Recon Bear: Bear Shifter Romance: B.E.A.R.S., #1

By Candace Ayers

Bashful Bunny meets Big Bad Bruin

 

The school librarian, Violet Caldwell, is in for a surprise this fall.
There's a new faculty member at Gasparilla Junior High.
He appears to be an unassuming history teacher, but Violet knows better.

He's dangerous.
He's dominant.
He's her mate!

All she can think to do is to run…and hide!
(It's not her finest moment, but…)

She's riddled with anxiety.
She's frightened of everything.
She's on the verge of a panic attack!

B.E.A.R.S. (Bruin Evaluation Assessment and Reconnaissance Specialists) series, Book #1: Knox and Violet.

SERIES READING ORDER:
1. P.O.L.A.R.
2. Cybermates
3. B.E.A.R.S.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lovestruck Romance
• Release date: Jul 17, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201950606

Book preview

1

KNOX

Is the house to your satisfaction, Your Royal Highness? Brennan Malkovich did absolutely nothing to conceal her sarcasm. It oozed through the phone like wet sand through bare toes. I’d hate to compromise your elegant style and exquisite taste or, heaven forbid, mistake you for one of us lowly peons.

I groaned. Make one comment, one time, and she never lets me forget it.

You said that if I thought the places I rented for you were habitable, you’d hate to see where I lived.

Wincing, I looked around the beach house that she’d recently procured for me on Sunkissed Key, well, for Andrew Waters, my alias. I should have kept my big mouth shut. When would I ever learn? It hadn’t been my finest moment, but in my defense, at the time I’d been running on two hours’ sleep, and after waking to cockroaches skittering across my stomach, I found a rat chewing a hole through my box of Sugar Puffs. That was enough to give anyone a short fuse. Well, I apologize for my insensitive comment. Again.

Insult.

I apologize for my insensitive insult.

She cleared her throat. What do you think of your new last name? Cute, right? Waters? ‘Cause you’re on the ocean.

Very clever.

I dropped my duffle next to the nightstand in the small bedroom and sat on the edge of the bed. Being stuck on one plane or another for over twenty-four hours was no picnic in the park. My body was stiff, I was tired, and the last thing I wanted to do was argue with Bren about anything.

Ha! So maybe you are learning women, Knox.

Fine. I get it. You’re in a mood. I could practically hear her rolling her eyes. A moving truck unloaded your things earlier in the day. They were from the Organization, so it was probably done with all the finesse of a drunk ape with a limp, but what can you do? They were instructed to leave your papers and a go bag hidden behind the back panel of a portable wardrobe, which, by the way, I’ve also had stocked with clothes befitting a junior high school history teacher.

I released a sigh. That’s the biggest joke I’ve ever heard. The point of my job was to blend in. The likelihood of me blending in as a history teacher was little to zero.

"There were no other jobs open, Andrew. It’s a small island. Unless you wanted to work as a receptionist in a hair salon called Jammie’s, you were shit out of other options. She was enjoying this immensely, I was certain. And, FYI, none of the other B.E.A.R.S. handlers have to listen to so much grumbling and complaining from their specialists. I’ve asked around. No one gets the grief I do, dealing with you."

Well, lucky you. You’ll soon be working with one of those nongrumbling agents.

The phone went silent. If not for Brennan’s gentle breathing, I’d have thought the connection was dropped. I shouldn’t have said that. The two of us always joked around about stuff like that, but now that it was close to being a reality, it had ceased to be funny.

Sorry. With a grunt, I kicked my duffel under the bed. You know I appreciate you. Always have. I’ll miss you, and I’m well aware that without you, I’d have been lost these past twelve years.

You’d be dead without me. You know how many times I’ve saved your furry ass? I could have sworn I heard her sniffle, although she’d never admit it. One more. This one last assignment, then it’s sayonara, adios, ciao. We’ll finally be free of one another.

My stomach twisted as much at the thought as at the underlying melancholy I sensed from her. She and I had worked together as a team since the day she was assigned to B.E.A.R.S., the Organization’s bruin evaluation, assessment, and reconnaissance specialists.

She’d been the voice in my head for every single assignment over the last twelve years. I’d miss her. It was true that I’d placed my life in her hands on more than one occasion, and she’d never once taken that trust lightly. Situations like ours forced people to bond. There was even a time when we questioned whether our relationship had sparked deeper feelings, and it had. Just not the lusty or romantic kind. More like the sibling kind. I’d do anything for her. Lay down my life for her, kill any fucker that harmed or wronged her, but our love was the familial type. She was like an annoying kid sister. You could leave too, Bren, you know. Resign, do something else.

Like what? My particular skill set doesn’t translate well to the real world. She snorted.

Come on now. You’re an incredibly intelligent and capable person, not to mention tech-savvy. You could do anything. You don’t have to be tied to the Organization, Bren. You could get out too.

She grunted and changed the subject. Do you see the go bag, or not?

I rolled off the bed, removed the false panel at the back of the wardrobe, and retrieved the bag from the narrow cubby. I had to slide some very questionable-looking beige cardigans, short-sleeved button-down shirts, and what looked like corduroy chinos aside to reach it. I’m not wearing fucking corduroy.

Jesus, Knox, you’re supposed to be a junior high school history teacher. What do you want to wear? Leather chaps and a chainmail harness?

I barked a laugh. I worry about you sometimes.

Wear the damn corduroys.

My go bag contained paperwork with the details of my new identity, as well as the extras I’d need in the event the mission went south and I had to escape quickly. At the bottom was my handgun, which I’d been unable to board the plane with.

My eyes scanned the info sheets. I was Andrew Waters, age forty-six, originally from Nebraska. I’ve been living in Tennessee for the past nine years and teaching at Fort Gray Junior High School.

Aren’t I just a party animal? Two-time divorcé. That’s my favorite part.

The rest of the information was just general stuff. Blah, blah, blah…

But I nearly choked on my own spit when I got to the bottom of the page. I’m teaching history to two hundred kids a day? Like, real kids?

No, they’ll be wooden children, Geppetto. Of course they’re real kids!

Are you fucking kidding me? I’m not trained to teach kids!"

What exactly did you think you’d be doing as a history teacher? Combat drills?

I don’t fucking know, but it didn’t register that it would involve actual children. Christ, Brennan. I’m not good with kids. This is not a good cover.

Just don’t say ‘fuck’ and you’ll be fine.

I couldn’t stop shaking my head. Nope. No way. This is not going to work.

You’re a history buff, Knox. I heard her tapping away at her keyboard. Teaching history is going to be a breeze for you.

That’s not the part I’m worried about.

You start tomorrow morning, and stop worrying. She sounded like she was grinning—I was pretty sure she was grinning. Day one is an in-service day, a day of training with the other teachers before the kids show up.

A day? One measly fucking day of training?

Welcome to being a teacher. It’s a thankless grind. She whistled at her dog in the background and then hung up without saying goodbye.

I sighed and caught sight of myself in the mirror over the dresser. I was 6’8" and 280 pounds of lean, toned, and finely honed muscle.

I terrified children.

Rightfully so.

Groaning, I leafed through the clothes in the closet, taking another look at the corduroys.

There was no fucking way.

2

VIOLET

I loved the smell of books. From the slightly musty scent of the older volumes with yellowed pages and layers of dust, to the crisp freshly printed pages of new releases.

The first day back at Gasparilla Junior High and I couldn’t wipe the grin off my face. I was practically bouncing around the library. I loved the aroma of the room, a mix of the polished wood of the bookcases, the musky scent of the books, and the salt air that wafted through the open windows on the gentle breeze rolling off the Atlantic Ocean.

The school building was old but well maintained and had been built on prime real estate, with an amazing view of the sea. My library, as I liked to think of it, had two levels. The upper level was a mezzanine that was open to the floor below. Bookshelves stretched from floor to ceiling on both levels, and there were several sliding ladders to access the books on the uppermost shelves. They were my favorite feature of the library. Every time I needed to climb one, and to be honest I looked for reasons, I pretended I was Belle from Beauty and the Beast.

The kids wouldn’t be arriving until tomorrow, so I had the library to myself. The school janitorial crew had already come in the week before and dusted and scrubbed everything down, which added the aroma of Murphy’s Oil Soap and industrial carpet cleaner to the already welcoming scents.

There were teacher and auxiliary faculty and staff meetings scheduled all day, but before my first meeting, I wanted to organize the new books that had come in over the summer. They needed to be cataloged in the system and have labels printed and adhered before the books were shelved.

I was maybe the only faculty member that loved my job so much that I hated when the doors closed in the late spring, and delighted when they reopened in the fall.

As I happily sorted the new books, I made mental notes for each one about which students I thought would enjoy it. Engrossed in my work, I was climbing the ladder to shelve a fresh copy of an old Agatha Christie paperback when a sharp knock sounded on one of the windows facing the hallway.

I jumped and grabbed the ladder to keep from falling. Rachel Vaughn, the art teacher, watched with a satisfied smirk. I pretended to be totally unaffected by her attempt to startle me and descended the ladder with a faux smile.

Team-building exercise in the cafeteria. Her lips were an especially bold shade of hot pink today. You can manage that, can’t you, worm?

I nodded, keeping the forced smile in place. Yep.

Worm was short for bookworm, Rachel’s form of endearment toward me—not. It was another of her attempts to belittle me, but it was not going to work. I refused to acknowledge her pettiness.

Her eyes scanned me from head to toe before her nose wrinkled as though she’d just gotten a whiff of manure. Then, she turned on her heel and strode away, her hips swaying as she tossed her long hair over her shoulder.

I’d known Rachel for years, since we had both walked these same halls as junior high school students. She was the proverbial mean girl and I was the dweeby nerd. I never knew why she hated me since she was prettier, more popular, had a better homelife, and seemed to live a more advantageous life all the way around. But she’d made my life miserable then, much the same way she was trying to do now. Some things just never changed, I guessed.

I ran my sweaty palms down the front of my