Beary And Bright (Fire Bear Shifters 6) by Sloane Meyers Page A

Christmas with the Burning Claws Crew. But she still felt like something was missing, and she knew what it was: love. Christmas was a beautiful season for lovers, and Clara hadn’t had a lover in a long time. Clara frowned, then hit the switch to turn off the radio. She needed a break from the jolly music.
    Moments later, the skies opened up and rain started pouring down again. Clara hadn’t been here in northern California long enough to truly appreciate how unusual these constant rainstorms were, but everyone in the clan told her that they hadn’t seen this much rain in years. Clara strained to see through her blurry, rain covered windshield, and she pushed thoughts of her secret admirer away.
    She knew that, whoever he was, he was trying to be sweet and add mystery and intrigue by not telling her who she was. And, she supposed, a beautiful bouquet of flowers every day was pretty impressive. Okay, it was really impressive. But she didn’t have time or energy right now to play guessing games. Let him continue to send flowers, if he wanted. She wasn’t going to bend over backwards trying to find him. If he really thought he could handle her, then he would have to come forward and show who he was.
    Clara wasn’t the type of girl to sit around and wait for anyone.

Chapter Eight
     
    Despite claiming, to herself and to Riley, that she was not impressed by her secret admirer, Clara couldn’t deny that he knew how to romance a girl. As the days passed, the messages only got sweeter, and the bouquets more beautiful. By the time she had received a week’s worth of bouquets, Clara had to admit that she was starting to look forward to the daily deliveries. Still, she didn’t know who this guy was. And he didn’t know who she was. All of his romantic intentions might disappear once he found out that his love interest had a secret bear within her.
    Luckily, Clara had a lot of distractions that kept her from thinking too much about her secret admirer. On December ninth, Clara agreed to babysit Zach and Mindy’s daughter, Sophia in the morning. Zach and Mindy were on their way to the courthouse, where they would officially adopt their new son, Drew. Clara didn’t consider herself to be an expert with kids, but she figured she could manage for a few hours. Besides, Sophia was a sweet, well-behaved child. Clara enjoyed spending time with her.
    The sun was out that morning, so Clara and Sophia decided to enjoy the break in the rain. They took a soccer ball outside, and spent the better part of an hour kicking it back and forth. Clara got so warm that she took her hoodie off, and she marveled at the fact that she could be outside in just a t-shirt in the middle of November. Right now in Alaska, the temperatures would be well below freezing. Clara could hardly believe that Christmas was just a few weeks away. It didn’t feel like the holiday season to her, with no snow and warm weather. Clara briefly thought that she should get a Christmas tree to decorate for the hangar. No one had done that yet, presumably because anyone with free time was helping take care of last minute preparations for Zach’s wedding. Clara had a little time during the week, though. Maybe she should borrow a truck to run to one of the Christmas tree farms and pick up a towering pine for the hangar. Clara mentally added this to her list of things to do as she played with Sophia. The little girl laughed and kicked the ball, her ponytail bouncing as she ran around with boundless energy.
    “Auntie Clara, watch this!” Sophia said, then launched the soccer ball as high up in the air as she could. She collapsed into a fit of giggles as the ball came back down.
    “Wow,” Clara said, doing her best to show an appropriate level of amazement at Sophia’s feat. “You threw that ball really high!”
    Clara smiled as Sophia ran to get the ball, which had rolled a short distance away. She wondered if she would ever have a chance to kick a soccer ball around with