by Lucy Farago
Pawsitively Impurrfect
Lucy Farago
Copyright © 2020, Lucy Farago
Cover Art © 2020 Dreams2Media
Produced in Canada
An EveL Worlds Production : www.worlds.EveLanglais.com
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
This story is a work of fiction and the characters, events and dialogue found within the story are of the author's imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, either living or deceased, is completely coincidental.
No part of this book may be reproduced or shared in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including but not limited to digital copying, file sharing, audio recording, email and printing without permission in writing from the author.
Contents
Introduction
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
About the Author
Introduction
When a Siberian loner and a Lynx perfectionist are ordered to track down an arsonist in the Rocky Mountains, trees aren’t the only things that catch fire. These two will discover, that despite their best efforts, a slow burn will eventually ignite. Can they extinguish the flames, or be consumed by a raging inferno?
* * *
There is a fundamental truth few understand. Felines and canines can co-exist. But where would the fun be in that?
Does this premise and world seem familiar? That’s because it is based off the Eve Langlais Furry United Coalition. Eve Langlais has invited her author friends to come and play in her world. To find out more, visit Worlds.EveLanglais.com.
Acknowledgments
Eve, thank you. Two words that can’t really express how much I appreciate all you’ve done for me. And now this…
* * *
And even though I'll never look at my beloved husky the same way, I had a lot of fun writing in your world. You are the best.
* * *
~Lucy
1
If Loki had learned one thing in life, it was never to come when told to. And this had nada to do with a female in the throes of the sexual bliss that he so unselfishly provided. This, sadly, was his demanding director insisting he report to her office, simply to piss him off. Because why else insist he go on this asinine mission?
He’d taken the job at FUC’s training facility not because he was some hot-shot agent, hired to draw recruits to the Academy but because it meant he got to do what he loved. He’d leave the adoration and ear scratches to the cats. Nothing said happy Siberian more than fiddling with souped-up engines. Cars, bikes, trucks, boats, shit, even buses gave him a hard-on. That exceptional purr, the quiet hum, and solid power as you turned the ignition…. Damn, he wouldn’t say it was better than sex, but when a motor whined, he was happy to put in the effort to fix it. A woman? Well, let him just say he’d never get left at the altar.
His motive for leading the transportation department had zero to do with wanting to train new shits and everything to do with a state-of-the-art garage they’d promised and delivered to his mechanical genius. And because of that, he’d sauntered into Director Cooper’s office promising himself to hear her out. But as he sat there, listening to her ramble on about forest fires and doing his part, he seriously considered a career change. Did Tibetan monks drive cars?
“Why can’t I drive?” He sounded far too much like a whiny cat for his own liking. But he hated flying and was nobody’s grease monkey. He’d leave that to the ape shifters, who lived to be airborne. He’d fix the flying death traps, but he preferred his feet…or paws…on the ground, thank you very much. Sheena, his assistant, took on flight hours.
“Because”—Cooper tugged on the jacket of her purple suit—“the drive would take too long. You’ll fly with the ATVs and have the opportunity to test your modifications. And,” she said, narrowing her dark eyes on him, “if you hadn’t been avoiding my messages, you’d have known you were scheduled to fly out late this afternoon.”
He hadn’t avoided anything. More like completely ignored. Just because llamas liked to socialize didn’t mean he had to. And Director Alyce Cooper had this annoying habit of talking when he didn’t want to listen.
“I need you to make certain everything is in place for the team.”
Team. How he hated that word. “I don’t know why I’m needed at all.”
They’d been receiving reports of inexplicable forest fires in northern British Columbia, and given their own location in the Rockies, the powers that be at FUC headquarters decided the school could assist with some preliminary investigating.
“I didn’t sign up for this. And why would a shifter, a Sasquatch no less, be starting fires?” The ones left were anti-social and avoided all contact. “Maybe it’s some hairy dude who doesn’t like people,” he added, cutting her off just as she opened her mouth.
“You just described the Sasquatch.” She opened her desk drawer and, after pulling out a thick file, dumped it in front of Loki. “This was recovered from Mastermind’s files. Specimen 0376. Eight feet tall, muscular, arm length exceeding the norm, foot size, eighteen. His coat is listed as both fur and hair. Ape-like in appearance yet by all accounts far more intelligent. When the lab was liberated, he disappeared.”
“Doesn’t make him responsible for the fires, nor does it prove those crazy tourists were correct. Fire produces smoke, and you know what a smoke-screen does.”
“It was climbers, not tourists, and maybe…if it happened once or twice. But we have four witnesses who swear they spotted a bipedal ape-like creature just before the trees ignited. Trees don’t self-combust.”
True, and given all the altered breeds of shifters created by Mastermind, Loki tried to keep an open mind. “Are we going on the assumption his DNA was messed with, like the ones Mastermind injected before she’d made her last escape?” Unbeknownst to all of them at the time, FUC had actually caught the evil villain when they’d liberated her facility. She’d been right under their noses, blending in with her victims.
The nasty runt had tricked everyone into thinking she was a benign shifter, a victim herself. By the time they’d discovered their mistake, she’d injected her experiments with a whacked-out serum. It fucked with their minds and made some insane, violent, or both. Two, a deer named Dawn and an ostrich shifter named Mari survived the ordeal. They’d been lucky enough to tolerate the juice, only to discover the sweet doe turned into a juiced-up stag and the bird, some kind of crazy raptor. Scary shit, that.
“We have no proof that this shifter’s DNA was altered. Let’s be honest, we have no proof this is a Sasquatch who enjoys playing with matches. But we’ve been tasked with finding out.”
“There you go again with the ‘we.’ Why am I part of this ‘we’?” She’d yet to tell him why he was being made to leave his man-cave.
“Do you really want someone else testing your ATVs?”
Damn, she had him there. He wouldn’t allow anyone near his toys until he was certain nothing he’d done would come back and bite him…or kill someone. No way would he want to be responsible for another life. Not ever again.
“After you teach the team how to use them, if there are no issues, you can return to your…den.”
Loki dismissed the condescension in her tone. His garage was his castle, and if no one appreciated eau de gasoline, they could fuck themselves and stay away. Yes, staying far away was a grand idea. “So, what? Two? Three days?” He had a new bike h
e was dying to test.
“I’ll let you be the judge of that. And,” she said far too quickly, “that doesn’t mean you leave the team hanging. I’m relying on your professional judgment and expertise. If your prototype needs more work, shelve your ego and return home with it. Other than that, I only want to see your face when, and if, your assistance is no longer needed.”
He was confident his modifications would be successful, more than confident. Whether the other agents could take on the new ATVs was left to be seen. From what he knew, FUC had more than enough qualified personnel, but even the best of organizations had lemons. One particular cat came to mind. Loki’s canines stuck his tongue whenever he saw her. Infuriating fur-ball.
“As long as I can return when they no longer need me.” Hunting down elusive creatures wasn’t his thing. Sasquatch wanted to be left alone. Loki could respect that.
“Like I said, test the machine, train the team, and we’re good.”
Loki nodded and turned to leave Director Cooper’s office.
“Forgetting something?” she said, shoving the file in his direction.
“You want me to read that?” He pointed to the encyclopedia-like folder.
“How do you expect to do your job otherwise?”
“My job has four wheels and an engine. No fur required.”
“You need to be briefed on everything involving Mastermind. We can’t have anyone going out there ill-prepped.”
He wanted to argue. He would’ve too, if not for the fact Copper had a point. He grabbed the file and resumed his exit, only to be met by her. How he wished his human side had hackles.
“Hello, dog.”
If she weren’t female, he’d smack that patronizing sneer right off her pretty little whiskers. “Hello, kitty,” he shot back, knowing full well Ms. Fisher despised the moniker he’d dubbed her with the first time they’d met.
“How many times do I have to…never mind,” she said haughtily, waving a hand. “I forget your limited intelligence is clogged by grease.”
She tried to push past him, but no way would he let the lynx have the last word. “Better grease, which serves a purpose, than the fur-balls you cough up.”
“Someone needs to put a harness on you. Now get out of my way. Or should I say, mush?”
A low growl reverberated in his throat, and for the briefest of seconds, he imagined biting her. She must have seen it in his eyes because she took half a step back…before stepping around him.
He didn’t like to intimidate females, but this one didn’t back down from a fight. It surprised and oddly irked him to think he’d scared her now. It was true, they hated each other. But since the day he’d first arrived in the Canadian Rockies, she’d been nothing but a bitch. So why the hell did he care that he’d frightened her? He didn’t. Again, he tried to exit the office.
“Loki, please wait.” Cooper’s tone said he wasn’t going to like this.
Closing his eyes, he counted to three then turned. “What is it now?”
“Maybe you should sit it on Mia’s briefing.”
“Why?” He and the cat replied in unison.
“This is the first time you’ll be working together. You should start acting like a team.”
There was that damn word again, but whatever director Cooper said afterward, Loki didn’t catch. He was stuck on the—dare he say it—‘working together’? Had he heard right? Fuck that. He held up a hand to stop the director’s chatter. “I must’ve heard wrong. Who is working with who?”
“You two.” She pointed first to the cat then, annoyingly, to him.
For her part, she didn’t look any more impressed or any happier than Loki. First understandable reaction he’d seen from the feline.
“You’re sending the dog on this mission? Whatever for?”
Dog? “Who are you calling a dog?” He wasn’t going to be insulted by a cat. “I’m a Siberian. Mine walked the earth long before yours lost their tails.” Faster, more powerful, and yes, meaner than any wolf, from a distance, his kind only resembled dogs. Huskies had lost much of their Siberian origins, domestication having tamed their wild side. However, Loki’s wild side remained intact. The cat would do well to remember that.
“And I’m a lynx. Yet you continue to bait me by referring to me as cat.”
Touché. Still, he didn’t relent. “You are part of the feline species. Lion, tiger, panther, lynx, a pussy is a pussy,” he said, when, out of nowhere, an image of her sprawled on his bed, legs wide open, practically took his breath away.
Not knowing what else to do, or risk giving himself away, he grabbed a chair and plopped his ass in it. “Let’s get on with this. I have ATVs that require my attention.”
He was grateful she didn’t notice and said nothing, except a muttered “fuck you” when she sat.
For the next twenty minutes, Loki tried to focus on whatever Cooper was saying but couldn’t get the image of the cat out of his head. The naked cat. The naked cat on his bed. It was wrong. So very wrong. He hated her. Hated how she always smelled of warm sugar and cream. Hated how her hair resembled silk and how he’d longed to touch it. Pull it. He meant pull it. He didn’t want to touch her hair. He wanted to yank it out, strand by strand. She infuriated him. Always condescending. Always with a smart-ass comment or comeback. Yes, he hated her. He did not want her in his bed…he did not want her in his head. Fuck. She was turning him into Dr. Seuss. A cat, for fuck’s sake.
“All of these fires were in a forty-mile radius? What do the humans think? They must have some idea.” Not that humans were smarter than shifters, but Loki appreciated the work park rangers did. It was a harder job than people understood.
“The theory is random lightning. Forest fires only happen for two reasons. Natural or human intervention. Natural being lightning or, on occasion, spontaneous combustion of dry leaves or brush. But on one occasion, the sky was clear.”
“They suspect humans,” Fisher said, staring at him as if it was obvious and he was a moron.
“After the fourth fire,” Cooper went on, “the ape-like creature was spotted by hikers. And after that, we intervened.”
Shifters working among the park rangers would keep any incoming intel to themselves. They protected their own, and as in this case, they didn’t want to raise awareness of their existence.
“There’s been two more incidents. We’re getting into the fire season. We can’t let whoever is doing this destroy a forest.”
“Any theories as to why Big Foot is setting fires?” Loki asked, not yet willing to admit this was a shifter’s doing. Far too often, his kind got the short end of the stick.
“Sasquatch. Big Foot is an insulting human term. And we’re not sure, but that’s why I’ve assigned Mia to the case,” Cooper said, smiling at the cat like she was some queen.
Mia was no queen. It wasn’t that he thought her incompetent. Her reputation had preceded her, and kitty was a renowned agent, enlisted to draw new recruits. Her tracking skills supposedly equaled his own. Not that anyone knew what he was capable of. He, however, had been invited because of his expertise with transportation. He wasn’t into hunting people. Not anymore.
He ignored the rest of the briefing. His role centered around new ATVs, nothing more. But he discovered ignoring his boss meant his senses were free to divert their attention to the cat. Not a good thing.
Mia shifted in her chair, crossing her—not long, but still sexy as fuck—legs. She’d obviously come from the gymnasium. Her short black leggings showed off muscular calves, and although her oversized sweatshirt hid most of her body, it didn’t matter. He’d seen it before.
He’d spied on her routine, not one of his finer moments. But she’d looked so agile demonstrating the rock wall in the gym that he hadn’t been able to walk away. At the time, he’d told himself she was a cat, and cats could climb. But her ninja skills were impressive. If she weren’t such a she-bitch, he’d have complimented her. Now, they’d be spending time together. With any luck, they w
ouldn’t kill each other and return still hating one another. Just as it should be.
“Loki?” The director gave him a look usually reserved for when he blew an engine.
“What?” he answered, leery of Cooper’s odd perusal.
“Have you heard anything I’ve said?”
“Big Foot…Sasquatch,” he quickly corrected, after it earned him a death glare from the women. “Lightning, fires…yeah, I heard.” Most of it anyway.
“It would be convenient to have an extra pair of keen senses.”
Had the cat actually complimented him?
“But I’ll settle for yours,” Mia added with her stupid cat sneer.
He got to his feet, deciding he’d better leave before saying something he’d regret. Fuck it.
Loki leaned in real close, so she didn’t misunderstand his meaning. “Kitty, mine would be the best you’ve ever had.” He straightened, ignoring the flash of temper in her eyes. “I’m going to go pack. Any records on what Big Foot likes to eat? So we can bait a trap?” he said on a bark of laughter.
He headed toward his garage with the cat yelling after him, “It’s Sasquatch, you ignoramus.”
2
After leaving the briefing, Mia returned to the gym. Better to take out her rage on a punching bag than the dog who thought himself so much better than her. To be fair, she knew she pushed his buttons. Hell, she enjoyed pushing his buttons. And if they weren’t two species who hated each other, she’d have enjoyed finding other ways of getting him all hot and bothered, if she went for his type. Which, she didn’t. She liked her men smart. If her kind had been smarter, maybe they wouldn’t be in their current predicament.
