Change in the Light_Shapeshifter Romance

by Tami Lund

“We get that from the moment we’re born,” he used to argue. “By the time they start school, every shifter knows not to tell humans about our magical nature. All you’re doing is making them all completely dependent on you, the pack master.”

  It had been a futile argument. At least, until his father died.

  Josh scrubbed his hand over his face, parked the Escalade, and headed toward the house. Maybe it was time to make some of those changes he kept putting off. Maybe it was time to shake up the pack a little. They’d resist in the beginning—shifters had a tendency to resist change of any kind—but they would appreciate him in the long run. He really did have the pack’s best interest at heart.

  He thought about the smokin’ hot redhead he’d reluctantly left when he finally noticed the dozen or so text messages from Matt on his phone. She had certainly shaken up his world. In a good way. Rachel had been a refreshing change from the shifters who surrounded him day in and day out. He hoped to hell he would have a chance to see her again. Maybe even tonight. He could see himself getting addicted to the beautiful human, if he wasn’t already.

  “Where the hell have you been?” Matt greeted him in the foyer, eyes flashing with anger.

  “Don’t look at me like that,” Josh replied as he draped his suit coat over the bannister of the nearby staircase, knowing Jeanine Wessel, the housekeeper he’d inherited when his parents died, would take care of it. He tried not to be careless and take advantage of her presence, even though she constantly admonished him and informed him it was her job to clean up after him.

  “I’m the one who’s pissed at you. What the fuck was that stunt last night?” he demanded, heading down the hall to the kitchen. He was starving. Probably a result of all the sexual energy he’d burned in the last twelve hours.

  Matt followed, sniffing the air as he went. “You got laid last night,” he accused instead of responding to Josh’s question.

  “So? It happens every once in a while.” Of course his cousin would know instantly. He hadn’t showered since the last go-round, so the musky smell of arousal still clung to him, as did Rachel’s own tantalizing scent.

  “The redhead from the charity shindig?”

  Josh’s steps faltered for a second. Shit. Busted.

  “She’s human.”

  “Thanks for the update,” Josh drawled. “Apparently you haven’t noticed my lack of interest in female shifters lately?”

  “I have. So have a lot of others in the pack. Which isn’t good.”

  “My sex life is none of their business.”

  “Your sex life is entirely their business,” Matt corrected as he slid onto a barstool next to the kitchen island and watched as Josh tossed sandwich fixings from the fridge to the counter. “Since that’s the way a shifter mates. And everybody expects their pack master to take a mate and get her to whelping a pup, so he can be sure to carry on his lineage. Otherwise, we have a nasty, bloody fight for power on our hands, and nobody wants that.”

  “Actually, one person might want that,” Josh replied, thinking about his father’s nemesis, Kent Pantera. Pantera had coveted the position of pack master since Josh’s grandfather had been in charge.

  “Luckily, most in this pack are smart enough to realize that’s a really stupid idea. Although if you don’t start handling your pack master responsibilities better, that could change.”

  Josh slammed the refrigerator door and stared at his cousin, who, despite his propensity for pulling pranks like the one last night, was his best friend. “What the hell is that supposed to mean? The hotel has generated the highest profit in its existence since I took over managing it. I find a job for every single member of this pack who wants one. And I support those who don’t, even though I shouldn’t. They’re perfectly capable of working for themselves, yet my parents taught them to be lazy-asses. Hell, I have to hire humans as housekeepers at the hotel because my own kind are too fucking lazy to work for the food I put on their table.”

  Matt stopped in the middle of making a sandwich to lift his hands as if fending off an attack. “Chill. I’m with you. You know I agree with everything you’re saying. But I also know that we have to change things slowly but surely, or you’ll have a damned revolt on your hands. And anyway, that’s not what I’m talking about.” He resumed piling rare sliced roast beef onto thick slices of homemade bread.

  Josh took a deep breath to calm himself and pulled open the fridge again so he could snag two bottles of Le’Tigre Summer Ale. Shortly after his parents died, he’d purchased a struggling local brewery and renamed it. He’d also weeded out the humans who had played a role in the brewery’s failure, but kept those who were good at what they did, and hired on a few members of the pack to make up the difference.

  It had been his first attempt at instituting change, convincing his pack that associating with humans wasn’t really all that bad. He pretended the shifters working at the brewery were okay with working side by side with humans because they were learning and growing as individuals, and not because they got a free six-pack of brew with every paycheck.

  “So what is it?” Josh reluctantly asked as he lifted the bottle to his lips and drank deeply. Damn, humans made good beer.

  “You didn’t do yourself any favors by leaving with the hot redheaded human last night.”

  “I was getting her out before she figured out she was surrounded by shifters,” Josh said, defending his actions. “Which, by the way, I wouldn’t have had to do if you hadn’t pulled your stupid prank.”

  Matt shrugged and took a hefty bite of his sandwich, chasing it with a slug of beer. “Everybody loves my pranks.”

  “Except the humans who ran screaming from the facility. Do you want to know how much money I had to pay to that place to, quote-unquote, cover the damages?”

  “Not really. Anyway, Kent Pantera was there last night.”

  Josh’s mood darkened further. Why the hell had he left Rachel’s place and come home again? He had a strong urge to walk out the door, climb back into his vehicle, and head back over there. Except pack masters couldn’t just walk away from their lives when they didn’t want to deal with the bullshit anymore.

  “That’s surprising. Pantera’s happy to take, but he rarely gives back.” And the man thought he would be a better pack master than Josh. A pack master spent ninety percent of his waking hours giving back to the pack. And half the time it was a damned thankless job. Pantera would hate it, aside from the prestige of being the one in control, making the decisions.

  “Yeah, well, he sure as hell saw you leave. And he made sure everyone else there knew it was with a human. And considering you reek of sex, you did exactly what he insinuated you were going to do. Just tell me you didn’t mate with her.”

  “I’m not an idiot, Matt.”

  “I don’t think you are. But shit, Josh. You need to take him seriously. He’s doing his damndest to undermine your authority, and he’s a conniving fuck. They’re going to start believing him eventually.”

  “If I weren’t so convinced he’d run the pack into the ground, I’d give him what he wants. Being pack master’s no picnic. In fact, more often than not, it downright sucks.”

  “You need to take a mate,” Matt advised. “And put a pup in her belly. Then he’d have to back off, because even if you died, your pup would take over in your stead.”

  “He isn’t going to kill me, even if I am mateless,” Josh said. “Because he knows that everyone will immediately point the finger at him. Half the pack is still suspicious that he contrived the crash that killed my parents.”

  “He probably did.”

  “It was an icy day. A jackknifed semi. Completely random. They were in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

  “Anyway,” Matt continued, “Pantera spent the rest of the night schmoozing the other guests, dropping hints about how it makes more sense to have a seasoned shifter at the helm, instead of some upstart youngling who would rather screw humans than his own kind.”

  “Jesus, I’m no
t that young,” Josh grumbled. He pushed away from the island and strode to the window overlooking forty acres of private land and a small lake that made up his backyard. Except it wasn’t really his. It belonged to the pack. Everything belonged to the pack, including the pack master himself.

  The beach was crowded with shifters enjoying the late summer, sunny day. He spared a moment to wish he were one of them, one of those who relied on another to take care of their problems, instead of being the one who had to take care of everyone else.

  “I’m thirty years old. And I’m fricking managing it, aren’t I?” he said to Matt, without turning away from the window. “I’m taking care of my own, managing the hotel, getting the brewery off the ground. Looking for other opportunities to support the pack. What the hell do they expect of me?”

  “For one thing, they expect you to sleep with your own kind. To take one of them to mate. To be more exclusive than you are. For generation after generation, our ancestors have trained us to steer clear of humans, as much as possible.”

  “Yet we live in their backyards. Take over their damn communities. Not to mention we eat their food and pay their taxes and support their elected government officials. We don’t steer clear of humans—we pick and choose what we’re willing to accept.” He glanced over his shoulder and saw Matt shrug.

  “It is what it is.”

  “I hate that phrase. I think I’m going to ban it at the next pack meeting.”

  Matt chuckled. “Good luck with that.”

  Josh punched his left palm with his right fist. “Goddamn it, Matt. It’s stupid of us to be so exclusive like this. There’s no reason we can’t live more like the humans. More self-reliant. More accepting of those who are different from us. Look at the Lightbearers. They’re run by a shifter now. The heir is half-shifter. It’s possible to get along with those who are different from us. It’s happening, just four hours northwest of here.”

  “Short of planning a mandatory pack excursion up to that coterie, I doubt you’ll be able to convince them what you’re saying is true. And we can’t do a mandatory pack excursion when we have a hotel to run. Not unless you’re going to leave it to the housekeepers to manage while we’re gone.”

  “I thought you were on my side?”

  “I am.” He shrugged and made himself another sandwich. “It’s the way we are, though. We don’t trust humans. Never have. And we sure as hell don’t want them to know our secrets.”

  “Our only secret is that we’re shape shifters,” Josh pointed out moodily.

  “That’s a pretty fucking big secret.”

  Josh narrowed his eyes as he continued to look out over the vibrant blue lake. “How much damage do you think he did last night?” Had that brief time in heaven with Rachel been worth it?

  “Well, if I were you, I’d back off on screwing human women for a while.”

  Chapter 4

  It was a full eight days later when Rachel dragged herself up the stairs to her apartment, emotionally exhausted from a long day working at the charity. She might be just a secretary, and only a tiny step away from qualifying for the same services offered to clients, but that did not mean she didn’t empathize with their pain and frustration.

  She wanted nothing more than to drink a bottle of wine for dinner. Maybe she’d supplement it with some cheese and crackers, so she would still be able to function the next day. But she most definitely wanted to get a buzz on tonight, to forget, just for a little while, how truly horrible the world could be.

  When she pushed open the door to her apartment, she let out a startled shriek and nearly jumped back out into the hall. The man who’d forced her to seduce Josh Tigre and had inadvertently given her the best night—and morning—of her life, stood in the middle of her tiny apartment. His hands were casually shoved into the pockets of his navy blue slacks, his gray streaked hair was windblown, and the look on his face was faked casual.

  “How did you get in here?”

  “I have my ways.”

  Rachel whipped her head from side to side, judging the distance down the hall, determining which staircase was closest.

  “Don’t run,” he advised. “My kind quite enjoys the chase. And I promise you cannot outrun me.”

  She paused in the act of doing just that. “I did what you said,” she defended herself without walking further into the apartment.

  “Hardly,” he said with a sniff. “You took him home for one night. You haven’t seen him since.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because he has thrown himself wholeheartedly into thwarting my every move for every day since that weekend, and I have to tell you, it’s really getting on my nerves.”

  “What the hell does that have to do with me?”

  “If he was distracted by you—which is, in fact, what I instructed you to do—then he would not be bothering me and my agenda.”

  Rachel shook her head and prepared to run, despite his dire warning. She had no idea where the hell she would run to. Josh’s house? That was a laugh. She didn’t even know where he lived. And even if she figured it out, what would she say? “Hey Josh, remember me? Yeah, well, I slept with you because this creepazoid told me he’d kill me if I didn’t. He’s back now and threatening me again and I was wondering if I could hide out here? We could keep sleeping together, if you want.”

  Maybe that plan really did have merit, if she weren’t so absolutely convinced that after hearing the first half of her confession, Josh would want nothing at all to do with her. Damn it.

  “I’m not kidding,” the man warned. “I will hunt you down if you run. And I will kill you. I’ve done it before. It really isn’t so hard after the dozen or so mark.”

  Dozen? Or so? Rachel grabbed the doorknob to keep from keeling over into a dead faint. Who talked about killing people with such casualness?

  “Go back to him,” the man ordered. “Get friendly with him. Distract him from bothering me. That is a direct order. And keep this in mind, Rachel Whitaker: I own you.”

  He walked toward her and she shrank away from him. He smiled, clearly enjoying her fear.

  “I—I don’t know how to contact him. W-we didn’t exchange numbers. I thought it was just supposed to be a one-night stand,” she said with more bravado than she felt.

  His smile twisted into a scowl. “You really are a whore, aren’t you?”

  “I did what you told me to do,” she protested. “I distracted him so you wouldn’t kill me. End of story.”

  He growled. A full on, wolf-like growl. “Give me your phone.”

  “My—what?”

  “Your phone, you little slut. Give. Me. Your. Phone.”

  She wanted to give him something all right, and it sure as hell wasn’t her phone. But when he grabbed her by the throat and shoved her against the nearest wall, she saw reason in his request. She fumbled in her purse until, with shaking hands, she managed to dig out her phone and type the password to unlock the screen. He grabbed it and released her, and she sagged against the wall.

  “There,” he said, handing it back a few moments later. “This should ring a bell. It’s where he works. He tends to be there a lot, Monday through Friday. See to it you pay him a visit. And keep him distracted for longer than a few hours this time. Got it?”

  After he left, she reasoned with herself that there were certainly worse things in life than sleeping with Josh Tigre in order to keep from getting killed. And then she looked at her phone.

  He worked at the same hotel where she moonlighted as a housekeeper.

  Chapter 5

  Rachel wiped her sweaty palms on the skirt of the sage green sundress she’d deliberately worn today. Her day job had a casual dress code, so the only time she had to put much effort into her appearance was when a big-time donor or the board of directors were paying a visit. Today, though, she’d dressed up for an entirely different reason.

  To seduce Josh Tigre. Again.

  The fact that he knew where she lived and had made no
contact whatsoever for the past week and a half worried her. If he’d enjoyed their little romp as much as she had, wouldn’t he have made it a point to try to see her again? Granted, until The Prick—as she had come to refer to the man who was controlling her like a puppet these days—had shown up in her apartment, she had been mostly okay with Josh’s apparent lack of interest in continuing their liaison. Her body missed him, to be sure, and even her mind did, but honestly, parting ways had been the smartest move—so she thought.

  The problem was, she could easily see herself falling for Josh. And that was a big, fat problem, given the circumstances under which they’d tumbled into bed in the first place. Because honestly, it couldn’t work. She’d been forced to sleep with him, and that was not even taking into consideration their complete opposite roles in life. She was a poor secretary who moonlighted as a housekeeper. He was the general manager of one of the most prestigious hotels in Detroit.

  She’s looked him up on the Internet last night, after downing a few glasses of wine to steady her nerves. While he was listed as the general manager, the name of the company that owned the hotel was Tigre Enterprises, which led her to believe that he or someone in his family owned the place, too. Since The Prick had alluded to Josh running some sort of organization, Rachel’s conclusion had been that Josh owned the hotel, too.

  When she researched Tigre Enterprises, she learned the company had recently purchased a local brewery, which had been on the brink of closing. Tigre Enterprises had turned it into a profitable venture in less than a year.

  She hadn’t been able to find much else on the web about Tigre Enterprises or Josh himself, outside of a few articles about the hotel being a premier place to stay while visiting the Detroit area.

  Josh was clearly a successful businessman, and he coveted his privacy. With little to go on besides her imagination, Rachel had begun to wonder if she hadn’t slept with a mafia kingpin a week and a half ago. He certainly had the look, and when she pictured the attendees at the gala where she met him, it wasn’t much of a stretch to imagine a scene out of a Godfather movie. She’d slept with Josh to save her own life, and now she wondered if that hadn’t been an equally dangerous decision.