Claim the Bear by T. S. Joyce

slowly. “No.”
    Agony ripped through him at the thought of losing Breshia now. “How do I keep her?”
    “The pride let up on getting me back when I got Muriel pregnant.”
    “You’re saying breed Breshia.”
    “When you are both ready. Doesn’t have to be now, but that’s when you’ll likely feel the relief. It won’t always be like this.”
    Logan hopped out of the truck and Dillon watched him greet Ethan and Reese near the main tent.
    Bringing a baby into this mess wasn’t going to solve anything.
    Somehow, he was going to have to think of another way to get the pride to let his mate go.

Chapter Ten
    “Follow me,” Bron clipped out, hands behind his back and posture ramrod straight.
    Breshia wrung her hands and stepped in line behind him. They filed through the front door of his house, but he turned abruptly.
    “Everything you said yesterday was truth, but before we move forward, I want you to swear to me you aren’t part of some convoluted plan for the pride to hurt my people.”
    “I swear,” she said.
    “Good. I am sorry about what you’ve been through, Breshia.” His dark hair fell forward into his bright eyes and he cocked his head as if he were studying her. “I haven’t ever concerned myself with pride politics, and all of this information about how it really is for you and your kind is unsettling. We are a monogamous clan of shifters. Do you think you’ll be able to handle a single relationship with Dillon?”
    “You’re asking if he will be enough for me?”
    “He’s one of my best friends. I want to know you feel about him the way I can tell he feels about you.”
    “I think I already love him,” she whispered honestly as heat flared up her neck.
    Bron’s smile transformed his entire face. “Good. Come with me. I have someone you need to meet.”
    Bron led her into a sunroom at the back of the house, and a dark-haired woman with her back to them turned. Anger flashed in her eyes before she dropped her gaze to a small bundle in her arms.
    “I’ll leave you to it,” Bron murmured, then left.
    “Tell me you aren’t here to take my child,” the woman said in a shaking voice.
    The room smelled like bear and fury, so Breshia backed into the corner farthest away from the woman. “I’m not here for that. I’m here for sanctuary. The pride isn’t my home anymore. Maybe it never was, I don’t know. I just…I guess I needed to start over, and the only place to do that seemed to be here.”
    The woman drew her hard gaze back to her, but Breshia couldn’t hold it. Instead, she stared at the hem of the woman’s dark blue jeans.
    “Logan told me about you.”
    Unable to find her words, Breshia nodded. She hadn’t a clue what Logan told her, or how much he even knew about her, but she was too frightened to ask.
    “I’m Muriel.” Silence descended heavily on the room. “What’s your name?”
    “Bre—Breshia.”
    “My mate told me you were in charge of the cubs in the pride.”
    “I was.” A pang hit her in the gut with how much she missed Samuel. His smell, and the little noises he made.
    “This is my daughter, Abigail.” Muriel lifted the corner of a pastel yellow blanket away from the little bundle. A beautiful infant with dark hair looked back at Breshia with solemn blue eyes.
    Breshia paced closer, fear warring with her curiosity. This was the child Shira was willing to go to battle for.
    When Muriel lifted her bright green eyes back to Breshia, they were rimmed with tears. “She stopped eating two days ago. I’ve tried everything, even formula. Her scent started changing, like she’s sick. She stays fussy most of the time and only seems to settle if I have her swaddled up tight like this. I have asked every mother in the clan what could be wrong with her, but no one has any answers and I can’t take her to the hospital. They’d find out something was different with her. When Logan told me you had experience with babies, I thought it worth the risk to summon