by Lane, Soraya
She could tell he wasn’t enjoying this conversation any more than she was, but still. He had all the information. He had all the power. And she knew nothing.
“Come on,” he ordered.
This time she didn’t argue. If he thought there was something out there in the forest that she needed to be wary of, he was probably right. And her feet were killing her.
“Need me to carry you?”
She looked down at his own feet. Bare like hers.
Riley just scowled at him.
He gave her that annoyingly handsome grin back, and she wished, so hard, that she could slap it straight off his face.
They sat, staring at one another. She avoided the catch of his green eyes. Now that she knew what she could potentially do, it was intriguing, but just because she’d seen him change into a wild cat didn’t mean she could. And it was frustrating. He’d just shown her, again, and she still had no idea what to do. It was like he expected she would know. Was it meant to come naturally? Should she know what it felt like?
“What if it had just happened, like, at school?”
Hunter grinned. “Carnage.”
She knew that wasn’t his serious answer. She raised one eyebrow at him, probably the only thing she could do that he couldn’t, and waited. Being in the forest, sitting here with him, was kind of nice.
But she was still frustrated.
“Seriously? It couldn’t have happened. Not really. You’ve only been able to change since you turned seventeen. Someone would have had to rile you up pretty bad to force it, and the pain would have given you enough of a fright to stop the trigger.”
A look crossed his face, like he hadn’t meant to tell her that.
“So it will hurt?” she asked.
Hunter nodded. “Yeah, but it’s worth it, and it hurts less and less each time.”
Okay. Wow. At least he was being honest. “So on a scale of one to ten?”
“Eight,” he said. “A solid eight for the first time.”
They sat in silence. She had no idea what to say. An eight sounded pretty bad to her.
“Want to try again?” he suggested.
She shook her head. “No.”
Now he looked mischievous, like he’d figured something out.
“Come on, just one more time.” Hunter smiled. His perfect white teeth seemed to glisten in the sun. “I promise it won’t be as bad as you’re expecting it to be.”
From the intensity of his stare, she knew he wasn’t going to give up.
“Just once?”
He grinned. “If you promise to try hard. And once you’ve proven you can do it, Sophia will fill you in on all the blanks.”
She stood up. “Let’s get it over with then.”
“Once you’ve done it you’ll want to do it all the time,” he said with a grin.
“What?”
He just grinned again. “Puss, puss, puss.”
He sounded like he was calling a little kitty cat. Anger bubbled slowly, swiftly, through her body. In to her mind.
“Puss, puss, puss.” He repeated, eyes challenging her.
Hunter was baiting her. He was trying to rile her. And it was working.
“Come on pussy cat.”
This time she watched the way his lips moved, taunting her, as he repeated the word.
A deep growl formed within her throat and her body felt like it was going to explode with fury. She couldn’t stop it. She’d get him for this, she’d make him wish he’d never called her that.
But her feet were rooted to the spot. Stuck. It only made her frustration, her fury, build. Like her wildness was trying to claw its way out, desperate to be unleashed now she’d acknowledged it.
“Come on puss cat, don’t you want to scratch me?”
Riley saw him change, watched through blurred vision as he shed his clothes then turned into a leopard beneath her half-lidded eyes; eyes that were burning so hard, stinging, so she could barely see. Then everything went a dark red, like she was swimming in a pool of liquid velvet. And it burned. Like her entire body was on fire, like every inch of her skin was burning away from her bones.
“Come and get me kitty cat. Little itty bitty cat.”
The voice beating in her mind was fierce, low, challenging. A voice she’d never heard before. Riley didn’t know where it was coming from. How she could hear it. Where she was. Why she was even capable of thinking when she was burning alive.
“Whiskers. That’s a good name for a little puss cat.”
The roar tore the red from around her and revealed him, the black leopard, stretched out before her. Her eyes fixed on his belly, at the soft, downy fur exposed.
She wanted to attack him. To rip open his stomach and wipe the lazy look off his face.
It wasn’t until she pounced through the air that she realized the growl, the roar, was coming from her. The pain was gone.
And she was a cat.
How was that even possible! Riley landed on all four feet, her anger replaced by amazement.
Hunter showed her his teeth in a spine tingling, alpha smile.
“See.”
Riley heard him say the word, could feel the word, but he hadn’t moved his mouth to speak. She went to open hers, to form a word, but found she couldn’t.
He just nodded at her, then beckoned with his tail, flicking it over his back.
Riley followed. Her feet fell into a four beat rhythm, stretching out alongside Hunter.
It was unreal. She was actually, without a doubt, a black leopard. And it was so exhilarating, she forgot all about wanting to kill him or the fact that she’d kind of seen him naked, and let the joy of running fast across the forest fill her mind.
CHAPTER FIVE
“Are there, um, I don’t mean to sound stupid, but… are there any real leopards around here?”
Hunter stretched out in the sun. His body, even in human form, was similar to his physique as a cat. Long, sleek and lithe. Strong.
So strong that she gulped, hard, nearly every time her eyes traced across his frame. Like they were now, as she rested on the ground beside him and watched him.
Physically, she’d never felt so exhausted. Her muscles aching, but satisfied. But her mind? She’d never, ever been so confused.
“Not stupid,” he said. “There are real leopards.” His tone was dry, but he was grinning.
“Should I freak out about them eating my horses?”
Hunter shook his head and ran a hand through the shadow of his hair. So short it was barely anything at all.
“If they were going to take them down they would have by now.”
“And by take them down you mean kill them?” she asked.
He nodded.
The thought made her stomach curl.
“So why haven’t they?”
He propped himself up on one elbow. “I’ve been waiting for you to ask me that.”
She wasn’t sure what he was hinting at. “Why?”
“Because Sophia told me only to tell you if you directly asked the question.”
She hated that they had been having secret conversations about her. What else had they been discussing?
“Spill.”
“From the day you arrived I’ve been injecting them with a repellent.”
He looked smug.
“Hold up, let me get this right.” She was furious. With him and Sophia. “Behind my back, you’ve been injecting my horses with poison? No wonder they’ve been a mess.”
Now it was his turn to throw her a look. “Their behavior’s your fault.”
“My fault?” How did he even know they’d been acting up?
“You were too sad when your sister died to focus properly on riding, and since you’ve been here they’ve been spooked by the change in you. They can sense something’s different.”
“You really should become a shrink.”
He ignored her. “It’s not poison.”
Riley just shook her head and lay back in the sun. This w
as unreal. Totally, insanely unreal.
“It’s a natural tea-tree potion. Makes their blood smell strong and stops insects from biting them too.”
It was hard to stay angry at him. At least he’d been trying to help. “Do you ever want to, you know, kill an animal?”
He shrugged. “I have before, when I’ve had to, but not for pleasure, if that’s what you mean.”
“But our kind, I mean your kind, do sometimes?”
“We’re all different.” He reached out to touch her finger, the tip of his nail skimming her skin where it sat on the grass.
It made her jump. Made her hot. Made her not want to move her hand in case he stopped.
“Some of the leopard shifters stay changed almost all the time. They like to live and hunt like their wild self. Me? I’m happy with a burger or a steak.”
She turned to watch him. Was he joking? Hunter smiled before he retracted his hand.
“No vegetarian options, but I’m a good boy and eat my greens when I have to. I like my meat juicy, but from the butcher or burger bar is fine by me.”
It was hard not to laugh at him. At the grin on his face which now mirrored hers, and the weirdness of what they were talking about. At everything that was taking place here. Riley was somehow satiated, satisfied, after shifting. A laziness had taken over her body, making her want to lie around in the sun, talking and snoozing, for the rest of the day. She felt… connected to Hunter. Like something had changed between them. Like they’d become close. Like they’d known each other forever. Yet for no time at all.
Would she wake up and find it was all just a dream?
“Do you know how ridiculous this all sounds?”
“Yup.”
They lay, backs on the soft cushion of grass, eyes turned up to the blue sky. She could feel him so close beside her, but she didn’t want to move away. Didn’t want to get any closer, but didn’t want to move away either. Like she was starting to crave him being close.
“Did I actually do it before? I mean, I was actually a leopard, wasn’t I?”
He turned his head to face her. She did the same to him. Almost became lost in the green pools of his eyes as they locked on hers. Felt a connection, a bond, like almost visible electricity pulling between them.
“You’re ready for this, Riley. It’s your destiny.”
Part of her hoped he was wrong. That her gran was just old and confused, that she believed in a hoax that wasn’t true, but there was no denying what she’d seen him do. What she’d done herself.
Hunter was as much a leopard as he was a human. She’d seen it with her own eyes.
What she couldn’t understand was that she was actually the same… creature, that he was.
It scared her. Worried her. Terrified her.
“Want to try again?”
She didn’t trust her voice to reply.
Hunter reached out and cupped her chin with his hand. Made her look at him, into the clear, shining green of his irises.
“Okay?” he asked.
She nodded before forcing a whisper from her throat. “Okay,” she repeated.
He held her gaze, kept his hand on her, before smiling and letting it drop away.
“You’re as beautiful as she said, you know?”
“She told you about me?” Suddenly her voice had returned.
“Of course.” He looked confused. “We’re meant to be together, Riley. I know everything there is to know about you.”
Great. So he did know. How more embarrassing could life get?
And what was with the meant to be together? What guy said that? Did he actually buy into the whole soul mate spiel?
“Um, I hope I haven’t led you on or anything.”
He laughed. So hard she swore the ground shook, just a little. It was like a bear rumbling inside a cave.
“It’ll all make sense soon. Chill,” he said.
Chill. Easy for him to say. He hadn’t just learnt he was a creature, not a human. And he didn’t have someone telling him they knew everything there was to know about them and then some. Oh yeah, and that they were destined to be together.
Riley tried to ignore the crawl of sadness as it trawled her spine. Claudia would have loved this. Would have thrived on every detail.
But Claudia was gone. And here she was having fun, laughing, changing.
It wasn’t fair. None of this was fair.
Guilt choked her. Just now, with Hunter, she’d been so busy thinking about him and what they were doing that she’d almost forgotten about Claudia.
“Change?”
Hunter’s question pulled her from her thoughts. “Change,” she whispered.
He turned his back and she did the same, taking her mind from Claudia. She stepped nervously out of her clothing, hoping it was going to work and that he wouldn’t look.
Because she didn’t want to be stranded naked.
Up until today, Riley had thought the most exhilarating experience of her life was galloping full speed on her horse down the beach. She’d always loved the wind stripping her hair back off her face, the feel of the powerful animal beneath her.
Now she was that animal. And it felt better than good. It was incredible.
Her feet hit the sand in a one-two-three rhythm. It was exciting, almost natural, but she knew she hadn’t truly hit her stride yet. She glanced over at Hunter. He was loping beside her, like it took no effort at all for him to run that fast.
The only thing that told her it was him, that she knew the cat racing alongside her, was the flash of his green eyes. Hunter’s eyes were ingrained in her memory. And he knew it. Every time he turned to her, when they were in cat form, they both felt it.
He slowed. Riley did the same. She stopped when he did.
She could hear him again. In her mind, like it was the most natural thing in the world.
“Do you like it?”
“Yes.”
She showed him her teeth and flicked her tail. It was just so… natural. So real. Like she knew what to do, as if it was normal.
He came closer. Slowly. His eyes were focused on hers again. As if asking her a question, but she couldn’t hear him.
She could hear everything else though. The break of the sea as it hit the sand was like a waterfall crashing in her eardrums, the smell of salt and seaweed strong in her nostrils.
But the pull she felt toward Hunter overpowered all her other senses. Her awareness of him. Was it possible for him to be even more irresistible in leopard form?
He stood close. Too close to her.
She breathed in the smell of him, his scent. She could see from the way he was watching her that he felt it too. But then he hadn’t exactly hidden his interest in her since she’d arrived.
He entered her space and butted at her with his head. Just tipped the top of his head into the soft space beneath her ear, against her neck. Riley couldn’t stop the growl as it echoed in her throat. Or was it a purr? She didn’t know. She pressed against him, flicking her tail in his direction, holding her head higher as he touched her again.
Then he stopped, stared at her, and invited her.
She wasn’t sure what he meant. Then she heard him.
“Race with me.”
His words were clearer now, and she wanted to. She definitely wanted to. Exercise was exactly what she needed.
He looked off down the beach, at the endless length of sand, and stretched his legs. Clawed at the ground as if he was sharpening his claws as she watched him.
Riley took off, not bothering to limber up. Her legs were burning, thrilling at the speed. All she could think of was going faster, beating him, but he was closing in on her.
He raced past her, faster than a racehorse. Challenging her.
She wasn’t far behind, but beating him was looking less likely. Besides, he was trying to impress her. He wasn’t going to let her win.
And she didn’t want him to.
Riley stretched her legs even further. Then he stopped. Whirle
d on the spot and halted her with his gaze. Sand flew up around her as she tried to stop fast, not used to slowing down from such speed. She dug her paws in, locked them on the sand, and almost flipped over.
His nose was tipped to the air. She could smell something different, but she didn’t understand what.
Hunter’s eyes scanned the forest that ran along the beach, dense pine trees a prelude to the thickness within its depths. Riley watched too, but she couldn’t see anything.
“Follow me. Now.”
She could hear his command and the look he gave her made her follow. She knew when to laugh and ignore, when she could disobey, and now wasn’t one of those times.
It was an order.
He inclined his head then started a slow lope. She matched his stride. The playful mood was gone. Hunter was deadly serious. He increased their speed, often looking over his shoulder or raising his nose to the wind. She didn’t dare slow down.
They were back to where they’d started within minutes, where they’d changed. He nudged her into the trees, away from the clearing; he shifted back into human form effortlessly. Riley turned away, but her eyes didn’t miss the curve of Hunter’s backside as he took the few steps to reach for the clothes they’d left tucked into the hollow of the tree he’d claimed as his own. His claw marks on the trunk of it told other cats to stay clear.
Or else.
She appreciated that he was being modest. It wasn’t in his nature, he didn’t care about showing his body, and he’d made that clear. But it was still weird to her. She couldn’t imagine it ever seeming natural, any of it.
Hunter had pulled on his jeans, feet and torso still bare, when he quickly threw her her own clothes. “Hurry.”
He turned his back and she changed. It still wasn’t easy for her, took so much concentration it made her brain hurt, but she transformed. The bright red flash of pain and ringing sound in her ears was already becoming easier to deal with.
“Done,” she told him. Riley had her light summer dress back on, feet bare.
“Come close,” he commanded.
She didn’t argue. He put his arm around her, slung, but still firm.
Riley went to protest but his grip wasn’t letting up.