Fighter Bear: Steel Protection

He’s a fighter. She’s the one who stays. Their families are sworn enemies.

For thirty-four years, grizzly shifter Stella Keenan has been the dependable one—running her family’s Fate Mountain Diner, knowing every regular’s order, watching everyone else chase their dreams while she holds the fort. She’s almost given up on finding her fated mate. Then mate.com pings with a 100% match, and his face is one she knows by heart: it’s tacked to the diner’s break room wall under her father’s handwritten DO NOT SERVE.
Blaze Mercer left home at fifteen with nothing but his fists. He’s clawed his way from underground fighting pits across Asia to a hard-won home with his pack at Steel Protection—the very crew Stella’s father banned after a brawl wrecked his restaurant. Blaze has spent his whole life solving problems by hitting them until they stop. But you can’t fight your way into a mate bond. And the woman fate chose for him won’t even answer his messages.

When Stella’s beloved young assistant manager vanishes without a trace and the police run out of leads, she has only one option left: walk into Steel Protection and ask the enemy for help. The man she’s been pushing away is the only one who can find her friend.
What they uncover is bigger than one missing girl—an organized ring trafficking vulnerable shifter women through illegal fight clubs across the Pacific Northwest. To get inside, Blaze goes undercover as a pit fighter. And Stella insists on going in as his girlfriend.

One hotel room. One dangerous cover story. A mate bond neither of them can keep faking—until the operation goes sideways and Stella becomes the next woman they take.

He’ll bleed in the pit for her. He’ll tear the city apart to find her. Because the loyal bear who almost let family duty cost her everything is the one thing this fighter was always meant to protect.