A Mate For The Bear: BBW Paranormal Alpha Shifter Romance (Bear Brides Book 4) Read Online Free Page B

were
gone.

CHAPTER
FIVE

    Joyce sniffed and swiped at
her eyes. These were tears of gratitude and relief, but her tears
seemed to have made those nice young men uncomfortable. They had
stammered and stuttered and beat a hasty retreat at the first sight
of her tears.
    Leaving her alone with her
very handsome benefactor.
    Standing beside the elegant
car which cost more than she made in a year, Joyce dried her eyes on
her sleeve, trying to compose herself and not look like a silly,
weepy fool.
    “Thank you,” she
said at last, blinking up at the tall, handsome man beside her. She
had seen his face in the crowd while she was up on the stage. She
stared at him for a moment, wondering if he was an illusion. He had
wavy brown hair, chiseled features and a long body that was tanned
and muscular. But it was his eyes that caught her attention. They
were intelligent, intense and kind.
    He was exactly how she
imagined her online friend, DJ, would look like. The face that
appeared in her mind whenever she was chatting with DJ online was the
face that was gazing down at her right now.
    She shook her head. No, he
couldn't be.
    How could he be…?
    Before she could marshal her
wayward thoughts, he stepped closer to her and said softly, “Joyce.
You are...JD.”
    She gasped and jerked her
head up. “What?”
    “JD. Your profile name
on that dating site.” His face split into a wide, winsome
smile. “I'm DJ. Dalton Jameson. We meet at last.”
    “I...how?”
    “Your eyes. I
recognized your eyes.”
    She stared at him, shaking
her head slowly.
    Seeing her look of shock and
disbelief, Dalton pulled his phone out of his pocket and typed a
message quickly. “Check your phone. I just sent you a
message. I really am DJ. This is not a prank, Joyce.”
    She heard her phone ping in
her bag. Her eyes rounded when she saw his message.
    I've always known that
you're beautiful.
    She
blushed. “DJ...”
    “Dalton.”
    She
blinked at him, staring into his deep brown eyes for a long while.
Finally, she stuck out her
hand. “Joyce Donovan. I'm pleased to meet you too,
DJ!”
    Her hand disappeared into his
large, strong hand and she felt the heat tingle up her arm and down
her body. She was suddenly very aware of how close they were
standing, how powerful and masculine his body was, and how attracted
she was to him.
    With a gasp, she pulled back
abruptly. She shouldn't be having all these naughty, inappropriate
thoughts about her online friend, who had just burst out of
cyberspace into her life. It was great to finally meet DJ, but she
rather regretted the way they met.
    She closed her eyes briefly
and began, “Dalton, half a million dollars is no paltry sum.
And you promised to pay the full amount in three days. That's
not...”
    “Don't worry about it,”
he said, shrugging. “I'll pay up promptly and get the wolves
off my back. They won't be bothering us.”
    “I'll pay you back,”
she said firmly.
    He opened his mouth, but she
cut him off. “No, Dalton. If you won't let me pay you back,
then I can't accept your help. I'll just go back in and tell Randell
that I'll continue working at Candybar to pay off the debt myself.”
    “Joyce,” he
growled in exasperation. “You...”
    “My job as a
receptionist doesn't pay that well, so I might take a while, a very
long while, to repay everything. If you...”
    “Wait.” Dalton
held up a hand. “I know what you can do to pay me back. I
have a job for you.”
    “What kind of job?”
she asked slowly.
    “I need a housekeeper.”
    “Huh?”
    “I stay alone in a big
bungalow, and I'm rarely home. I hardly clean and when I cook it's a
disaster. My brother and cousins can attest to that. I need someone
to keep my house in order. If I don't hire you, I'll need to hire
someone else, but it's not easy finding someone good and trustworthy.
Good help is hard to find these days.” He shrugged. “There
are documents and financial details regarding the clan and the
business in my office. I'm the