Mirabelle's high-pitched scream made up for Finn's own misery, and the feline smiled as he shifted into cat form and loped away into the night. After all, with pepper spray in his eyes, Mirabelle wouldn't be able to see how his quarry had made his escape...and a jaguar would reach safety much faster than a man.
Plus, now Finn had an excuse to pay a call on that tantalizing veterinarian.
Chapter 3
Jaguars like to swim, but an eternity spent treading water was making even Tezcatlipoca weary. The deity's imprisonment also left him plenty of time to think about topics he'd far rather forget. Such as the way he'd become trapped in this world so completely devoid of all potential worshipers.
My old buddy Q was involved in that chicanery, Tez thought, and not for the first time. Despite his efforts to ignore old memories, the betrayal still stung.
He's just jealous, the god thought to himself. I've always been the more enticing deity. No wonder poor old Quetzalcoatl felt threatened by my awesomeness.
And yet, two millennia after being trapped in this empty world, Tez knew that he would no longer win out over his brother god in a beauty pageant. No, Tez's charisma had drained away over time, falling like a rock to the bottom of this new world's endless sea until he could barely remember being dropped two-legged into the salt water.
Yes, he could barely remember ceremonial robes and feathers buoying him up. He could barely remember being a feared and prayed-to god. Slowly but surely, bit by bit, every hint of the trapped deity's powers had faded into the oblivion of darkness until even the memories of his power were disintegrating.
It hadn't taken long for Tezcatlipoca to regress into his core essence—a jaguar with one obsidian foot. Make that a lonely, grumpy, wet jaguar, who continued to tread water even though he knew that no rescue was eminent.
So when the first voice emerged out of thin air and drifted into his mind, Tez could almost feel his powers expanding. They're praying to me at last! Somehow, a lowly human being had made his way into Tezcatlipoca's domain and was speaking to his god, albeit in a language completely foreign to the jaguar deity's experience.
But when Tez continued to lack the power necessary to shift forms, he was forced to admit that the voice didn't have anything to do with him after all. Still, it was intriguing to have someone to listen to within his watery domain. So the jaguar god focused all of his prodigious brain power on deciphering the code of this strange tongue.
By the time the air was filled with what Tezcatlipoca now knew were radio and television waves—and, more recently, with cell phone signals—Tez had become fluent in English and had settled into a daily routine. In the morning, the god took in the news, catching up on the happenings around the world and doing his best to exercise his brain. Later, he drifted on a wave of day-time soap operas and afternoon cartoons, then he whiled away the rest of his hours with late-night TV.
I've become a couch potato, Tez thought, amused by his own modernity. And that was the day when the signals began to subtly shift.
At first, the god thought the new voices were simply another form of long-distance communication used by the humans so near his world and yet so far away. But the speech didn't seem to tell any story at all. Instead, the experience resembled the way Tez used to feel when eavesdropping into the thoughts of other gods' followers.
Then, as now, the humans' words didn't increase Tezcatlipoca's power the way prayers of his own worshipers did. And yet, the words seemed real. Not canned entertainment, but living humans walking around somewhere up above his world's darkened sky.
"...room together next summer," one human was saying. "And he told me that.... Oh!"
"What is it?" The other voice seemed bored at first, but then delight filled the male human's tone as he spoke again. "Whoa! Professor!"
Soon a medley of voices, male and female, young and not-so-very-young, rose up, bouncing around within Tez's watery cavern. For the first time in thousands of years, Tezcatlipoca could see! And what he saw was walls encircling his watery abode, a vista that wasn't a world at all but a prison.
Even though the view should have made Tez's hopes sink into his heels, it instead filled him with exultation. Because if his cell came complete with walls, then that meant there was something outside those walls. The god of hurricanes, temptation, and discord should have no problem breaking out into that external world.
And when I do, Quetzlcoatl...and everyone else...will feel my wrath. They'll be sorry they ever tried to capture the Enemy of Both Sides...
Chapter 4
It just figures, Ixchel thought as she felt the knife continue to prick into her skin. I flee the inner city, work two jobs to pay my way through vet school, scrimp and save to open a practice in a nice community, and this is where I get robbed at knife point.
Despite her best attempt at sarcasm, though, the vet's heart was racing every bit as fast as little Jason's budgie's had been pumping that morning. The winged pet had escaped from his cage in the waiting room and battered his beak against the windows for five solid minutes before flying right into Ixchel's hands...moments before Miss Gracie's cat could pounce upon her prey.
Terror doesn't help anything, the vet had cooed to the little bird then, and she repeated the same mantra to herself now. But the admonition definitely wasn't keeping her knees steady or preventing her vision from tunneling down as her body prepared to black out.
This is officially worse than coming face to face with a huge black cat that shouldn't live in West Virginia, she thought. Particularly since the vet didn't currently have a defenseless animal to protect, so she was forced to focus on her own feelings for a change. It was always better to stay outside her head's endless scattered ruminations, especially when the going got tough.
"Turn around slowly," came a calm, melodious voice behind Ixchel's back. Her attacker must have been hiding in the shrubbery, waiting until her receptionist drove away before moving in on his quarry.
I'm like a lame antelope separated from the herd, Ixchel thought, peering through the trees that encircled the office on three sides in hopes of finding a new dwelling nearby. Nope, her practice was just as isolated now as it had been when she'd started renting the space six months before. There was nowhere to run and no one to come to her aid if she screamed.
"Ma'am?" At least he was a polite mugger, although the knife did press a little harder into her flesh when Ixchel failed to instantly obey his command.
The pain, more than the word, brought her back to reality. Focus, Ixchel. This was why she preferred working with animals rather than humans—cats and dogs were so much simpler to understand than the one species that had learned so well how to lie.
Taking her own advice to heart, Ixchel kept her hands where her attacker could see them and pivoted slowly in place. He's no more dangerous than a scared and wounded doberman, she promised herself. But clearly Ixchel hadn't mastered that hallmark feature of Homo sapiens sapiens, because she didn't believe her own deception. After all, if this mugger was allowing her to see his face, chances were good that she wasn't going to make it out of this altercation alive.
Let him be masked, let him be masked, let him be masked....
Her attacker wasn't masked, and he also didn't look at all the way Ixchel had thought he would. Everyone she'd met since moving to West Virginia was Caucasian, obviously descended from the Scots-Irish immigrants who had made these mountains home centuries ago. And the current residents out here in the boondocks all tended to dress like farmers, too, with Carhartt overalls giving way to tight jeans and ball caps in the summer.
But the person holding a knife—her knife, out of her kitchen in the apartment above the practice!—instead resembled an exotic gentleman. He wore a dark suit that flattered his form so well that it must have been tailored to fit, and the seams on his trousers were pressed into knife-edge creases. In fact, Ixchel was pretty sure that the mugger was wearing dress shoes as well, likely Italian loafers that cost more than she made in a year.
The clothes were a surprise, but it was the man's face that took Ixchel's breath away. Eyes so dark they were nearly black were half-hidden by straight, raven-hued hair. The combination was unbearably handsome...and also far too familiar for comfort.
Not that the veterinarian had met this particular mugger before. But all of the guys her brothers ran with in their youthful gangs had sported similar features and similar brown skin. Plus, Ixchel saw a feminine version of the same facial structure every time she looked in a mirror. So even though her neighbors would have thought her mugger was Hispanic, Ixchel knew that he was indio, a Mexican Indian like herself.
The realization terrified Ixchel more than the knife had done. Because her brothers would have grown out of their youthful gangs since she'd seen them last. And even though those teenage ventures had seemed horrifying enough at the time, the criminal world her brothers must now be embroiled in could only be a hundred times worse. Antonio, in particular, would probably have become a mob linchpin by now if his teenage leanings were any indication of that brother's eventual adult career choice.
And if my siblings' current unlawful element is showing up on my doorstep, all of my attempts to cut off ties have failed. Which meant that Ixchel was in for much worse this evening than simply being robbed outside the door of her own practice.
Despite her best intentions to stand her ground, the vet sank onto the concrete step at her feet. This couldn't be happening. She'd tried so hard to leave that world behind!
And then a large male hand was pushing her head down between her knees. For a moment, Ixchel struggled. But then she realized that her attacker was simply promoting blood flow to her brain to prevent fainting, and she relaxed into his arms. Please don't let this get back to my brothers, she thought, imagining how her favorite sibling—Miguel—would tease her for nearly passing out in the face of an attack. What she wouldn't give to have her middle brother here to protect her now....
Then the man's other hand came around to rub away the tension that created hard ridges along the sides of her neck. Ixchel had begun to shiver in the chilly evening air, but the mugger's touch warmed her skin and seemed to clear her mind even better than sinking her head between her knees had. And, in the end, some combination of adrenaline and extra oxygen to her brain finally allowed the vet to think straight.
The knife. If her attacker had one hand on top of her head and the other one on her neck, then his weapon must be lying unattended somewhere nearby. Which meant this was her best chance to get away with skin and dignity intact.
Strangely, Ixchel's muscles didn't want to budge. Well, perhaps they would be willing to move...but only to lie all the way down on the concrete walkway and beg for the massage to work its way down her back. On the other hand, when asked to spring to her feet and flee, her legs pretended weakness at the mere thought.
Get a grip, Ixchel told her legs. There's a time and a place for runaway hormones, and this is neither!
But before she could even twitch, both large male hands had left her skin and the knife was once again present in Ixchel's peripheral vision.
Which is when she noticed the other salient feature of her attacker's appearance, the one her veterinary training should have picked up on right off the bat. There was a steady stream of blood flowing out of the wound high on the man's left arm. And, if she wasn't much mistaken, blood loss was making her mugger's face grow increasingly pale beneath his dark skin.
"YOU'RE BLEEDING!" THE woman exclaimed, bringing Finn's mind back to the purpose of this knife-point introduction.
The shifter had meant to get his wound stitched and then to leave the area as quickly as possible, moving on before any potential pursuers could uncover his trail. But something about the curve just above the woman's hip had caught his eye and held it. And then she'd sunken down to the ground in shock, and Finn had felt so shitty that he had to soothe her tremors.
In feline form, the shifter would have licked the woman's fur until it lay smooth and clean along her spine. But in human shape he had to settle for simply rubbing her neck, the muscles of which miraculously relaxed beneath his ministrations.
Every hint of tension that he'd teased away was back in spades now, though, as the woman peered at the blood dripping down and pooling along the inside of his elbow. So Finn decided to attempt a more human method of breaking the ice. "What's your name?" he asked.
"You want to know my name?" the woman retorted. "That's your response when I notice that you're suffering from a gunshot wound that's probably torn through your bicep and might have nicked your humerus? Is the bullet still in there?"
All valid questions, but the woman was becoming more agitated with every word, so Finn declined to answer. He'd thought his quarry was a vet rather than a human doctor, but she seemed awfully familiar with the results of gun play...and also particularly agitated about its aftereffects.
Not that he blamed her. Finn wasn't very fond of the results of being shot either. Not when blood loss was beginning to make his head swim.
But what really fueled the shifter's annoyance was the way the woman's eyes remained trained upon his knife rather than looking up into his face. It was as if she thought Finn was a predator just waiting for the perfect opportunity to disembowel his prey. As if she didn't see him as a person at all, but instead as a wild animal that required slow movements and quick wit if she wanted to escape.
Well, okay, so her analysis is technically true. But just because I'm a predator doesn't mean I like to be treated as one.
And she didn't appear this terrified when I menaced her in feline form this morning. Surely a veterinarian trained to operate with razor-sharp scalpels should be aware that a jaguar's teeth and claws are far more dangerous than this dull kitchen utensil. The were-jaguar's thoughts drifted off track for a moment as he added, She really does need to take better care of her cooking knives.
Shaking his head once to bring his thoughts back on track, Finn decided he shouldn't have bothered holding this woman up at knife point. From what he'd seen of her behavior thus far, the vet might have stitched up his wound even if he hadn't resorted to threats. And she definitely wouldn't look so wan and pale if Finn had used words first instead of slipping up into her apartment in search of a weapon to intimidate his quarry into obedience.
Lacking the ability to go back in time and remedy the past, though, Finn vowed to do what he could to ease the woman's angst and to make the remainder of their introduction a little more enjoyable for all concerned. So, slipping his purloined knife between the belt and fabric at his waist, the shifter reached out one hand toward his companion.
"Look, let's start over," he said. "I'm Finn. And you are?" As he spoke, Finn allowed both eyes to slowly drift closed for a fraction of a second, cat-speak for I'm relaxed and you should be too. No one's going to hurt you.
And unlike all of the other humans whom Finn had struggled so hard to communicate with ever since discovering his humanity for the first time more than a decade before, this woman seemed to understand what he was really trying to say. Because she accepted his hand within her own firm but gentle grip and responded, "I'm Ixchel."
Chapter 5
"Michelle?" the man asked, and Ixchel had put effort into not rolling her eyes. Was it crazy that a criminal had stepped out of the shrubbery to accost her and yet the issue that bugged her the most was this common mispronunciation of her name?
Yep, definitely crazy. But Ixchel still heard herself respond with words so familiar that they would have been threadbare and holey had they been a favorite pair of jeans. "No, Ixchel, without an M. It's the name of..."
"...a Mayan jaguar goddess," the man finished for her.
"Well, I was going to say a Mexican deity," Ixchel replied, her head tilting to one side as she sized her companion up more fully. Perhaps he wasn't a common thug after all. The vet could honestly state that she'd never before met a man who recognized the provenance of her unusual name.
"But what you sai
d works too," the vet continued. She couldn't help being intrigued by the person in front of her, even if their introduction had been less than seemly. Perhaps a knife was what it took to break the ice she felt solidifying around her tongue every time she met someone new?
Despite knowing it wasn't wise to taunt erratic humans, the vet couldn't resist engaging her attacker further. "What kind of mugger are you exactly?" she asked. "One with a degree in comparative mythology?"
"What kind of parents name their daughter after a jaguar goddess?" the man shot back. He clearly wasn't willing to offer any additional identifying information, and Ixchel's lips firmed back up into a frown. Note to self, she thought grimly. This is not a first date with an intriguing romantic candidate. No, Ixchel was currently attempting to escape from a man who had held her at knife point mere moments earlier, so she shouldn't be surprised if the mugger in question didn't want to spill his secrets into her ear at the first sign of interest.
Which is really a good thing, the vet reminded herself. After all, the less I know, the fewer reasons Finn has to silence me after he's gone. And she shivered as the thought brought her back to reality. Hopefully the semblance of civility that seemed to cloak her attacker would hold firm and allow her to extricate herself from this encounter with skin and bone intact.
Not that any of her brothers' thug-like acquaintances would leave a loose end like Ixchel untied. But, despite the man's apparent ethnicity and his penchant for introducing himself with weapons rather than words, nothing else about the mugger seemed to link him to Ixchel's past. Instead, he appeared to be doing his best at the moment to downplay her initial intimidation. After putting his knife away, the man's shoulders had immediately slouched down as if to counteract his height, and his body was now angled to the side, offering Ixchel an avenue of escape rather than menacing her head-on.
Shifter Origins (Series-Starter Shifter Variety Packs Book 1) Page 60
