by Zoe Chant
Protect your mate, his panther reminded him.
Shane clung to the cliff, his fingers and toes jammed into narrow cracks, and muttered aloud, “Just because it hurts doesn’t mean I’m giving up.”
He clambered upward, not looking down. Often he was forced to balance on only one foot, with one hand clinging to a smooth knob of stone.
A piece of granite broke off under his foot. He dropped down with a terrifying jolt, catching himself with three fingers on his right hand. For a precarious moment, he hung on, supporting his own body weight with those fingers alone. Sweating, he felt around for a new foothold. His searching toes found a crack. Shane crammed them into it, caught his breath, and then reached up for the next handhold.
Shane could hardly believe it when he finally hauled himself over the edge of the cliff. He became a panther so he could again leap over the bushes— no way was he shoving through those thorns naked— and began retracing his path back toward the cave.
But when he reached the cave, he found it empty. Catalina had gone, taking the tranquilizer guns and one set of her own clothes but leaving everything else. He nosed at his discarded jeans, and gave a huff of dismay when he found his Swiss Army knife and lighter still in the pocket. If she’d set out to rescue him, wouldn’t she have taken those?
Wouldn’t she have taken everything? She was a paramedic— she’d have been prepared to find him injured. She could have used the extra clothing for bandages, the lighter to make a fire to keep him warm, and the knife for anything to make a splint to perform emergency field surgery. His mate wouldn’t have just rushed out unprepared. She was brave, but not reckless.
He sniffed, picking up her freshest scent trail, and followed it out of the cave. At the edge of the woods, it was joined by that of another human. Fury made his hackles raise as he realized that she’d been captured. He didn’t recognize the other person’s scent, but that wasn’t a surprise; it must be someone who’d started working for Apex since Shane had escaped a year ago or whom he’d never scented as a panther. Some shifters could scent people while they were in human form, but Shane couldn’t.
He let out a hiss of anger and concern when he caught sight of three emptied tranquilizer darts on the ground. Had someone actually shot her three times? Or had she managed to hit her attacker?
But both the scent trails led back into the woods; Catalina and her kidnapper were both on their feet. Shane puzzled over the darts, then gave up on that small mystery. The important thing was to catch up with them before they made it back to the base.
Shane followed the trail through the woods, moving as fast as he could. But in his heart, he was certain that he was too late. The sun shone bright through the leaves; he was hours behind them.
As he loped through the woods, he considered the best strategy. Infiltrate the base? Wait till someone left the base, ambush them and get their phone, call Protection, Inc., and then infiltrate the base? Shane liked that idea. He needed reinforcements, for sure, but he didn’t have to wait to rescue his mate till they arrived.
He sensed approval from his panther, both of the ambush and the infiltration.
Hiding in shadows, hissed the big cat, with the implication that it was always a good choice.
Then a jolt of cold terror made his heart lurch and his fur stand on end.
Protect Catalina, his panther hissed urgently.
Shane put on a burst of speed, even though he didn’t know what had gotten into him and his panther. He’d always known Catalina was in danger; there was no reason to think it was imminent right now.
Mates know, his panther told him. She’s in danger now. Don’t infiltrate. Don’t ambush. Just run!
Shane ran through the forest. He’d never heard before that mates knew if the other was in trouble, but he believed it. He could feel its truth in his bones.
The gray concrete of the base came into sight, so much less threatening from the outside than it was on the inside. Shane forced himself to halt, making a quick survey from the shadows of the trees. Given time, he could sneak in, ambush some guards, obtain clothes and weapons...
... but time was the one thing he didn’t have.
Shane became a man and walked out of the woods with his hands raised. He made himself go slowly, giving the guards monitoring the video feeds plenty of time to see him and alert their superiors. The last thing he needed was to be tranquilized.
Once he was within earshot, he called, “I surrender! Tell Dr. Elihu I’ll do whatever he wants, so long as he doesn’t hurt Catalina.”
By the time he reached the door, his message had been received and answered. The door slid open, revealing ten armed guards.
One, looking embarrassed, tossed him a jacket. “Tie this around your waist.”
If Shane hadn’t been so worried, he’d have been amused. He tied it on, concealing his nudity, and said, “I want to see Catalina.”
The guards didn’t reply. Instead, they began hurrying him along the corridors. Shane went with them, his nightmare replaying in his mind. Justin, gasping for breath in his arms. Catalina, dying...
The door slid open. Shane forced himself not to lunge inside and give some trigger-happy guard an excuse to knock him out. Instead, he took a single step forward.
The scene that met his eyes so exactly resembled his nightmare that Shane froze in the doorway. Catalina lay ashen and gasping on a hospital bed, surrounded by doctors, nurses, and machines. She was hooked up to so many tubes and wires that she seemed caught in some horrific spider’s web.
He’d come too late.
Shane bolted forward, forgetting the guards. His heart was pounding so loudly in his ears that he couldn’t hear the hum of the machines or the urgent voices of the doctors, but only saw lights flashing and lips moving.
Catalina’s eyes were open. Frightened. His mate was one of the bravest people he’d ever met, and she was lying there afraid and dying.
Shane sank down on his knees beside the bed and took her hand. It was limp and cold. Lifeless. The wires that attached to it were warmer than her skin.
“Hold on,” he urged her. “You’re strong. You can get through this. Fight!”
But he could see in her pallor and hear in her breathing that no amount of courage and determination would save her. Justin had been brave and Elizabeth had been determined and all of them had fought like hell, and it hadn’t saved any of them.
He couldn’t save her, but he wouldn’t leave her.
Shane laid his head beside hers and whispered, “I love you. I’ll stay with you to the end. You won’t die alone.”
She had no breath to reply, but some of the fear went out of her eyes. The extraordinary woman he loved was dying, and all he could do for her was give her that small comfort. He squeezed her hand and stroked her hair, his heart cold as a lump of stone within his chest. Shane had known her for such a short time, but he couldn’t imagine what it would be like to live without her.
The part of him that was pure predator thought, Maybe I won’t have to. Once she dies, I’ll kill as many of them as I can before they take me down.
A hand descended on his shoulder. Shane knocked it away with a hiss.
Distantly, he heard a man yelp in pain. Then Dr. Elihu stepped into his field of vision, flapping his arms to get Shane’s attention. From the rasp of his voice, he’d been shouting at Shane for some time without Shane hearing him.
“Bite her!” Dr. Elihu demanded. “What are you waiting for? It’s the only thing that might save her life!”
Shane stared at the doctor, jarred out of despair. “I thought she’d been bitten already, before you did the process. Your other shifter—”
“Wouldn’t do it,” the doctor replied. “Bite her, or she dies.”
A wild hope sprang up in Shane. He turned back to Catalina. “Should I? It could kill you—”
She gave him a look that didn’t need words: Yes, you idiot.
The next instant, he was a panther. He was sitting on the floor
with his huge black paws resting on the bed, one of them pinning down Catalina’s wrist. Shane bent down and bit her hand.
When he became a man again, he could still taste the copper of her blood. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, then slid one arm beneath her shoulders, gazing into her glassy eyes. Waiting.
It happened fast if it was going to happen. Either way, it happened fast. One second Elizabeth had been standing with blood soaking into her boot, and the next she was a leopard, holding up one crimson-stained paw and lashing her spotted tail.
One second Mason had been wincing and applying pressure to a bite wound on his forearm, and the next he was dead on the floor.
“Shane...!” Catalina’s voice was hoarse but strong.
It’s working, he thought, his heart pounding. I hope...
A sudden weight pressed down on his arm and shoved at his chest. Thin cloth over smooth skin became soft fur over lithe muscle.
A magnificent leopard sprawled over the bed, its emerald eyes bright and alert. She nuzzled his hand, and he rubbed behind her ears. As Shane kept stroking her, a rumble filled the room. She was purring.
Fur smoothed into skin, and Catalina lay nude on the bed. She hastily grabbed the sheet and yanked it back up.
She had the strength to pull the sheet over herself. Her color was better. She was breathing easily.
Catalina wasn’t going to die. She’d already gone through the ultimate predator process, and she wasn’t dying.
His mate would live.
His mate would live.
“I was a leopard,” Catalina said, her eyes filled with wonder. Excitedly, she added, “And I’ll have super-powers now, right?”
Shane had to smile at how thrilled she sounded, when thirty seconds ago she’d been dying. That was his fearless mate. “The powers come later. It might take a couple days.”
Catalina reached up to stroke his hair. “I knew you’d come back for me.”
Shane held her in his arms, resting his head against hers. He closed his eyes, reveling in the ease of her breathing, the steady thump of her heart, the warmth of her skin. He’d thought she was lost to him, but here she was. He didn’t care that they were once again imprisoned or that he’d missed the chance to alert his team. Nothing mattered but that Catalina was alive.
An annoying voice penetrated his awareness, speaking louder and louder. Shane paid no attention to it, not even enough to listen to what it was saying. But it finally reached such a pitch that, without opening his eyes, he snapped, “What?”
Catalina cleared her throat. “I think Dr. Elihu is trying to tell you to put on some pants.”
Chapter Twelve
Catalina
To Catalina’s annoyance, Shane was escorted out once a medical technician fetched him some clothes. At least she got to watch him get dressed. She hadn’t been able to appreciate it properly when he’d rushed in mostly naked, given that she’d been dying at the time.
Catalina spent the day recovering and getting medical tests done in the lab, and then Dr. Elihu grudgingly agreed to release her back to her room. Before he let her leave, he told her all about the agonizing way she’d die if she ran away now. As the doctor described the precise symptoms, Catalina’s heart lurched at the realization of just how much Shane had understated when he’d told her his story.
Dr. Elihu, who had been closely watching her face, looked satisfied. He’d obviously mistaken her expression of horror at what Shane had suffered for one of terror at what might befall herself.
Oh, well, Catalina thought. It’s for the best. Now he thinks I won’t try to escape. Maybe he’ll let down his guard.
“How often do I need the treatment?” she asked.
“We’ll do it once a week to be safe,” Dr. Elihu replied. “But it varies from person to person. The range seems to be seven to twelve days. But you don’t want to find out the hard way what your maximum is.”
Catalina eyed him thoughtfully. It had been terrible and dangerous, but Shane had survived with no treatments at all.
Apparently her thought appeared on another neon sign, because the doctor said, “Garrity would have died the first time he ran away if we hadn’t found him in time. I believe that his body slowly adjusted to the process over time, enabling him to live without the treatments by the time he ran again. Even so, he almost died, didn’t he?”
Before she could stop herself, Catalina nodded.
“I thought so.” The doctor practically glowed with smugness. His nose was still swollen and red. Catalina wanted to punch him again. “So if you run away now, you certainly won’t survive. If you waited a year, you might have a chance. But I doubt it. I suspect that Garrity was a special case.”
Catalina tried very hard to keep “We’ll see about that” from lighting up over her head.
“And he knows it,” Dr. Elihu went on, staring hard at her. “Ask him how long he thinks you’d last away from Apex. If he cares about you at all, he won’t help you run away again.”
He snapped his fingers at the guards, and they escorted her back to her room. Catalina kept her gaze fixed on the floor so her face wouldn’t betray her. She had no intention of staying on the base one second longer than she had to— not when she could turn into a leopard!
She suppressed a grin at the memory of her body expanding, her senses sharpening, and the luxurious sense of stretching as she’d first extended her claws.
I’m a ferocious big cat, she thought. Wonder what my kitties will think?
The guards opened the door barely wide enough for her to squeeze in, shoved her through, and slammed it behind her.
Catalina stumbled. She started to fling out her arms to catch herself. But as her weight shifted forward, she suddenly knew that she had alternatives beyond regaining her balance or falling down. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Shane jumping up to grab for her shoulder. He was as fast as always. If she’d continued to fall, he’d have caught her with time to spare.
But she was already moving, even faster than him, sliding beneath his outstretched hand in a controlled dive. She twisted in mid-air and landed lightly in a crouch at the other end of the room.
It was a leap worthy of an Olympic gymnast. And it had been easy. Instinctive, even. She was already standing upright before Shane even had time to turn around.
Catalina flexed her hands, then rotated her shoulders, ankles, and hips. Her entire body felt different: stronger, lighter, more flexible, more aware of her position in space. Her senses were different as well, subtly sharper and more perceptive. Light was brighter. Colors were more distinct. Sounds were more clear.
Shane stood across the room from her, a boyish grin she’d never seen before brightening his face. She could feel the radiant heat coming off his body. As usual, he had his shirt off, but now she could perceive the difference in temperature between his exposed torso and his jeans-clad lower body. She could scent him, too, an intoxicating aroma of clean sweat and masculine musk and a faint trace of something green and herbal, like fresh-cut grass.
Her leopard spoke within her, in a strong yet distinctly feminine purr. My mate.
Catalina had loved and desired Shane before. But before she’d become a shifter herself, she’d had doubts. He loved her, that she knew. But she hadn’t been sure if it would work out between them. She’d seen lots of love affairs flare up between people working together in disaster zones, and she’d seen most of them burn out once they both returned to their normal lives. Catalina had hoped that what she and Shane had together was based on more than their circumstances and would last after they returned home, but she hadn’t had any way to know for sure.
Now she knew that he would never leave her. With all her heart and soul, with the pure instinct of the leopard that now lived inside her, Catalina knew that Shane wasn’t just her lover, but her mate. They were meant to be together. Theirs was a bond that would live as long as they did.
Desire broke over her like a tidal wave. She was instantly wet, h
ot and slippery between the thighs, her clit throbbing like a heartbeat. Catalina squirmed, and just the little friction from her thighs rubbing together was enough to make her gasp. Her pulse hummed in her ears, too fast to feel individual beats. She couldn’t catch her breath. Her whole body burned for Shane. She was dying of thirst, and he was a tall, cool glass of water. If she didn’t have him this instant, she’d die of longing.
She knew, she knew that Shane felt the same way— she could see it in the heat of his eyes, in the set of his jaw, in every line of his body— but he took a step away from her, not toward her. Catalina couldn’t believe it. As she watched, incredulous, he took another step backward. Then another, until he stood with his back to the wall, relaxed and casual as if he had nothing better to do than simply lean.
A growl of impatience rumbled through her chest and throat. “What are you doing? Are you playing with me?”
He nodded, a teasing smile hovering at his lips.
Like a cat plays with a mouse, she thought. No, like a cat plays with another cat.
His voice was low and rough, half-growl, half purr. “If you want me, come and get me.”
Catalina leaped. But Shane was ready for her this time. He stepped forward to meet her, and his deft hands snatched her out of the air. For a breathless moment, he swung her around as if she was light as a feather. Then they were tumbling down, rolling over and over on the floor, tearing at each other’s clothes. His hands were urgent, his scent dizzying, his breath coming in shuddering gasps. She could feel every place where his body touched hers, hot and vivid as a fever dream.
Catalina heard herself groan as she tore the shirt from his body. She was out of control, ripping his clothes to shreds and digging her nails into his back. No longer cool, Shane made a sound that was almost a snarl as he ripped her shirt off. It tore straight down the middle, along with her bra. He buried his face in her breasts, licking and nipping and kissing. His tongue left trails of fire on her skin.