Page 23 of Bear My Heart

"…shelving books?"

"That too, but I meant the whole fate thing!"

Shanti said, "The what?" as all three of the redheads hissed breath in between their teeth as they followed Shanti and Sabrina.

"The whole fated mates thing, you know, love at first sig…oh, no." Sabrina dropped Shanti's arm, not in an unfriendly way, but so she could press her hands over her mouth, eyes huge above her fingertips. "Oh no. He hasn't talked to you about it yet?"

Shanti's "About what?" was more or less lost beneath the other three women going, "Sabrina!" in various tones and volumes of dismay.

Sabrina moaned behind her hands and sank down to the floor, hiding her whole face behind her palms. "Ooooh nooo. I mean it's not bad! It's all good! I'm just…oops? You just look so stunned and I totally get it?"

The other three said, "Sabrina!" again, this time sort of hopelessly, like the cat was all the way out of the bag. Which would have been fine if Shanti had the foggiest idea what they were talking about at all.

"You get it? How can you get…" Her own hands lifted and waved in the air helplessly, like she was trying to encompass all the overwhelming feelings that had cropped up in her overnight. No, even faster than overnight: literally from the moment she'd laid eyes on Peter Baranov. "What do you mean, fated mates? How do you know that I just…it's just a crush, right? It has to be? But how do you even know? What…?"

Hannah, with a note of genuine severity, said, "This is why we keep our mouths shut, Sabrina," and the petite, curvy woman on the floor groaned behind her hands again.

"I know. I know. I'm sorry, I just thought—I don't even know what I thought I was doing, except commiserating." She peeked up at Shanti through her fingers. "Oh my God, you didn't just meet today, did you? He hasn't had time to tell you? Not that Luke told me for…oh, man, I blew it."

"What are you talking about?" Shanti's voice rose and broke. She took a step back, and another, until she bumped into the bookshelves on the far wall, and then she wondered why she hadn't run for the door, which was much closer, instead.

Except part of her knew why: somehow, Sabrina Keep—and apparently the redheaded sisters—understood the enormous, wonderful, terrifying emotional storm that had risen in Shanti since she met Peter. "What's happening to me?"

"You're from here," Sabrina mumbled. "I figured you knew. Oh, man, I'm sorry. But look…it happened to me too. When I met Luke, he just knocked me off my feet. I was like, this guy's a total stranger and I think I want to marry him. Right?"

"I don't—what? Yes, but—what?"

Zim, the quietest of the three redheads, groaned. "You're from Virtue, right? Have you ever noticed anything a little strange about this town?"

Shanti stared at her a moment, honestly trying to think if there was anything weird about her home town. "I don't know. There's the Easter Bunny, I guess…?" Because she was pretty sure most places didn't have a forty pound fluffy bunny actually deliver baskets of eggs and chocolate to kids in their town squares during the Easter season.

Sabrina crowed, "Yes!" with obvious relief as the three redheads exchanged glances. Abby shook her head and left the bookstore as Sabrina said, "So the bunny is⁠—"

"Sabrina," Hannah said firmly, and the blonde woman clamped her mouth closed, but then scowled defiantly at Hannah.

"What? She'll find out anyway!"

"Not if you're wrong," Hannah said, still firmly. "And even if you're not, it's not your place to tell her."

"I'm not wrong," Sabrina muttered. "You don't think I'm wrong, either. You're just⁠—"

"Doing what keeps people safe," Zim said, much more shortly than Hannah had spoken.

Shanti flung her hands upward. "What's keeping people safe? What are you not telling me? What is Peter not telling me?"

Peter, from the doorway, with Abby a shadow behind him, said, "That I'm a shifter."

CHAPTER 12

Pete had already been on his way back to the bookstore when Abby came out to get him: shifter hearing meant he could pick up on the rising voices inside, and shifter scenting, which he rarely noticed when in human form, told him that Shanti's stress levels were skyrocketing. Now she was staring at him in bewilderment across the bookstore, where Sabrina Keep sat on the floor and two of the three redheaded women who owned the place were inside, looking pained. Abby squeezed past him and joined her sisters, her expression also pained.

"What's a shifter?" Shanti demanded. "I don't even know what that means!"

"Shifters are people who can—we turn into animals." Pete had never tried explaining this, and discovered immediately that it was even more difficult than he'd expected. "Not any animal. One each. I can't show you because I'm too big for this space, but…there are a lot of shifters in Virtue, Shanti. It's a haven town for our kind."

"People don't turn into animals," Shanti said blankly.

All four women ducked their heads and smiled, with Sabrina muttering, "That's what I thought, too," before Abby said, "What are you?" to Peter.