Joining the Jaguar: BBW Paranormal Jaguar Shifter Romance by Zoe Chant

Joining the Jaguar
     
    By Zoe Chant
     
    Copyright Zoe Chant 2015
    All Rights Reserved
     
     
    "Are you seriously already working?"
    "What does it look like?" Jake Brown responded dryly, looking up from the enormous stack of files on his desk. "Morning, Vince," he added, smiling up at Vincent Ericsson, his best friend and second in command.
    "It looks like you need to get a life," Vincent said, perching on the desk with a sigh. "It's not even six am, and you were here till, what, nine o' clock yesterday?"
    Ten, actually, but Jake wasn't going to mention that if Vince didn't already know. "I've got a life. And the town's not going to—"
    "— run itself, I know. You're a great alpha, and I know it's a lot of work. But you don't have to do it all yourself. We're here to help, you know that, right?" Vincent said, gently knocking his shoulder against Jake's.
    Jake braced himself, pushing back affectionately. Like most bear shifters, Vincent was a giant of a man, and even a playful shove from him could knock you over if you weren't expecting it. Not that he ever meant to hurt anyone. Vince was one of the most gentle people Jake had ever met, and always ready to help out where he was needed. With friends like that and his town to look after, what else did Jake really need?
    You need a mate , his jaguar reminded him. Well, that wasn't likely to happen anytime soon. Jake had been looking for his mate for so long, he'd almost given up hope that it would ever happen. As the alpha of the town, he knew almost every woman in Brooksville at least in passing, and none of them had ever called to him the way a true mate was supposed to.
    And anyway, when did he have time to date? What woman would be willing to put up with the long hours he worked, the constant demands on his time and the emergencies in the middle of the night?
    No. Jake had resigned himself to being alone a long time ago. It wasn't a bad life. Sure, he got lonely sometimes. But who didn't? The hollow ache in his soul, the place where a mate bond was supposed to be, was a small price to pay for being able to take care of his pack and his town.
    "At least promise me you'll take a break and have some breakfast, later," Vince said. "And don't forget the new doctor's coming in today."
    "I know," Jake said with a grimace. That worry had been on his mind all night, and was half the reason he'd come into the office so early. He'd needed a distraction.
    "If it's another damn biker spy — " Vince started worriedly.
    Jake sighed. "We'll deal with it if we have to."
    Brooksville had had a string of rotten luck with doctors. This wasn't a rich town. Ambitious and capable doctors flocked to the big cities, where the money was. Brooksville got the people who couldn't hack it elsewhere.
    Dr. Miller, the last GP, had been spying for the biker gang. The gang had been running the city before Jake and his pack had tossed them out, and they'd almost ran it into the ground. Drugs, poverty and crime had been rampant before Jake and his shifters had cleaned up the place. Now Brooksville was a safe community again, a good place to raise your kids. But the bikers kept trying to regain control of the town, and sending Dr. Miller to spy on them had been their latest ploy.
    As a doctor, Miller had been lazy and uncaring. Jake had tolerated it for far too long, figuring they didn't have much choice, and a lazy GP was better than no doctor at all. But then Miller had sent little Emily Johnson home with a hundred degree fever, a raging headache, and an instruction to take some Tylenol. It'd been Jake who'd driven Emily and her desperate mom to the nearest children's hospital, where they'd gotten to her just in time to stop her dying from meningitis.
    That kind of thing wasn't happening again, not on his watch. A spy he could put up with, but if they'd sent him someone lazy, incompetent or uncaring again, he was going to toss them out before they could do any more damage to his people.
    Brooksville was