On his first night renting a cottage on the Cornish coast, widower John Tennant comes face to face with, of all things, a grizzly bear. Fearing for his life, John tries to convince the animal he isn't worth eating, and is relieved when the bear ambles away. Maintenance man Mitch Benjamin is two hundred years old but doesn’t look a day over forty. As a werebear, he needs to stay under the radar. The new renter is making that difficult. Not only is John attractive, but his vulnerability triggers all of Mitch’s protective instincts. If that wasn’t trouble enough, Mitch is struggling with his inner bear’s desire to befriend John. He knows what his bear is up to, but Mitch doesn’t want another mate. His last one was murdered ninety years ago, and he’s still grieving. John is confused by Mitch’s mixed signals. Physically, Mitch -- with his bulging muscles and hulking frame -- is a gay man’s wet dream come true. But emotionally, he keeps closing down. John discovers more comfort with the magnificent grizzly bear he occasionally meets on his evening walks along the beach. In an effort to help, Morwenna, the owner of the cottages, uses her psychic gifts to give John a message from his dead lover, George. Far from helping, it adds another layer of strangeness to what’s already turning out to be the strangest summer John can remember. Can a well-meaning medium and a determined grizzly bring John and Mitch together? Will Mitch come clean about his werebear nature? If he does, can John accept that a man and bear exist in the same body?

Summer's Lease

“Stop,” Mitch panted, pulling away. He had to blink a few times to clear his vision, which had started to grey around the edges.


He and John had kissed a number of times before, but these kisses…they were on a whole other level.


Back came John’s smirk. “Okay, big guy.” He looked down at Mitch’s crotch. “Very big guy. Where’d you keep the stuff?”


He’d never used commercial lubricant—it probably hadn’t been invented the last time he’d had sex. He and Ben had always used whatever was handy. And as for condoms, he was a werebear and couldn’t get sick. Nor again, Mitch doubted, would condoms have been around in their current form when he last had sex.


“Sorry, it’s more my fault than yours,” John said, touching the frown lines Mitch assumed were on his face. “I should have gotten the supplies after KFC. But I was so taken with your, what did you call it? Your caveman act to think ahead.”


Chapter 55