Page 1 of Claimed By the Grumpy Shifter

Chapter 1 - Marcus

The house smells like someone else's life.

I stand in the center of what the landlord generously called a "living room," though it's barely large enough for the secondhand couch I bought yesterday. The walls are thin enough that I can hear Mrs. Chelsea next door humming something tuneless while she waters her plants. Everything about this place screams temporary, which suits me fine. I don't plan on staying long enough to make it feel like home.

Home. The word sits bitter on my tongue. I haven't had one of those since before my first deployment, back when Jake and I still talked, back when I thought the military would give me purpose instead of just more ways to fuck up my life.

The bear paces restlessly beneath my skin, agitated by the confined space and the lingering scent of previous tenants. I press my palms against the window frame and breathe deep, trying to center myself the way the therapist taught me before I stopped going to those sessions.

The view helps—nothing but trees and the small-town charm of Cedar Falls stretching out below. This is what I came here for. Space. Silence. A place where I can't hurt anyone.

The incidents… That's what they called them in my file. Incidents. As if losing control of a six-hundred-pound grizzly bear in the middle of a firefight was just an administrative hiccup. As if the fear in my commanding officer's eyes when he signed my discharge papers was just professional concern.

I flex my fingers, watching the tendons move under scarred skin. The bear wants out. It's been cooped up for three days of driving, three days of truck stops and gas station coffee and forcingmyself to stay human when every instinct screams at me to shift and run. But I can't. Not here, not around people who might see.

The moving truck pulls away with a diesel rumble, leaving me alone with my sparse belongings and the weight of starting over. Again.

That's when I see her.

She's across the street, unlocking the door to a shop I hadn't noticed before. The sign reads "Blooming Wonders" in script that looks hand-painted, surrounded by painted flowers that seem to spill off the wood and onto the sidewalk. She's struggling with an armload of supplies, ribbon, it looks like, in every color imaginable, while trying to balance a coffee cup and fish her keys from what appears to be the world's largest purse.

I should look away. Mind my own business. Focus on unpacking the boxes that contain what's left of my life.

Instead, I find myself pressed against the glass, watching her with an intensity that should alarm me.

She's beautiful. Soft curves that her loose sweater can't quite hide, honey-blonde hair that catches the morning light, and when she laughs at something, probably her own clumsiness as she nearly drops everything, the sound carries across the street and straight into my chest.

The bear goes completely still.

Then it roars.

The sound is internal, thank God, but it reverberates through every cell in my body. My hands flatten against the window hard enough to leave prints, and I have to lock my knees to keep from falling. Because I know what this is. I've heard the stories, dismissed them as folklore, but there's no mistaking the recognition that slams into me like a freight train.

*Mate.*

"No." I say it out loud, my voice rough from disuse. "No, no, no."

But the bear doesn't listen. It never does. It fills my head with images. Her beneath me, around me, carrying my cubs. The possessiveness is instant and absolute, a claiming that goes bone-deep before I even know her name.

She finally gets the door open and disappears inside, leaving me staring at empty sidewalk. The scent of her lingers in the air, vanilla and roses, even though she's too far away for human senses to detect. But I'm not entirely human, and my bear has already catalogued everything about her. The way she moves, the pitch of her laugh, the exact shade of her hair in sunlight.

Mine.

The thought is primitive, undeniable. She belongs to me. I belong to her. It's as simple and terrifying as that.

I stumble backward from the window, running both hands through my hair. This is exactly what I came here to avoid. Complications. Connections. The risk of losing control and hurting someone who matters.

But she already matters. After thirty seconds of watching her struggle with ribbon and coffee, she matters more than anything else in my fucked-up life.

I pace the small room like the caged animal I am, my bear pushing against the edges of my control. It wants to go to her, to introduce itself, to start the claiming process that's been hardwired into my DNA since birth. The logical part of my brain—the part that got me through two tours in Afghanistan—knows this is insane. You can't just walk up to a woman and announce she's your fated mate. That's not how the human world works.

But I'm not entirely human.

The war between instinct and logic rages for exactly three minutes before instinct wins. I grab my jacket and head for the door, my bear practically purring with satisfaction.

The October air is crisp, carrying the scent of dying leaves and wood smoke. Cedar Falls is exactly the kind of small town I'd normally avoid. Everyone knows each other, too many opportunities for things to go wrong. But as I cross the street toward Blooming Wonders, I can't bring myself to care about anything except the woman behind that glass door.

The shop is warm and bright, filled with the most incredible array of flowers I've ever seen. Roses in every color climb the walls, baby's breath spills from vintage buckets, and the air is thick with perfume that makes my head spin. It's overwhelming in the best possible way.

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