Bear This Heat (A BBW Shifter Romance) (Last of the Shapeshifters) by A.E. Grace Page A

knew from the moment I saw him that he was connected to Kinnear’s death in some manner.
    Dylan: Yeah, but you got it backward.
    Sasha: Put yourself in my shoes. We’ve talked about this before.
    Interviewer: Did you have any hint that you two would, you know- [Interrupted by Sasha]
    Sasha: [Interrupts.] No, not really. I mean, he’s attractive. I definitely noticed that. Then again, I was on duty. I had to notice it.
    Dylan: I knew.
    Sasha: No, you didn’t.
    Dylan: I did.
    [Short pause.]
    Interviewer: Explain to me what was going through your mind when you told him the location of the murder scene?
    Sasha: You can’t hold someone for more than twenty-four hours unless you have something solid, right? Well, Sally Clark’s drunken testimony would be a liability if I took him in then. I had to get something on him so I could hold him for longer.
     
    - Excerpt from full transcript of Interview with a Shapeshifter by Circe Cole. Printed with expressed permission.
     
    *
     
    She had been delectable, Dylan thought to himself. He was beginning to realize that he was wrong. He hadn’t quenched that thirst, never exhausted that drive. It had only been lying dormant, buried under more pressing, more immediate needs. The need to find answers. The need that had brought him to Salty Springs, that had introduced him to a woman that made him feel warm and fuzzy inside.
    This D.I. Sasha Monroe… she had looked like a woman used to pressure, and had no problems being in control. The thought intrigued him in a variety of ways, none of them appropriate.
    He turned around as he walked away, seeing the car still parked. He was certain she was looking at him in the rear-view mirror. She might even follow him for a while, or get one of her boys to, to see what he was up to. And that also intrigued him. What had them her so worked up that they would question a man in public like that? Granted, nobody else had been around, but the tactic smelled of desperation, and he was pretty sure was completely illegal.
    Those two uniformed policemen as well, they had acted oddly, hands quickly to their guns as though they were expecting danger. And while Dylan could certainly see why he could be considered dangerous, only someone armed with the knowledge of what he truly was could make that call. And these police officers had no idea.
    He did have one clue, though, and he didn’t doubt that it was spoon-fed to him by the lovely Sasha. Namedropping the street was definitely odd, and not something a seasoned police officer would do, and so he knew that, it wasn’t a mistake. He figured he’d take the bait – he had nothing to lose, and he might find out what all the fuss was about.
    He was beginning to think that it couldn’t be a coincidence that just days after there had been wolf sightings in the greater area that he turn up at the only logical destination to find an antsy police force quick to their side-arms. Not to mention a rather unique interest in new folks in town.
    “Lester Street,” he hummed to himself, pulling out a folded map from his back pocket. His arms glistened with sweat, but the heat was dry. He wasn’t dripping. It was just a sheen. The map of the small town was from the tourist office, and was one of those sorts of maps that were cartoon-like, off-scale and with little clipart images of the major attractions in and around Salty Springs.
    He had indeed read in a brochure why the town was called that, and the answer was as benign as it was expected. The town had first been settled because there were generous springs, the only water source for miles. The town had, at first, been called Megan Springs, after the horse of the man who found the water source. Fresh water in the desert! Rarer – and more valuable – than gemstone.
    But over time the water started to grow salty, and so the name of the town was changed to Salty Springs. But by then it had already been settled, and the people refused to move out, as people do. That