Bear Cuffs (Broken Hill Bears #3)(28)

    "Uh, hello?" Lauren snatched the phone out of Kristin's hand and pulled up her profile photos. "Not from where I'm standing, chica!" she said.

    "I appreciate you putting up those photos of me, but they're really flattering. If he saw the real me, he'd be sorely disappointed," Kristin said firmly.

    "But  –  "

    "No buts. Now, I'm going to check out my other messages."

    Most of them were simple 'Want to find out if we're a match?' alerts, followed by a happy face and a sad face icon.

    "I feel like I'm going to really offend these guys by looking at their profiles, leaving a track, and then saying no," Kristin said, clicking on a profile of a beaver shifter. "I mean, this one looks like a great guy, but  –  a beaver? I don't know. It just doesn't feel right to me."


     
       
         
       
        

    "Guys don't work like that, especially shifters," Logan said, with a grin. "We're all about finding our perfect match, so anything else is a waste of everyone's time. If you're not interested, you'll be doing these guys a big favor by telling them straight up."

    "Uh, ok," Kristin said, giving the beaver the sad-face treatment.

    "You know you can filter by animal, right?" Lauren said.

    "Oh, really?"

    "Tell me what kind of shifters you see yourself with? Or at least, which ones you wouldn't rule out?" Lauren said, swiping to the options page. Kristin leaned back on the sofa and stared up at the cabin's wooden beams.

    "All big cats, I guess," she said. "Wolves kind of intrigue me." She slid a glance at Logan. "Bears, of course."

    "Are you sure?" Dina said. "You're such a city girl, Kristin, and bears always live out in nature."

    "We're earthy and kind of homely. And we get a little slow and grizzly in winter when our bodies want us to hibernate," Logan chipped in.

    "Ok, fair enough," she said, her voice tinged with regret. "What else is there?"

    "Um, horses, deer, moose, sea creatures. Everything you can think of really," Dina said.

    "No. I think I'm good with felines and wolves. I feel like I need to be with a shifter that's high up in the food chain. I want a guy I can wrestle with, you know? The kind who challenges me." Dina shuddered and snuggled into Logan.

    "It's a good job there are so many types of shifter out there," she said. "Conflict is the last thing I like in a relationship." Kristin looked at Dina with affection. Logan's hand was resting on her pregnant belly, and he looked like he couldn't be happier sitting with her, just chilling, while she gossiped with her friends. They were absolutely adorable together, she thought, as she got up to visit the bathroom.

    "I'll be back in a moment," she announced, and headed out of the living room. The second she'd gone, Dina leapt to her feet.

    "Quick, give me her phone before it locks itself!" she hissed.

    "You're going to message the tiger, aren't you?" Lauren said, handing it over.

    "Absolutely. I've got a hunch that they'd be good together," Dina said, tapping and scrolling on the screen. "Ooh  –  wait  –  the app has a new setting. There's a perfect match analysis. Apparently they're 100% compatible. How crazy is that?"

    "Wow! Let's send the guy a message, and when she starts to complain, point out that they're a perfect match," Lauren said, eyes sparkling with mischief. 

    "Ok. I'm writing: 'Hey, handsome. I was just padding by, when your profile made me stop in my tracks. Looks like you and I might have a thing or two in common.'" Dina hit send just as Kristin skipped back into the room.

    "I'm just applying the animal filters for you," Dina said, hurriedly, her thumb moving fast.

    "Thanks," Kristin said, taking her phone back.

    "Oh. That's made half my messages disappear. So that leaves  –  " She clicked on the next message in her inbox. "A wolf. Ooh, he's hot," she said, opening the guy's profile. Dina and Lauren craned their necks to see his photo. He had black hair and amber eyes, with a narrow, slightly hard face. As with the others, he was bare chested, but he was also wearing a leather jacket. His hair was done in a quiff, and he was raising an eyebrow, cockily.

    "He looks interesting," Kristin said.

    "So he's into bars, JD, his Harley, video games, and biker chicks," Dina said. "He sounds like one of those guys you used to date. You know, those ones who weren't good for you. At all."

    "I don't know. I think we could be good together," Kristin said. Lauren and Dina shot a warning glance at each other. Kristin had that dreamy tone in her voice that meant she was close to making a bad man-decision. It always amazed them that someone as smart as Kristin could be so dumb when it came to men.

    "Ok, look. It says you're 43% compatible," Dina said, swiping to the bottom of his profile. "That's not a good match at all. Whereas  –  " She located the tiger's message. At that moment a message popped up: "According to Shiftr, we have everything in common. Shall we meet up for dinner and find out if our little matchmaker has got it right?" it said.

    "Huh?" Kristin shook her head in confusion. "That doesn't make sense. Oh, it's from the tiger." At the realization, her heart began to beat fast again. "But what does he mean?" As she looked at the messages more closely, she let out a gasp. "What have you done?" she exclaimed, her eyes blazing as she looked from Dina to Lauren and back again.

    "You were being ridiculous about not contacting the tiger, so, as your friends, we made an executive decision to give you a helping hand," Lauren explained, matter of factly.

    "You're a perfect match. 100%," Dina added.

    "That doesn't mean it's true. No way am I hot enough for him."

    "Kristin, listen to me," Lauren said. "Shifters like curvy girls. All the women with a profile on the app are at least as curvy as you are. You're like the minimum. So you don't need to feel self-conscious about that. And you're more than hot enough for any guy."

    "No. I've made my decision," Kristin said. "I'm not going to humiliate myself." She stared typing:

    Sorry, it was my friends who messaged you just now. They were messing with my phone without my permission. Thanks for your interest, but I don't think we're compatible. I hope you can respect my decision.

    Regards,

    Kristin.

    "Girl, you're making a big mistake," Lauren said, her voice heavy with disappointment. "And who ends a dating app message with 'regards' anyway?"

    "I don't know. I just wanted to make sure he knew I was being serious," Kristin said. Another message came through:

    I'm sorry to hear that, but I'll do as you say.

    Sadly yours,

    Roman

    "And he even sounds like a nice guy," Dina said.

    "Maybe he is, but he's not the nice guy for me," Kristin replied. She didn't want to admit that his stunning good looks weren't the only reason why she didn't want to speak to him. She was superstitious about mentioning her fears that she wouldn't be able to have kids, scared that every time she mentioned it, the possibility would increase by one per cent. She knew it was silly; it was just something that was so outside of her control that it seemed to belong in the realms of fate.


     
       
         
       
        

    "Can you promise me one thing: after making one monumentally silly decision, can you at least not compound it by messaging the wolf?" Lauren asked her.

    "I can't see you with a wolf, Kristin," Logan said. "I've spent enough time with different shifter species to know them pretty well, and I can tell you're not compatible. They're too hierarchical for you."

    "Which is why you get a low compatibility rating," Lauren added. Kristin flicked through her messages. It was true that none of the wolves were more than a 70% match.

    At last, she put her phone down with a sigh.

    "I think I've maxed myself out on shifter dating for one night," she said. "It'd be good to chill with you guys for a little while before I have to head back home though."