An Ember To Bear (Fire Bear Shifters 5) by Sloane Meyers Page B

was a total prick? She squeezed her eyes shut and tilted her head up toward the ceiling, slapping the palm of her empty hand against the cold wall behind her. This had been a waste of time. She would find somewhere else to go.
    Just as quickly as she made that decision, she changed her mind. Or, rather, a tiny four-year-old boy with an adorably freckled face changed her mind. When she felt a tiny hand grasping hers, she looked down and saw Drew’s hopeful face looking up at her.
    “Miss Mindy? Can you play in the sambox now?” he asked.
    Mindy’s heart broke a little as she looked down at his innocent face. “Yes, sweet pea. I can play in the sandbox now.”
    She let Drew lead her out to the backyard, and they were joined along the way by Emma, who held three stuffed bears and a plastic teacup in her arms.
    “Teddy wants a tea party in the sandbox,” Emma explained.
    Mindy smiled and took one of the bears from Emma. “Then Teddy should have a tea party in the sandbox. Come on.”
    Mindy didn’t often dwell on negative feelings, but she felt hatred for Mr. Stewart bubbling up in her chest. He didn’t deserve to be in charge of these sweet children if he was going to deny them a forever home based on his own stupid prejudices. But she would prove to him that his prejudices were misplaced. She didn’t know how, but she would find a way to get together the money Mr. Stewart required.
    These kids deserved someone going to bat for them, and fighting for them. Mindy was ready to fight.

Chapter Six
    When Mindy finally arrived home that night, her body had reached a state of complete exhaustion. All she wanted to do was collapse into bed, even though it wasn’t even ten o’clock yet. But her mind wouldn’t stop racing. She kept running over figures in her head, trying to figure out where she could scrimp or save even more to build up her nest egg even quicker. She tried to guess what her future raises or bonuses might be, but even when she estimated on the high side, she was coming up short. As she went over numbers in her head, one thing became clear—if she wanted to grow her savings account to fifty thousand dollars within the next decade, she was going to need to bring in some extra income on the side.
    Mindy sat on her couch in her dark townhome, and started running a string of Google searches on her smartphone: “make extra money,” “ways to bring in extra income,” “grow savings faster.” Her mind started spinning with all of the options the internet was throwing at her.
    She closed her eyes, and tried to just focus on breathing for a moment. There had to be a way to make this work, and she wouldn’t give up until she found it. She would sort through her options, until she found the one that worked.
    A few moments later, her phone beeped loudly, telling her that she had a text message. Her eyes flew open, and she looked down at the caller ID. To her surprise, she saw the name Bailey Webb displayed on the screen. Bailey had been a patient of hers at the hospital after a recent hotel fire in Red Valley. Bailey had been in Red Valley for a work trip, and didn’t know anyone. Since all of Bailey’s things had burned up in the fire, Mindy had loaned her a hundred dollars to help her out. Bailey hadn’t even had an ID to get back home to Washington D.C., where she was from. Bailey had seemed grateful, but Mindy hadn’t heard from Bailey since the day she left the hospital. Mindy had begun to think that she might never see the loaned money again, but she had decided to just consider it a good deed. Bailey had been through a lot, and paying Mindy back was probably not the top thing on her mind. Mindy let it go, and hoped that the good karma she had sown would eventually come back to her.
    But now, Bailey had texted Mindy to tell her that she was still in Red Valley, and was planning to stay in the area indefinitely. She wanted to know if Mindy was free to meet for coffee the next morning so that she could