Pride Mates

by Jennifer Ashley

  If it wasn’t too late.

  Chapter Five

  A muffled tinkle of broken glass trickled from the kitchen downstairs. At first Kim rolled over in bed, not paying attention. This was a safe neighborhood, never any break-ins.

  When hinges of the kitchen door squeaked, she sat up straight.

  Kim hadn’t been asleep. She’d been staring at the dark ceiling for the last hour, absorbed in thoughts of Liam. How his warm, friendly voice tickled her ear, how the corners of his eyes crinkled when he smiled, how nice his butt looked in those tight jeans. Now her heart pounded, adrenaline pumping as she heard someone moving around her kitchen.

  Should she trust her martial arts classes? In her baby-doll nightie?

  Screw that. The magic numbers were 911.

  Kim lifted her cell phone from the nightstand, thumb reaching for the numbers. She smelled a sudden sour odor, and then the phone flew across the room and shattered against the wall.

  Before she could scream, strong hands lifted her by the neck. Kim found herself staring into white-blue eyes in a hard male face that had half changed to a wolfish form. Lips lifted from pointed canines, and the breath that washed over her smelled like rotten meat. Kim fought frantically as the half-shifted man’s hands cut off her air, claws raking hot pain. He was going to kill her. Through her dimming vision she realized that this Shifter wore no Collar.

  Then suddenly she was free. Kim crashed back into the bed, gasping for breath, as the Shifter was ripped from her. She dragged her hair out of her face in time to see a wildcat slam the Shifter to her bedroom floor. Snarling filled the room, not angry doggy snarling, but the real thing, wild animals in red-hot fury.

  Sean Morrissey stood inside Kim’s bedroom doorway, holding a broadsword that gleamed with light of its own. Sean’s eyes were midnight dark and full of rage. His gaze fixed on the fight in the middle of the floor, but he didn’t rush to interfere. He watched, waiting.

  The creatures upended Kim’s dresser and nightstand and shoved her bed across the room like it was a cardboard box. Sean didn’t do anything, just stood there with the sword ready. Kim heard herself shouting, but her words were lost in the animal screams as the two creatures fought.

  The wildcat—ears back, canines extended—snapped its jaw across the wolf’s throat. The wolf yelped once. Its paws scrabbled hard against the wildcat’s body, drawing blood, before the wolf’s head lolled to the side and it fell to the carpet, lifeless. The wildcat sat back, sides heaving, watching the corpse as though expecting it to get up again.

  Kim fought the urge to laugh hysterically. Excuse me but there’s a deceased wolf and a wildcat in my bedroom! She wasn’t certain what kind of wildcat it was—tawny like a cougar, muscled like a leopard, with a hint of stripe like a tiger. It also had the huge jaws and massive paws of a male lion. But the cat didn’t look weird, like a mishmash. It was lithe, beautiful, powerful.

  Sean finally moved. The wildcat backed off as Sean raised the sword, then drove its point into the dead wolf’s chest. The wolf shimmered, became the half-shifted man who’d attacked Kim, then slowly disintegrated to ash. At the same time, the wildcat rose on its hind feet and flowed back into the form of a very naked Liam Morrissey.

  Mmm, he looks good, the back of Kim’s mind said. Rippling muscles, smooth skin, wiry dark hair spreading across his chest. Tight abdomen, massive thighs, huge…Oh, man.

  As soon as air poured back into Kim’s lungs, screams hurtled out of her mouth. She tried to stop them, but hysterical reaction grabbed her and wrung her in its grip.

  Liam’s big body was next to her on the bed, his hand covering her mouth. “Hush, now, love. It’s over.”

  Delayed shock. Understandable. I’ll be all right.

  Liam’s hand was warm, somehow comforting, even though he was trying to keep her quiet. After a moment he gave her an inquiring look, and she nodded, indicating she’d finished screaming. Liam lifted his hand away, and Kim dragged in a deep breath, inhaling his heady male scent.

  “Liam, man, get yourself dressed,” Sean said. “You’ll scare the woman.”

  “No, it’s all right.” Kim closed her eyes, felt Liam’s bare arms and legs encircling hers. Nope, didn’t bother her at all. She opened her eyes again and looked at Liam. “What the hell just happened?”

  “We killed him,” Liam said. “We had no choice. The bastard would have killed you.”

  “Is that what happens to Shifters? They dissolve into dust, like vampires on TV?”

  Sean didn’t answer, standing stoically with the sword still pointed at the floor.

  “No.” Liam eased himself away from Kim. She wanted to reach for him again, have him enclose her back into that so very nice, naked embrace. “Only the ones Sean runs through with that sword. Sean is our Guardian.”

  Sean’s eyes narrowed. “Liam.”

  “What’s a Guardian?” More nonverbal cues flew between the brothers, not telepathy, but body language so subtle she couldn’t catch it all, let alone understand it.

  “A protector,” Liam said. “Of Shiftertown, in this case.”

  “I didn’t see a Collar on the Shifter.” Kim shivered suddenly, violently. “I was going to die, wasn’t I?”

  “He would have killed you. He was feral. That means he was dangerous, to you, to me, to our families. He’d already killed a Shifter female and her children.”

  Kim gaped. “Wait, I heard about the Shifter woman dying. I thought she and her kids were killed in a car accident on a back highway in Hill Country. Weren’t they?”

  “No, lass.” Liam looked so sad. Sean stood apart, incongruous in jeans and T-shirt with the medieval-looking sword. “She was murdered. Sean and me, we put her body in her car and pushed it into that ditch and set it alight.”

  “Why?” Kim got off the bed. She realized all she wore was a short, silky baby-doll, and she grabbed for the robe she’d tossed to a chair. “Why not report the crime and have the Shifter brought in?”

  “Because it’s our responsibility.” Liam’s gaze took in her body as she hastily shrugged on the robe, but his voice rang with anger. Sean gave a nod of agreement.

  “No, it isn’t,” Kim said. “Shifters live in the human world now—that means human law prevails. You signed the agreement. The Shifter should have been arrested and tried like anyone else, not killed vigilante-style by you and Sean.”

  She ran out of breath. The two men weren’t listening to her but looking at each other, still talking without talking. The weight of the Shifter’s death pressed on the room.

  Finally Sean shook his head and slid his sword into a leather sheath. “You’re effing crazy, Liam, you know? You do what you have to, I’m reporting in to Dad.”

  “Do that. Take my bike.”

  “What, you think I’d be hitching a ride with a sword strapped to my back? I’ll see you at home.”

  With a final scowl, Sean turned and left the room, carrying the sword by its sheathed blade. Kim heard him on the stairs, and then the back door slammed beneath them, shaking the house.

  “Come on.” Liam got up, still naked and unembarrassed about it. “Get dressed and go downstairs. I’ll cook you some dinner—you look peaky.”

  “The Shifter—he’s…” Kim swallowed. “All over my carpet.” Gray dust coated the rug she’d bought at an antique store out in Fredericksburg. “Ew.”

  Liam enfolded her in his arms and kissed her neck, his warmth like a blanket on her cold skin. “I’ll take care of this, love. Go on downstairs and wait for me.”

  Kim didn’t want to. She wanted to stay here for a while and run her hands along Liam’s broad, strong shoulders. His body was solid and reassuring, and so was his smile. She could stand here in his arms all damned night.

  Liam kissed her neck again. “You’ll be all right. Go on, now.”

  Kim was never sure how she made herself back away, grab her clothes, and scoot across the hall to her guest bedroom to change. As she made her way downstairs, she strained to hear
what Liam did in her bedroom, but all was silent.

  Liam found his clothes where he’d thrown them off in Kim’s kitchen and slid them on. His adrenaline was still high, his heart pumping hard and fast. He wanted to run, hunt, grab Kim and have unbridled sex with her. Containing himself wasn’t easy, but his body running so hot would continue to stave off the pain that was coming. And then he’d pay. Damn, would he pay.

  Kim hunched on a sofa on the other side of the breakfast bar. She had no kitchen table and chairs; instead, a couple of stools stood at the counter, and she’d filled the rest of the room with a couch and two comfortable-looking chairs.

  Her loose hair straggled over the blouse she’d put on, her blue eyes enormous as she watched Liam dress. He’d cleaned himself up in her bathroom after he’d vacuumed what was left of the feral Shifter from the rug. The bugger wouldn’t come out all the way out, though.

  “You’ll have to send that carpet out for cleaning,” he said.

  Kim whitened. “Oh, God.”

  “I’ll do it for you. It’s my fault the shite came here at all.”

  “Why do you keep saying it’s your fault? Not everything is your responsibility. You live in the human world now.”

  She was trying to hold on to what she knew, what she’d been told. Humans liked to comfort themselves like that.

  “It’s my responsibility because I let you come to Shiftertown. The feral smelled your scent on me and decided to hurt me by hurting you. That way, even if he died, he’d know I’d be grieving. It’s the feral way—take vengeance on your enemy even while they’re killing you.” Liam shook his head as he moved to the refrigerator. “I’ve never seen a Shifter move that fast, or be able to track that quickly. There was something wrong with him.”

  That bothered him more than he cared to admit. Ferals, ironically, were weaker than Shifters with Collars, because Collared Shifters were well fed, well rested, and had plenty of time to exercise. But this feral had been fast and had brushed off Sean’s first sword thrust as though it were an insect bite.

  Kim shivered. “Are there any more of them out there?”

  Liam didn’t know, and that bothered him more than he cared to let on, but he made his tone reassuring. “Shouldn’t be. We keep track of the ferals pretty well.” Or so Fergus claimed. The refrigerator’s shelves were bare except for a few containers of yogurt and a rubber-banded bunch of greens. “You have no food, woman.”

  “It’s in the freezer.”

  That compartment revealed stacks of boxed frozen meals, all with “Lite” or “Low-calorie” written on them. “This isn’t food,” Liam said. “It’s a travesty.”

  “I have to watch my weight.”

  Liam remembered how Kim had looked in her wisp of a nightie—lovely breasts, sweet waist, and thighs he wanted to lick. “I don’t mind watching it for you, love. There’s nothing wrong with your body.”

  She went a deep shade of red, and Liam slammed the freezer door. “I can’t cook you up my famous mile-high pancakes with this crap. Come on. I’ll take you out for some real food.”

  “I can’t go anywhere. My back door is broken.”

  Two small panes had been smashed, the lock ripped out. “I’ll take care of that.”

  Liam unhooked his cell phone and made some calls. Voices on the other end promised to come and replace the glass and fix the lock in half an hour. “Does the human woman have any beer?”

  “Bring your own,” Liam growled and clicked off the phone.

  Kim had a stunned look on her face. “What are you doing?”

  “I keep telling you, sweetheart, it’s my fault the bastard attacked you. I have friends who will take care of things, as a favor to me.”

  “Shifter friends.”

  “What other kind? Come on, we’ll leave them to it.”

  Liam somehow convinced her to walk out of the house and open the garage, but he took the car keys from Kim’s shaking hands and drove her back to Shiftertown himself.

  Sean was right, Liam was effing crazy, but he had to do this. Kim needed protecting, but then, so did the Shifters. Liam would have to combine the two needs. Dylan would be livid, but Liam also had the feeling that Dylan would understand. Fergus, now…Well, Liam would deal with Fergus when he had to.

  “This is where you work,” Kim said, as Liam parked behind the bar in the tiny space reserved for him.

  “Well spotted, love. They do a mean chicken-fried steak.”

  Kim’s eyes flared with sudden hunger. Did she starve herself, the little sweetheart? She had a man, she’d said. Why didn’t the idiot take care of her?

  The bar was full when they walked in. Shifters predominated the crowd, with a handful of humans who’d either become friends with Shifters, had come in to gawk, or were Shifter groupies. Most patrons hovered at the long wraparound bar, but Liam guided Kim to an empty booth and sat her down.

  Liam’s heart was thumping, his adrenaline still high. He’d have to endure the agony sooner or later, but he hoped it held off long enough for him to enjoy his meal.

  “Two chicken-fried steaks, Annie, and a mess of chips.”

  The tall, svelte Shifter woman who’d come to wait on them rolled her eyes. “We call them french fries over here, Liam. I tell you all the time. Not chips.”

  “I don’t see anyone French in this bar,” Liam said, continuing the usual banter between himself and Annie.

  “The new cook is Cajun. Close enough.”

  “And we’ll need something to drink,” Liam said. “What will you have, Kim?”

  “White wine?”

  White wine. She was precious. “You don’t want to drink the wine here. Bring me a pint of plain, Annie.”

  “Guinness,” Annie said, noting it on her pad. “For you, miss?”

  “A Tecate,” Kim said. She glared at Liam. “With a lime, please.”

  “You got it.” Annie whisked away, her tight barmaid shorts clinging to her trim behind. Every male in the bar turned to watch her pass, but once she’d gone their gazes swiveled back to Kim.

  “Why is everyone staring at me?” Kim whispered. “I’m not the only human here.”

  But she was the only one scent-marked. Every Shifter, male and female, had caught what Liam had done. Nostrils widened, eyes flickered in acknowledgment. Kim belonged to Liam, and anyone who bothered her would answer to Liam. Message sent and received.

  “I’m looking after you, and they know it.”

  “Why did you want to come here? We passed two IHOPs on the way.”

  “It’s safer.”

  Kim glanced around. “For you or for me?”

  “For both of us.”

  He quieted as Annie set down one sweating bottle of Guinness and one of Tecate, lime firmly wedged into the opening.

  “Are you going to explain why you didn’t call the police on that Shifter?” Kim shoved her lime entirely into the liquid and lifted the bottle to drink. Her tongue came out and touched the bottle’s opening before her lips closed around it.

  Goddess help me, it’s hot in here.

  Liam clenched his beer bottle, but the cold bite on his palm did nothing to calm him. “What do you think would happen if your human police found out he was on the loose?” he asked. “Shifters would be hunted, and the hunters not too worried about whether they brought down a Collared Shifter or a feral. Just so long as they got one.”

  “All right, I can see that. With one Shifter already on trial, people would freak if another one went crazy.” Kim leaned forward, letting Liam see that this blouse didn’t stay fastened any better than the last one had. “Do you think he killed the girl Brian is supposed to have murdered?”

  “I wish it could be that easy. We weren’t aware of him until a few nights ago, when he killed the Shifter woman. He wasn’t around before that. Brian’s girlfriend died months ago.”

  “How do you know he wasn’t here?” She wrinkled her nose. “Of course, you’d have remembered smelling him.”

  Liam acknowledge
d that with a laugh.

  “What did you mean by ‘Collared Shifters’?” Kim went on. “Sounds like collard greens. Before tonight, I thought all Shifters wore Collars. It’s the law.”

  This was getting complicated. Liam sifted through what was safe to tell her. Hell, none of this was safe. “Not all Shifters took the Collar. Your human government knows that, but they keep it to themselves.”

  Kim’s slim fingers toyed with her beer bottle, but she didn’t drink again. She watched him with intelligent eyes. Beautiful eyes. Damn, it’s been way too long…

  “You make it sound like wearing the Collar is a choice.”

  “It is, love,” Liam said. “It’s a choice we were given twenty years ago, and we made it. Most of us. Some Shifters chose to remain wild.”

  “You mean free.”

  “Hunted. Dying. Pushed out. We might have survived maybe five more years if we hadn’t taken the Collars.”

  “Are you saying you chose subjugation to save yourselves?”

  Liam shrugged, pretending to agree. “Our lines were dying out. We weren’t fertile, and children that managed to get born often didn’t last their first year. Now look at us.”

  Kim moved her gaze from him to the filled room. At the bar Jordie Ross stood with his four sons, all tall and bulky, talking and laughing loudly. Their mother had survived their births—she was sitting in a booth on the other side of the room with a couple of friends.

  Another Shifter woman held her hand on her swelling belly while her husband kept a protective arm around her. She was prudently drinking bottled water, leaning back against her husband.

  “Liam.” A tall figure cut his vision. “Nice human you’ve got there.”

  Liam looked up and scowled. “Ellison. Get lost, man. I’m trying to convince her that Shifters are civilized.”

  The tall man laughed. As usual, Ellison wore a black button-up shirt and jeans, cowboy boots, and big hat. He loved Texas, had adopted the state when his Shifter clan relocated from Colorado. Some of his clan missed the cool air of the Rockies, but Ellison Rowe embraced Texas Hill Country, even with its humidity, mosquitoes, bad traffic, and state congressmen.