded the corner, I heard her cry out in surprise, obviously recognizing my name.

Andrea

“
The
Chase Hammer?” my mother asked, her eyes wide with surprise. “What’s he even doing in Boone? Isn’t his company based out of New York?”

“His parents had a place over on the Parkway,” my dad replied matter-of-factly. “He must finally be clearing out the place. That, or he’s using it as a vacation home.”

I just stared at the business card Chase had left me with, my eyes still wide with wonder. Whatever he was doing in Boone, whatever he’d come here to do, he’d taken the time to somehow find and rescue me. He’d saved my life, even if I didn’t know how, and I was more than baffled by it. Part of me wanted to call him immediately, set up a time and place for dinner, and dig into how everything unfolded. The other part of me - the saner part - wanted me to just leave it all alone. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t intimidated. In fact, just knowing that I had called him out, clung to, and slobbered all over him was enough to leave me sick with embarrassment.

He hugged you back
, I kept reminding myself. Though, whether that was out of pity or genuine sincerity remained to be seen.