Page 9
His bear had the same idea. Yes! We should go to her.
Gabe wanted to. The temptation was almost impossible to deny. But what would she see if he did? A stranger running down Main Street toward her, out of breath, with nothing to say that would make any sense. He would only get one first meeting with his mate. He did not want her to remember it as the morning a man she had never met frightened her in the street.
His bear’s excitement grew. Let’s go!
No, Gabe said.
Why? his bear moaned.
Because she’s getting closer, Gabe replied.
You mean we don’t need to go to her, because fate is bringing her to us. His bear lifted his head.
The certainty inside him grew stronger. Yes.
So they waited. Trusting in fate. And their mate.
CHAPTER 3
Mara
“So those are your famous cinnamon bears.”
Mara leaned closer to the display case. Curtis had described them the day before, but she hadn’t quite pictured rows of actual bear-shaped pastries, their rounded ears and paws formed from twists of dough with cinnamon running through the layers.
The man behind the counter didn’t answer, and when Mara looked up, she found him staring at her.
Staring for long enough that she glanced down at herself, wondering whether she had managed to spill something on her shirt before she had even bought her morning coffee. When she looked back, he was still watching her.
“The cinnamon bears?” she prompted, pointing through the glass. “Curtis told me I had to try one.”
He blinked, as though she had brought him back from somewhere far away. “Right.” A faint flush moved over his cheekbones. “Yes. Sorry.”
Mara smiled. He was extremely attractive, which was unfortunate. She had come into Bear Creek looking for breakfast, not a man.
No. Definitely not a man less than a week after ending an eight-year relationship.
“I’ll have one,” she said.
“Good choice.” He reached for a plate.
“And coffee, please.” Mara looked past him to the front window. “I can see why you called it Mountain View Bakery.”
His smile came more easily this time. “The view might have influenced my choice of location.”
“I’m surprised you get any baking done.” She turned to look at him. “Aren’t you tempted just to stand and look at the view?”
“Sometimes.” He slid the cinnamon bear onto a plate and met her gaze. And held it. Then his eyes widened, and he looked away, as if he’d caught himself staring. “What kind of coffee?”
“Plain, with milk. No sugar.” Mara watched him reach for a mug, still amused by the fact that he seemed more flustered by her than she was by him.
“Staying or taking it with you?”
Mara looked around. The bakery didn’t have many tables, but they were mostly empty. An older couple sat by the window with half-empty mugs, and at another table a woman was wiping something sticky from a little girl’s hands while a boy folded a paper napkin into what might eventually become an airplane.
“Staying. I’ve got nowhere I need to be for a while.” She liked the sound of that. There was no schedule she had to keep this morning unless she chose one.
No one else to please. There was something freeing in that. When had she last picked a table, or a time, or anything at all, only because it suited her? She couldn’t remember. It ought to have felt lonely, breakfast for one in a town where she knew nobody. So why did it feel like the first deep breath she had taken all week?
