He was waiting for her—a beautiful, golden beast, head on his front paws, purring like a motor, his cat eyes somehow managing to look innocent. She snorted. Yeah, right. Innocent.
When he didn’t shift back to human, she simply settled in next to him with one arm around his thick neck and stared down into the clearing, just as every other shifter was doing now. She noticed Amanda lower down in the next tree, one with plenty of low branches, making for an easier ascent in consideration of her pregnancy, probably with Rhodry’s considerable help. She leaned against his huge, black form, while cats high and low faced the grandfather in a three-quarter circle.
Wolfrum struggled to gain his feet, looking around as if suddenly aware he was free, ready to make a break for it. But no matter how hard he tried, his feet and hands kept sinking into the loam, and he couldn’t seem to gain enough traction to push to his feet. Finally, he crawled to the grandfather and clung to its trunk, getting one foot beneath him. But he’d no sooner started to rise, than a whip-thin root came out of nowhere, tripping him up and slamming him back to the ground. He fought to free himself from its grip, but with every root he disentangled, another two surfaced to grab hold and pull him even deeper. He was screaming now—incoherently, frantically—as he struggled to escape a tangle of roots that became first a cage and then a straitjacket, until finally a thick band wrapped around his throat and turned his screams into choked shrieks of terror that she could still hear, even after he’d been sucked down and completely disappeared beneath the moss-covered forest floor.
Rachel stared, horrified.
“His crime was against the Green and its creatures first,” Aidan said from right next to her. She’d been so caught up in the terror of Wolfrum’s death that she hadn’t noticed him shifting. “And the Green always takes care of its own. Now you know why the colonists needed shifters back then, and still needs them now.”
She nodded wordlessly, her mouth dry. It wasn’t that she thought Wolfrum didn’t deserve what he’d gotten. He’d deserved that and more. But…what a nightmarish way to die.
“Don’t worry,” Aidan said, putting his arm around her later. “You’re safe.”
“I know,” she said faintly. They walked a little way together, taking their time. Just a stroll in the beautiful Green…which also happened to eat people it didn’t like.
“Does it bother you?” he asked.
She shook her head. “No, not really. I mean, yeah, I’m a little freaked out, but…if you tell me I don’t have to worry about being eaten alive, I’ll believe you.”
He chuckled. “What you saw out there is extremely rare. In fact, it’s never happened before in my lifetime. That wasn’t true of those first colonists, though. The planet saw them as invaders and fought back. It’s why they were so desperate to create shifters.”
She cocked her head curiously. “But why shifters?” she mused, half to herself. “I mean, I can see why they’d want to include some Harp DNA in the next generation, but why shifters, specifically?”
He seemed reluctant to answer, and it occurred to Rachel that this might be another one of Harp’s secrets. The ones she wasn’t allowed to know.
But then he said thoughtfully, “I’d say we were a fluke rather than a plan. I don’t think they meant to create what they did. Shifters, that is.”
Rachel nodded. Now that made sense. Although she’d love to learn more. Even if they didn’t have records, they had oral histories. And medical records, although from what she’d seen, it didn’t seem shifters had much need of a hospital. Unfortunately, she wasn’t going to be around to explore any of that.
“Why so sad, love?”
She shrugged, her shoulders moving under the warm weight of his arm. “The shuttle arrives tomorrow.”
He stopped dead, which meant she did, too. “What’s that got to do with you?”
“Well… I’ll be on it, won’t I? I mean, I didn’t exactly arrive here legally, and—”
“Do you want to leave Harp?” he asked, and there was a note of vulnerability to his question that she’d never heard from him before. Aidan Devlin didn’t do vulnerable. He was big and tough and able to handle whatever life threw his way.
Her heart was a flutter of trepidation clogging her throat, so that she had to swallow before she could answer his question. She met his eyes, once again human blue with no more than sparks of gold. “No,” she breathed, daring to hope. “I don’t want to leave. I mean, there’s so much to explore here, so much I could study.”
He regarded her in bemusement. “That’s the only reason?”
“Well. Shifters, of course.”
“All of us?”
She gave him a narrow-eyed look. Was he laughing at her? “Fine,” she admitted. “You. You’re the reason I want to stay. Happy now?”
He grinned. “Almost. You want to study me, sweetheart?” His lips nibbled at her ear, his voice a sinful purr that lifted the hairs on her neck.
“Yes,” she said breathlessly.
“Much easier to do if you stay close.” He slid both arms around her, holding her flush against his body so that she could feel the defined muscles of his chest and arms, the firm thickness of his thighs, and the hard length of his erection. Desire shivered over her body.
“I love you,” she whispered, then pinched her lips and slammed her eyes shut. She shouldn’t have said that. She meant it, but she shouldn’t have said it. She waited for the inevitable rejection. Waited for him to pull away and make an awkward joke.
“I love you, too,” he said, so softly that she wasn’t sure he’d meant her to hear.
She had to swallow again, but it wasn’t fear clogging her throat this time. “Okay.” It was the only word she could squeeze out.
He stroked the back of his knuckles over her cheeks, wiping away tears. “Okay?” he said, smiling. “That’s it?”
She laughed, half sobbing with emotion. “I guess I’m staying.”
“There you go, love.” He slung an arm over her shoulders and turned them back onto the path to the city.
Epilogue
Amanda stood in the guest bedroom, watching her mom pack. Elise would be back, but the universe was a big place, and she was still a fleet officer.
“This won’t be the end of it, you know,” Elise said.
“I know.”
“Randy tells me there are certain forces pushing for your recall to active fleet status.”
She hadn’t known that. “I served my full contract.”
“But you’re always subject to recall if circumstances warrant. You know that.”
“Last I heard, the fleet wasn’t at war with anyone,” she scoffed. “At least, not anyone big enough to justify the recall of retired officers.”
Elise tipped her head in agreement, her eyes never leaving Amanda’s. “True, and you could certainly fight it. But they don’t need a war to try.”
“Why would they bother?” Amanda finally asked, although she knew the answer.
“Because someone in the Admiralty knows about shifters, or thinks they do. I doubt Wolfrum managed to smuggle any real data out to whoever employed him. You Harpers are too tight with what you share. But he admitted that his employer had at least one contact high up in the fleet—although that was so obvious that a blind man could have called it. And whatever he did pass on made them curious enough to support his crazy plan, and now they’re pissed.”
“Yeah, well, they can waste time recalling me, if they want. I’m not going anywhere. I know my rights.”
Elise nodded noncommittally, but said, “I’ll keep looking for whoever was behind this, and so will Randy. He doesn’t need to know about shifters to know something happened here. It would be odder if I didn’t ask him about it. But be careful, Amanda.”
She gave her mother a bemused look. “This is Harp, Mom. Careful is how we live.” She rested one hand on her belly and turned back to smile at Rhodry, who was carrying Elise’s luggage in from the guest bedroom. “And I have a lot
to live for.”
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Acknowledgments
First and foremost I want to thank my editor, Brenda Chin, who never lets me down, and who inspires me to make every book the best it can be. To Liz Pelletier and Heather Riccio for letting fellow Earthers travel the universe with me. And to all the people at Entangled—reviewers, copy editors, cover artists, and everyone else… I may never know your names, but I benefit from your hard work and I appreciate it.
Angela Addams read this manuscript more than once, providing honest and always excellent feedback. Karen Roma did the hard task of reconciling the details from various revisions. Annette Stone handles the myriad details of publishing life, so I don’t have to. And my family and friends encouraged me to keep writing my shifters, even when life conspired against me.
This book would never have been written without the enthusiastic and consistent support of readers who loved my shifters and kept pushing for more. A million thanks to all of you for letting me do what I love.
xoxo
DBR
About the Author
D.B.Reynolds is the award-winning author of the popular Vampires in America series, as well as other paranormal fiction. She lives in a flammable canyon near Los Angeles, and when she’s not writing her own books, she can usually be found reading someone else’s.
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