Finders Keepers [Alpha Eye 2] (Siren Publishing Classic ManLove)

by Fel Fern

  You’re safe.

  Asher’s words, but unlike the empty promises he’d heard from others, Asher meant his.

  He pawed at Asher’s pants all the way to the front door, even purred for the werewolf. Asher looked distracted since morning, but finally, Asher shot him a brilliant smile, patted his ears. Dan thought it would be enough, but it wasn’t.

  “I’ll be back before you know it.” Then Asher shut the door, leaving him alone in the frighteningly silent apartment.

  Dan stared at the front door a couple of moments, sat right there, as if Asher would magically open it, tell him he’d changed his mind. He overheard Asher talking to Raul the night before. Despite Asher keeping his voice low, he caught murmurs of the conversation. Dan recalled the fragments he heard.

  “I’m starting to lose hope.”

  “I don’t think you can help him.”

  His insides twisted. What if Asher lost patience and decided Dan was no longer welcome in his home? Only three days had passed, and yet this dingy place got under his skin. Not the apartment, he realized, but the generous shifter that lived inside it, that invited him in like a guest and told Dan he could stay as long as he wanted.

  Did Asher change his mind?

  Realizing Asher was in all probability not coming back until evening, he walked away from the door. The window looked back at him. He usually jumped out and landed on the ledge to go exploring but today, he didn’t feel like it.

  Something had to give, Dan understood that on some level. Asher had done so much for him, had been patient and had helped the little cracks in his heart to heal. Now it was his turn.

  Chapter Four

  It took Dan the entire day to figure out how to turn back to human form. He’d engaged a fierce inner battle with the animal in him. Dan relied on the cat to keep them alive, and the cat still didn’t trust anyone, but they agreed to make an exception for Asher.

  The clock on the wall above Asher’s bed told him it was six in the evening now. Once more, Dan reached for his human half. The cat, tired of fighting him, let the change flow over him. It was painfully slow, but he expected that.

  Fur faded, turning to human skin. Dan shivered, used to the protection of his fur coat by now. Being human made him vulnerable. On the floor, he tried to stand, stumbled, slightly off balance. Dan gritted his teeth, annoyed. His heart beat so hard, it felt like it would explode out of his chest.

  He refused to have a damn breakdown now, of all times. Dan waited for the shock to wear down, for his brain to adjust to the fact he was human again.

  “Like learning to ride a bicycle again,” he whispered, voice hoarse, unused to forming words. Dan’s hand crept to the snap collar that had fallen from his neck during the transformation, the one Asher put there to make sure no one would mistake him for stray. He fingered the letters on the tag.

  “L.C. Little cat,” he whispered, still fingering the engraving.

  Dan had grown fond of the nickname, considered it a term of endearment.

  Maybe he could keep the collar on for a bit, until Asher returned.

  The werewolf would have one hell of a surprise, to see him.

  As a cat, he thought he’d be content hearing Asher’s words flowing over him, but he found himself wanting to talk back, start a conversation with his savior. Asher was that, because if left to his own devices, Dan would let his human half fade completely. In a way, it was similar to dying, because he’d chose to live the rest of his life as a cat.

  Not anymore. Dan had found a new reason to live.

  A few tries and he managed to walk on two feet instead of four. Wanting something to wear to ward off the chill from the window, he walked over to Asher’s drawer. Pulling it open, he looked at the messy but fresh shirts. He picked one he knew to be Asher’s favorite, a black tee with a faded wolf on the front. Inhaling it, enjoying Asher’s familiar scent, he tugged it on, unsurprised it fell to his knees.

  Dan wandered over to the mirror in the bathroom and sucked in a breath. His ribs still poked out, but he wasn’t as emaciated as he thought thanks to Asher’s constant meals.

  He twirled a finger into his long, tangled hair and decided one of the first things he’d do was get a haircut. Lastly, Dan lifted the shirt and winced at the scar that stretched across his ribs. There was nothing he could do about that but hopefully with time, he’d no longer care about the mark.

  Tired from attempting to shift all day and finally managing it, he ended up on Asher’s bed. Their bed. He flopped on it, buried himself under the warm comforted, amazed to be hugging Asher’s pillow. It smelled of his wolf, too. He nuzzled it, remembered how he’d watch Asher until the wolf fell asleep.

  Gorgeous man. He wondered how it would be like to kiss those lips, now that he could? To feel those callused but gentle hands on his skin, his dick. God. His cock pulsed between his legs. The need in him grew, intensified as more erotic images played in his mind, of Asher doing all kinds of filthy things to his body.

  Ever since Chris, he’d grown terrified of sex, but not anymore. Chris was only interested in seeing him scream, in making him hurt. Asher, though, would be the exact opposite, could be the kind of lover who focused on his partner’s needs.

  Goosebumps raised over his skin. He let the pillow go, traced the hideous old scars on his ribs and shivered, even though it was no longer that cold under the comforter.

  What if Asher saw him in human form and decided he preferred the tabby cat to this scrawny, scarred man? Dan was used goods, after all, not worthy of a generous mate like Asher.

  “Mate.” He whispered the word, scared of what it meant.

  Before, he associated it with enslavement when Chris showed him his true colors. When he was a naive teen, he’d thought mating was a special part of the shifter culture. Dan brushed a hand over his neck. Chris’s mate mark had faded over time, but the memory of Chris biting him and nearly ripping out his throat brought him nothing but remembered agony.

  Was a genuine mate someone like Asher, who obviously cared for his friends, even bothered putting up with a stray who clawed him so many times and drew blood?

  Dan hesitated. Maybe turning back to human had been a bad idea. It wasn’t too late to turn back yet, but what if his animal won the next time round and he couldn’t become human anymore?

  He didn’t know what terrified him more—Asher’s rejection or being stuck in animal form for survival again.

  In the end, he couldn’t make up his mind. He heard the door creaking on its hinges and scented Asher entering. Unable to move, he peered at the other shifter from the bed, too scared to move, to say a thing.

  * * * *

  Something felt different, Asher realized the moment he entered his apartment. The scent he’d grown associated with his little cat seemed changed, altered, and he soon found out a way. Asher shut the door behind him, remembering to lock it, and beheld the beautiful stranger in his bed.

  Dark blond hair fell over the guy’s shoulders, curling under his ears, over a face more pretty than handsome, the body underneath slender, the skin creamy and tempting. It didn’t help that he could tell the guy was aroused under the sheets, erection poking out.

  Normally, Asher accepted gifts delivered at his door, but he couldn’t make any hasty moves. He recognized the shirt, that the other man carried his scent. There was no mistaking his strong-willed little cat, who somehow found the courage to find his way back to his humanity on his own.

  “Little cat.” A statement, not a question. The wolf in him watched and waited, although Asher knew his patience wasn’t at its best.

  “Daniel Porter. You can call me Dan.”

  Pleased he hadn’t scared Dan into changing back to tabby cat form, he approached the bed, tentatively, slowly, knowing anything could set Dan off.

  “That name sounds familiar, read it somewhere in the papers before.”

  Dan flinched. Shit. Bad move, but his mind shifted through information nonetheless, because digging for secrets was pa
rt and parcel of his job. Old society papers, announcement sections, but his mind came up with a blank. Dan had to tell him the rest.

  Reaching the edge of the bed, he sat down, careful to keep some distance between them. He could scent Dan’s fear, but he wasn’t offended, couldn’t even imagine what would push Dan into clinging into the skin of his animal.

  “Do you need me to give you more space?”

  He had to ask, although his wolf didn’t like that one bit. Raul and the others told him it had been a hopeless case, that only a tiny percentage of rogue shifters came back, and they never came back right. He proved them all wrong, because despite Dan’s fragile appearance, his little cat had a spine of steel.

  “No,” Dan eventually said. “I like it when you’re close. I feel safe with you.”

  “I’ll never let anything or anyone hurt you.”

  Dan narrowed his eyes. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”

  A snarl slipped between his lips, but Dan didn’t look away, didn’t slap his hand or stop Asher from tipping his chin upward so they could look eye-to-eye. “I keep all my promises, little cat, especially those important to me.”

  Asher’s gaze slid from that remarkable face to the side of Dan’s neck. Dan stilled as he tugged the collar of the shirt aside, growled at the sight of the bite mark there. Not just any simple mark either, but a mating bite, even though it had faded.

  “You belong to someone else,” he said, voice dull. Asher wasn’t the sort of man who took without asking, would never steal from another. He released Dan, wolf full of sorrow, surprised when Dan grabbed his hand, closed slender fingers over it.

  “No, not anymore.” Dan’s vivid green eyes blazed with remembered fear, anger. Those eyes looked far too ancient for Dan’s face.

  The realization dawned on him. Fury speared inside of him, and his next few words were accompanied with a growl. “This fucker was the one that hurt you so bad, you had to retreat into your animal.”

  Dan began to look away, but he gripped Dan’s jaw again, thumbed the stubble there. Not knowing when Dan would withdraw touching privileges, he thumbed Dan’s bottom lip, waiting for the other man to tell Asher to halt what he was doing.

  Thin-lipped, Dan’s look turned haunted, distant, as if going to a place he couldn’t reach.

  Asher didn’t like that. If Dan wasn’t ready to talk, he’d wait, but he wouldn’t let Dan go to the dark places in his mind alone. He grazed Dan’s lips with his own, slowly, feeling Dan’s reaction. If Dan didn’t like it, he’d pull away, but miraculously, Dan kissed back, reaching out for his left bicep and gripping it, before sliding closer out of his own volition.

  Pleased, Asher took control, plundered Dan’s mouth until the kiss turned rough. Their tongues tangled, teeth clashed. He slipped his hand under Dan’s shirt, touching a still too-skinny frame, but he’d make sure to feed Dan the nutrients his mate needed. He also touched old scars, but didn’t remark on them.

  When he deepened the kiss, Dan sucked down on his tongue. Eager little cat. When he withdrew his mouth, he smiled. “That looks better. You were heading somewhere I can’t reach you.”

  Dan stared at him, panting, then looked down to see his hand under the shirt. Asher ran his callused fingers over the old claw marks. Dan dropped his gaze. “Do you find me displeasing?”

  “What the fuck? Why would you say that?”

  “I’m scarred. I mean, he left my face intact, but the rest of me,” Dan faltered. “I’m used goods, no good to anyone.”

  Since Dan seemed unable to comprehend he was perfect the way he was, Asher sealed his lips over Dan’s again, bit Dan’s lower lip. Dan widened his eyes, and he broke from the kiss.

  “You bit me,” Dan accused, licking his lips.

  “You liked it, and besides, you were spouting stupid shit.”

  “Stupid?” Dan repeated, looking stunned.

  “Don’t ever talk about yourself like that. You know what I see when I look at you?”

  “What?” Dan whispered.

  “A fucking survivor who didn’t give up when other shifters would. You know the percentage of rogues being able to turn back to human form? One percent, just one, and you made it.”

  Dan swallowed, bit his lower lip, a mouth he wanted to taste, kiss again. Oh, Asher wanted to do so many things, to touch, to put his mouth on Dan’s most intimate places and wrangle moans of pleasure from his little cat’s mouth, but that could wait.

  “Will you tell me?”

  Chapter Five

  To Dan’s relief or disappointed, he wasn’t sure yet, Asher suggested they have dinner first and talk after. The werewolf seemed intent on feeding him, because Asher grabbed his cell and called for take-out. His stomach growled. Dan recalled how Asher always gave him human food, even when he was a cat, always talked and sat beside him, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

  Asher believed from the start, he realized, that he’d be able to get out of the second cage he placed himself in to survive. Never once did Asher doubt him. That made his heart race.

  “Yeah. Wait, two more fried noodles,” Asher said, finishing the call to look at him.

  Dan hadn’t move once from the bed, still hadn’t been able to quite take in the fact Asher kissed him. That kiss. God. It had been capable of incinerating him from the inside out. Dangerous, this man was lethal to the core. Dan knew that from the start, because while Chris had treated him with callousness, then cruelty, Asher showed him kindness and generosity.

  Asher managed to do what Chris could never achieve—get under his skin and make a permanent placement in his heart.

  “Are we having a party?” he asked, trying to sound casual. “You ordered for, like, ten people.”

  He wasn’t ready for more company, not yet. It would be a lot to take in. Too much.

  Dan had met Raul and Tom as a cat, and he liked Tom, because the kind human reminded him a little of himself, was someone he could have gotten along with, could have become friends with, if Chris never entered his life. Then again, if Chris hadn’t happened, then he’d never have met Asher. The past couldn’t be changed, but the future was his to create.

  Hope flared in his chest.

  Did his future contain this brave and possessive wolf?

  “Nope, it’s all for us. Besides, if you noticed, this place is small.”

  “For us? You’re that hungry?” Once he started to speak, it became easier. It felt comfortable talking with Asher.

  “You need more meat on those bones,” Asher said.

  He scowled, crossing his arms. “That’s what you’re complaining about? That I’m too skinny, yet you didn’t even blink once at my scars?”

  Dan had been worried about them the most, grimaced when Asher touched the rough texture of the raised skin. He’d made Chris really mad that time to the point the tiger shifter nearly killed him. Dan hoped Chris would cross the line, but the bastard kept him alive instead, knowing death was a sweet reprieve compared to the suffering he could inflict.

  Strong, corded arms wrapped around his body, Asher’s chest warm against the curve of his back. He tensed at first, but relaxed against the bigger shifter, unable to explain the sense of calm that entered him. Most of the time, he was wary of strangers, of anyone who came too close, but Asher was no longer a stranger.

  “Hey,” Asher said. “Did I say something wrong?”

  “Not at all, just remembering bad stuff.”

  “You can talk to me.”

  He fell silent. Asher didn’t judge him, would never do that, he realized. “The guy I mated became my captor. I didn’t realize until it was too late that his beauty only went skin deep, that underneath, he was a monster, a psychopath who enjoyed hurting others.”

  Asher didn’t interrupt him once. When he began to shake, trembles running up and down his body, Asher began to stroke him, the gesture calming. Cats luxuriated in tactile contact, except Chris made touching feel repulsive to him.

  Dan didn’t thi
nk he could stand another man’s touch after Chris, but Asher was different. These hands, he realized, took him home and helped him heal.

  “My clan and his family arranged my mating to Chris Roman.”

  Asher spoke, “The Tiger Prince?”

  He nodded. “The press still calls him that?”

  “I’ve heard negative rumors about this asshole. He’s been sued by a number of ex-lovers for abuse.”

  “No one’s been successful, I’m guessing?”

  “He has the best lawyer in the city and the backing of his prominent family,” Asher said flatly, clearly unimpressed. Good thing, too, because most ordinary folks would be awed by Chris’s image and family.

  He nodded, accepting Chris would always remain untouchable. It was a miracle Asher didn’t immediately cut ties from him. Any sensible person, even a strong, dominant predator, would take the first exit route after learning the kind of mess Dan was entangled with.

  The danger he’d bring was part of the reason why he’d taken so long to shift back to human. He had a feeling Chris continued to search for him. Dan in human form would make for an easy target. It also meant placing Asher in the limelight. Except he couldn’t remain as Asher’s stray cat forever.

  Dan became selfish and started wanting so much more, even if it meant bringing a threat to his savior, the one man who bothered to reach out and believed he could come back.

  That hope, along with wanting to speak to Asher face-to-face, propelled him to make either the best or worst decision of his life.

  Story not done, he continued, “His family owns plenty of businesses in the city, and he comes from the largest tiger clan in the country. All feline shifters, big or small, are connected by a network. I came from a small clan of domestic shifters. They considered it an honor that the so-called famous tiger prince would take interest in me. Unlike the rare Omega wolves, we male tabby Omega shifters capable of giving birth form a sizable number.”

  Dan shivered, glad Asher tightened his embrace. “When I asked him why he picked me when he and his father visited the compound where we lived, do you know what he said?”