Free Grizzly Love by Eve Langlais

won’t see any traps they might have laid. You gotta watch for landmines along with ambushes.”
    “Dark or light, I’d say the danger level is high.”
    “True, but then there’s the fact you’ve already been attacked once today, you just arrived, and judging by the circles under some eyes, you’re jet-lagged. Which means you’re not functioning at 100 percent, which out here can get you killed. You’re better off getting a good night’s sleep and waiting for daylight. We’ll head out first thing in the morning.”
    Jess could have hugged the old guy. A night’s rest sounded heavenly.
    A bell clanged before Brody could argue any further with the master sergeant.
    Travis grinned as he announced—with a hopeful glint in his eye—“Dinner!”
    Actually the bell was a test of the perimeter security system, which led to a crestfallen bear who grumbled he had a rumble in his tummy. Boris told him he could eat a knuckle sandwich if he didn’t stop his bellyaching.
    Travis asked if it came with mustard.
    Gene threatened to eat them both if they got in a fight, while Brody conversed with Layla in a corner.
    Welcome to camp life where sticking four alpha-tendency males in one tent meant too much testosterone and the possibility of fists flying.
    To the sound of soft bickering, Jess drifted off to sleep, but it wasn’t a restful one. In her dreams—more like nightmares—she soared as a hawk, free in a bright blue sky until a dark swarm converged. A mob of ravens, each bearing a cold blue gaze, chased her, nipping at her tail feathers with their beaks as she coasted the aerial drafts, tiring her until she plummeted.
    Down. Down. Down.
    In a lethal spiral, she flailed, trying to control her deadly descent. The ground rushing to meet her.
    Thump .
    She hit the hard floor, only narrowly missing her nose because her hands broke her fall. Instantly, she woke, groaned because of the rudeness of it, and hoped no one noticed her ignoble dismount from her bed. A hope dashed.
    Head turned sideways, she opened her eyes and bit her tongue, lest she squeal at the upside down visage dangling from the bed alongside hers.
    Brown eyes peered at her, the corners crinkled with mirth. “You know,” Travis said conversationally, “most people prefer to get out of bed on their feet, not their face.”
    “Why bother standing when I thought I’d do some pushups first to get the blood flowing?” she quipped, pumping a few. When embarrassed, nonchalance always provided a great fallback.
    A tsking sound escaped his pursed—and very nice, as well as too close—lips. “Liar,” he chided. “Although it is a great cover. I’ll have to remember it the next time my handsome mug hits the floor.”
    If she were one of the guys, she might have refuted his handsome claim, but she’d already fibbed once. “Maybe if you behaved and didn’t do things to end up on the floor, you wouldn’t need a cover,” she replied, dropping her pretense at pushups so she could perch on her cot.
    “Behave? But that would ruin all my fun.” He looked and sounded appalled, which made her laugh.
    Actually, a lot of things Travis did made her laugh, crack a smile, and feel good. While many saw him as a clown—and in some ways he was—his wasn’t a malicious kind of humor, but a playful one. Travis never saw the negative. He never let adversity bring him down. He also never passed up a chance to tease, hence his numerous visits to the infirmary. Yet he never resented the damage he took. Never complained. And he was never truly grievously hurt.
    Much as the guys liked to threaten him and, in some cases, hit him, they also cared for the grizzly. One might compare him and his antics to the pesky little brother that drove them insane but that they’d defend with their last breath.
    As for her, he was the ray of sunshine in what was a bleak life. A teddy bear who just had to exist to make her smile. A man who made her want—
    Ack. What was with her? Smiling at