Bearly Breathing (Werebears of New Hampshire #1)(24)

“We’re playing this,” he said. He brought the Trivial Pursuit box to the table and they set up the game.

“Your funeral,” she said, choosing the green pie.

Sidney sprung up and headed to the kitchen. He opened a cupboard for something that he had seen earlier when he was searching for matches. This would level the playing field a little bit.


“Since you’re such a genius,” he said, “let’s play this my way.” He pulled out an old bottle of Scotch and slammed it on the table. “Every time you get an answer wrong you take a sip.”

She rubbed her small hands together and glared at him. “You’re on.”





Sidney was drunk.

Angie was feeling pretty tipsy herself but her pie piece was almost full. She was just missing the sports category and she would win the game. Always f*cking sports.

She had taken a few swigs of that horrendous liquid herself because she missed a couple of answers. John Lombardi, Charles Barkley, Nolan Ryan…why the hell would they put a sports section in an intellectual game?

Those were the only questions that Sidney had gotten right. And now he was drunk.

Not sloppy drunk, hilarious-make-Angie-almost-pee-her-pants-laughing drunk. She was actually having a really fun time with him.

“Which sailor discovered the Hawaiian Islands?” she stuttered. The small print was starting to get blurry.

“Popeye,” he said.

“No,” she said laughing. He bit his lip and scrunched up his forehead when he was thinking. Angie loved when he did that. It was so cute. “Captain…”

“Crunch. Kangaroo. America. Jack Sparrow.” He grabbed the almost empty bottle and shook it. “Please don’t make me drink anymore,” he begged.

“We were looking for Captain James Cook,” she said, lifting her leg up on her chair and resting her chin on her knee.

“Didn’t I say that?”

“Everybody but him,” she said giggling. “Drink up.”

He poured the scotch into his empty, pie-shaped, playing piece and took a shot. She slapped the table, cheering him on.

Sidney slammed down the makeshift shot glass on the table and raised his arms in the air like a runner crossing the finish line.

“Alright smarty pants. Your turn.”

Angie rolled the die and got a three. “Yes!” she squealed. She moved her pie piece three spots over to the big orange square.

“For the win,” Sidney said, picking up the card. He squinted at it and swayed in his chair. “The letters keep jumping around.”

She reached across the table and plucked the card out of his hand. She read the question keeping her finger over the answers. Angie never wanted to win by cheating. There was no pride in that.

“Who was the last heavyweight, bare-knuckle boxing champion?”

Sidney laughed and crossed his big, muscular arms. “Good luck with that one!”

Angie lowered her head and tried to stop the alcohol induced, swirling of her mind. She knew this one. Her grandfather had black and white pictures of bare-knuckle boxers all over the bar in his basement. One was signed by a heavyweight champion. She remembered her Pappy saying that he was the last champion ever before they changed the rules. He was born on the same street in the South End of Boston as him.

What was his name? The scotch was making it hard to think.

It finally came to her. She could see the picture clearly in her mind and the big, loopy signature scribbled across it. “John L. Sullivan!” she said, throwing the card at him. She jumped out of her seat and danced around the cabin, shaking her hips to imaginary music.

Sidney stared at the card with narrowed eyes. The card looked like a postage stamp in his large hands. “I can’t see,” he said. “Is it right?”

“Of course it’s right,” she said, shadow boxing.

“You think you’re so smart,” he said playfully.

“No. I know I’m so smart.” She threw a right hook and then a left uppercut. “That full green pie on the board says I’m so smart.”

“I know something you don’t know,” he said, leaning on the table.

“What? How tree bark tastes like?” She jumped in the air with her hands up like she just won the imaginary boxing match.

“Come outside and I’ll show you.”





Sidney’s shirt caught around his shoulder and he yanked it. A ripping sound filled the outside night as the shirt tore in half.

“What are you showing me?” Angie asked in the doorway. “How to get mosquito bites?”

Sidney needed to impress her. He had lost the game. She was smarter than him. He needed something big. He was drunk and this was all he could think up.

But people always seemed impressed whenever he did this.

“Watch this,” he said. He urged his bear forward, pushing him to the surface. The burning started as his body grew even larger than before. He grimaced in pain as his bones snapped and his muscle tissue tore. His nose was on fire as it extended away from his face. His skin disappeared behind white fur.


Sidney was a polar bear shifter.

He was still drunk, watching Angie through the eyes of his bear. She was standing in the doorway watching with fascination. Not fear or panic. Fascination. Like a scientist discovering a new species and observing it.