Matched To His Panther

by Lorelei M. Hart

  “I hope you both are, though my goddaughter is doing it in style, aren’t you, my love. I kissed Ursula and hugged my friend. “But I don’t see you banging anything to welcome me.”

  Gabe smirked. “The only banging I’ll be doing is in my bed with my husband.”

  My shoulders sagged. Normally him saying something stupid would have me elbowing him in the ribs. But today it reminded me that no matter how much time I spent here, I wasn’t part of this tight-knit family. I’d always be Gabe’s Number 3.

  After handing the wine to my friend and taking over the baby-feeding duties, I asked, “Any sign my goddaughter’s a shifter?”

  “I’ve told you we have to wait til puberty.”

  I rubbed noses with Ursula making her giggle. “But you’re special, aren’t you, sweet cheeks? I bet you’ll be the bestest bear shifter ever.” I leaned in close. “And Uncle Corey will make sure you always have a spare set of clothes for when you shift back. There will be no naked butts allowed.”

  Unfortunately, I’d arrived here at Meadow View early one day and witnessed Brad in his birthday suit. And while he was a fine specimen of an alpha, seeing his dick had not been on my bingo card for the year.

  As soon as Gabe put Ursula to bed, I cracked open the wine.

  “Don’t you want to eat first?” he asked

  “I can drink, then eat and drink again.”

  “Stop it, you’re worrying me.” He made a salad and heated up leftover quiche. I was impressed with his ability to put a meal together. “And the guilt is killing me.”

  “Sorry? Gabe, whatever’s going on with me has nothing to do with you.”

  “I convinced you to go on that stupid date. It’s all my fault. Will you forgive me?”

  “No, it’s that dipshit’s doing.” I’d considered stalking the restaurant, reasoning that as he was a regular customer, he’d be back there soon enough. I wasn’t much good at throwing punches, but I could speak from the heart and finish saying what I’d been too angry to tell him that night.

  “If you haven’t deleted the app, we could have set him up, pretended to be a needy omega who loves being ignored and ordered about.” Gabe pushed a plate of food toward me. “And if he’d taken the bait, Brad could have turned up and punched his lights out.”

  I pictured the asshole being roasted on a Brazilian barbecue, and stabbed the food with my fork.

  “I’m beginning to feel sorry for the quiche.” Gabe closed one eye and titled his head. “You shouldn’t let one asshole get to you.”

  “You’re right. I’m not sure why I can’t shake it off.”

  My friend’s fork clattered onto his plate. “What did you say?”

  Rather than repeating myself, I demonstrated, shaking my hips and head and waving my arms in the air. “Get it?”

  “I think so.”

  A moment later he’d dragged my off the kitchen stool and onto the couch. “Tell me everything.”

  “About? You’re not going to psychoanalyze me, are you?”

  “Be serious, Corey. Start from the beginning.”

  “I need wine.” When I finished repeating the details of that night, I polished off the glass. “Your verdict, doctor?”

  “Don't be silly. Though I am rather proud of myself.”

  “For what? Putting together a salad?”

  He slapped my shoulder. “Listen. The reason you can’t get him out of your head is because…” His dramatic pause had me studying his face. He was practically bursting with anticipation, bouncing up and down on the couch as he pressed his lips shut.

  “What’s got you…?” But something clicked into place. I put two and two together and the pieces of the puzzle aligned. “No! No! Do not say it.” I feared if he spoke the words and put that idea out into the universe, it would make it true and I’d be cursed.

  I put my hand over his mouth delaying the inevitable. “It can’t be.”

  “Yes, it can,” he mumbled. “He’s the one. Your mate.”

  Mate as in shifter’s mate? “Fuck no, he is not. I won’t have it.” I shook my fist at the ceiling. “You hear me, universe? This little cosmic joke you’re playing has to end. Make things go back to the way they were.” Being friends with a shifter was one thing, but being my other half? No!

  “Not going to work.” Gabe sipped his wine and sighed before leaning back on the cushions. “And my work here is done. If anyone else would like my expertise on how to find a mate, please make an appointment.” He bowed.

  “But he ignored me and I’m convinced he hated me. Thought only of himself and was a genuinely horrible person. And while I’ve never had a mate, surely his scent would have welcomed me, drawn me in, made me its prisoner.” I was being a tad dramatic but when someone drops a bombshell, your reply had to be over the top.

  “You’re right about the scent unless…” Gabe said. “Brad mentioned going to a Brazilian BBQ restaurant once. Shifters can’t scent one another. It’s because of the thing,” Gabe announced.

  “For a college professor you sure have a way with words.”

  “The stuff, the red stuff.”

  “You’re not making any sense,” I told him.

  “The thing they use in Brazilian cooking. He grabbed his phone and did a search. “It’s a natural food coloring but it has a distinct flavor and aroma. Maybe that inhibited your ability to smell one another. It doesn't talk about shifters here because this isn’t the shifter internet.”

  I had no idea what he was talking about regarding the internet. Even though I wasn’t convinced about that coloring, I leaned over his shoulder as the search results appeared on the screen. “Annatto!”

  8

  Bryce

  Six days in a row I ate at the Brazilian place. Six. And that wasn’t the craziest of things I’d done looking for the guy. I set up not one, but ten accounts on Love and Hate, I partially shifted near the restaurant in order to see if I could pick up anything. Something I’d never normally do and some poor kid saw me and cried.

  I offered one of the waitstaff an insane amount of money to give me information about the diners that night only to have him explain to me how dumb my plan was given the omega paid cash. I still gave him a huge tip and he promised me up and down he’d call if my mate came back. That didn’t stop me from my six days of Brazilian food and door staring.

  Something had to give, and it wasn’t going to be finding him.

  I marched right up to Zev’s place and pounded on the door. It was a dick move, showing up as his alpha like this, about to ask him to break the law, but in our claw, there was no one better at computers, so there I was.

  “Alpha, what’s wrong?” he asked, his voice quivering slightly as he bared his neck.

  “Sorry.” I pushed my panther back hoping to lessen his anxiety. Shit, my panther was scaring me these days, of course he would impact others not in my inner circle. “May I come in?” He nodded and stood out of the way. I was officially an alphahole.

  I walked into his living area and sat in the armchair, “My panther is on edge,” I started to explain. “You see, we met our mate and now he’s gone. I need your help.”

  “Absolutely, Alpha. Tell me all the things.”

  And so I did, grateful he was able to see my sincerity and was no longer afraid of my sorry ass. Maybe if I hadn’t bled my own Beta multiple times in the past few weeks he’d have not thought as much about me scenting like fur, my panther close to the surface. But I had. And I hated myself for it, and yet, as much as I wanted to control my panther another way, that was all that could be done. Iver swore being bled was good for his panther, kept him in prime shape. Iver lied. It was bad for us all.

  Every last bit of this situation was. Thank gods we hadn’t needed to go to court during this. There was no way I’d have left there without a contempt charge.

  “Can I break into Love and Hate? Probably, but from there it would be a hot mess of finding your guy in time to not get caught,” Zev told me.

  “I�
��d pay your bail.”

  “It’s not that as much as we wouldn’t be able to find him.” He scratched the back of his neck. “Would you—if you let me have your phone, I might be able to get in and get out fast enough.”

  “It wasn’t my phone. I’ll get it, though...the phone, I mean.” I could sense an unspecified favor to Iver to be given later becoming my reality, in exchange for his phone, as well as being in debt to Zev big time. It’d be worth it to find my mate, beg his forgiveness, and calm my pain-in-the-ass panther. “I owe you.” I bolted from the house, not wanting to waste a single minute.

  Where are you? I shot a quick text to Iver as I reached my car, not wanting to get all the way to his place only to have to come back to fetch my car.

  Office. Why? Miss me?

  I didn’t have time to respond to him, instead running to his place and walking right in because that was about as much control as I had.

  “I need your phone,” I barked as I charged through the door.

  “Please gets you a long way.”

  I froze as I stood in the doorway. Mate. My mate was here? The scent was everywhere. No. Not my mate. Brad and Iver and a desk full of maps.

  “Iver. Here,” I commanded between clenched teeth. If he had been with my mate he was going to die a quick death. I was overreacting. I knew it, and I stomped my foot, a sure sign to my Beta that what I was doing was way over the top. And I bet he sensed that. He came right over, amusement on his face. Fucker! He could. Maybe a slow death then. I inhaled deeply and pushed him out of the way.

  “Out!” I commanded Brad who, to his credit, obeyed. I followed him kicking off my shoes, ready to rip out of my skin and kill the bear. Or die trying. “You are fucking my mate!” Brad picked up on Iver’s amusement and had a smirk on his face.

  I shifted and immediately attacked, Brad shifting just as quickly, as Iver stood on the sidelines cracking up. Damn him being able to read me so well.

  My panther would take Brad if I was thinking clearly. I was not and he had me pinned to the ground within a minute, Iver cackling even louder.

  I shifted back, still wanting him dead, but also needing him to be alive to do so, and had he wanted to end me he would’ve.

  He jumped off of me, shifting midair and joining in Iver’s laughter.

  “I fail to see what’s so funny. He scents of my mate.” And that at least had Brad’s laughter subsiding.

  “Ohh,” was all he said as he marched his bare ass into the house.

  “What is that supposed to mean?” I got up and pushed Iver over as I walked by, grabbing the remains of my pants so I at least had my phone and wallet, the fabric no longer resembling attire.

  “Brad?”

  “I think I know who your mate is. I can’t believe I didn’t connect the dots before. Get some clothes on, I’ll take you to him.”

  “I could take you if I weren’t…” He had told me he knew where my mate was and there I was worried about my pride. No, that wasn’t even it. I was afraid that he would let my mate know I wasn’t alpha enough, which was all kinds of fucked up.

  “In a mate frenzy—I figured.” Brad brushed past me to grab his scraps of clothing which Iver was now holding in the doorway, still amused. “Now let’s go and find him. His name is Corey, by the way. You should know this.”

  “Thanks,” I turned back to Iver. “We’re taking your clothes.”

  9

  Corey

  I closed Ursula’s nursery door and checked the baby monitoring app before settling myself on the couch with a book. My annual vacation had finished, but as I’d never been sick since starting my present job, I’d built up days of sick leave which I had to take otherwise I’d lose them.

  But instead of lounging about and worrying about where the dipshit guy was—the one Gabe insisted was my one and only—I was keeping up to date with projects at the office by working from home, but I also helped out Gabe as his regular babysitter was heavily pregnant.

  Right now, Gabe was at his office down the hill beside Willow Den and I guessed Brad was at work. The book I’d chosen, which Gabe had given me, was sending me to sleep. I wanted to stay awake and wait for a repeat of a Shifter World episode which I’d missed because Gabe had been cooking up a scheme to have me meet Mr. Asshole himself. He downloaded the app and set up a trap. My bestie wasn’t very good at being devious and the whole thing fell through.

  As the weeks had passed, the certainty that Bryce was my mate had waxed and waned. Each time I admitted Gabe was right, I pulled away. You needed courage to believe and fall in love. And even more when the person was a shifter. And I didn’t think I was brave enough.

  My eyes were closing and my head fell to the side while in the distance a car door slammed. Was I expecting a delivery? I half sat up, and after recognizing I was at Gabe’s, fell back on the sofa and snuggled into the cushions. I could get used to this life.

  A door opened followed by footsteps. Two pairs. “Did you finish work early?” I was too comfortable to get up and was looking forward to a nap before heading home.

  “Not exactly.” That was Brad’s voice. I briefly wondered if he’d been intending to shift, and I huddled under cushions hoping to not see that!

  But while I recognized what I referred to as Brad’s bear scent— all forest-like with a hint of moss—there was another aroma. This one was stronger than Brad’s and it was demanding my attention.

  Intrigued, I flung off the throw and scattered the cushions across the floor as the intoxicating fragrance had me struggling to breathe, but at the same time, I wanted it. Needed to be starved of oxygen. Couldn’t get enough of it. Savored it as if it were the finest cognac.

  It was familiar and yet not. Struggling to recall where I’d encountered that perfume and as I blinked and stared in the direction of the front door, a man was outlined against the light. And it hit me. My dream/nightmare the night of my date with the asshole. That scent had swarmed over me, and when I’d woken up in the wee small hours, there were traces of it on my skin.

  “You! Corey!”

  That voice. The one I’d been determined to never hear again until Gabe worked out he and I were destined for one another. During the intervening weeks since that day, I’d mooched around, lost and alone, even when I was with friends or video chatting with colleagues. Waiting for the next episode of Shifter World and looking after Ursula didn’t perk me up as they normally would, and I’d booked a full physical at the clinic for the following week, convinced I only had weeks to live. I made a mental note to write my will.

  But on hearing my name on his lips, the doubts dissolved and the truth smacked the melancholy out of me. Bryce! I’d imagined us meeting again, but when I did, it was me delivering a smackdown. Not now. Not ever. And another truth popped up. The one I’d been avoiding. He was a shifter. Not a bear or a wolf like Gabe’s friend’s husband. Panther!

  Holy fuck shit! Tears blurred my eyes as I raced across the living room. I wasn’t known for my athletic ability but my run deserved all the gold, sliver, and bronze medals. Without giving it any thought I leapt at Bryce and he caught me. If he’d stepped out of the way, wondering about the identity of the crazy person charging him, and allowed me to slam face down on the floor, that would have been beyond humiliating.

  But I was in his arms, one of his hands was on my ass, the other cupping my face. His mouth on mine, his tongue pushing between my lips. My fingers raked through his hair as I couldn’t get enough of him. Old leather and mint. My all-time favorite combination.

  When I pulled away, gasping for breath, there were red splotches on Bryce’s face. My bad! And, like me, he was panting, his lips were wet, his eyes roaming over me were deep pools of unbridled lust.

  We spoke in sound bites.

  “I was an ass.”

  “You were,” I agreed.

  “I was going through hell.”

  Part of me wanted to say, “Good.” But instead I replied. “It’s okay.”

  “No, it’s n
ot.”

  “Sorry I jumped you.”

  His lips on my ear whispering, “Jump me anytime. That’s what mates do.”

  “Mates. Yeah. I get it.”

  His brow furrowed as he cupped my chin. “You mean… shifters…?”

  “I’ll let you in on a little secret. I’ve seen things. Naked butt things. That’s more horrifying than shifting.”

  Someone cleared their throat. We aren’t alone! My legs were wrapped around Bryce and I glanced over my shoulder. Brad! His face was almost as red as the alpha who was holding me.

  “Hi, Brad.”

  “This is the omega you were talking about, right?” Brad asked. “This guy who decorated my house and is my daughter’s godfather?”

  “Ummm… yeah.” Bryce kept a hand on my hip.

  Brad jerked his head toward me as he spoke to Bryce. “I like a clean house, but he’s fanatical about tidying.”

  “I can see and hear you,” I snapped.

  “Nothing better than spending a Saturday night cleaning a bathroom,” Bryce replied as he winked at me. “The snap of plastic gloves as you go to war with dirt.”

  Brad made a face. “You’re both weirdos.” He wandered toward Ursula’s room mumbling, “You deserve one another.”

  “I went a little overboard,” Bryce told me.

  My pulse sped up thinking he’d been faking it when he kissed me.

  “Saturday mornings are for cleaning,” he said. “The evenings are for watching Shifter World.”

  A sense of humor. I liked it.

  Bryce pulled me onto the sofa and kneeled before me. Wow! He moves fast. Our second meeting and he’s ready to propose.

  “I owe you a huge apology.”

  Not quite what I was expecting.

  “But if you’re up for it, we could start again. Pretend that date never happened. Go back to the Brazilian restaurant.”

  “I missed out on dessert.”

  “Yeah, that was one hell of a dramatic exit. I almost went after you but the phone rang and…”