Her Undercover Panther : A Paranormal Shapeshifter Romance

by Jasmine White

  “But you’re putting your life in danger all the time.”

  “I am. And the concert schedule is forty weeks, with ten weeks off throughout the year. Depending on what kind of schedule you end up with, you could even have all ten weeks off at once, plus most orchestras only play three to four nights a week. It really is a great living.”

  “So why didn’t you go after that dream?”

  She shrugged, suddenly feeling uncomfortable.

  “I don’t know. I guess I didn’t believe that I would ever make enough to live comfortably, and I didn’t want to struggle. My parents worked too hard to give me a better life than they had, and I didn’t want to end up right back where they started.”

  She stepped away from him, quickly rinsing out her hair and stepping out of the shower. He lathered up quickly while he watched her dry off and pull on panties and a t-shirt.

  “I’ve upset you,” he said quietly.

  “No, you didn’t. I’m sorry; I’m just not used to so many trips down memory lane in one day. It’s been a long day, and it looks like we have more of the same tomorrow. Let’s go to bed, and we’ll be ready for whatever tomorrow brings.”

  Luis nodded and Tara breathed a sigh of relief. For a moment, she had worried that he was going to pursue the matter, and she was glad that he’d dropped it.

  “I’ll be in bed,” she said.

  “Am I joining you?” he asked, stepping out of the shower and drying off.

  She looked at him, smiling wryly and walking away.

  “I’m not even going to answer that,” she said over her shoulder, and then walked out of the bathroom, leaving him to figure the answer out for himself.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Tara woke up early the next morning feeling well rested, the first rays of the rising sun streaming in through an open window and waking her gently.

  They’d gone to bed just after sunset the night before, but Tara had been physically and emotionally exhausted, and she had slept like a rock in Luis’ strong arms. She stretched, looking around the room and wishing that she was actually on vacation. The little bungalow was so prettily decorated and the air so fresh and heavy with the scent of the ocean. She could stay here for a month and never get tired of the view.

  Luis was already awake, laying on the bed, stretched out and watching her get dressed for the day.

  “You slept well,” he commented, his eyes never leaving her as she moved around and gathered the few things that she had left out and packed them neatly in her bag.

  “I did. Thank you. Do you have a plan?”

  “I do.”

  “What is it?”

  “We’re going to go to breakfast.”

  “That’s it?”

  “No, but this is where I need you to trust me.”

  She nodded. “I can do that.”

  “Good.”

  He got up and dressed quickly, pulling on his boating shoes and running his fingers through his hair to pull out any tangles. When he was ready, he waited for her to put her backpack on and then grabbed her hand and led her down the path to the common area.

  “That’s a lot of fruit,” she said in awe as they rounded the corner.

  “It’s a traditional island breakfast. Try anything that looks good. We’re going to grab our breakfast to go.”

  She didn’t argue, going straight to the long table with the massive spread of fruits and picking the ones that looked appealing to her. Luis left her to it, walking over to where Eric was and greeting the man warmly. Tara watched him out of the corner of her eye, impressed at the way he was able to pretend to be friendly even though they were both certain that Eric was the enemy.

  He returned quickly, Eric not far behind him, a concerned look on his face.

  “I’m sorry you’re not feeling well,” Eric said, eyeing the stack of fruit that she had piled into a wooden bowl.

  She shook her head.

  “Don’t worry about it. It’s a female thing, so it’s not a surprise. I should have tracked better.”

  Eric’s face went pale, but behind him, Luis was struggling not to laugh at Eric’s obvious discomfort.

  “Well,” Eric said, his voice cracking subtly and almost cracking Tara’s control, “you’re free to come back when you’re feeling better, but Luis is correct, you will feel more comfortable in your hotel until the-” he paused to search for the polite word, “illness passes.”

  “Thank you. I’m sorry to cut my trip short. I was having such a lovely time. I’ll return as soon as I’m feeling better.”

  “Take all the time you need,” Eric said quickly. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, the other guests are arriving for breakfast.”

  He didn’t wait for her response, just turned and practically fled to the other end of the common area.

  “Wow,” Tara said, still struggling to keep her laughter at bay.

  Luis leaned down and kissed her cheek.

  “What was that for?” she asked.

  “You. You’re perfect. I couldn’t have planned that better if I had tried. Now let’s get out of here.”

  He topped her large, wooden bowl with some fruit for himself and led her down the trail to the dock. Since they were already halfway there from the common area, they skipped the car and walked, enjoying the crisp morning air that the marine layer brought in with it and listening to the animals in the nearby jungle. Luis stopped at a small hut hidden away behind some fruit trees, disappearing inside for a moment and coming back out with a backpack slung over his shoulder.

  “I didn’t even notice that building there.”

  “It’s meant to blend in.”

  “What’s in the bag?”

  “Street clothes and a few other things I grabbed just in case. We can’t show up to the mainland in leather sarongs, so we keep a supply of street clothes here and other supplies for when we accompany guests into the jungle for day trips. No one keeps track of who takes what—we just refill the supplies once a month—so they won’t even notice that I took anything. And if they do notice, they’ll assume that it’s clothing so that I can stay with you while you recover.”

  “This place is so magical at times, and then so dark at other times. I don’t know quite how to feel about it.”

  “This place would be perfect if GRE wasn’t manipulating every little thing. Look around you—you’re surrounded by paradise, and you can almost forget that modern day technology exists. There’s no constant checking of phones, no hurriedly rushing from place to place. This place is wonderful.”

  “It is wonderful, but the animals are pretty loud, which reminds me constantly that there are venomous creatures lurking nearby. It makes it a little hard to relax.”

  “You’re safe as long as you stick with me. And the loud animals are the howler monkeys. You actually get used to them after a while, and then you will completely tune them out.”

  “I don’t know if that’s possible.”

  “Trust me, you won’t even hear them unless they are suddenly quiet.”

  “Wouldn’t that be a good thing?”

  “No. The jungle is only quiet if something dangerous is in the jungle. If you ever hear silence, you need to take cover and find a safe place because something big and bad is close by.”

  “Good to know.”

  Tara could see the boat in the distance. As much as she wanted to leave this island and make their way to the other island, she wasn’t too keen on getting back on the speed boat.

  “It’s a short ride. We’re going to head toward the mainland and then circle around when we’re out of sight.”

  “Great,” she said, stepping onto the boat and placing the bowl of fruit onto her lap.

  “Aren’t you going to eat?”

  “I don’t want to chance getting sick for real.”

  He unhitched the boat and pushed away from the dock with his foot, letting the boat drift a few yards before he fired up the engine.

  “It won’t be as bad as yesterday.”

&n
bsp; “You don’t know that.”

  He smiled wryly, and Tara suddenly realized what he was trying to say without coming out and saying it.

  “Wait. Did you purposely make the ride out here miserable?”

  “Not really. I just didn’t work particularly hard at making it a smooth ride out.”

  “You can’t be serious.”

  He looked at her, his hazel eyes sparkling with mischief.

  “Look. We got off on the wrong foot yesterday, and I wasn’t exactly happy to be assigned babysitter duty. I wasn’t being intentionally rough, but I was definitely driving the boat like I would if I was alone. I promise to be gentler. Besides, we’re trying to sneak up to the island, so we can’t go in with guns blazing.”

  She glared at him, but she didn’t say a word.

  Luis watched her for a moment, but her face was set, her expression unreadable.

  “I have to admit, I’m a little frightened of the quiet version of Tara. It almost seems like you’re plotting my demise.”

  “Or just fantasizing about pushing you overboard.”

  Luis laughed, his hands firmly on the wheel, gently guiding the boat east and just slightly north.

  “I promise that it will never happen again. I was wrong about you.”

  “I’m not even sure how to take the babysitter comment. It isn’t exactly in line with your need to feel seductive and sexually powerful. Maybe the fact that I wasn’t immediately enamored by you challenged your machismo and bruised your ego.”

  “It’s possible.”

  “So pushing the boat so much that it was nerve-wracking was a way to show me that I did need you, even though you didn’t want to be needed by me and would have preferred a male partner to help you bring down GRE?”

  “That is frighteningly accurate.”

  “And ridiculous,” she laughed.

  “What can I say? I’m a complicated man.”

  “That’s not what I would call it,” she laughed.

  She dug through the bowl, pulling out a custard apple and tearing the fruit open to reveal the tender flesh inside. She handed Luis one of the fruits he had grabbed for himself, and he ate it leisurely while he steered the boat through the open water with one hand.

  When they were so far from the island that Tara could barely make out the coastline, Luis turned the boat south and began the slow process of circling around to the other island.

  “Isn’t Ian bringing someone out to the island today?” Tara asked, talking loudly to be heard over the engine noise.

  “He is, but even if we see them, they will assume that I’m taking you back to your hotel, and even though it’s farther away, many of the women choose to fly into Lima instead of Chiclayo.”

  “Why?”

  “Because they’re stubborn? I honestly have no idea. It adds a few hours to the journey on the water, but many of the women just sleep on the luxury speed boat that you saw on the dock. The waves on such a large boat are calming, and many of them sleep through the entire trip, thinking that it is only an hour or two.”

  “How long is it really?”

  “Several hours, depending on where they come from. It’s one of the many things that GRE has us do to give the women that come here a false sense of security.”

  “So that it never occurs to them that they might be in danger?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Does every woman that goes to the resort stay?”

  “No. Not even close. Women don’t just pair with a shifter. There has to be something there; some kind of potential for lifelong love between the two.”

  “Like a Fated Mate?”

  “Similar, but a Fated Mate usually comes with an announcement dream before the two meet. A Fated Pair is a little different. Unlike a Fated Mate, which is a single, preordained soul that is the deepest match for a shifter, a Fated Pair is one of countless people who are compatible with a shifter. When a shifter finds his Fated Pair, his soul recognizes that their souls are compatible, and the pair become entwined on the deepest level. Once a shifter is paired, he is taken for life and so is the human. It’s physically painful for both to separate. Even if the shifter would have had a Fated Mate at some point, once he or she is paired, their Fated Mate is freed from their fate and is often never aware that they were meant to be fated.”

  “How does GRE play into this?”

  “They found a way to predict with some accuracy which women are likely to be one half of a Fated Pair. That’s why the unpaired shifters are paraded around like livestock for the women to choose, and that’s why the resort is an elite, invitation only place. They want to control the quality of female that is paired with the shifters. So the price is steep, the resort is almost unknown to the outside world, and the women are enticed through a carefully orchestrated campaign that is meant to seem random.”

  “That’s insane,” she said. “They’re using Fate to practice eugenics and intentionally manipulating which shifters breed and with whom.”

  Luis looked at Tara, impressed that she had so easily made the leap.

  “That was impressive. That is exactly what they’re doing. And then they’re studying the families that are formed, gathering genetic material and using it for whatever is going on in the large research building on the other side of Isla Escondida.”

  “That is beyond unethical.”

  “Exactly. Which is why I contacted Andrew and then he contacted you.”

  Tara smiled. “It feels good to call him by his real name, doesn’t it?”

  “It really does. Whenever I see him, I have to remind myself that we never served in a war together and that we aren’t friends here.”

  “That must be hard.”

  “Not really. I’m just eager to be done with this. Despite being effectively exiled here, we are very happy here. It wasn’t until GRE stepped in with false promises to the U.S. Government that everything went downhill.”

  “So how do they decide which women are allowed to leave?”

  “The women who don’t pair up are sent home with a spring in their step and no idea how close they came to being trapped here.”

  “I can’t even wrap my head around all of this. It’s just so-”

  “Wrong?” he offered.

  “More than that. It’s like something out of a horror movie, only this is real life.”

  “That’s why I called.” He looked at her then, his eyes haunted by the horrible possibilities.

  “I’m so glad that you did.”

  The moment passed, and Tara was the first to look away.

  Don’t get attached, she warned herself. This assignment will be over in a week, maybe two, and then it’s back to your old life and he’ll be back to his.

  Tara sighed inwardly, sitting back in the co-pilot’s chair and watching the horizon to their west. She could just make out the outline of the island in the distance, but it was the water between them and the island that caught her attention.

  “It’s dark over there,” she pointed out, her voice shaking slightly.

  “I see it. It should be fine. There was a small squall yesterday after we made it to the island, too, but I heard that it wasn’t that bad and our other boat made it through without incident.”

  “So if they made it through alright, then we should be fine, too?”

  He looked at her and took a deep breath. Tara waited, watching him weigh his words so carefully.

  “We’re going to be fine because it isn’t very bad, but it’s going to be a little rough for a few minutes. Is your backpack waterproof?”

  “Mostly. The lady at the register was pretty excited about all the features.”

  “Good. Put it on, and then put a life jacket over it and make sure you run the leg strap between your legs so that the vest doesn’t pop up.”

  “Why do I need a life vest?”

  “We both do. They’re in the storage over there. Put one on and hand me the other one.”

  “Why don’t we just stay here until the st
orm passes or go around it?”

  “We’re not going to outrun it, and there’s nowhere for us to go. We either go through it on our terms and hope we get to shore without capsizing or we sit here and wait to capsize.”

  “Are you serious? Why didn’t Eric tell you that there was a storm coming?”

  “Storms aren’t always predictable. This one isn’t too bad, but it came up quickly. Did you notice it a few minutes ago when we first turned back to the west?”

  “No.”

  “Because it wasn’t there. It might even fizzle out before we get to it, but we definitely don’t want to take our chances this far out in a boat this size. We’ll be safer closer to shore without getting near the breakers, and if we have to, we can swim for it.”

  “Aren’t we supposed to avoid the shoreline in rough waters?”

  “Usually, but this storm is coming toward us, and if you look at the shoreline, the waves have already calmed and the shoreline is sunny. This squall is in front of us coming this way. If we can go into the wind and run into it, we should break through the other side much faster than we would sitting out here. It’s a small storm right now, but it could build between now and then. I don’t want to take that chance.”

  “Better the enemy that you know than the one you don’t know.”

  “That’s what I’m thinking. And like I said, we can swim for it if we have to, but we don’t really have a lot of options.”

  “You know I’m human, right?” she asked, tightening the straps on her backpack so that it was as tight against her as possible and then putting the life vest over her bag and tightening the strap between her legs. “Swimming to shore isn’t something I can just do.”

  “I do. I’ll be right here with you. Panthers are excellent swimmers.”

  Tara looked at him skeptically.

  “I don’t think that the turbulent ocean in a storm is the same as a river.”

  “It’s really more of a small squall. You should sit down; we’re going in.”