“Then why are you naked on top of me?”
“That’s my frenzy talking. And I’m naked on top of you because I didn’t want my leopard hurting you. Humans are fragile, and you’re only half-Shifter.”
“All right, so let me go. Let me run.”
He growled again, the rumble vibrating her and making her warm. “You’re out of control. You’re running like a wild thing. You have to learn to control it.”
“I have. I’ve controlled it all my life.”
“No, you suppressed and ignored it. Not the same thing. You have to let it out, love, but you need to be in charge.”
“Like you are?”
Eric licked her lips again. “I have iron control. I never came close to losing it until I met you.” Another lick. “I’ll help you through it.”
“And then you’ll boff me?”
His growl turned to a chuckle. “When we make love, it will be like the world exploded.”
Iona wanted it to be like that now. A tiny part of her mind was waving at her, telling her that if she did go into frenzy with him now, she’d hate herself later. She’d be angry, resentful, both at him and herself.
Or would she? Eric’s body on hers felt so right, as though she’d been waiting all her life for him. How would she know what she felt if she didn’t give in and let him take her now?
“Eric, I—”
Eric put his fingers to her lips. “We’ll run some more. I’ll wear you out with running, and then I’ll take you home.”
Disappointment bit her. Iona felt her fingers become claws, heard the snarl in her throat. Her panther was pissed off.
Eric unclasped his fingers from around her wrists, letting her go, and as smoothly climbed to his feet.
Iona remained on the ground and gazed up at his tall body above hers, the strength of him obvious. He was erect, the firm length of him beautiful to see. Shifter cocks were longer and bigger than humans’, Iona’s friends who were excited about Shifters had told her. Lying here with the evidence above her, Iona believed them.
The female in her made her want to rise to her knees, fit her mouth around the tip of that cock, and draw it into her. She wanted to feel how heavy it would be against her tongue, find out whether it tasted as good as had the skin on his neck and shoulders.
Eric’s gaze on her told her he knew where her thoughts were going, and that he had the same thoughts.
Unembarrassed, he reached down and helped her to her feet. Iona landed against him, and he lightly kissed her lips as she tried to catch her breath.
“There’s something I want to check out,” Eric said.
Iona blinked at him, half startled out of her arousal. “Check out?”
“Something my trackers told me about this evening. I brought us out here, figuring we can take a look while we’re running things out of our systems.”
“Oh, right. Sure.” She stared at him, bewildered by the abrupt way he could change from seduction to being Shiftertown leader again.
Eric kissed her one more time, the warm, easy kiss of a man with a woman he liked. “Ready?”
Without waiting for her answer, Eric shifted back into his leopard. He stood against her a moment, his hot leopard breath fanning down her abdomen to her too-sensitive female places.
He made a low sound in his throat that Iona swore was a laugh before he turned and sauntered away.
Iona’s shift this time hurt, the stiffness from lying on the ground not helping. She shook herself once she became panther, and trotted off to catch up to him.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Eric led her down the ridge, across a valley cut by another deep wash, and up another hill. At the top of this, Eric moved along a saddle between two boulder-strewn ridges, then climbed even higher to the top of the highest ridge.
When he reached the summit, he crouched low and moved in a wildcat slink that Iona hadn’t yet perfected. His belly nearly touched the ground, paws moving automatically to find the best purchase and balance his weight.
Iona copied his movements as best she could, her limbs stiff and sore. At last, Eric dropped all the way to his stomach and looked down the hill.
Sounds came to Iona from what must have been a half mile away, but her wildcat easily caught them.
People talking. Men, two of them, she heard distinctly. They weren’t saying anything important, just general conversation.
“Warm tonight.”
“Yeah, hear it’s going to be in the nineties tomorrow. Where’s winter?”
Hunters? Campers? There were no marked campgrounds out this way, Iona knew, but that didn’t mean hikers didn’t walk out and set up tents.
Drug dealers, maybe? But they sounded relaxed and ordinary, not worried about anything. As though they had every right to be out here in the middle of the desert in the vast darkness.
Eric sniffed the wind, making a soft sound in his throat. Iona sniffed too, and caught the scent. Humans. How many, she couldn’t tell, but not a lot of them. A crowd of humans smelled far different from one or two.
Eric dropped even lower. The light from the waning moon dappled both his fur and the ground around him, making the snow leopard almost impossible to spot.
Iona puffed a little as she moved closer to him, trusting her black fur to blend into the shadows.
Eric didn’t look at her. His gaze was riveted to what was below, and when Iona saw, she stilled as well.
Three rows of one-story buildings were strung along the desert floor, each about a hundred feet long but not more than about ten feet wide. Doors entered these at intervals, but there were no windows.
Square bulks of air conditioners that doubled as heat pumps squatted on the roofs. The three buildings were surrounded by a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire.
Few lights illuminated the place, only one on either end, each near a gate. The men they’d heard were two guards, standing together, smoking cigarettes, automatic rifles slung over their shoulders.
Iona tried to do what Eric had taught her this morning—reach inside and open up her scent ability. She widened her cat nostrils and drank in the wind.
She smelled very little out of the ordinary. The two men, the dust and creosote, the scent of coyotes, rabbits, birds, and reptiles that lay hidden in the brush. From the buildings, nothing. A bit of Freon from the air conditioners, but the units were silent.
Eric’s nose was twitching too, his sides moving as he sniffed and sniffed.
Finally he turned to Iona, his gaze unmistakably telling her it was time to leave. Iona let him lead the way, but as she followed, her foot caught on gravel, the stones grating. The trickle of pebbles didn’t fall over the edge of the ridge, but the rattle was loud and startling, sound carrying a long way out here.
“What was that?” one of the men said.
The other didn’t seem worried. “Probably a coyote. Or a snake. This place is crawling with snakes.”
“Yeah, no one’s stupid enough to come out here,” the first one said. “Except us.”
The second chuckled, Iona heard the flick of a lighter, and then she crept away after Eric.
Iona made no more noise as she picked her way down the ridge, back the way they’d come. When Eric reached the bottom, he broke into a run, leading her across the valley and back to the hill where they’d lain. Iona pounded behind him.
Eric didn’t stop, didn’t shift, but loped on, never doubting she’d follow, all the way back to where they’d left the bike and their clothes.
The leopard stretched when they reached the motorcycle, bending his front almost to the ground to unkink his forelegs, then lengthening to stretch hind. As Eric rose from the stretch, his body changed back into that of a delectable, naked man, his tattoo black in the faint moonlight.
Iona shook herself out, trying to dislodge gravel, stickers, and creosote leaves from her fur, while Eric watched her. He made no move to dress, but waited until she’d slowly and painfully changed back to human.
Not unti
l Iona was standing on her human feet, rubbing her aching arms, did he reach to the ground for his clothes. Iona enjoyed watching him a moment before she slipped on her underwear, sweatpants, and sport top, a bit disappointed that they were getting ready to head home.
But the stealthy move to the top of the hill and the equally careful one down had taken the edge off Iona’s frenzy. Eric had been smart to include her in his reconnaissance.
“What was that place?” she asked as Eric settled his black T-shirt over his body.
“No idea. What did you get from it?”
“You mean the scents? Nothing. I mean, apart from the guys and the usual smell of desert and buildings. But I’m not very good at scenting, I told you.”
Eric buckled his belt. “I didn’t smell anything either. It was neutral.”
“Maybe the buildings are airtight.”
He shook his head as he leaned on his motorcycle’s seat and pulled on his boots. “No building’s that airtight, unless it’s underground or something. These are crappy buildings on temporary foundations. I should be able to smell what’s inside them.”
“Unless the buildings are empty.”
“Then why the AC units, and why the barbed wire and guards? Very weird.” Eric took the helmet from the back of the bike and handed it to her. “I’ll send my trackers back out to have another look around.”
“Trackers?”
“Trackers are my eyes and ears. Brody, who lives next door to me, is one, a couple of wolves, my son, and Neal, our Guardian.”
Iona didn’t know what a Guardian was either, but she wasn’t in the mood for lessons on Shifters at the moment. The men on the other side of the ridge made her nervous.
“Your son,” she repeated. Iona had looked up information on Eric after she’d met him and knew he’d had a wife—a mate—who’d given him a son. But Eric, so far, had never spoken about him.
Now he grinned. “Jace. You’d like him. He’s nicer than me.”
“Most people are.”
Eric was across the few feet of gravel, his hand gripping the back of her neck before Iona registered he’d moved. He held her solidly, his eyes glittering in the moonlight, gaze fixing hers and not letting her look away.
“I can’t be nice and be leader,” he said, all smiles gone. “My Shifters have to be ready to obey me in an instant, or everyone is in danger. That doesn’t leave me much room for being nice.”
Iona stilled as her mating heat started to rise again. Why did him touching her with so much strength make her want him?
She looked steadily back at him, knowing he could scent her fear as well as her excitement and need. “I was joking,” she said.
“You have a sassy mouth. I like it.” Eric licked swiftly across her parted lips, then released her.
He walked to the bike, straddled it, and started it. He didn’t look at Iona as she quickly jammed on the helmet and swung on behind him, but he waited until she’d wrapped her arms around his waist before he lifted his feet and guided the motorcycle back down the narrow dirt trail.
Eric arrived home to a full house. He was restless as he dismounted and put away the bike, the run with Iona not having calmed him. Even the long ride he’d taken after he’d dropped her off, to get her smell off him, hadn’t helped either.
Having her under him, ripe and ready, still had his body roaring. He could have taken her, fallen back on what Shifters did in the wild, forced the mate-claim on the female and dragged her home. She’d been ready, her mating need high.
If Eric had been younger, he might have done it. He’d chased Kirsten hard, and she’d played just coy enough to make him crazy.
When Kirsten had finally let him catch her, and they’d mated, it had been fast and frantic. Eric had shut her with him into the half of the house he’d shared with Cassidy in Scotland, and they’d not come out for days.
Since Kirsten’s death, Eric hadn’t bothered to pursue females. He had enough casual encounters to keep his libido under control, he already had a son, and besides, he missed Kirsten. Females were scarce among Shifters, and he’d decided to leave the females in their fertile years to younger males who hadn’t yet produced cubs.
He knew that what he should do with Iona was bring her into Shiftertown and give the younger males first chance with her. Neal, their Guardian, still needed a mate, as did several other males, including Shane and Brody.
But every time Eric thought about stepping aside and letting another Shifter have her, sharp, red rage boiled through him. Eric had seen her first. Iona was his.
Cassidy was in the kitchen, leaning on the breakfast bar to watch her husband cook. What Diego was mixing up in that cast-iron pan—strips of steak that smelled like they’d been marinated with spices and jalapeños—made Eric’s mouth water and stomach growl. He was hungry.
Cassidy drank water, her stomach distended with the cub she carried, while Diego had a beer. At Eric’s appearance, Diego, without a word, fetched another beer from the refrigerator and handed it to him.
Eric opened the bottle but didn’t drink, his adrenaline still too high. Beer would calm him down, but he didn’t really want to calm down.
Cassidy’s pregnancy looked good on her. She wore a knit shirt that clung to the bump that was Eric’s nephew or niece, the rest of her as long and lean as ever. It would be cliché to say that Cassidy glowed, but in Eric’s opinion, she truly did. Her face was rosy, her eyes bright, her pale hair sleek, her smile wide. Her love for Diego was plain to see, as was Diego’s for her.
“You look good, Cass,” Eric said.
He put his arm around his sister and leaned to press a kiss to her neck. Cassidy returned the embrace, ruffling Eric’s hair.
Diego watched them, the man used by now to the way Shifter families needed constant touch for reassurance. Diego was all for embracing and touching Cassidy, but he wasn’t as comfortable hugging Eric or Jace, even after living with them for most of a year. How humans had survived this long without curling close to their loved ones was beyond Eric’s understanding.
Eric could never resist goading Diego a little, though. Even now, when he was still wound up from Iona, he walked around the counter to Diego and wrapped both arms around his brother-in-law.
“Eric,” Diego said carefully. Eric suppressed a laugh as he squeezed Diego and nuzzled his hair. Diego didn’t move, though Eric felt the man’s fighting instincts rise.
Eric relented, released Diego, and clapped him on both shoulders. Human men were much happier when they were hitting each other, for some reason.
Eric picked up his beer again and leaned back on the counter, finally tipping the cold liquid into his mouth. “Smells good.”
“Carne asada.” Diego flipped the nearly smoking meat in the pan.
“Diego’s teaching me to cook like his mother,” Cassidy said.
“Cassidy is watching me cook like my mother,” Diego said. “Has been all week.”
Cassidy winked.
“You feeling better?” Diego flashed Eric a dark-eyed look. Diego was what humans called Latino, meaning his origins were a combination of Latin American Indian and Spanish European, mixed hundreds of years ago.
Diego had black brown hair, light brown skin, and dark eyes that held intelligence and passion—at least, passion for Cassidy. He’d grown up hard but had turned his life around, taking care of his mother and brother at huge cost to himself. He’d never been submissive to Eric, no matter that he was human, and he was a good match for Cassidy. He took care of her and made her happy.
Diego had come home early today, startling Eric, who’d been leaning against the wall in the shower, letting cold water beat down on him. Iona had called Diego, concerned about Eric, which—once Eric had taken his hand from Diego’s throat after Diego surprised him—had made Eric warm all over.
Diego, who didn’t know about Iona, had tried to question him. Eric had put him off, going next door to see Brody, who’d called while Eric had still been lying in bed recovering,
wanting to talk about the buildings in the desert.
“Sure,” Eric said, answering him. “I went for a run. Checked out something Brody told me about.”
Eric described the guarded buildings sitting empty in the desert behind the fences topped with barbed wire. Both Cassidy and Diego looked interested and agreed that the compound warranted a closer look.
“I can do some research for you,” Diego said. “Xav is good on computers. He can find the place on a satellite map, figure out who built it and what it’s for.”
“Could be some secret human government place,” Cassidy said. “You know, like Area Fifty-one. You were close to that. Maybe it’s some new weapon-testing site. Humans like to build weapons.”
“Possibly.”
Eric knew Cassidy was likely right—it would turn out to be a human facility built for whatever weird purpose the humans thought important at the moment. The compound would stay there until funding ran out and no one could remember what the weird purpose was. Then they’d abandon the buildings or tear them down and cart out the pieces, moving on to some other project equally as bizarre.
“I’d be interested to see what Xav can find out,” Eric said.
“Me too,” Cassidy said. “Now, who is Iona Duncan, and why was she so worried about you today?”
Eric jolted, and a small amount of beer spilled to his shirt. “Shit, Cass.”
Cassidy didn’t look sympathetic. “A woman calls Diego out of the blue and says you’re here alone, and you sound weak and hurt. Diego rushes home and finds you dealing with the aftereffects of your Collar. How did she know? Is she psychic or something?”
“No, I was talking to her on the phone when it happened.”
Cassidy just looked at him, and so did Diego. Eric glanced at the pan. “You’re going to burn that.”
Diego stirred the contents. “No, I won’t. Been making this since I was ten. Iona Duncan is the daughter of the woman who owns Duncan Construction, the company that’s building the new Shifter houses. That was easy to find out.”
“I’ve been talking to her about the plans,” Eric said. “I need to find out if I can trust her.”
Mate Claimed su-4 Page 7
