Wounded Shifter

2. Familiar Stranger

"I don't want him back." Anya sat across from her friend, Carly, who was giving her a look. "I'm miserable yes, but that's the mark searing anytime I try to move on, not me fixating on him. It's been six years i should be allowed to move on."

"Anya, will you at least meet his kid." Carly, ever the therapist friend, suggested. "Either way I'm on your side."

"I don't want to potentially lash out at him when the guilty party is Ezra and that woman." Anya sighed tiredly. "I hear a but coming."

"I saw the kid in the nurse's office more often than I should've. He's not safe with her." She set her coffee down and was leveling a worried look at Anya.

"Of course not, Jolene flew onto the ranch like she owned the place and started bossing our hands around. Then she slapped me for asking who she was and then had the audacity to claim to be his mate. The fact she walked away with only a warning and not an assault charge is both a miracle and an act of corruption."

"Ah, I hear from the rumor mill that she was suing for child support." Carly's face twisted with a sneer at that.

"It won't go anywhere, when the guys signed the deed they also had a contract that they all signed and had notarized. In the event of an affair, the portion of the ranch held by the guilty party will be held in a trust until the eldest child from the marriage reaches the age of majority." Anya remembers signing this as well when the three brothers decided to get their mates included in the deed so they wouldn't have to rely on the other brothers' charity.

"How are you handling all of this with Jolene and the kids and Ezra being declared missing by her." Anya could tell Carly was just showing concern for her friend, even if it felt like she was giving a story to the town's rumor mill.

"I'm not, I'm hanging by a thread and it sucks. I know I'm not at fault for any of this but with how old their kid is, I can't help but wonder if it was because I wasn't enough. I know I was enough but I don't feel it and it's dragging my mood down like there is a bear of my own trying to break out but if I let it I'll lose my kids and I can't do that."

Carly's pager went off then.

"Shit, my break is up. Are you sure you're alright for now?"

"I'll live to see tomorrow, don't worry." Anya gave her friend a small smile that had a hard time reaching her eyes before standing and leaving the comfort of the coffee shop and embracing the sullen feeling that rested in her chest.

She sat in the car and sighed, resting her head on the steering wheel as she gained her composure. A ding from her phone told her that a text from Samuel or Jeremiah had reached her. She pulled it out and read it. She was told to spend an hour for herself since they had the kids. She lifted her head and caught sight of an idea. There, a ways down the road, was the Rubber Duck, the town's bar.

Anya threw the car into drive with the intention of mulling over one drink and sighing mournfully to the air. A tradition that she had been doing since five years ago when Amalie was finally weaned off breastfeeding. The owner was a friend of Samuel's and had already gotten the rundown of why a, in her words, a fine piece of tail was at the bar with a damaged mark. Six years since she found out her mate was a cheating ass to the very day. It was also the day Amalie's twin left her side permanently.

She took her usual seat at the corner of the bar where people left her alone to her one beer and melancholy. Save this time. Someone slid into the seat next to her and ordered her another drink.

"I guess that this is an anniversary of something?" The man's voice held a familiar note that all the Ross Brothers carried.

"You would be right." Anya glanced at the man who was about as large as David at least, his hair the same black of her in-laws and kids.

"Where's your mate? They shouldn't leave you alone in a place like this." He huffed annoyed that someone would be so stupid.

"You tell me, bastard cheated and was kicked out. Haven't had the agony of seeing his ugly mug again." She turned her attention to her one beer.

"If his affair led to any offspring, the poor kid won't be blessed with a mate themselves. It's payback for such a sin." He sighed and shifted in his seat.

"You know this because?" She sent him a skeptical look.

"I'm one of those kids, I'm traveling through to find my brothers, would you happen to know the Ross brothers?" He flashed a smile at her earning a dry chuckle from her and the nearby bartender.

"You don't know? You're talking to Ezra's mate. Fucker messed around with one of the gals at Paradise and got caught. Serves him right to get skinned." The bartender cackled at the man. "Sorry, Anya, not laughing at you. Promise."

"Go on, it's fucking hilarious." Anya downed the last of her beer and left the bar after leaving a tip.

"Hey, where are you going?" The man that hasn't given her his name grabbed her arm stopping her at the door, gaining a look of disapproval from everyone in the bar.

"If you value whatever life you have I'd let go before they start standing. It's for your sake really, they hit softer." Anya gave him a cold stare that made him release his grip with an apology. "You may follow me outside where I will call Sam, and have him confer with David about you coming over. But I need a name."

"Isaac. Isaac Grant, I use mom's last name because the furry bastard did to my mom what he did to theirs once he actually met me and found out I'm not a bear. And-" Anya cut him off, another glance making her notice how much like Ezra his face was.

"I said name not back story, come on you can tell all three of us in one fell swoop instead of repeating the whole thing over again if you are allowed on the premises that is." She walked out the door after she finished speaking leaving a dazed Isaac standing there for a moment.

"I think I'm in love." He muttered, the nearest tables stared at him with a worried look before betting on how this would play out.

Anya finished the call and then looked over at the man who was joining her by her car.

"Sam and David said you are welcome to join us for a late drink and maybe, since I have an extra bed and no mate to bang around the house at night you could crash at my place." She ran a hand through her auburn hair and huffed a sigh. "Do you need a ride or?"

"I can follow you on my bike." Isaac pointed towards his motorcycle a couple parking spaces over.

~~~~~~

Everything was gray. Has been for six years. He was lighter than a bear should be. He didn't even make it a month before Jolene tried to force herself into his life reeking of deceit and her clients. The smell of a cougar wafting around her. His bear couldn't take it and busted out of him and barreled his way to the woods around the ranch. Where he sat on his big fuzzy butt and watched over his family. He should've just told Anya everything the moment he woke up with a sick feeling all around him. He should've said something. But no, he let the worse night of his life become something that could control him and now he's paying for it.

So here he was watching his mate with another man walking to his cabin, his den, the cubs were there. She wouldn't. Would she? Would Anya let this man into their bed just to spite him? He deserves it. The cubs don't need to witness that. He wanted to stop her but his bear wouldn't move an inch and just sat on his fuzzy ass just to make him suffer from the knowledge that another man was going into his den where his mate and cubs were.

A shift in the wind made his heart twist. It wasn't just a man. It was a lion shifter. A lion shifter was in his den warming his mates bed and he deserves every bit of this. Fuck.