Tiger Tail: Shifter Romance

by Sky Winters

  “Do something while she’s distracted,” Glinda said over the sound.

  De drew a deep breath and concentrated. An iron cage fell over the top of the witch.

  Glinda looked stunned and the witch cackled.

  “You think a cage can hold me?” she asked. With one wave of her hand, the bars disappeared and fell like daggers into the ground before De and Glinda.

  The witch cackled again as she raised her hands, ready to do more damage.

  “I can’t hold this field forever,” Glinda said. “You have to do something more permanent.”

  De’s body shook with combined fright and effort of concentration. Then she saw Aspen’s face appear in one of the many arched doorways surrounding the great hall. Her heart soared, but she feared what the witch would do if she were to catch sight of him.

  “Take this, ugly!” she shouted as distraction and threw out her own hands with enormous effort.

  An invisible force shoved the witch backward into the stone wall of the great room. Her eyes grew wide with fear and she finally stopped cackling. “Kill, my pet!” she screeched at the top of her lungs.

  De braced herself for an attack from one of the monkeys or something worse. And Aspen chose that moment to charge from his hiding spot.

  The witch pointed a crooked finger at him, and De shoved Glinda’s shoulders so that her force field fell between the witch and Aspen, leaving them vulnerable.

  Aspen leapt through the air, morphing into the great lion as he did so. He charged back toward De and her heart soared. He was coming to protect her and she’d used Glinda to block his attack on the witch and vice-versa.

  But as he charged, De’s smile fell. Something was wrong. His golden eyes showed immense pain and he stared only at Glinda.

  “Stop!” De screamed, understanding only a moment before it happened.

  Aspen pounced on Glinda, knocking her to the ground where her head bounced against the rock, finally resting still, a pool of red flowing beneath her like a tiny river.

  Aspen let out an enormous roar and barred his teeth like he was about to rip out her throat.

  De didn’t think. She threw herself across Glinda’s motionless form. If Aspen was going to rip out anyone’s throat, it would be hers and she’d deserve it for trusting him. She pressed her eyes closed, shielding Glinda’s head and shoulders and felt his familiar warm breath against the back of her neck.

  But instead of teeth, she felt his human head, moments later, lying on hers. His body wracked with sobs as he folded her into his arms.

  “I’m so sorry,” he cried, turning her to face him. His eyes pleaded with her for forgiveness.

  “You will give me the boots,” the witch said, standing behind him. “Now. Or they die.”

  “Who dies?” De asked, looking back into Aspen’s eyes and searching for the truth.

  “My pride,” he said, powerful voice cracking. “She has my family, De.”

  “And you’re willing to kill to protect them,” she said. She knew it was true. Hadn’t he already killed to protect her? “But I thought I was part of your pride.”

  The anguish on Aspen’s face was too much to bear.

  “He doesn’t love you, silly girl,” the witch said with a snort. “It was a part he played to get you to take off the boots.”

  And he had. He’d tried at every turn to get her to take them off, hadn’t he? Until she admitted she couldn’t do it.

  “I’m such a fool,” she said softly, unable to hold back the tears.

  “It was easy at first,” Aspen said, tilting her chin and forcing her to keep looking at him despite the pain it caused. “I only had to get the boots. How hard could that be? Killing was unnecessary.”

  “You know I can’t get them off,” De said. “So it’s not a choice anymore. You’re going to have to kill me. Or at least rip my legs off.” She tried to control the trembling, but her body betrayed her.

  Aspen cried and growled then stood. De supposed he’d have to be a lion to really do it.

  “Do it now. No more lollygagging,” the witch demanded. “The owner of the boots will bring an end to the old regime. I’m the new regime. Those are my boots.”

  “No,” said Aspen, still watching De.

  “Excuse me?” the witch asked, danger in her voice.

  “I won’t hurt you, De. I may have been trying for the boots at the beginning, but I really did fall in love with you. I won’t choose between you and my pride.”

  “You fool,” the witch said. “I’ll kill them and you.”

  Aspen spun on her. “You would have kept using them against me until I was no longer valuable to you. You never meant to let them go. Or me.”

  De stood on shaky feet and tugged his hand, pulling him back. “Aspen, no. You have to protect them. I’ll never make it out anyway.”

  “I will kill her,” he whispered, nuzzling her ear. “You run when I attack. Don’t look back.”

  De shook her head. Others had sacrificed enough trying to protect her. She was more sure of herself in this moment than she’d ever been in her whole life. She concentrated hard and the boots that had been stuck on her legs for so long appeared in her hands, which she offered to Aspen.

  His golden eyes grew wide. “De? You used magic?”

  She nodded and pushed past Aspen to face the witch, whose hungry face focused only on the boots.

  “They’re not your size,” De said as the witch lunged for them.

  They disappeared from her hands.

  “Where did they go?” the witch asked, panicked.

  “To their rightful owner.” De nodded toward Glinda, who sat up slowly, clutching the back of her wounded head, barely noticing the boots on her feet.

  “No!” the witch shouted, backing up toward the wall.

  Glinda grinned and her eyes glowed green. The witch shook her head vehemently as steam sizzled from her skin. De buried her face in Aspen’s chest as the Wicked Witch of the West disintegrated into a pile of ash.

  “We did it,” Glinda said. “Thank you, Delilah.”

  “You’re going to need those. But,” De said, walking right into Glinda’s personal space, “if I ever find out you aren’t treating the people of Oz right? I’m coming back.”

  Glinda swallowed and forced a bigger smile. “Got it.”

  “Aspen?” De said, taking his hand. “Let’s go find your family.”

  Chapter 9

  De’s heart sang with a mixture of love and grief as she watched Aspen, in lion form, nuzzling with the two lionesses, one of which had the sagging belly of a mother-to-be. De wondered if the cubs would be shifters or full lions. In the end, it didn’t matter. These were beautiful creatures and she understood on some level how he could love them so much.

  But watching their reunion also made De’s decision that much easier. She’d understood what she had to do so clearly in that one moment of danger. When Aspen had refused the witch in order to spare her life, she realized she couldn’t let him or his pride die for her. She had to start making it on her own.

  She’d love him to be a part of her new life. Lord knew she’d never find a lover like him in a million years, but his place was here, and hers… Well, it was somewhere back in the real world, that much she knew for sure. And it wasn’t running from her parents, it was facing them head on.

  “I have to go back,” she said, sensing Glinda, who’d just entered the room.

  Glinda sat next to her, folding her ridiculously long ruby boots.

  “You can do that yourself. Just use your power. But I think you owe him a goodbye first.”

  De nodded. She didn’t know if she’d be strong enough, but she did owe it to him. So she waited patiently for him to finish with his pride and accepted his hand when he came back to her in human form, beaming.

  Aspen lifted De around the waist and swung her around in a circle as she laughed. It was so good to see him like this. To see him with the secret weight he’d been carrying lifted.

  “I
t’s nice to see you smile,” she said, when he set her back down again.

  “It’s all thanks to you,” he said in his deep, treble voice that vibrated her soul.

  “That’s why it’s hard to tell you what I have to say.”

  “Then don’t say it.” Aspen pulled her in for a lingering kiss that threatened to melt away all conscious thought.

  “That wasn’t fair,” she breathed when he finally let her go. “But I still have to go home.”

  “I will go with you,” he offered.

  “No.” De glanced over his shoulder at the two lions waiting patiently in the grass. “You have to stay here. You’re going to be a daddy after all.”

  Aspen grinned. “You noticed.”

  “Hard not to.”

  “We could make some beautiful cubs,” he whispered, nuzzling her ear.

  “I’m not ready for that yet,” De said, pulling back, but hanging on to his hands. “I’ll never forget you, Aspen.”

  “Nor I you, Delilah.”

  De’s vision blurred with tears as she finally let go of his hands. She closed her eyes and concentrated. Home, she repeated in her mind. Home. Home.

  When De opened her eyes and saw Aspen’s face, she thought it hadn’t worked. But then she realized she was lying down and the space was dark, cool, and much smaller than before. Taking a second look at his face, she realized his eyes were a shade darker than she remembered and his beard was more neatly trimmed.

  Seeing her open her eyes and smile, Aspen relaxed back into his huge lopsided grin.

  “Aspen,” she said, her voice hoarse.

  “Is that your name?” he asked.

  “What? No. My name is Delilah. But you can call me De.” She sat up slowly, head spinning. A dull ache clung to the back of her skull. “Ow.”

  “Take it easy, De. You had quite a fall. You really scared the crap out of me. I mean, the last thing I expected was a beautiful woman to come running down into my storm cellar in the middle of a tornado.”

  “I tripped,” De said, remembering.

  “Yeah,” the handsome man said, rubbing the back of his head with some embarrassment. “That would’ve been my cat, Lion.”

  A small meow made De turn her head to find a golden cat sitting at the bottom of the steps.

  “Sorry to barge in like that,” De said, accepting his help to stand. His hands were warm and calloused. They sent shivers of anticipation down her body.

  “Glad you found a safe place.”

  She smiled and they stared into each other’s eyes for a full minute.

  “My name is Luke, by the way. This is my farm.”

  “Pleasure to meet you, Luke,” De said, tucking a stray hair back behind her ear. “You don’t happen to have a wife, do you?”

  Luke turned bright pink up to his ears. “No, ma’am. Why do you ask?”

  “Oh, just making sure before I do this.” De sauntered up to the man before her, pulled his face down to hers, standing on her tiptoes, and kissed him.

  “Wow,” he said when she stepped back again. “Are you sure you know what you’re doing? I mean, was that because you hit your head? I don’t want to take advantage.”

  De smiled. Being in control of her life was a damn good feeling.

  THE END

  About the Author

  Sky Winters is drawn to writing paranormal fairy tales with bad-ass shapeshifters. She likes her heroes and heroines to be the unexpected ones, and their passion to be steamy! She writes these sizzl'n and surreal tales for you, late at night, when the wolves are howling from her Northwestern home.

  If surreal romance with shapeshifters is your thing, you best sign up for Paranormal Romance Publishers email list, and grab a copy of “Wolf Babies” for FREE

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