Page 72 of Bearly Out Loud

Nari:We’re fine. He’s wearing my jacket.

Takumi:AS A SHIRT?

Nari:As the entire outfit.

Takumi:I need a photo. This is non-negotiable. This is going in a frame. This is going on my HEADSTONE.

She pocketed the phone. Looked at Dojin. He was watching her with the patience she’d learned to recognize as his default setting—the steady, grounded waiting of a man (a bear, she corrected, a realbear) who understood that she processed at high speed and high volume and the best thing anyone could do was stand still and let her arrive at her own conclusions.

Her conclusion: she was terrified and furious and falling in love with a bear shifter who’d gotten shot for her and looked mortifyingly good in her jacket.

She took his hand. The one that wasn’t holding her jacket to his shoulder. Laced her fingers through his. His hand swallowed hers—warm, enormous, built for tending bees and kneading sourdough and, apparently, crumpling a car door with a single blow.

“For the record—” Her voice didn’t shake. “If I’d realized on the first day that you were abearbear, I would have had follow-up questions about the food thing much sooner.”

“What food thing?”

“The relentless, obsessive, deeply personal food delivery system you’ve been running since week one. The bento boxes. The honeycomb. The matcha you memorized from a conversation you weren’t part of. It’s not hospitality. It’s bear courtship. You’ve been courting me with LUNCH.”

“Also breakfast, occasionally.”

“ALSO BREAKFAST.” She threw her free hand up. The gesture was enormous, theatrical, pure Nari—a full-body expression of exasperation delivered ten feet from an unconscious man and a destroyed Honda. “I’ve been the subject of a cross-species courtship ritual conducted entirely through Japanese cuisine and homemade honey and I didn’t NOTICE.”

“You noticed the food.”

“I noticed the food was EXCEPTIONAL. I did not link ‘exceptional food’ to ‘bear mating behavior’ because that is not a leap normal people make, Dojin.”

He squeezed her hand. “You’re taking this well.”

She laughed. High, bright, cracking at the edges. “I’m taking this at volume. That’s different.”

Headlights swept across the structure. A black SUV, moving fast. Reo. He pulled into the lane, killed the engine, and stepped out carrying a duffel bag and a first-aid kit. He’d done this before. The practiced speed said so.

Reo looked at Dojin—naked under a denim jacket and an Hermès scarf. Looked at the crumpled Honda. The caved hood. The unconscious operative.

His expression didn’t change.

“The Honda’s totaled.”

“The Honda was in the way.” Dojin took the duffel. Started pulling on clothes one-handed, his other shoulder still bound in Nari’s blood-soaked denim.

Reo turned to Nari. Assessed her—the glass cuts on her knees, the adrenaline flush, the tear tracks she hadn’t wiped. His face stayed neutral but his eyes softened a fraction. An inch of the man visible through the operative’s armor.

“You good?”

“Define good.”

“Standing. Talking. Not in shock.”

“Then I’m good.” She crossed her arms. “You’re a bear.”

“Yes.”

“Black bear?”

A flicker in his eyes. Surprise—that she’d guessed, that she cared about the specifics. “Yes.”

“Smaller than his.” She tipped her head toward Dojin.