by Susan Arden
She closed her eyes, shutting out the unexpected raw vision of Cole’s torn body. He had been the man she’d loved since high school. She fought against remembering him as she’d found at the bottom of a ravine. Cole was dead and here she was alive, throwing herself at a stranger. It should have been her at the bottom of the ravine. Not Cole, when he’d leapt to help her. Cole — her mate — forever gone.
Diana pulled the robe across her shoulders and cinched the sash around her waist. She turned away from the door, picking up the chain. She steered clear of the center of the room where a crimson column of heated light fell. Her eyes flattened and she could feel the elongation of her pupils, a physical sign of her leopardess cunning, prompted by the colored light which aided night vision. Unfortunately, it also fried her skin.
She peered up at the infrared light bulb within the ceiling fixture. Impossible to unscrew the darn thing. The ceilings were at least fifteen feet tall. Soon enough, she’d have no problem leaping up to punch out the light bulb, putting an end to the scorching red glare. Soon enough, it would be dark and she’d not need the light. Soon enough, she’d have company in the form of an alpha male who’d give her release from the torturous craving that rocked her mind and body.
A roar rumbled deep inside her, and if left unrestrained, she’d give in and let the vociferous sound tumble from her lips. And at this point, her cravings more than twisted her soul. One more night and she’d have sold her spirit to have one shifting male properly fuck her past this heat. The space between her legs spasmed. Her edgy condition, or the fact that she’d agreed to let a stranger fuck her into submission, no longer shocked or bothered her. She’d gotten past her morals, thrown aside her inhibitions, and overcome her loner tendencies when she’d almost pounced on Shawn, her boss, followed by a near streaking incident at home.
She shook her head. “Oh God, I’ve almost lost it.” She continued pacing and swinging the chain.
After tonight’s coupling, she prayed tomorrow would arrive with a hint of normalcy. Her current design project was running out of time with the deadline looming. She should have notified her boss and requested an extension.
Her whole body constricted when she thought of him and her near lip-lock fantasy. Shawn Barclay’s muscular build and rugged good looks had sent her over the edge after a year of going it alone. Last Friday, before her heat cycle actually came on, she almost licked his face while they had stood shoulder to shoulder at her desk reviewing her work. Afterward she had left her office, telling the receptionist she’d be at home. She didn’t understand why she had become out of control before her heat. It was no mystery that he was a shifter. Albeit just her luck, an alpha leopard. But not once had she sought any form of attention that wasn’t strictly professional. Business all the way. That was, until recently — precisely, until this heat.
Once the cycle began, her cravings required she remove herself from temptation. So far, remaining inside her home and avoiding male shifters — all male shifters — had seemed to do the trick.
For the past year, contained within her house, she’d been able to weather the storm of monthly heat cycles while working flextime. A tremendous perk and the reason she’d accepted the position at Matrix Design. Shawn didn’t care as long as her projects were completed on time. He was too good to be true. And what a body … she inhaled, closing her eyes.
Shawn. No wonder, she thought. Her boss waltzed around in sneakers and a pair of snug jeans that clung to his tight ass. He constantly complimented her work, to the point she hungered for him. Her one insurmountable problem boiled down to, Shawn didn’t return her admiration. The man was all business, twenty-four seven. Shawn had this uncanny way of making her feel appreciated for her creative ability and work product. She would have sworn on a stack of Bibles an undercurrent existed between them, but not once did he reveal an ounce of carnal interest — which would have been tolerable had he not smelled good enough to lick. She sighed, wishing he admired her for something less ethical and more physical.
A pulsating spasm shot through her abdomen, forcing a caterwaul to expand within her chest, rising up her throat. Her eyes sprang open. She pulled at the collar in frustration, eyeing the door.
She drew in a breath to steady her racing mind. Hard fucking with a stranger no longer frightened her. Quite the reverse. She welcomed the moment a hard cock would save her. She was well inside her cycle of this body-wrenching heat when she’d made the mistake of thinking she could beat the odds. She had for twelve months.
Pride before the fall kept looping around her mind for the last month or two. Apparently, somehow her leopardess premonition had known she was close to breaking. She had already lived through one close call and feared she’d do something more than foolish without professional help. Last month, she’d lost it at the edge of the city’s nature sanctuary and bordering private woods. She’d shifted without warning. She didn’t remember much except running all night, for several nights in a row, and then waking up naked, dirty, and scratched.
Then, a day ago she hungered to run free again. Standing at her back door, shifting between her leopard and woman forms, she had sniffed the air. Thankfully, her neighbor’s German shepherd had howled at a feline ear-piercing pitch. The sound snapped her back into human form long enough to close and bolt the door in lieu of running naked down the alley. With a brewing desire for her boss — and a newfound interest in streaking — she put her pride aside.
The Downtown Den had been a last resort yesterday. She’d requested an emergency intake. The cost of this stud service no longer mattered if she obtained relief.
Diana ran her hands through her hair. The chain rattled with each movement. Her choices were to sit or pace. She lowered herself onto the pallet covered by a clean, soft sheet. The cushion resembled a thick futon and was wide enough for two bodies. She crossed and uncrossed her legs, studying the shadows on the wall, letting her gaze wander out the window, up into the midnight blue sky. Hope mounted within her. Any second the door would open. She bobbed her head to the bass rhythm vibrating across the floor, wiggling her legs hard enough to make her breasts bounce.
She pressed her legs together, warding off the need to plunge her finger into her opening and satisfy her hunger. That hadn’t worked since the time she almost bumped into her boss by accident, her hip grazing across his crotch. His scent continued to wrap her in cords of frustration. Now, she couldn’t orgasm on her own. It was as though her body wanted one unattainable thing. Or shifter, really. This far into her heat, her appetite for sex had become unmanageable.
Without thinking, she rubbed her thighs together. Undulations swelled within her sex. She shivered as her unbearable longing awoke yet again. Any brushes against her slit exacerbated a hunger threatening to overtake her on the next breath. Diana nervously ran her fingertips along a row of scratch marks on the floor.
“Ouch,” she cried.
A thick splinter stuck out from her skin. Without thinking twice, she used her teeth to extract the piece of wood. A droplet of blood formed on the tip of her finger. The pungent scent wasn’t so much inhaled as the air was tasted. She sipped a wisp over her Jacobson’s organ, perceiving her surroundings acutely. The smallest of bursts lit as she captured the tail end of an essence. She released a puff of air from her nostrils. A low, sawing growl escaped from her throat.
She sucked her finger, thinking she must avoid touching the deeply furrowed lines gouged in the wooden floor. For now she sat and waited, listening to the music from the dance floor downstairs pound a rhythm into her chest instead of focusing on her own racing pulse. She rued her decision to come up early into this reserved room, giving up the chance to enjoy a flute of champagne to blunt her needling anxiety.
Her blood raced, sensing it was almost time. The waxing moon would be overhead, creating an apex in her intolerable craving. She hissed in anticipation. Finally, she’d make her own scratch marks on this well-worn floor and upon the body of the alpha who’d agreed to take her
on. She rocked back and forth, recalling the long questionnaire she’d filled out for the Den’s intake counselor and then the photographs of countless men she’d been given to ponder. No one seemed better than the next, and she’d left the decision to the Den’s counselor.
In Denver, there were several places where unmated shifters could go, including online coupling services. Daring shifters braved the underground clubs to seek fulfillment using kink and elaborate bondage gear, making this mere collar and chain appear very simplistic.
The Downtown Den was a highly regarded establishment known for confidential penchants, proclaiming experience in handling first timers in search of stud, and she’d sought services after learning about them as one of Matrix’s clients. Here, the club provided a supervised face-to-face meeting where she could veto the chosen stud.
In truth, she needed a modicum of security, not for her but against her uncontrollable nature. In a BDSM club, she feared what would happen when her lustful nature let loose. She almost laughed at the thought of her needing assistance. What she required amounted to being leashed and unable to break free, but also protection against someone who’d take advantage of her. She wasn’t up for a roomful of alphas who might tag-team a female. Some shifters mounted a female in heat simultaneously. Her pussy clenched and spasmed uncontrollably at the image of her body filled to the brim.
Diana stretched, arching upward, releasing pent-up energy. She had no doubt her own primal nature would get her into trouble if left unbridled. So she willingly sat with the steel collar locked around her neck.
When she shifted, she’d be almost six feet long and weigh in at more than a couple hundred pounds. Nothing dainty or fragile about her leopard body, and she wouldn’t have to worry about splinters with a set of curved claws replacing her French manicure.
Chapter 2
Shawn dropped into his chair, prepared to give his attention to the roster for the evening. Being a part owner of the Downtown Den meant he kept an eye on the solo shifters booking rooms and services. Things could get hairy in a second, in more ways than one. Hence the club’s private menu of shifter services.
Not everyone had titanium control on his or her shifting urges. And the reason he continued to lose business to Howl, a BDSM club a few blocks away. Even his staff ventured over there to sample the menu of kink. Not him. He’d been doing this for so long, he’d adopted a Zen ability to fuck instead of mate when the urge arose.
That was one of the few points on which he and his partner agreed. They’d gone to school together and were hardcore bachelors on different paths.
For any alpha male, fucking and mating were two distinct activities, one being a primal act and the other being a near-spiritual ceremony. He doubted he’d ever find the right female shifter whom he’d be bound to care for and protect for a lifetime. Shawn wasn’t about to abandon bachelorhood anytime soon.
As he reviewed the bottom of the Excel spreadsheet, he did a double-take, staring at the neatly-typed name. “No fucking way.” Shawn ground his teeth. He double-clicked the mouse, opening the client directory. “Quinn, who booked room eleven?”
His partner glanced up from his cellphone with an arched brow. “I’ll ring you back, doll. In five.” Quinn tossed the phone on top of his desk.
Shawn studied the document displayed on the computer screen, searching for the intake counselor’s name.
“I’ve not heard that tone in your voice since … Hmmm, when was it last? That’s right — never. Who the hell is in eleven?”
“A straightforward question. Was it Bethany? Where’s the file?” Shawn tunneled his fingers through his dark hair.
Quinn stood and came around the desk. He bent close to the computer, his red wolf eyes tracking across the screen. “Diana Hambre. I don’t get it. She’s not infamous. An ordinary woman’s got your edge up. How’d that happen?”
“She’s not just any woman. Miss Hambre works for me at my day job.”
“Yes, I know she’s part of your wiz design team. I’m still lost. Dude, what’s the big deal?”
“She’s my employee. I, for one, don’t share what I do in my off time with those I file W-2s for while paying their health premiums. That’s asking for complications. Didn’t anyone remember to check her references and flag her for being a possible conflict of interest?”
“I guess not. What do you want to do?”
“For starters, I’ll see if we have grounds to rescind the executed service contract.” After opening Diana’s digital file, Shawn clicked on the service agreement. He scrolled down to her place of employment. “Bingo. Diana entered freelance graphic artist for employment.”
He skipped to the end of the contract. “And she signed the contract agreeing to terms. Clearly, she didn’t read the fine print.”
“Don’t be a son of a bitch. I don’t even read the fine print, and I’m a fucking attorney. That’s bullshit, Shawn. Whoa.” Quinn pointed at the computer screen below where Diana’s photograph was displayed. “She’s a widow. Says she’s been going solo since her mate died last year. Are you going to do that to a woman in need?”
He glared at Quinn. “Now who’s full of it? You’re only taking up her cause because you’re interested. Don’t you get enough pussy already? Fuck you. Diana isn’t up for grabs. And besides, what she needs isn’t a scrappy wolf with too much testosterone.” Shawn’s chest expanded with the sensation of being filled with cement.
Why the hell did it bother him that Quinn wanted to service Diana? He drummed his fingers on the edge of his keyboard. Christ, he’d avoided thinking of her in terms being of a woman or a shifter. She was a graphic designer. Who was he joking?
For a year, he’d not let his imagination get the better of himself. He continually fought against thinking of her in terms of being a luscious shapeshifter needing a stud. Without warning, he envisioned her seductive pink mouth, invitingly open. He gritted his teeth, scrubbing his hand over his jaw.
Christ. No reason to continue this fantasy unless he wanted to sport a full-blown hard-on. Bad enough that Diana’s body had given him one for the first month that she’d worked for him. Espiritu Santo. He gazed up at the ceiling. Room eleven was on the next floor above his office.
Diana — his little enigma. He’d never doubted her talent in graphic design. After all, it was her creativity and design sense that made him respect her more and more, thwarting his desire to bend her over his desk and fuck her at Matrix. He’d put aside what his dick had wanted because her talent wasn’t worth crossing boundaries. Not when Diana had the goods for being an up-and-coming graphic artist.
Last month she had been nominated for the prestigious American Design Package Award. His complete confidence in her was reflected in his reserving a table for his staff to attend the ceremony in Las Vegas. Diana and he had a standing breakfast meeting this Monday in which he planned on presenting her with a promotion, moving up from an associate into a partnership slot.
She’d pack up her desk if she found out he owned the Den — a stud club. She and her prim sensibilities. A year she’d gone without sex. How the hell was that even possible?
Quinn backed away from his desk. “I’m not interested. I can tell this woman is off-limits by the careening macho reaction you’ve got going on.” His partner chuckled in an irritating manner.
“Don’t be so damn dense. Do you screw your office staff?”
“Eleanor, my assistant, worked with my grandfather, just to remind you. I think of her like an aunt. Don’t go there. The day she retires, I’m toast. I understand the problem. I just believe you’ve got a screwed-up perspective on this one. Shit, Shawn, ever since you agreed to head the Southwest council, you’ve taken a holier-than-thou attitude. You’ve been asked to mete out justice, not act the part of a saint.”
“Aren’t you the one who constantly harps on my position in this community? That I’m supposed to be a role model for other shifters? Or was that all talk?”
Quinn cocked his head. “I see
both sides in the justice system for shifters and what we’re trying to do with the Den. So what if you have an employee who wants a night of release? Isn’t that the point of this place? Isn’t that the point of you heading the council? Giving shifters options.”
“Sometimes I think it would have made more sense for you, as an attorney, to head the justice council,” Shawn muttered.
“Naw, you’re the one with family ties. This is more than knowing the law, it’s having clan standing. I could never fill your father’s shoes.”
“The hell if I know how my old man did it all. Managing shifters is far from easy.”
“It never is.” Quinn rapped his knuckles against the desk before he stepped away. “So what’s your game plan?”
Shawn frowned, picking up a paperclip and pulling it apart. Most tended to want fast action and quick results. Mercurial was part of the shifter charm. Shawn’s life was embroiled in solving shifter passions. He’d proven that forging a southwest control center over the once-independent packs meant violent crimes — or at least shifter-on-shifter crimes — had lowered remarkably. Forget the court system or police; shifters lived a different life and were largely ignored by humans.
Shifters melded and fit into society by being invisible. When disputes occurred, they were settled in shifter form. Wolves and panthers, coyotes, and leopards didn’t require attorneys or bail bondsmen. And the justice doled out was harsh, bloody, and wrenching. Whole families and clans were once targeted. That, too, had changed, now that he’d created the means to allow shifters an opportunity to articulate and seek justice on issues only shifters could appreciate and understand; well beyond the human justice system and what was permitted.
“Obviously, times are changing. And just because they are, I don’t agree that Diana should be here … seeking this type of release from a club banger. Christ, this isn’t the type of conversation I’d want to hear over the water cooler on Monday.”