by Zoe Chant
Lydia stared at him. “You haven’t heard! Oh, it was awful - the boat blew up with Tex and Laura in it! They barely made it back with their lives!”
Travis blinked stupidly at her. “I didn’t hear about any of that,” he said. His gut clenched at the idea of his mate - Tex’s mate! He reminded himself - in danger. Also, “They sunk my boat? What about the whale watching tour?”
Lydia laughed, a musical sound. “You slept through quite a story…” she started.
Then the door opened again, this time with Bastian pushing another cart of laundry.
“One of the casters on this thing is off,” the dragon shifter said, wiggling the cart to demonstrate. “Aren’t you supposed to have the day off, Travis?”
“Aren’t you supposed to be on the beach?” Travis countered crossly.
The lifeguard shrugged. “No one is there. One of the girls needed a hand with the laundry.”
“I’ll fix that,” Travis said with a sigh. He kept a basket of extra casters in the back of the laundry room.
“Have you seen Tex this morning?” Bastian asked, with what Travis thought was exaggerated innocence.
Did staring at his mate from across the pool deck count? “Not really,” Travis decided to answer, fishing through the basket for the correct caster.
“Had to pull him back to shore on the last sorry piece of your boat,” Bastian said. “Guess his mate’s friend-of-the-family wasn’t such a great friend after all. The Civil Guard has already been here this morning to get him.”
Travis stared. If the Civil Guard was involved, there must have been quite a story. “Is that who was trying to kill Miss Smith?” He had to rein Lynx’s out of proportion desire for revenge.
“And her sister!” Lydia exclaimed.
“Though it turns out it was the French housemaid who poisoned her latte,” Bastian added, shoveling laundry into the washer until Lydia clucked at him to stop and unpacked the over-stuffed drum.
Feeling very left out, Travis popped the new caster onto the bottom of the cart. “It sounds a pretty far-fetched story.”
“Are you coming up to the staff room for dinner?” Lydia asked. “We can catch you up on it.”
Travis bit back the question of whether Tex and his mate would be there. It didn’t matter; she wasn’t his mate.
Is too, Lynx insisted like a child, complete with stomping his big feet and pouting.
“I’m not really caught up on my sleep,” Travis fibbed. “I’m just going to grab a quiet dinner out of the staff fridge and go to bed early.”
He didn’t really expect to sleep, given the grip Lynx had on his nerves, but remembering the contents of the fridge made him realize how hungry he was.
He followed Lydia and Bastian carefully out of the laundry, and was relieved to see that the bar was deserted. The sun was already setting, sinking down into the ocean horizon, and Travis was happy to slink away along the path to the staff house by the cliffs.
Breck’s cake sounded even sounded pretty good.
Lynx helpfully provided the picture of feeding it, bite by fluffy bite, to his mate. White frosting contrasted against her dark rose lips, and her tongue…
I’m going to give you a cold bath, you filthy tomcat, Travis threatened in return. That is Tex’s mate. Not ours.
But Lynx’s delicious image lingered, despite Travis’ best attempts to squelch it.
Chapter 6
Jenny stared at the computer screen. It was black, and for a long, confused moment, she had no idea how to go about turning it on.
Before she could confess to the unexpected gap in her knowledge, Scarlet grew impatient and reached over to press the space bar and bring the screen back from sleep.
“I very much appreciated your work with the World Mr. Shifter contract,” the red-haired owner said. “Beehag’s lawyer is making noises about trying to sell the property out from underneath us again, and I want a better understanding about our lease terms to fight him with.”
“Of course,” Jenny said faintly.
Scarlet opened the document in question with quick efficient motions on the touchpad while Jenny was still trying to remember what a touchpad was.
After a moment of stillness while Jenny fought down panic, Scarlet added, “I am, of course, happy to pay you your company rates for your time.”
Jenny looked blankly at her, then realized that she wasn’t going to be able to bluff her way through competence with this. “I’m sorry,” she said shrilly. “I… I… can’t read it.”
The words on the screen might as well have been in a foreign language, Jenny could make no sense of any of it. The letters simply refused to order themselves into any kind of recognizable pattern.
It was a terrifying, helpless feeling, and Jenny was deeply ashamed to admit it.
Scarlet frowned at her, and Jenny told herself it wasn’t probably wasn’t meant to be a judgmental frown.
“Curious,” the resort owner said blandly, giving a little shrug of dismissal. “We can try at another time when you feel up to it.”
Jenny got to her feet, trying not to wring her webbed fingers nervously. “I’m so sorry,” she said meekly.
Scarlet’s expression softened. “I’m sure it will pass,” she said kindly. “Your sister is at the bar if you’d like to go see her.”
Jenny nodded, and let her feet lead her out of Scarlet’s resort-top office and down the white gravel path to the bar. It had just stopped raining, and the sunlight was burning the raindrops off of all the jungle foliage; it smelled clean and delicious.
Laura had a swift hug for her in greeting when Jenny arrived at the bar.
“I’m about to go make up a few of the cottages with fresh laundry,” her twin said. “We may or may not be millionaires, but sitting on my ass doesn’t suit me, and who knows when we’ll actually see any of that.”
“Can I help you with it?” Jenny asked.
Laura looked skeptical, but covered it quickly with a smile. “Sure!” she said. “It will go faster with a second set of hands.”
Unfortunately, it didn’t. Jenny’s claws snagged on the sheets and she was hopelessly clumsy about everything Laura tried to have her help with. Finally, she kept herself to merely sweeping, careful to keep the bristles on the floor so she didn’t endanger any of the artwork or vases.
Laura took the time to catch her up. “I talked to Scarlet’s contact in a government agency that deals with shifter affairs. His name was Tony, and he was able to get things expedited with getting the charges brought against Fred for killing our parents and withholding our life insurance settlement. I even talked to him about bringing charges against one of the big players in the cartel, Blacksmith - they were already trying to build a case and planning a sting, I guess, and they think my testimony will be enough to make things stick. He said the best thing to do was lie low here until it comes to trial. You’d have a better idea of how that will work than I do.”
“I’m - I was - a civil lawyer, not a criminal lawyer,” Jenny told her, marveling at how competent and self-sufficient Laura had become as she swirled through making beds. “And how did you get mixed up in the mob, anyway?”
“Cartel,” Laura corrected. “You know me - I have terrible taste in men and worse judgement when it comes to work.” She tucked a sheet in and pulled it smooth. Clearly, she had done this before, many times; she moved through the housekeeping tasks confidently. “I didn’t ask questions I should have until it was too late. Blacksmith paid well in cash and didn’t make me fill out a W2.”
“As if those weren’t warning signs,” Jenny scoffed. She immediately felt terrible and judgmental. This was why they always argued as children.
But Laura only chuckled with self-deprecating humor. “It’s true,” she agreed. “I was an idiot.”
“What - what did you do for him?” Jenny wasn’t sure she wanted to know.
“Sometimes I carried messages, sometimes I did odd errands. I went to the bank twice a week with a fake ID
they gave me and made withdrawals for them. Sometimes they’d have me go to the store and make very exacting purchases. I delivered packages that probably had questionable things in them once or twice.”
Jenny sucked her breath in. “Could you get in trouble?”
“Tony doesn’t think so. A slap on the wrist at most. Maybe a fine, certainly no jail time. Testifying against Blacksmith could get me off the hook entirely.”
Jenny swept her pile out the big double doors onto the deck and off into the tiny lawn below. “You’ve got everything figured out,” she said, as they put the cleaning supplies back and shut the cottage behind them. There was no reason to lock empty buildings here.
Laura took her hand reassuringly, and though Jenny thought she startled at the feeling of the webbing between her fingers, she didn’t let go. “You will, too,” she said confidently. “I’ll help you.”
Jenny had to chuckle at how backwards everything seemed to be.
And if she didn’t laugh, she’d probably cry.
Chapter 7
“Aren’t you supposed to start looking better as you catch up on sleep?” Bastian asked frankly when Travis stumbled down mid-morning.
Travis muttered wordlessly, not wanting to explain that he’d gotten very little in the way of sleep because he couldn’t seem to keep from lusting over someone else’s mate.
“You do look awful,” Breck agreed with Bastian critically.
“Don’t you guys have jobs to do?” Travis asked crossly.
“Already done with the breakfast crowd,” Breck shrugged.
“I put out the swim-at-your-own-risk sign,” Bastian said. “It was raining, earlier. No one was in the water when I left, and I got bored. There’s a big storm headed for us, probably hit us in the next few days. I’ve even heard a bunch of guests have canceled.”
Travis went to the fridge with an unappreciative scowl for the waiter and the lifeguard.
“A hurricane?” Breck asked.
“I heard it could be,” Bastian said. “They aren’t supposed to get as far south as Costa Rica, but it’s still a category four and will still be pretty strong when it hits.”
“You guys seen Tex?” Travis had to ask, retreating from the cool sanctuary of the fridge with a egg pastry of some sort and a pile of crispy bacon.
“He’s staying with Laura over in cottage six,” Bastian explained.
“Mates,” Breck said with a shudder. “The horror.”
Our mate is close by, Lynx reminded him, as if he hadn’t spent the night trying to forget.
Travis made himself eat the suddenly tasteless food, sitting on one of the tall kitchen stools. The house the staff had taken over had a formal dining room, but it had already been converted into a weight and exercise room, sparsely filled with the leftover resort equipment and some rusty hand weights.
Bastian and Breck argued good-naturedly about the boat they wanted to buy to replace the boat that had somehow been sunk the day before - Travis still didn’t know the story that went with that, but suspected it was quite a tale.
“What do you think?” Breck asked him abruptly.
Travis shrugged. “I have no opinion one way or the other,” seemed like the safest answer, since he hadn’t been listening at all.
“That’s cheating,” Bastian scoffed.
“What are you, Switzerland?” Breck rolled his eyes. “You know you want an inboard this time to run the whale watching tours.”
But Travis couldn’t focus on the conversation, no matter how invested he was in the outcome. He washed his plate and tossed his napkin.
“What’s gotten into you?” Bastian asked, with genuine concern. “Are you okay?”
“I gotta talk to Tex,” Travis told him, agonized, and left him more puzzled than ever in his wake.
Tex was sitting on the bar with his guitar, playing something uncharacteristically happy. His mate -
Our mate! purred Lynx.
His mate! Travis corrected in despair.
- sat a few chairs away, a glass of ice water covered with condensing droplets in front of her.
She looked up at his approach, and Travis could see both confusion and longing in her dark eyes.
Travis made the mistake of letting his feet stop, and was still trying to screw together the courage to walk forward again when someone brushed by him.
“Sorry, Travis,” she said merrily, and Travis had to stare.
She was a perfect double, dressed in a red sundress compared to her mirror image’s blue. She sat between Tex and the other version, and Travis couldn’t believe that he had ever confused them. Tex’s mate was gorgeous, but his mate -
Our mate! sang Lynx.
- was utterly perfect.
Relief made his knees feel like water. Travis wasn’t crazy, it was the world that was crazy. There were two of them, twins, and he was sure he would never have a problem distinguishing them again.
“You alright, man?” Tex asked in concern, stilling his fingers on the strings of the guitar.
Travis could move again, and he strode forward with new confidence. “Never better,” he declared. “Though you ladies had me doubting my sanity until now.”
Tex’s Miss Smith exchanged an amused look with him. “You didn’t know there were two of us?” she asked teasingly.
“I thought I was going to have to skin my Lynx for insisting that Tex’s mate was our own,” Travis admitted frankly. “I couldn’t imagine a situation more impossible.”
“Your mate?! Oh, Jenny, how perfect!” Laura’s squeak was nothing but delighted, and Tex grinned congratulations at him.
Jenny only looked alarmed, not at all delighted, but Travis was still buoyed by the revelation that there were two of them.
He closed the distance between them and held out his hands. “My mate,” he repeated firmly, almost giddy with relief and joy. “May I kiss you?”
Chapter 8
Yes, her otter insisted. This is what we want. This is everything!
The rest of Jenny was in a white-hot panic.
If she let this man kiss her, she would be lost forever to her otter, anything of her human self washed away in the passionate wave of the lust that threatened to consume her. She’d never have any kind of self-control again.
“No!” Jenny said firmly, standing up and pushing her chair back. Instead of sliding, it toppled over backwards with a crash, and she was keenly aware of the stares of Tex, her sister, and most of all, of Travis.
He was perfect, she thought achingly. Gorgeous as a model, with golden skin in perfect planes, and shoulders that could carry the world.
He stood before her, hands outstretched, his look of delight and desire fading to confusion and puzzled rejection.
“Jenny,” Laura said hesitantly. “What’s wrong?”
“What’s wrong?” Jenny repeated shrilly. “What’s wrong is that I have webbed fingers and sharp teeth, and I can’t eat anything without wanting to dunk it in salt water first.” She heard her voice climb an octave. “What’s wrong is that I’ve spent nearly two weeks in someone else’s skin. What’s wrong is that I can’t even read any more, let alone make sense of words. I don’t remember how to turn on a computer.” She turned to Travis. “What’s wrong is that you want to kiss me, and I don’t even know you.”
We know him, her otter insisted.
“I don’t know you,” she snarled, and she wasn’t sure if she was replying to her otter, or to Travis, who was gazing at her as if she were hanging stars instead of having a ridiculous breakdown.
Rather than continue to stand there looking like an idiot as she ran out of words, Jenny turned away, and staggered out of the bar, knocking another chair over as she fled through the tables and out the back entrance.
Half-running, blinded by tears, she ran soundly into something soft but unyielding, just outside the bar entrance.
“Gracious, darling! We’re on island time, nothing can be worth a rush like that.”
The woman she’d barre
led into was as tall as Jenny, and perhaps three times as wide, rolls of flesh bared at the shoulders and again at the knees, and otherwise swathed in swirls of magenta silk. Loose auburn hair hung to her waist. Despite her soft look, she didn’t budge an inch at Jenny’s collision, and if she hadn’t put an iron hand at Jenny’s wrist, the fleeing woman would have bounced off and fallen backwards. Instead, Jenny was steadied on her feet, and her shoulders were brushed off like an errant child.
“Oh, sugar, you’ve been crying,” the woman said compassionately, and even if Jenny hadn’t been crying already, that kindness would have undone her.
As she bawled anew, the woman drew her to a bench in the shade. It creaked alarmingly as they settled on it, and the woman pulled a piece of fabric from an orange beach bag to let Jenny wipe her face.
“Oh,” sniffed Jenny as her claws snagged on the fabric. “This is silk… I shouldn’t…” She tried to offer it back, tear-stained as it was.
“It will launder,” the woman said dismissively, continuing to pat Jenny’s shoulder in comfort. “Or it won’t, no matter. What matters is that you look like you’ve lost your best friend, and here we are at a beautiful resort where you ought to be enjoying the good food and good views.” She put a hand at Jenny’s chin and tipped it up to look into her eyes.
Were they human eyes this time? Or were they her otter’s dark eyes with no whites?
Whatever the woman found there, Jenny forced herself to look steadily back. She had the most arresting blue eyes.
“I’m Magnolia,” the woman said, smiling and releasing her chin. “And that’s a little better now, isn’t it. Sometimes a good cry is just what you need to put things back into perspective.”
“I’m Jenny, and I’m sorry to bother you,” Jenny said, wiping away the last tears from her face. “I’m just... a little new to being a shifter.” It seemed like the simplest explanation.
“Ah,” Magnolia nodded. “That doesn’t happen often, but I imagine it’s quite an upset. Particularly if you think you have your life all figured out in a particular way.”