Free Claimed At First Sight (Curvy BBW Paranormal Bear Shifter Romance) by Evelyn Grey

 
    CLAIMED AT FIRST SIGHT
     
    I grunted with pain at the blisters that were forming around my ankle.  When Gerri invited me to spend a few weeks at her grandfather’s old cabin, I didn’t exactly have a seven-mile hike through the mountains in mind. 
     
    “How’re you doing, Layla?”  Gerri asked, not a bead of sweat on her pretty little face.
     
    “Great,” I muttered sarcastically as I fanned the perspiration from my hair and neck. “I’m getting blisters on my blisters, but I’m pretty sure I’ve lost five pounds.”
     
    “No pain no gain, right?”  Gerri giggled and held out her arms towards our surroundings.  “Besides, isn’t this beautiful? And I bet the blisters are keeping you-know-who off your mind!”
     
    Gerri was right--for the first time in two weeks I wasn’t thinking about Danny, or the slutty little brunette with perky tits who was forever burned into my memory. 
     
     
    “Come on, just another mile,” she grinned, popping her headphones back into place and taking off like a damned jackrabbit. 
     
     
    I gritted my teeth and pushed on. Danny didn’t deserve anything from me, not even my anger.  Still, it hurt.  It hurt that he had lied to me for so long.  It hurt that he blamed his infidelity on my weight, and it hurt that he hadn’t so much as called me to apologize.  Thank goodness that I had a friend like Gerri.  Honestly, if it hadn’t been for her, I would probably still be lying in a heap in my apartment, balling my eyes out. 
     
    As we climbed the woods began to thicken, creating a dense canopy of cool shade. The forest was different at this elevation…quieter, more ominous, and yet somehow I felt drawn to the darkness.
     
    “This is it,” Gerri exclaimed as we came over a ridge. The trees suddenly dropped away and exposed the most amazing view I had ever seen in my entire life.  Pristine countryside with rolling green hills and a sparkling blue lake stretched as far as I could see. In the center of it all, perched on the side of the lake, was the most picturesque cottage I had ever laid eyes on.  
     
    “Oh wow!” I uttered with astonishment.  Suddenly even the blisters seemed worth it. 
     
    “First things first: we’ll eat, and then we’ll go swimming,” she chirped, running ahead and disappearing into the quaint little cabin. 
     
    ****
     
    A week had passed and my entire attitude had changed.  Losing Danny was the best thing that could have ever happened to me.  But it was only now, now that we were separated, that I could really see it. He had taken every ounce of positivity from my life, shut me away from friends and family, and harped on me about my weight—which by the way, had never really bothered me before I met him.  I had always been curvy, but my mother insisted that men liked a woman with curves.  I grew up with plenty of self-confidence, and it was only when I started receiving snarky remarks from Danny that I began to feel less than the goddess that I knew I was. 
     
    “I’m getting a beer, you want one?”  I asked Gerri one day while we were sunbathing in a rubber raft not far from the shoreline.  
     
    “Sure,” she replied absentmindedly, not looking up from her magazine. 
     
    Holding my nose I rolled into the water, diving down deep before popping up at a wooden dock that jutted out into the water. Feeling refreshed and cool, I lazily made my way down the dock and towards the cabin. 
     
    I must have been in a happy little fog, because it wasn’t until they were right in front of me that I noticed them…
     
    “Well, well, and who might you be?” the tallest of the four asked, lifting an eyebrow and cocking his head to the side.
     
    I took a step back, startled. 
     
    Pick up your jaw, I scolded myself, taking in the quartet.  Normally, something like this would have concerned me.  But finding myself surrounded by four of the hottest men I had ever laid eyes on wasn’t exactly normal.  My eyes