Shifter's Dance

by Vanessa North

  The cold man was quiet, but she could hear his labored breathing. Stephen was louder, larger, and the grunts of pain were coming from him. A whining, dog-like noise came from lower to the ground. The animal. She focused on the sound. A dog? A wolf? Something like that. She took a deep breath, and let the rock fly. There was a yelp, and Romy grabbed her cane, turned, and ran toward the Haus. She hadn’t gone far when she stumbled into warm, firm hands.

  “Hush now, you’re okay.”

  “Cemil?”

  “My brother and Rekkus will take care of this. No one has ever died at the Wiccan Haus. They aren’t going to let Stephen be the first.”

  “Oh my God, Stephen.” She felt a wrenching pain in her gut. “What’s attacking him?”

  “He hasn’t explained anything, has he? Your man is very stubborn, Romy. Come with me.” Cemil scooped her up and swung her around until she was perched on his back like a child having a piggy-back ride. Before she could protest, he was running back toward the sounds of the fight, a fight which, from the sound of it, was nearly over.

  “It’s okay. Rekkus is there with him. Nice throw, by the way. Not many humans can take down a werewolf with a rock.”

  “W-W-Werewolf?” Did Cemil seriously just say werewolf?

  “Yep. And you knocked him down for the count. Rekkus has the vampire in custody now, and Stephen is sitting on your wolf.”

  “Vampire?” Of course he said vampire. She’d hit a werewolf with a rock; the other thing had to be a vampire. The absurdity of it forced a hysterical sound from her.

  “Indeed. You might as well know it all, Romy Lewis.” Cemil set her down on the ground. “Be gentle with Stephen. You’re new to him also,” he said low in her ear before he dropped her hand.

  “Go ahead, Stephen. I’ll take the wolf from here.”

  She heard that strange bellow again, smelled something large and strange. No. Her brain shuttered.

  “Stephen?”

  The large, strange, bellowing thing came closer to her, but she wasn’t afraid. Stephen?

  She reached a tentative hand. Fur. Thick, coarse fur. Not soft like a dog’s exactly. Rougher, bigger.

  “Are you a werewolf too?” she asked, sliding her hands deeper into his fur as she heard an offended snort. Suddenly, it was Stephen’s warm, naked chest she touched, her hands curling into hair that only this morning had been pressed against her naked breasts. His big, familiar hands bracketed her face, and she turned it toward one of them, instinctively seeking the warmth of his touch. Oh, Stephen, what are you, lover?

  When he spoke, his voice sounded strangled, tight.

  “No, sweetheart. I’m a bear.”

  * * * *

  Say something, Romy. Her blue eyes widened, and then a breath came out of her, harsh and strained.

  “Take me back to the Haus,” she whispered, reaching for his hand.

  “Okay.”

  When they walked in through the front door, Myron gave him a reproachful glare before handing him a towel off a housekeeping cart. He wrapped it around himself as Myron gestured for the bellhop to take Romy’s hand and guide her away to the elevator, her cane slapping against the floor, her back rigid. She didn’t say a word to Stephen as she walked away, but just before she’d dropped his hand to take the bellhop’s, she’d given him a gentle squeeze. Stephen held onto that tiny sliver of hope.

  “Rekkus and Cyrus are going to want to talk to you. Why don’t you wait in your room, Stephen?”

  “For fuck’s sake, Myron.” He turned on the little woman whose cards slapped down on the table. He wanted to rip them out of her hands and throw them across the room. “I suppose it was ‘in my cards’ for me to be attacked out there tonight? What the hell?”

  “Your choices impact everything. I can tell you what the cards say you’re supposed to do, but you have free will and the suck of that is you have to live with the end result and have no one to blame but yourself. You can’t protect the people you love by keeping things a secret from them.”

  Love.

  Oh, that word was a punch in the gut. He stumbled away from Myron, fumbling for the button that would summon the elevator. Love. He was in love with Romy and he’d failed to keep her safe. If he’d just been man enough to tell her from the beginning, before they were intimate, they never would have been on that path, she’d have been safe. Maybe not in his arms or his bed, but she’d have been safe.

  What had he done?

  Chapter Fourteen

  When she heard the knock on the door, Romy didn’t know if she was ready to speak to Stephen or not, but she opened it anyway. She knew immediately that the man on the other side of the door wasn’t her Stephen.

  “Hello, Romy. We haven’t met. My name is Cyrus Rowan. I’m one of the owners of the Wiccan Haus. May I come in?”

  “Of course.” She gestured him into the room, heard him settle into a chair. She counted the fourteen shuffling steps to the bed and sat, waiting to hear what Cemil’s brother had to say.

  “I owe you a debt of gratitude. That wolf and vampire were both part of a conspiracy to attack me. Your man, Stephen, he’s been working with the Paranormal Syndicate—sort of our government, I guess—to find information about the various factions out there that want me dead.”

  “I didn’t do anything, though.”

  “Stephen was being double-teamed, Romy. The vampire is quite strong, and he was hungry. Normally neither he nor the wolf would be too much trouble for a shifter Stephen’s size, but the two of them together in the tight quarters of the path could have seriously hurt him. Your taking out the wolf gave Rekkus time to get there. Well done, really.”

  “Well, I’m glad I could help. Why did they want to hurt Stephen?”

  “Most likely to send a message that they knew who he was and who he’s working for. I don’t believe they’ve had an opportunity to relay that information to anyone else, but he and his brothers are probably going to have to be very careful for a while.”

  “His brothers are part of this too? I thought they were…”

  “Yes, a writer and a photographer. Stephen is a talented programmer too. But that’s all part of the cover. They work for the Syndicate, and I don’t believe Stephen has been given any reason to trust my family, but he’s helped us and we trust him.”

  “I’m really confused, Cyrus.” She heard her voice breaking, felt her chin trembling. Even without tears, she was capable of crying in front of this stranger.

  “I know. And I don’t know if this will help with your confusion at all, but you’ve done something truly extraordinary for me. I’d like to do something to say thank you. You may have gathered that my family is not exactly normal. Each of my siblings is gifted in a rather unusual way—they call me a retrocog. I see things, feelings, memories, information about the owners of an object. It can be useful. It can be painful. I don’t do it anymore, not usually. But if you wouldn’t consider it an intrusion, I would like to hold one of your dance shoes for a moment.”

  “My dance shoes?”

  “Yes, the ones you wore earlier, when you danced with Stephen.”

  She considered the request for a moment. All in all, it was one of the more absurd things she’d heard this evening. Let’s see: the cold man was a vampire. There are werewolves. And here is this guy who claims that he can tell something about me from touching my shoes?

  What the hell. What did she have to lose?

  “Okay.” She felt around on the table next to the bed, found the shoes, and held them out. He took them very gently and held them for just a moment before he pressed them back into her hand. She heard a heavy sigh, then felt the soft pressure as he squeezed her hand.

  “That was lovely, Romy. The feelings when you danced your last rehearsal for Giselle…It’s like you were flying. The music, the emotions, the connection. It was beautiful.”

  “I miss it so much.” She swallowed hard, not trusting herself to say more.

  “And when you were with Stephen, you felt so
mething very like that?”

  She nodded.

  “Did you know, Romy, for most of that rehearsal, your eyes were closed?”

  Her head shot up. Of course she closed her eyes sometimes when she danced. She let the memories overtake her. It had always been more intense when she closed her eyes, felt her way through the steps. The music would feel clearer, brighter. It had always been that way.

  “Maybe you’ll never have what you had before. But it seems a damned shame to not hold on to as much of it as you can, as long as you can.”

  “Thank you, Cyrus.” His words unlocked the floodgates. No, she couldn’t shed tears, but she knew it was only a matter of moments before great ugly sobs would wrack her body. “I’d like to be alone now.”

  “Of course.” She heard him stand and place the chair back where it belonged. He crossed to the door, and then turned back. “Romy…I don’t get to see beautiful things with my gift very often. Thank you for the dance.”

  She nodded, not trusting herself to speak. The door closed, and she knew he was gone.

  She reached for her iPod again, but the batteries seemed to be dead. She didn’t have the energy to call for a bellhop just to show her where to plug it in, so she tucked it back into her suitcase and lay back on the bed.

  In the dark and the silence without vision or music, all she wanted was Stephen.

  * * * *

  Stephen paced his room alternately terrified and angry.

  He loved Romy.

  When the knock came, he thought it would be Rekkus, so he was surprised to see Cyrus standing there.

  “Rekkus is still interrogating the vampire,” Cyrus explained without a hello.

  “Are you sure Cemil’s the only empath in the family?”

  “Like it takes an empath to read your thoughts? If you want to hide your surprise, don’t stand there with your mouth open.”

  Stephen grinned then, opening the door wide to let Cyrus inside. “It’s good to see you, Cyrus. And looking happy no less.”

  The dark-haired Rowan brother smiled back. “Your little mate, she’s responsible for that. She’s really something, Stephen.”

  Jealousy worked through him, and he snarled, but Cyrus held up a hand.

  “Relax—I thought maybe I could help her, and I held one of her shoes. I think it helped me more than it helped her, to be honest. So, are you going to forge the bond or what?”

  “I don’t see how that’s your business, Cyrus.”

  “True enough,” the other man agreed. “We’re pretty sure that the vamp and wolf have not had an opportunity to get any information off the island. Your cover is probably not blown. But just in case, you should be a little extra careful for a few months, okay? Maybe stick close to home.”

  “Okay. And what about the two that attacked me? What’s going on with them?”

  “They’re the Syndicate’s problem now. They won’t bother you again.”

  “Thank you.”

  “No, thank you, Stephen. I know how you feel about your brothers. I know you put your family at risk to guard mine, and I don’t blame you for any resentment you might feel. Believe me, you will never lack for friends at the Wiccan Haus.” Cyrus turned to leave, then: “Do you want to see her?”

  “Yes.” Of course. Being away from her made him ache in the worst of ways.

  “Come on.”

  Stephen followed Cyrus to the elevator. “Where are we going?”

  “You missed your yoga class.”

  When they arrived in the lobby, he said goodbye to Cyrus and made his way to the yoga studio. The class he and Romy had missed was long over, and the studio would normally be deserted this time of night. He wasn’t surprised to see Romy there, her foot balanced on the stereo cabinet, stretching.

  “Hi,” he said. Her head snapped up.

  “Stephen?”

  “I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you before.” He came to stand behind her, wrapping an arm around her waist. Her head lolled back against his chest as she set her foot on the floor and turned to face him.

  “I understand why you didn’t.” She laid her head over his heart. “But, Stephen, my whole world has turned upside down in the last two hours.”

  “I know. I thought maybe I could tell you now, a little bit. And then tomorrow, we can talk again.”

  “Okay.” She nodded.

  “I was born like this. My people, we’re a species that’s part human, and also part bear. I can shift whenever I want, but most of the time, I stay in my human form.”

  “That’s why you live so far out in the middle of nowhere?”

  “Yes, that’s part of it. The proximity to the Wiccan Haus is part of it too. My brothers and I, we’re kind of like informants for the Syndicate. We watch and listen, and pass information on to Rekkus and Cyrus.”

  “Why does someone want to kill him?”

  “It’s not personal. There’s a pretty huge bounty on his head, so lots of people want to kill him. Or use him. Because of his gift.”

  “Oh.” She sucked her lower lip into her mouth as she mulled it over. He wanted to scoop her into his arms and do the same.

  “There’s more, Romy, about me.”

  “Okay.” She nodded again. “Might as well tell me now.”

  “My people…”

  “Canadians?” she teased, a little smile curling her lips up.

  “Shifters,” he corrected, smiling back even though he knew she couldn’t see it. “When we mate with someone, it’s for life. A joining of the souls.”

  “You mean, when we had sex? You did something to my soul?” He could see the panic in her face, rushed to reassure her.

  “No! God, no, I would never…” He shook his head, realized she couldn’t see it, pressed her hands to his lips before he spoke again. “I would never, ever force that on you. I love you, Romy. You’re my destined mate. But I want you to choose me.”

  “Love me? No. You can’t love me.”

  “You said once that dancers who perform together form intense relationships. Sometimes for an evening, sometimes for life? Is it really hard to believe that bears might do the same?”

  She appeared to mull over his words, her eyebrows drawing together.

  “What does that mean, destined mate?”

  “If you agree to mate with me, we’ll be married in the eyes of my people. And I’m selfish enough that I’d want to be married in the eyes of your people too. So I guess we’d do the whole white dress and tuxedo thing, if that’s what you want.”

  “You’re asking me to marry you?” She pushed at his chest, and he caught her hands to his lips again, pressing a kiss to her knuckles.

  “Yes. Marry me, join your soul to mine, live the rest of our lives making each other crazy and happy.”

  “You’ve known me less than a week—you don’t know me really.” This time, when she pushed at his chest, he let her go.

  “I knew you the moment we met, Romy. The first time I smelled you. The first time I touched you. The first time I kissed you. Has it honestly ever been like this for you with anyone else?”

  “No.” She shook her head. “No, it hasn’t. But, Stephen, I’m blind.”

  “So what? I’m not pretty enough for you?” He couldn’t help but tease her, and was glad to see her smile again.

  “Don’t you want to be with someone who’s perfect?”

  “You. You are perfect for me.”

  “I need to think,” she said.

  Her rejection caused a pang in his chest, but he’d known she would need time to think about it. Walking away would be the hardest thing he’d ever done, but for her, he would do it.

  “Okay.” He sighed, burying his hands in his hair as he studied the emotions flying around on her face.

  “Come here.” She reached for him.

  One step and he was in her arms and his lips were on hers. He poured all his love and all his desire into that kiss and felt her answer in the stroke of her tongue against his, the press of her body. Sh
e might not know it yet, but her soul was seeking its mate. He pulled away.

  “Until tomorrow, Romy. I love you.” He kissed her forehead, then one last lush swipe across her lips. “I love you. Marry me. Be my mate.”

  “Go on, then, before I jump you again.” She smiled half-heartedly, shooing him out the door.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Romy spent half the night in the studio, stretching and dancing until her body was exhausted, and still she didn’t sleep well that night. Between the attack on the path, the conversation with Cyrus, and Stephen’s stunning proposal, her world was coming unglued. When the dull light of the predawn morning fell on her closed eyelids, she closed them more tightly, for once not wishing she’d open them to discover the last two months had been a nightmare.

  Because then I wouldn’t have met Stephen.

  Just the thought of him stirred her up inside, made her ache with a longing to be close to him. He thought of her as his mate. He wanted to marry her.

  In that moment when she lay in her bed with her eyes closed tightly against the onslaught of the day, she realized she wanted him more than she wanted to go back in time. More than she wanted to see. More than she wanted to dance.

  Her feet hit the floor before her eyes opened.

  Laughter poured out of her as she scrambled to get dressed, pulling on her clothes in a record time that would have passed for fast backstage during a show. A few sharp tugs of bristles through her hair, teeth brushed, ointment on the eyes.

  I’m getting married.

  The thought sent another round of giggles through her, and she fumbled for her cane.

  She rode the elevator impatiently down to the lobby, listened for the sound of Myron’s cards slapping.

  Nothing.

  “Myron?” she called out tentatively.

  “It’s five o’clock in the morning, Romy.” The other woman’s voice was sleepy, and came from behind her.

  “Oh! I didn’t think.”