by Kit Tunstall
“If you can’t do that… I hope you can, but if you can’t, then I have to go away.”
Annette’s lips pressed into a hard line. Deep lines that Liddy had never seen before etched her forehead and for once made her look her age. She closed her eyes for a long moment, then opened them to reveal the glimmer of unshed tears. Quietly, she asked, “You won’t come back, will you?”
Liddy prayed those unshed tears meant her mama was close to giving in, the way she had always told herself she would with the right persuasion. Still, she couldn’t allow her hope to surface. “To a town that thinks I and the man I love are freaks? No. I won’t come back to that. I love you both so much, but I have to follow my heart.”
Kevin squeezed her hand, assuring her that she wouldn’t be alone no matter her mother’s decision. “Liddy, we should go. Give them time to digest all—”
“You’re not going anywhere with my baby,” Mama snapped, all trace of tears gone.
Kevin stepped forward, bringing Liddy into the circle of his left arm. He pinned her mother with a derisive look. “She’s my baby now, and I love her just the way she is.”
Something flickered in Annette’s eyes. As her mama spoke, Liddy realized it was admiration. “Then she’s both of our babies, Mr. Montcalm. But you’re still not going anywhere with her the way you two look right now.” A sheepish look came into her eyes, and she nodded at their bedraggled clothing. “You need to get those wounds cleaned up, treated. Do your, uh, kind go to the hospital?”
Between the way her mouth hung agog and the rush of thankful thoughts that cruised through Liddy’s mind, Kevin knew she was incapable of forming a response. He did it for her with the first genuine smile he’d ever given her mother. Clearly, as he’d told those in his pride at countless gatherings, it was fear of the unknown that had shaped her mother’s opinion of those who were different from her. Fear that had begun to evaporate and, in time, he hoped would completely fade. “Unless we suffer mortal wounds, we mend very fast. We should be fine by morning.”
Annette returned his smile with one of her own, and the years seemed to fall away from her face. She was the vibrant woman she presented herself as on a daily basis now. In the past, Kevin had assumed her youthfulness came with the assistance of surgery. Now he realized it was the natural beauty that came from loving her family.
“Then how about some coffee and carrot cake?” Annette asked. “I made a cake for Sunday dinner, but it seems we have a lot to talk about it, so we might as well have it tonight.” She turned to her husband. “Harry, can you see to the coffee while I get these two some towels to clean up with?”
Liddy’s father nodded agreeably. “Of course, dear.”
Beside Kevin, Liddy finally moved, her body brushing his with the subtlest of touches and sending a bolt of heat and lust shooting through him. God, how he’d missed those touches today while he’d been trapped behind bars. Never again would he spend a day away from his mate.
“Thank you, Mama.” Liddy’s voice trembled as she talked, and tears slipped down her cheeks. “I’ve hated keeping this from you. I love you.”
Annette came to them and pulled Liddy into a hug. “I love you, baby.” She set her daughter back at arm’s length and wiped at Liddy’s tears. “Now enough of these tears. You don’t want your man thinking you blubber all the time, do you?”
Kevin’s hearted warmed with the acceptance in Annette’s voice. He hadn’t thought he cared to have it so long as he had Liddy, but now he realized how much getting her parents’ approval meant to him. “I don’t mind a few tears. Not when I know exactly how strong my Liddy is. It seems I now know where she gets that strength from.”
Annette bit her lip and looked away.
Liddy laughed. “Mama you’re blushing.”
Tsking, Annette waved her hand at Liddy. “Get your backside in the bathroom to clean up before I take your father’s belt to it. You aren’t too old to take over my knee, you know.” With another laugh, Liddy pecked a kiss on her mother’s cheek then returned to Kevin and gave him a much longer, intimate one on his mouth. She went off in the direction he guessed the bathroom to be then, and Annette turned to him. “As for you, Mr. Montcalm, it seems it’s about time I got to know my future son-in-law better.”
“How about we start by you calling me Kevin?”
“Kevin,” she repeated, threading her arm through the crook of one of his and gesturing toward the door her husband had gone through moments before. “Annette, or Mama if you prefer. It’s a pleasure getting to know someone who cares so deeply for our Liddy. She’s a special girl, you know.”
“That I do, Mama. And it’s just one of many reasons I plan to make her my queen.”
“Your queen?” The surprise in Annette’s voice was clear. “Is that a title that comes with money? Not that I care about money or anything else, mind you, you could be a pauper so long as you love Liddy, it’s just that—”
“Old habits die hard?”
Annette’s eyes lit with amusement and a sound Kevin had never heard from the woman came out of her mouth. Laughter. Rich, hearty and lilting in a way that ensured from this day forward life in the city of Hanover, for shifters, for humans, for people of every color, race, ethnicity and class would be a whole lot different. A whole lot better.
*
Kevin pulled Liddy to the center of the conference room they’d been renting for pride gatherings the last months, and she fought off the blush that came with the knowledge all eyes were on her, on them. On their naked bodies.
In the five months since her mama expressed to Hanover that she had been wrong about shapeshifters being freaks unworthy of calling the city home, Liddy had made love with Kevin, in darkness and daylight hours, among the pride many times. However, she had never done so in her human form. It had been her decision to do so tonight, the night of their nuptials.
Mama’s disapproval of both shifters and people dating beyond their ethnicity had truly fled. She had openly cried tears of joy through the wedding, while Chenille and Daddy had shown their support for the marriage with their smiles and cheers of congratulations. The reception had been a beautiful affair, attended by humans and shapeshifters alike. Shifters who no longer tried to hide what they were.
It was for that reason Liddy chose to stand naked in the center of the pride as Kevin announced she was their queen to all in attendance. Joining in their human forms, while fur couldn’t disguise who they were, somehow seemed more intimate. And, she admitted as she looked around the large room filled with shifters in various forms of transformation, all of whom watched them intently, far more erotic.
Kevin let loose the roar that signified the time for the joining ritual had come, and turned a wide smile on Liddy. His fangs gleamed white in the overhead lighting, showing their razor sharp edges. She shivered at the thought of those fangs sinking into her flesh, suckling at her warm blood as he joined them together for eternity. Her pussy, already moist from all the attention, pooled with a rush of wetness.
“Now, as for you, my queen…” He reached a hand to her, gently cupping her cheek. She titled her face against his warm palm, purring in the back of her throat. “You’re so beautiful, Liddy. If I were the jealous kind, it might bother me to have so many other men looking at you, seeing these big, beautiful breasts.”
Kevin released her cheek to cup a dark breast in his hand. The nipple, already aroused, tightened fiercely with his touch. The pad of his thumb scraped along the stiff peak, and the roughness of it told her he’d allowed other parts of his body to shift than just his teeth. For her pleasure, Liddy knew, as excitement charged through her body.
“And this belly,” Kevin continued, settling his free hand on the rise of her stomach. “If I were the jealous type, I wouldn’t want to share this belly with anyone.”
One finger dipped into her navel, and she bit back a cry at the unexpected pleasure the simple touch evoked. He worked his finger in and out, and her pussy dampened further, her sex ting
ling with the loving heat in his intense blue eyes.
His thoughts gave away his next move, before he said, “And your hot little pussy.” The hand at her belly moved to her mound, clean shaven just for tonight. “I couldn’t stand any other man, feline or otherwise, looking at this beautiful pussy if I were the jealous kind.”
Kevin’s smile turned feral as he slid a finger the length of her slit. “But I’m not the jealous kind, because I know how much you love me, and how much I trust you.”
His finger sank deep, thrusting hard in and out of her sheath. Liddy watched his thick finger fucking her body and couldn’t hold in her growl of ecstasy. “Oh yes, Kevin! Fuck me like that, just like that.”
Laughter exploded around them, breaking her from the sensual haze that had overtaken her to stare out at the crowd of voyeurs. The conference room had been decorated especially for these pride gatherings. Large couches and chairs dominated much of the place, while tables and platforms took up more of the space. Kevin and she stood on the highest platform, and she gulped with the realization her bare pussy was at the perfect viewing sight. Everyone in the room could see the way Kevin’s finger splayed her sex wide, could see the cream leaking from her body. Could smell the scent of her arousal. They could see Kevin’s arousal, too.
Liddy turned her attention on the thick length of Kevin’s cock jutting toward her. Rigid veins stood out against the pink flesh and her tongue throbbed with the desire to lick over his sex.
The laughter around them faded to the myriad sounds of slapping flesh and grunts of satisfaction. Each one of those sounds reached deep down inside her. Her pussy pulsed with the need to have him buried deeply inside her, but the knowing in Kevin’s eyes as she lifted her attention back to his face ruled out her own need.
“Do it, Liddy,” he encouraged in a rough voice. “Suck me. Show everyone here how gifted you are with that delectable mouth.”
“I want that.” The admittance brought power cruising through her veins, making her blood stir to fever pitch. “I want to fuck you in front of everyone.”
With a siren’s smile, she closed the short distance that separated them, brushing her lips against his mouth once, then dragging her heavy breasts down his chest as she went to her knees. Cupping her breasts, she captured his cock between them, and milked the solid length with the twin mounds.
Kevin’s hands fisted in her hair. His growl of approval filled the room, ringing above the sounds of the others.
“Do you like that, Kevin?” Liddy teased, knowing full well that he did. The proof was evident in the cum that leaked from the tip of his penis, and the way his cock twitched between her breasts, jerking in the direction of her lips.
Before he could respond outside of thoughts, she released one of her breasts and fisted his cock in her hand. Tipping her head back to watch his face, she lapped at the tip, savoring the taste of her husband’s cum.
Husband.
Liddy grinned with the thought. Happiness consumed her as she took his sex fully into her mouth and hummed her elation against his shaft.
“Oh hell, yes Liddy!” Kevin’s grip on her hair tightened and his hips jerked toward her face. His face was a tight mask of quiet control.
She reached for his ass, cupping a taut buttock in each hand. You have the greatest ass, she thought, unable to share the thought aloud with her mouth full.
That didn’t stop him from hearing it. Using his hold on her hair, he pulled her mouth from his penis and brought her to her feet and into the circle of his arms. His tongue filled her mouth, coasting over her teeth, tasting his arousal on her palate. As do you, and that’s where I want to be right now.
Liddy trembled with the nip of fangs against her tongue and the power of his thoughts. They held the command he showed only on occasion, but that she loved to the fullest. He kissed her several more seconds, his large hands sliding down her body to palm her ass, and then he lifted her in his arms and moved to the end of the platform where a small round table sat in wait.
She had never been taken on a table before. As Kevin settled her against it, her palms flat on the hardwood and her ass thrust in his face, she remembered she had never been taken in her human form in front of dozens of prying eyes, either.
All of the shifters were engaging in sex now, fucking their life partners and those they were partnered with for the night. Many of them kept their eyes trained on the center of the room, on her and Kevin as they moved. Liddy locked eyes with a woman in the crowd. She was half transformed, soft yellow hair dusting her body save for her breasts and mound, both of which were bare, her breasts jiggling, her pussy leaking cream down the inside of her thighs. Her partner was in the same state of semi-transformation as he took her from behind, fucking her ass with long, solid strokes, much the same way Kevin was about to do to Liddy.
Kevin’s cock slid along her crack, the damp head nudging her anus, and Liddy trembled with anticipation. The look in the woman’s eyes was a mixture of rapture and love, and it was that same look Liddy knew filled her own eyes as one of Kevin’s hands came around to palm her breast and the other moved to her pussy.
He teased the bare mound with slow strokes, then pushed a finger into her crevice. His mouth came to her neck, brushing damp kisses on her sweaty flesh. “So wet,” he murmured nipping at her ear while he twisted a nipple between thumb and forefinger. “You like being watched this way, don’t you?”
She tipped her head back against his mouth, whimpering as his fangs rubbed over sensitive skin. “Yes. It’s arousing, but only because you’re here with me. I love you, Kevin. Only you. Forever.”
His thoughts conveyed that he felt the same for her, but she wouldn’t have needed them. The possessive way he sank his fangs deeply into her neck and plunged his cock into her ass was more than proof enough.
Her gaze was still locked on the woman in the crowd and that woman smiled now, sharing a moment of blissful understanding with Liddy. Then the feel of Kevin’s large shaft, her body milking him and the heady tang of her blood on the air took over, and the room before her became a haze of thrusting bodies and satisfied roars.
The finger at her pussy moved to her clit, stroking the swollen nub. The push of his cock grew faster, harder into her ass until tension coiled hot and heavy in Liddy’s belly. Sweat glided between the valley of her breasts and her heart beat out of control.
Release crashed over her hard, making her grip the edge of the table for support as her limbs shook, threatening to give out. Wary of the roomful of shifters, she cried out her fulfillment, wanting for one and all to hear her love for Kevin and appreciation for the way his skilled hands played her body so beautifully.
Kevin’s climax came fast on the heels of her own, his cock pulsating within her before exploding with a burst of silky warm fluid. He pulled his fangs from her neck and, as he had done months before while fucking her among the pride, he growled her name as he came. Only this time when he said it, it was the knowledge it was truly Liddy in his arms.
His mate. His queen. His wife.
About the Author
Jodi Lynn Copeland discovered her love for writing at an early age and soon after that came an even greater love for the hot, steamy romance—some riddled with humor and fun, others shock full of enough dark and emotional baggage to sink a ship. Jodi is married to her real life hero and has more than a dozen children, though only one of them is human and two-legged.
Jodi is an all-around tomboy at heart, which you can often see shades of in her writing. When she isn’t writing or spending time at the day job she likes to pretend she really doesn’t have, Jodi can be found in the great outdoors, scrapbooking, watching the discovery channel, CSI or 24, or on any given Sunday sacked out on the couch with her husband and stepson, taking in the latest NASCAR race.
Jodi Lynn Copeland welcomes mail from readers. You can write to her c/o Ellora’s Cave Publishing at 1337 Commerce Drive, #13, Stow, Ohio 44224.
Also by Jodi Lynn Copeland
; Gold, Frankincense and Myrhh
Naughty Mistress Nita
Sons of Solaris: Aries
Sons of Solaris: Taurus
Uncharted Waters
Wild Hearts: One Wild Weekend
Wild Hearts: Wild By Night
Tiger Eye
Kit Tunstall
Author’s Note
There are no tigers in Africa, except in zoos. They are indigenous to Asia, but the story wouldn’t have worked as well in an Asian setting. Please forgive the artistic license I used to place tigers in Africa.
Prologue
Mekimba, Africa
Thirty years ago
Grant knew his mother wouldn’t approve of him investigating, but he pushed on anyway, ignoring the blades of stinging grass that slapped against his bare legs. Absently, he lifted a leg to scratch a mosquito bite irritated by the dying vegetation, his eyes never wavering from the two frolicking tiger cubs in the grass ahead of him. The contrast of black stripes against their pure white fur enthralled him, making his fingers itch to touch them.
He briefly wondered where their mother was, taking time to scan the area surrounding them. When he didn’t see her, he moved forward until he was within a few feet of the babies. The larger of the two cubs pounced on its sibling, issuing a growl that was probably meant to be ferocious. A giggle escaped Grant as they rolled together, yowling at each other in playful outrage.
He stepped closer, pushing aside vegetation reaching his waist, to get to the cubs. Fingers extended, he clicked his tongue at them. The cubs broke apart, watching him warily. He dropped to his knees, inching forward. The smaller cub backed away, hissing at him, but the larger cub stood its ground, growling. When he scooted closer still, the cub’s bravery fled, and its eyes widened while it backed way.
They were about to flee. In his eagerness to pet them, Grant abandoned caution and lunged forward, catching the hind leg of the larger cub as it turned to flee. A piteous cry escaped it as he dragged it toward him, escalating in pitch as he wrestled with the cub, trying to pull it into his arms. Although only a baby, it put up a good fight, raking his arms with its razor-like claws.