Edward (BBW Western Bear Shifter Romance) (Rodeo Bears Book 1) (88 page)

“It’s really looking awesome in here,” Knox said, peaking into the bathroom. “And it smells good. I like that floral cleaner stuff we got.”

“Thanks.” Jasmine brushed a hair from her forehead with her arm and set down the scrub brush. The tile floors were gorgeous—once she scrubbed the layers of dirt off.

“I talked to Slade, too. We’re going to pay you more than what we agreed on. This place is so gross, and you’ve already done such an awesome job, it’s the least we can do.”

“Thank you very much. It’s a big help to me, and just that you would take a chance on someone with no experience.” She chuckled. “I thought I did very poorly in the interview.”

“I think it was the ‘my good looks’ comment that won it for you.” He winked at her.

She shook her head and felt her cheeks warm. “I can’t believe I said that.”

“Well, it’s certainly true.”

She looked down, her pulse speeding up at his words.

“I came up here to ask you a question, though. A favor.”

She pulled the gloves off, one finger at a time, and stood up.

“Something is up with one of the hives. We had a lot of deaths.” His smile faded and his face became concerned, maybe even worried. “We’re not sure what’s going on, and we don’t want anything to affect the other hives. Can you come take a look at something? We want to clean it all out, but I’m not sure what would be best.”

“Okay, sure.”

She followed him out of the house, into the backyard, her heart racing now for a different reason. She didn’t want to be anywhere near these bees. But how could she say no? He’d just given her a raise, and compliments, and he was her employer. She prayed the bees would stay far from her.

Knox took her to one of the wooden boxes where Beck stood, looking inside. Several flat pieces of wood leaned against the box. She thought it was the honeycomb, but wasn’t sure.
 

“So, here’s the thing,” Knox said. “First, we have all these dead bees. There’s a place we can send them for testing, and we’re going to do that, but we only need to send a few. We need to get the rest out of there, and we need to clean everything out in case there’s a contaminate. So, what can we clean it with that won’t be toxic for the bees when we rebuild the hive?”

She looked down in the hive and her eyes widened. The box was full of bees and the sides of the box were coated in a sticky substance. She didn’t know if it was honey or something else. There were several products that would take off stickiness, but something safe for bees?

“I’m not really sure,” she said. “Vinegar can clean a lot of things and is usually not toxic.”

Beck nodded. “I think I’ve heard of that. I’ll check online. I’m sure there’s info for that.”

“Can you help us with this?” Knox said. “We need to take all these frames in to be processed.”

“Okay.”

He picked up a few of the frames that were leaning against the box. He handed some to her, several to Beck, and took the rest. They walked toward the building. She looked down and noticed that one of the frames she carried had a bee crawling slowly across the wood. She watched it for a moment. It seemed to be moving slowly, but it made her nervous.

“Umm, Knox?”

He looked back at her over his shoulder.

“This bee is alive.”

He stopped and looked at the frame. “I’ll take it.”

When he picked it up, the bee flew off and landed on her hand. She let out a startled scream and yanked her hand away. Then she felt the pinch of a sting.

“It stung me!” She almost dropped the other frames, but handed them to Knox so she could inspect the sting.

“It’s dazed from whatever killed the hive. I probably aggravated it by picking up the frame. We have stuff in the house to clean out a sting.”

“Umm, should it look like that?” Jasmine looked down at the place the bee had stung her, which was now rising on her skin into a small mound.

Knox’s eyes grew wide. “Are you allergic to bee stings?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think I’ve ever been stung before.”

“Crap.” He set the frames down and said to Beck, “I’m gonna take her to the hospital.”
 

Beck picked up their frames and stacked them onto his. He glanced at her hand. “Oh wow, that looks bad. Hurry.”

“I will. Come on,” Knox said, and took her other hand to pull her along. “Can you breathe okay?” He yanked open his truck door and helped her in.

“Yes.” She buckled her seatbelt as he sped off.

“Can you swallow okay?”

She swallowed and thought it felt maybe a little tight, but didn’t know if that was just from her increasing panic. “I think so?”

He looked over at her, then sped up. They pulled into the ER, and he slammed the truck into park after pulling into a spot.
 

Her hand was now swollen to the point where the entire back of it was puffy and her wrist was swelling, too. In the center, where the sting was, had turned an angry red.

Knox took her by the hand and hurried her into the ER. He made her sit, then went to tell a nurse what was happening. They immediately took her into a small exam room. The nurse shined a light in her eyes and looked down her throat.

“It looks like your face is starting to swell and you’re having a fairly serious reaction,” the nurse said. “We’re going to give you a shot of epinephrine to stop the allergic reaction.”

The woman prepared a needle and gave her the shot. The swelling started to go down quickly.
 

Another woman came in and took down all her information. Name, address, birth date, etc. She still had active insurance, luckily, and gave them the info for her policy.
 

She and Knox sat in the exam room for a while. They wanted to watch her reaction and get her an Epipen, they said. She wouldn’t need to be admitted, which she was relieved to hear.

After a while, the woman who had taken her information came back. “Okay, we have your insurance all set. We connected your next of kin listed, Darius Cruz, per the instructions on the account. He said he was on his way.” The woman smiled and left the room.

Whatever panic Jasmine had felt at the sting was nothing compared to the panic she felt now. She looked at Knox with a wild expression.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Why would they do that? Why would they call him?”

“She said your account said to. Why? Is that a problem?”

Tears already formed in her eyes. “I have to get out of here before he gets here.”

Knox seemed shocked by her reaction. “Okay. I’ll find the nurse.”

“No!” Jasmine looked around, making sure no one was near the door. “If they know I’m leaving, they might tell him.”

“Okay, it’s okay.” He stood up and went to the door, looking out in both directions before saying, “Come on.”

They hurried through hall, trying not to draw attention to themselves. He kept looking around, watching for anyone that might notice them or approach them. They got to his truck, and he pulled away quickly.

Jasmine closed her eyes and couldn’t stop the tears from running down her cheeks. She felt the truck stop and opened her eyes to look at Knox. He had pulled over and was turned in his seat to face her.

“What’s going on, Jasmine? Who is Darius, and why are you so afraid of him?”

“He’s my ex-husband.” She wiped the tears away. “He can’t find me. He just can’t.”

“Okay…”

She didn’t want to tell him everything. Maybe he didn’t want an employee that had so many problems.
 

“Jasmine.”

She bit her lip and met his eyes.

“Did he hurt you?”

Her vision blurred with fresh tears. She heard her seatbelt click as he released it. Then felt his arms around her. He pulled her close and let her cry on his shoulder.

“I’ll keep you safe,” he whispered.When she’d finished crying and making a complete fool of herself, Knox drove them back to his house.

“Why don’t you just come inside and rest for a while?” he said. “Don’t worry about doing anything else today.”

“Maybe you should just take me home.”

“I will. Later. I want to make sure you’re okay.”

He led her into the living room and brought a small blanket to her. She laid down and started to relax. Here, she felt safe. All these big men around and Knox who said he’d protect her.
 

“Do you need anything?”

“No, I’m okay, thanks,” she said.

“Alright. I’m going to head back outside, but just yell if you need something. Amir is in the basement and Slade’s in the office, so you’re not alone.”

“Thank you.”

She managed to calm down enough to take a short nap. The chaos of the day had gotten to her and made her tired. But she hadn’t slept long, and she woke to shouting. She recognized Knox’s voice out front and went to the window to see what was happening.

To her horror, Knox stood in the front lawn, yelling at Darius, who was flailing his arms and yelling back. She put her hand to her mouth. He had found her. She snuck to the door and peaked out the window in its center, listening carefully to what they were saying.

“She is my wife! I have a right to see her. I know she’s in there,” Darius said.

“I don’t care what you think you have a right to. This is my house and my property, and I said you need to go, now.” Knox poked his finger into Darius’s chest.

Darius stepped back. He was nothing in size compared to Knox, and she thought that he looked somewhat scared.

“I have a gun,” Darius said. “I will come in the middle of the night and shoot you in the head.”

Knox threw back his head and laughed. Darius made a huge mistake then. He swung his fist and tried to hit Knox. Knox put his hand up and caught the punch effortlessly. He swung his other arm and punched Darius in the jaw. Darius started swinging wildly, his hands flying, not connecting, but just trying to hit something.

Knox took a step back, away from him. He dropped to the ground, putting his hands down like he was doing a push up. Jasmine thought this was odd, but her confusion turned to shock when Knox’s clothing burst and split, revealing thick black hair. He stood up and the man that had been Knox was now a huge black bear.

She gasped. Darius reacted much the same way. His jaw hung open and his eyes were huge as he backed away. Knox growled and leapt at him. Darius turned and ran, and Knox chased after him.

 
Jasmine watched them run into the woods. Minutes later, Darius reappeared and ran to his car. He got the door open, whipping his head around frantically. He climbed in and didn’t even have the door closed fully before he sped off, kicking a dust storm up behind him. She kept watching for Knox. She didn’t know if he’d come out as a bear or a man, but she kept her eyes on the place where he’d disappeared into the woods.

“Everything okay?”

Jasmine jumped and let out a startled scream. She turned to face Slade.

“Sorry,” he said. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

She pointed to the door, her speech failing her. “Knox… Darius…” She shook her head. “He turned into a bear.”

“Ah.” Slade nodded in understanding. “I guess you didn’t know he could do that?”

She blinked at him. So, this was something people knew about? So, it had actually happened then and she hadn’t imagined it.
 

“Don’t be afraid,” Slade said. “I know it might seem a little strange at first. You’ve probably heard horrible stories about shifters.”

She nodded slowly, thinking back to her childhood and the stories people told. That they were terrifying beasts capable of horrific things. She could see why people believed that. Knox as a bear had been quite scary.

The front door opened and Knox walked in, wearing only shorts. “Hey. Everything okay?”

Jasmine just stared at him, at his muscular bare chest. He had a collection of thick black curls in the center, and she could see the veins popping from his arms.

Slade said, “She saw.”

“Oh.” Knox gave her a concerned look. “Let’s just sit down and talk, okay?”

She walked numbly to the couch and sat. He sat across from her on the chair.

“Please don’t be afraid. Are you afraid?”

“I—I—”

He let out a breath in a hard sigh, then reached out slowly to take her hand. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m a shifter. I can change into a bear, but it’s something that I control completely. It doesn’t happen by accident or if I get mad or anything like that. I’m not like the Hulk. And even when I am a bear, I’m still me. I know what I’m doing and who I am and who you are.”

She stared into his gold eyes, listening carefully.

“Did you see that Darius showed up?”

She nodded.

“I chased him off. I doubt he’ll come back. Usually people get pretty scared when I shift. Do you have any questions?”

She thought about how all five of them were so huge and had the same gold eyes. “Are you all bear shifters?”