Bearing The Long Road Home (Ice Bear Shifters 7) Read Online Free PDF Page A

enough to risk attacking her around that many people.
    Chloe slowly peeled off her boots and thick parka. She had arrived here in Canada just over a week and a half ago. When she had applied for the job, she’d received a call back within an hour. The manager had been eager to hire her, and had wanted her to start as soon as possible. He said they’d had a bunch of people quit recently. Turnover here was always high, but apparently a rift among some of the veteran truckers had caused some drama, and many more than usual had left to work for a different company. Chloe had taken a flight to Canada the very next day. She’d started training on the same day she landed, and she’d even had training on New Year’s Day. The company was behind schedule, and they were desperate to get new drivers on the road. Chloe hadn’t minded. She didn’t have anyone with whom to celebrate New Year’s Day, so it was just a day like any other to her.
    After a week of training, she’d been cleared for the ice, and the company had wasted no time in putting her to work. She had just come back from her second load to the mines up North, and so far this job had been much easier than she had anticipated. Driving on the ice had taken some getting used to, but as long as you followed the rules and the safety protocol, things seemed to go pretty smoothly. The most difficult part of the job was fighting boredom. The trips were about two hundred and fifty miles each way, and the maximum speed allowed was twenty miles an hour. At that slow pace, and with nothing to look at other than snow and ice (which was blanketed in darkness most of the day, anyway), Chloe found it difficult to keep her mind occupied. Unfortunately, the most entertaining thing to do seemed to be eating. She had stocked up on snacks, and found herself downing more bags of chips than she wanted to think about. Still, she couldn’t complain. This gig would only last about three months, and then she would be free to start over somewhere new. She just needed to keep her head down and work hard—and stay out of the way of that shifter, whoever he was. Chloe didn’t want any trouble. She just wanted to get through the winter.
     
    * * *
     
    The next morning, Chloe set off on another trip. She drove away from base at 5 a.m., onto the pitch black ice road. The sun would not rise for several more hours, and, when it did, it would only remain above the horizon for about six hours. This was six more hours of daylight than northern Alaska was getting right now, but it still left Chloe driving in darkness for much of her journey. Chloe shivered as her truck started bouncing along, more from the unsettled feeling in her stomach than from the cold. Yesterday, she had tried to stay in her room for the majority of the evening. She had ventured out once, to quickly get some dinner to-go from the cafeteria. Other than that, she stayed securely hidden behind her deadbolted door. Something about the way the shifter in the office had looked at her made her feel like he knew something about who she was. Was it possible he was Alaskan? Chloe shivered again.
    She wasn’t sure if being out in her truck made her feel better. On the one hand, at least she was alone. If everything went according to plan, she would not see another soul for hours. The odds of running into the shifter out here were much lower than at base camp. On the other hand, if she did happen to run into him, she was miles away from safety. He would be able to attack her without worrying about who might see her, and she would have nowhere to escape to. Chloe took a deep breath and tried to focus on the road ahead. She told herself she was overreacting. She was over twelve hundred miles from home. The odds of anyone recognizing her out here were slim to none.
    Chloe made good time, and thirteen hours later she arrived at the mining outpost where she delivered her load of supplies. She would spend the night here, and then head back to