by Helen Scott
“So, what now?” Elijah asked through gritted teeth.
“Well—” Valentina’s response was cut off when the door to the office banged open.
They both spun, only to find the Reaper running at them full tilt from the doorway. Elijah pushed off, and Valentina wanted to scream at him to stop, to get out of the way and let her handle it, but the man’s claws were already out, and when he slammed into the wall of muscle that was the Reaper, they both went down.
She rushed around the desk, her jaguar pushing at her skin, demanding to be part of the fight. A voice in the back of her mind warned her not to risk it. If the Reaper knew what kinds of animals he was dealing with, he might have a little something extra to hurt a cat or a bear or whatever. Rule number one drilled into her by her mother was to always keep her animal safe. If she did, her cat would do the same. There was nothing more dangerous than a smart Reaper who knew exactly what he or she was hunting.
Elijah’s howl of pain drew her gaze to where a patch of red was seeping through his T-shirt. Before she could stop him or say anything, his panther suddenly took over, the sleek black fur masking the wound the Reaper had given him.
“Cat, huh?” the Reaper said as he got to his feet. “You, too?” he asked, looking at Valentina.
Her brain was blank, more focused on Elijah than on the question the Reaper had asked. He hadn’t gone on the offensive when the panther emerged, which surprised her. She looked at his stance and positioning and realized that he was protecting her. The glint of silver in the Reaper’s hand drew her attention away and stoked the flames of her anger. Where the hell had he gotten a weapon? Had the guard missed it? Or had the Reaper killed the guard and taken the weapon from his lifeless body? Her brain was flooded with questions while her body urged her to shift.
The Reaper began tossing the blade from hand to hand as he looked for a way to either attack or get around the panther. Valentina knew that either they needed to move around him so that at least one of them could get out, or they needed to attack. They were leaving when he was either unconscious or dead, not before. With a flick of his wrist, the blade flew through the air and lodged itself in Valentina’s shoulder before she could react.
She roared in pain as the silver and wolfsbane burned her both inside and out. The jaguar within couldn’t wait anymore and forced itself out, expelling the knife during the shift. She heard the metal clang onto the floor as it hit milliseconds before her paws did. The carpet was itchy on the pads of her paws, and the whole room smelled wrong, full of cleaner and sweat, fear and anger. A vicious roar ripped out of her throat, and she could almost hear the windows at the front of the building rattling from the force of the noise. It was a scream in her own ears, and she saw Elijah hunker down closer to the floor while the Reaper visibly flinched and seemed to be questioning his decisions.
As she leaped into the air, the man’s eyes widened. She sailed over Elijah and landed directly in front of the Reaper, her lips peeling back from her fangs as she showed him exactly what a true blood alpha looked like. She was bigger than a regular jaguar, and in her humble opinion, her coat was more beautiful. Plus, her fangs were longer and she was able to stay in control through the whole shift if she wanted to. In that moment, she wanted to let her human mind fade away, to become solely cat, an alpha who had a packmate and her territory threatened. She knew it wouldn’t go well if she did, though. Cleaning up a dead body was different from glossing over the events and telling a few servers that the police were handling it.
She moved closer and closer to him. The saliva dripping off her fangs was no doubt terrifying, but he seemed to be gaining his composure, and she couldn’t have that. Valentina lunged forward, raising up onto her hind legs, and though she had wanted to stay in control, it seemed her cat had other ideas. Her claws scraped down the man’s torso, leaving ribbons of blood in their wake.
Elijah snarled behind her, and she backed down from flat out killing the man, which she could have done quite easily since her attack had apparently shocked him. It made her wonder how long he had been a Reaper.
When she saw his hand go behind his back, she lunged again. This time, her claws weren’t out to do damage, not that they still wouldn’t hurt him, but she wouldn’t dig them in. All she wanted to do was get him on the floor again. Once he was there, she knew they could take him, knock him out somehow and be on their way. She hadn’t counted on the blade suddenly protruding from the toe of his boot. He kicked up and caught the side of her hip, slicing through her fur and the skin underneath so her blood scented the air.
Elijah was next to her then, pushing her back with his shoulder before he jumped and landed on all four feet on the man’s torso, bringing him to the ground once more. Valentina bit his leg, feeling the bone crush between her teeth and the hot coppery blood coat her tongue. His blood burned her mouth, making her cough and choke. The pale green eyes of Elijah’s panther found her own, and she could see the question in them.
If they were mated, he would be able to sense that she wasn’t in mortal danger, and that he should avoid spilling the Reaper’s blood with his teeth. If they were mated? What kind of thought was that to be having when they were in the middle of defending themselves from an attacker?
While they had been distracted, the man had pulled another knife from somewhere. It was like he was full of tiny compartments, and each one contained a weapon. Before she could alert Elijah, who was still watching her, the man sliced the knife across his side. A roar of agony filled the air, and her jaguar roared in response, locking her out as it dove for the man’s neck. Her jaw closed around the soft, pliable skin of his throat and squeezed. She felt him stab her with the knife, but her jaguar was almost completely out of her control. It was only because she was fighting tooth and nail to stop her from crushing the man’s windpipe that he wasn’t dead already.
A wide black head appeared in her line of vision on the other side of her almost-kill. Her cat’s first instinct was to protect its kill, like it would in the wild, but this wasn’t the wild. This was a meeting room, and she was a human. She slowly forced her cat to back down and release the man’s throat, thinking that was what Elijah wanted her to do.
As soon as her head was far enough away, his paw flashed in front of her vision and blood sprayed over them both as he slashed the Reaper’s throat. A gurgle sounded from his throat, making her stomach turn. Everything about today had gone sideways, and now, seeing the amount of blood covering the carpet, she would need to call the cleaners again for their services, not just to let them know that one of their own was dead or missing.
They both sat there for a moment, staring at each other, and then Valentina turned and walked to the top of the stairs, scenting the air coming up from the basement area. The coppery sweet smell of blood quickly wound its way into her nose, followed by the sour stench of death, and she knew that the guard wasn’t missing at all. It had been a silly hope, but one she had clung to while they were fighting the Reaper.
She turned back to see Elijah still standing over the body. This was probably the first time he’d experienced death in such a way, and the first time he’d been the cause. It wasn’t the first time for her; hell, it wasn’t even the twentieth. He was strong, and she knew he would adapt, but part of her cried over the innocence he had just lost. She padded back over to him, carefully moving around the body, and nudged at him with her nose until he began to move.
When they got to the front doors, she pushed herself up so she could scrape the lock with her claws until it turned. As soon as it did, the doors gave way and a blast of fresh air hit them both, cleaning the blood and death from their nostrils.
She growled quietly at Elijah as he turned toward the car, and motioned with her head that she wanted to go a different way. Reluctantly, he followed. After what he had just experienced, she needed to show him the joy of being a shifter, of feeling one with the animal that lived within each of them as they ran, so she took off, looking over her shoulder at
first to make sure he was following.
Elijah didn’t miss a beat. He was on the path she laid down, right behind her. Their paws pounded over the cement and tarmac until they reached lush green grass, and the two of them dove headfirst into the trees.
Chapter 12
Elijah had never experienced anything like it. Nothing could even come close to running as a panther through the woods with Valentina. He’d just committed a heinous act, albeit in self-defense, but still, he had murdered someone, and now he was happy, joyful even, as their pace ate up the ground under them. Trees and bushes all blurred past as streaks of green and brown as they practically flew over the ground.
A familiar scent caught his attention, and before he knew what he was doing, he veered off. Valentina must have heard him move off to the side, because a moment later, she was nipping at his heels. Her head pushed into his shoulder as they moved more slowly through the grove of trees he had led them into, and then she moved in front of him and climbed into a tree.
The night air ruffled his fur as he watched, and brought with it the scent of smaller woodland animals, and he knew without thinking what they were. A raccoon here, opossum there, a squirrel, a rabbit, a deer, they were all either turning in for the night or just starting to wake up. His cat knew that it could hunt them down, kill them, and eat them, and that there would be something completely satisfying about completing the task, but his human mind was focused on other things, such as the jaguar making herself comfy up in the tree in front of him.
He passed her and batted at the long tail that hung from the branch as he made his way to a sturdy-looking tree. On instinct, he knew how to climb, where to put his claws, when to push up, and which branch would be the most comfortable to relax on. Moments later, he mimicked Valentina’s position on her tree and found it oddly comfortable. He rested his chin on one side of the thick branch while his legs hung off either side as the branch ran the length of his torso.
A low sound resonated from the jaguar in the tree behind him. It was almost a purr, but almost a growl, too, as if she was content but didn’t want to be. The day’s events flashed through his mind, and all he could feel was frustration and disgust with himself. The urge to protect Valentina had been so strong, he was willing to let himself get killed. What kind of ridiculous idea was that? He barely even knew the woman and was considering risking his life for her?
He jumped down from the branch, his claws digging into the dirt as he landed. As he paced away from the tree that he had been in, he noticed the scent from earlier had grown even stronger. There was something so familiar about it, something that drew him to it like a magnet, but he couldn’t place it, at least not yet.
When Valentina headbutted him, he startled. He’d been so focused on the scent that he hadn’t heard her get down from the tree. She nipped at his shoulder and rear leg as he went to move away from her. It was when he felt a paw on his hips that he stopped and turned around. A big jaguar paw caught him across the shoulder, and he rolled to the ground. He was unsure what was going on, but his cat seemed to know, so he went along for the ride. When he was down, she pounced on top of him, gently swiping at him with her paws and nipping at him with her teeth. It took him a second, but then he realized what was going on.
She was playing with him.
He began to mimic the gestures, softly biting and batting at her, rolling so she was on the ground and then he was back under her. It wasn’t a test of strength or who was willing to back down first, nothing like that. It was just simple, joyful fun.
Valentina took off running a moment later, looking over her shoulder to make sure he was following, just like she had done before. He dutifully followed along up a hill. Once they crested the top, he could see what he thought was Woodhaven. When he saw the alpha’s slow, cocky walk, he knew his guess had been correct.
After walking around the lake that separated them from the estate’s house, and stopping to play a few more times, they were finally standing on the steps. Valentina shifted and looked at him expectantly. His mind was too fuzzed by the brazen nakedness of her, though. She stood by the door, bathed in both the warm glow from the house and the pale glint of the moonlight, and looked like some kind of angel. An angel covered in mud and splatters of blood, but an angel nonetheless.
He couldn’t shift back. Not with her naked like that. If he did, it would be a one-way ticket to boner town, population: him. So, he stubbornly stared back at her. After a while, she shrugged and opened the door. They both wandered through the mansion, her completely at ease with her nakedness, while he was trying to look at anything but her. It was an impossible task, though. His cat’s eyes were drawn to her human form just as much as they had been to her jaguar. She was sleek and powerful, with enough sass to fill a football stadium, and he was oddly attracted to her.
They paused by a phone in the kitchen.
“There is a cleaner down at the Kildeer location, along with another body. I also need the SUV there cleaned and replaced,” she said after a voice answered the phone.
He could hear the other person talking, but couldn’t understand the words they were saying. It was like whoever it was spoke a different language. He quickly lost interest and began to pace around the house. Everything changed in animal form. There were so many new smells—some even gave him an image as to whom the scent might be attached to—and then there were the textures. The feel of tile and plush, soft carpet under his paws was much different from the grass and dirt outside, or the tarmac of the parking lot, or even the scratchy gross carpet of the meeting room. Plus, the perspective shift made everything look larger or out of place from when he had seen it as a man. The scent from outside was in the mansion as well, but it was slightly different, and as he followed it, it only seemed to get stronger.
Once everything was taken care of, Valentina came and found him, and that was when he realized that the scent belonged to her. Without thinking, he rubbed his head against her thigh, practically along her hip, and her scent changed in that area. She smelled of him now, or at least of his panther, and that stirred something within him that he wasn’t comfortable thinking about, something primal and alpha.
“Come on, Elijah. Let’s go get you cleaned up,” she said with a chuckle.
He followed her, and suddenly there was nothing but her scent everywhere. When he looked around and saw the big sleigh-style bed, he realized they must be in her bedroom. At the top of the headboard was some beautiful scroll work done in metal, while everything underneath, though framed by the wood of the sleigh, was a tufted, pillowy texture. It was one of the most luxurious beds he’d ever seen, and yet all he could think about was how much better it would look with a naked and satiated Valentina in it.
When he heard a sound, he turned and saw her going into the bathroom and flicking on a light. She tugged on a thin, silky robe that was short enough to make the human side of him hum in appreciation, but long enough to cover what it needed to, loosely tying a knot in the thin belt that wrapped around her.
“Are you going to shift back or am I stuck with a panther all night?” she asked as she picked up a remote and pointed it at the fireplace. Flames licked up the sides of the logs that were there waiting to be used. He could hear the crackle and smell the burning-wood scent, so he knew they were real, none of this fake stuff, but it must have had a gas starter for her to be able to use a remote like that.
He huffed and reluctantly shifted back to human. It wasn’t that he was opposed to being human and wanted to stay a panther for the rest of his life. He just had been enjoying the freedom and how different the world was with an animal’s senses, not to mention he could look at a naked Valentina without all his blood rushing to his cock, as it was doing now. As he cupped himself with both hands, he tried to hide the fact that he was getting an erection, but if something didn’t change, he wouldn’t be able to hide it for much longer.
“Want to talk about what happened?” she asked as she perched on the edge of her bed.
“Not really,” he said, glancing over at her without thinking. Her robe was parted almost to the point that it no longer hid anything. He gulped, trying to think about anything other than the fact that she was mostly naked and on a bed. Baseball. Spreadsheets from work. What the plot of the latest superhero movie was. Why people still had belly buttons as adults. None of it helped. He was still acutely aware of her and exactly how far away from him she was, exactly how many steps it would take to get to her, and exactly where he wanted to kiss and touch. Everything about her called to him like a siren to a sailor.
“You should probably take a shower,” she said, her voice lower than it had been a moment ago.
The scent of her arousal hit him like a ton of bricks. He hadn’t ever picked up on things like that before, but now with his cat ever so helpfully providing translations of what different scents meant, he knew exactly how turned on she was. “I don’t think I’m the only one.” He practically growled the words at her.
“No, but it’s probably best if we go one at a time.”
That was the exact opposite of what he wanted. “Oh?” He turned toward her and let his hands drop to his sides.
“Elijah . . .” Her eyes traveled down his body, fixing on his cock.
“There’s something between us. A craving. I want to explore it, to explore you.” There was a tone in his voice he didn’t understand, but he knew it was similar to Valentina’s alpha voice.
She got up and walked toward him. “Fine. We explore tonight and get this out of our systems. Deal?”
He didn’t want to make that deal. What if he wanted more than one night? Some cravings took a while to be satisfied. Without saying anything, he took a step closer to her, invading her personal space until she backed up.
“Do we have a deal?” she asked again, her hoarse voice skating along his skin straight to his cock.