Tempted by the Jaguar #1: Transformation (Riverford Shifters)

by Cristina Rayne

  His odd words gave her pause only for a split-second, but it was the edge he needed to finally push the door open wide enough for him to squeeze through. In a panic, rather than make a break for her bedroom, Kylie grabbed the doorknob and pulled the door flush against her front and scrambled back until her back hit the wall, using the door to cover her nudity.

  Immediately she felt a tug on the door, and Kylie gripped the doorknob so tightly that her entire hand was beginning to hurt. “No! Don’t!” she moaned desperately.

  The stranger abruptly stopped trying to pull the door away from her.

  “I’m not going to hurt you,” he said softly.

  Kylie sucked in a sharp breath. Those words, that tone—she had heard them before, just last night, in fact. It was him, the shifter guy, the jaguar. How in the hell had he found her?

  “I can smell you.”

  She mentally cursed as his earlier words echoed mockingly within her mind, remembering how acute her sense of smell had been while she had been in her shifted form. He had tracked her. She had never had any chance of escaping him at all.

  “I—” Kylie had no idea what to do. She was quite literally backed into a corner, and her options were practically nil. Weak and trembling behind a door, she doubted she could solve her nudity problem by shifting since she both lacked the energy and more importantly, had no idea how to initiate the change in the first place.

  Light was pouring through the window beside her, too much for it to still be early morning. Surely she had been passed out for longer than a couple of hours, so where was Paul? Had his plane been delayed?

  She needed to stall for time, and that meant getting him talking and playing dumb.

  “I—don’t have any clothes on,” Kylie admitted.

  She was completely unprepared for his sudden laugh. “Why didn’t you say so in the first place?” he scolded.

  Kylie couldn’t help feeling slightly offended by his tone. “Maybe it was because I was too busy trying to keep some psycho from breaking into my apartment!” she snapped.

  “The door was unlocked,” he said pointedly, sounding completely unrepentant.

  “And?” she shot back hostilely. “Since when does that give every asshole on the street permission to waltz into the apartment of someone they don’t know?”

  “You’re certainly taking all of this a lot better than I’d thought you would,” he remarked. She could hear the sound of cloth rustling as he talked. “Things may be more serious than I thought.”

  Suddenly he thrust something dark between the door and the wall. Kylie shrank away instinctually before she saw that it was a thin, navy blue sweater.

  “Put that on, and come out. As I said before, for now I only want to talk.”

  The sweater was utterly saturated with the smell of him, of something earthy and powerful that she knew she would have never smelled yesterday. The jaguar’s senses were muted but very much still a part of her even in her human form.

  Her nostrils instinctually flared as she slipped his sweater over her head, his scent starting to make her head spin. She got the feeling that by putting on his sweater, she had just done something that she really shouldn’t have done, but between some vague feelings of misgivings and parading out naked in front of some unknown guy, there really was no competition.

  Kylie was relieved to discover that the sweater was more than long enough to cover her ass. After pushing the overly-long sleeves up past her wrists, she hesitantly slipped out from behind the door. She half-expected to be met with the sight of a bare-chested man, but the dark-haired man standing only a foot or two away from the door—and completely blocking that potential escape route—was dressed properly in a simple white t-shirt and jeans.

  It had been dark back in the forest, and she most definitely had not been herself, so Kylie really didn’t remember much about the shifter that had confronted her. Now, she couldn’t help but stare as she noted his tanned, well-muscled arms and not just for the obvious reasons. Either he had not been trying too hard to push open the door earlier or shifting had changed her body even in its human form. She wasn’t sure which idea disturbed her more.

  Her gaze rose to his face, and Kylie could feel her entire body stiffen as she fought to control her startlement. To say that the guy was hot didn’t even begin to accurately describe him. He had the type of chiseled, perfectly proportioned face with plump, luscious lips and just the right amount of stubble on his cheeks and chin to give him that sexy edge that photographers or painters wept over. His eyes, a hazel color more golden than brown regarded her with all the wariness of a predator presented with an unknown entity.

  Kylie was grateful for that look. It instantly dragged her mind out of the gutter it had fast descended into and back to the seriousness of the situation. Her eyes flickered once towards the door to her bedroom. It had a lock, and the window was large enough for her to climb out. Could she make it?

  A slight narrowing of her uninvited visitor’s eyes was all the answer she needed. The last thing she wanted was to end up tackled on the ground while wearing only an overlarge sweater.

  “Okay. Let’s talk,” she said, gesturing over to the couch.

  The smile he flashed her made her heart seize, and now completely irritated with herself, Kylie tore her eyes away from his mouth and stomped over to the couch while the door clicked shut behind her. What was wrong with her anyway? She was beginning to wonder if last night’s horrors had robbed her of her sanity after all.

  She gave her head a mental shake. Now was not the time to think about her kidnapping. She needed her mind sharp and her emotions stable to safely maneuver the potential minefield this jaguar shifter presented.

  Kylie sat on the far end of the couch, making sure his sweater adequately covered all her naughty bits. She watched him approach, all feline grace even as a human. She was relieved when he sat at the other end of the couch, respecting her personal space.

  “So, will you at least tell me your name?” she asked, hating how stiff her words sounded. This was not a man she could afford to show any weakness to, no matter the circumstances.

  “Hunter Rivera.” He raised an eyebrow expectantly.

  She hesitated, but then realized that by knowing her address, finding out her name was only a Google search away.

  “Kylie Moore.” Then before he could say anything else, she asked, “Do you want to tell me why you think you’re entitled to forcing your way into my apartment? Why I should even talk to you instead of calling the cops?”

  Hunter’s eyes suddenly hardened. “Take a good look at your hands,” he said quietly. “That’s all the permission I need, given it was you that entered my territory and did what you did.”

  Wondering if he was trying to trick her in some way, Kylie was reluctant to take her eyes off him, so she raised her hands to eye level instead. She immediately gasped in shock when she realized that her hands were splattered with dried blood. Without a word, she abruptly rose and headed towards her bathroom.

  She had already turned on the tap in the sink when Hunter’s large form filled the doorway. He stood there silently and watched with no discernable expression as she vigorously soaped and scrubbed her hands raw until even the blood beneath her fingernails had been cleansed. By then, Kylie’s entire body was shaking with the effort of trying to keep it together, and her breathing sounded sharp and panicky. But damned if she was going to fall apart in front of this man without knowing his intentions.

  “He’s alive you know,” Hunter said suddenly, making her jump.

  Slowly, she turned to look at him. That wary look had entered his eyes again.

  “Although you damned near gutted him, he managed to get back to his car and drive to the outskirts of the city before crashing into an auto repair shop.”

  Kylie turned her head and looked down at her reddened, damp hands. ”He was going to hurt me,” she whispered.

  She could see him nod out of the corner of her eye. “I was hunting nearby,
” Hunter said. “I heard you screaming.”

  “He snuck up behind me when I was reaching into my backseat for my backpack,” she continued, the words suddenly tumbling from her lips as if of their own accord. “He knocked me out, and I woke up tied up inside his trunk. He took me into the forest. He had scissors. He started to—started to—c-cut—” Kylie wrapped her trembling arms around her waist and squeezed tightly. “Then I—I—”

  “Hey, it’s okay,” Hunter said gently, reaching a hand out to her, but stopping just short of touching her shoulder. “For now, why don’t you go change. I’ll be waiting for you in the living room.”

  Without waiting for a response, he turned and left her to try to regain her composure.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  When Kylie walked back into the living room more than half an hour later, now dressed in jeans and a simple long-sleeved shirt, Hunter was seated back on the couch staring pensively at the various picture frames of family and friends that hung on the wall next to the TV. Frankly, she was surprised that he had not barged into her bedroom to drag her out.

  She didn’t know what to make of him. It was clear that he wasn’t going to leave until he received whatever answers he had tracked her down for. For that reason alone, she wasn’t quite ready to trust in his professions of not hurting her. Just because he hadn’t hurt her yet didn’t mean he wouldn’t later if he felt her answers were less than satisfactory.

  Once her trembling had more or less stopped, Kylie had shut herself into her room and quickly threw on the first set of clothes that had caught her eye in her closet. She had even put on a pair of her running shoes, seriously contemplating trying to escape through the window. However, her phone was likely still on the floor somewhere near the front door, and she had never memorized Paul’s number. Even if she holed up at a friend’s place, Hunter would likely literally sniff her out before Paul could find her.

  She was screwed either way, so the best thing she could do was cooperate with Hunter until Paul showed up. At the very least, Paul would add an unexpected variable to the mix, and maybe, just maybe she and Paul would be able to talk their way out of this whole nightmare without raising anyone’s suspicions.

  It was now almost five hours since she had made it inside her apartment and collapsed in front of the door. Either Paul had been unable to catch a flight home on such short notice and was forced to drive or his flight was delayed. Whichever it was, it probably wouldn’t be long before he arrived. She only had to hold it together for a little while longer…feign ignorance…

  “What are you thinking?” Hunter suddenly asked, startling Kylie from her thoughts.

  She turned her gaze back to him but didn’t move closer to the couch, nervously bunching the sweater she had planned to return to him between her hands.

  “This is a nightmare,” she replied. “That’s what I’m thinking. People don’t turn into freaking leopards, no matter how scared they are.”

  He scowled. “Jaguars, not leopards,” he corrected, an edge to his voice that made her think that particular mistake was made often, though in her case, she had made it purposely. She knew damn well there were only four different cat shifter clans in Riverford, and none of them were leopards. “But you’re right. Humans don’t turn into animals, but shifters do.”

  “Shifters?” she echoed with feigned confusion.

  “As in shape-shifters.” He was watching her face very closely. “Or were-jaguars if that helps you understand it better.”

  “Were-jaguars…you mean, like werewolves?” Kylie exclaimed as incredulously as she could manage. “But—but—last night there wasn’t—”

  Hunter sighed. “You really don’t know anything about this, do you? We don’t shift at the full moon if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  “How can you be so calm about all of this?” she demanded. “I turned into a freaking jaguar! I nearly killed someone, no matter that the sick bastard deserved it! How can any of this be real?”

  He held up his hands. “Fair enough. Come and sit down. I obviously can’t take you to see the Elders when you’re this confused. We need to figure out a few things first.”

  Kylie stayed rooted to her spot. “Elders? What do you mean elders? I’m not going anywhere with you!”

  “No, not yet,” he agreed, “but Kylie, let me make something clear right now. You are a shifter, and as such, you are expected to obey certain laws. If it had only been me that witnessed your shift last night, then the situation would not be as dire as it is.”

  Kylie shrank back in true alarm. “What do you mean?”

  “You shifted in front of a human not in the know,” he explained, “and that is the one law that must never be broken.”

  “But I didn’t know I could even…!” she protested.

  He nodded. “And now that I know that, we can fix this, figure out what happened here.”

  After staring each other down for a long, tense moment, Kylie finally set his crumpled sweater on the arm of the couch before she cautiously seated herself as far away from him as she could.

  “You were adopted weren’t you?” Hunter asked.

  Her eyes widened. “How could you possibly know that?”

  “Because that’s the only explanation that would make sense here,” he said wryly. “If your parents had been shifters, then there’s no way you wouldn’t have known about your own heritage, not even if you were a Deadend.”

  Kylie went positively rigid; she simply couldn’t help it.

  “What’s a ‘dead end’?” she asked.

  Just saying the word left a very bad taste in her mouth. She damn well knew what it meant and had hoped that she would never hear it spoken again for as long as she lived. However, she didn’t want to raise his suspicions by not asking the obvious question.

  Hunter’s lips twisted in what looked like disgust. “It’s what kids born to shifter parents are called when they lack the ability to shift. It happens very rarely, but until recently, it was seen as something shameful—a weakness in a shifter family’s bloodline or for other, equally stupid reasons. These children were almost always sent to live with humans from the moment their inability to shift was discovered.”

  “I see,” Kylie said frostily. “You think my birth parents abandoned me?”

  “Maybe,” he replied reluctantly, “or they might have been killed. Lord knows we jaguars have our share of enemies. How you came to be raised by humans could have been for any number of reasons. Some parents are reluctant to give up a Deadend child but do not wish them to grow up with this stigma. Thus, adoption is seen as the best option for the kid.”

  “But I shifted,” she pointed out.

  “The fact of which muddies the waters completely. How old were you when you were adopted?”

  “Just a baby. Why?”

  “And you know nothing about your birth parents?” Hunter pressed, ignoring her question.

  Kylie frowned. “I would think that was pretty obvious by now.”

  His lips quirked up. “So far all your reactions have been way different than I had expected, so sorry sweetheart, but there is nothing ‘obvious’ about you at all.”

  I’m not your ‘sweetheart,’ Kylie bristled, but she managed to keep her irritation from her expression. Now was not the time to unnecessarily butt heads with him. She needed to concentrate on getting as much information as she could about him, how much power he truly wielded within his clan, as well as stalling for time.

  “Keep smirking like that and I won’t answer any more of your questions at all,” she warned. “In fact, what even gives you the authority to barge into my home demanding answers in the first place? Those elders you mentioned earlier? Are you some kind of underground shifter cop who answers to only them?”

  He made a face. “God no, but the Riverford PD does have a few shifters on the force. Which brings me back to the reason why you’re currently in deep shit. As I mentioned before, the man you shredded lived. He’s currently in the ICU of St. Agnes
’s Hospital babbling about God sending a girl who turned into a ‘leopard’ in order to punish him for what he had done to a shit-ton of other girls.”

  “So he does have something to do with all those missing women that have been all over the news lately,” Kylie interjected softly, not able to stop the cold shudder that rippled through her body.

  “Probably,” Hunter agreed. “The bastard was practically begging to confess something at the very least, and because the pair of detectives sent down to the hospital happened to include a shifter, the elders of all the Riverford shifter clans know that there was a breech of secrecy. The only reason why they aren’t here and I am is because everything you did last night happened within my territory, and like it or not, it makes you my responsibility above all others.

  “You’re lucky—not only that your body picked that moment to shift for the first time, but that the bastard’s system was pumped so full of a cocktail of illegal shit that it’s a wonder he could even stand up straight. Everyone that heard him ranting on and on about his victim turning into an animal just assumed it was the ravings of a druggie tripping out after getting attacked by a mountain lion or bear. As I said before, we can fix this—if you’ll let me. But you’ll have to plead your case before the elders. There’s no getting around that.”

  “And if I don’t?” Kylie said slowly. “If I refuse to see them, to have anything to do with your clan or shifters in general?”

  Hunter flashed her a sad smile. “I hope for your sake, sweetheart, that you don’t force me to show you the answer.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  Kylie was over the arm of the couch and halfway to her bedroom before she heard Hunter‘s surprised curse, immediately followed by the thump of his shoes hitting the floor heavily as he had likely leapt over the back of the couch as well. Screw stalling. She had heard enough. His implied threat was all the answer she needed. There was no way she could trust any of the shifters. She had to get out of there!