by Nalini Singh
CHAPTER 4
Bastien glanced at her at once, though she hadn’t made a sound. “You’re hurting.” His fingers brushed over her cheek before he turned his attention back to the road, his tension apparent in the roughness of his voice. “We’ll be home soon.”
Kirby’s throat thickened. He was so wonderful. How was she supposed to protect her already battered heart? “I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” she said, scared in a way that sent her pulse stammering.
This time when Bastien reached out, it was to gently squeeze her nape. “We’ll figure it out.”
He kept the warm strength of his hand on the sensitive, vulnerable skin until he had to remove it to maneuver the car into a parking spot half a block down from her apartment building. “Wait there.”
Scowling—just because she understood his protectiveness, even adored it, didn’t mean she was about to allow him to boss her around—she pushed the passenger-side door open right as he reached her. She looked up . . . to find herself the focus of leopard-green eyes that glowed in the darkness. “I can walk,” she said, even as her breath caught at the sheer, wild beauty of him.
He refused to budge from in front of her. “You’re barefoot.”
“Bastien”—she wished she could growl, too—“you are not carrying me again.” She was an independent adult female and it was critical Bastien see her that way, not as a weakling he had to cosset. “Move,” she said, and when he simply folded his arms, she gave in to the strange, overwhelming urge to bare her teeth at him, the sound that emerged from her throat perilously close to a snarl.
“Now you’re trying to get me into bed.” His grin transformed her near-feral annoyance into a sense of happiness so strong it didn’t seem possible it could exist . . . happiness because he was hers.
Eyes still night-glow, Bastien unfolded his arms. “I’ll give you a piggyback ride. Come on.” Turning to get into position, he shot her an “I dare you” look over his shoulder that made her want to nip at his mouth, draw in the scent at the crook of his neck.
He was playing with her, she thought all at once, delighted.
Unable to resist, she stood on the edge of the car door frame and wrapped her arms around his neck. He hoisted her up with effortless ease, muscled arms locked under her butt. Burying her nose surreptitiously in his neck, she cooperated when he turned and asked her to push the door shut with her foot, the car locking automatically.
Then he strode down the street while she grew drunk on the exhilarating soap and skin and maleness of his scent, and battled the urge to use her teeth, to bite down hard. So he’d be marked. So everyone would know he was hers. Then she’d tear off his clothing with her bare hands, kiss and touch and lick, embedding her scent into his skin, ensuring that even after one mark faded, the other would remain.
Skin flushing at the untamed possessiveness of her thoughts, she nonetheless held on tight, her bones melting at the feel of his strong, hard body moving against her own. When an older couple strolling by smiled at them, she smiled in return, feeling truly young for the first time in her life.
The world might be in a state of turmoil as a result of the recent Psy civil war, but Kirby’s much smaller world was filled with a joy she’d never known.
“How’s the service?” Bastien asked a few seconds later.
“Passable.”
“Careful.” It was a growled warning, a squeak escaping her throat as he pretended to drop her. “You don’t want to make the driver mad.”
Oh, I adore you.
Her need for him an ache deep within, Kirby surrendered and nuzzled his neck. While she was free with reassuring hugs when it came to the children she taught, it was hard for her to show affection in her personal life. No one had ever welcomed it from her. Bastien did. Angling his neck in a silent request for more, he made a sound that vibrated against her upper body.
An ear-to-ear smile broke out over her face. “You purr!”
“Maybe.”
Delighted with everything about him—including the protective bossiness that had made her snarl—she held on as he ran up the steps to the door of her building. She’d expected him to take the elevator once they were inside, but he jogged up the three levels to her place without breaking a sweat or losing his breath. It was a stunning display of strength, throwing the deceptiveness of his usual lazy prowl into stark focus.
Kirby couldn’t help but imagine how he’d move against her . . . in her, in a far more intimate setting, all power and strength and healthy golden skin rubbing over her own.
Butterflies in her stomach, her lower body molten.
“Hey, now.” A rumbling wave of sound against the taut tips of her nipples. “Don’t be thinking those things tonight. You’re going to rest.”
Cheeks burning, she pressed her palm to the scanner beside the apartment door. “How did you . . . ?”
“I’m changeling, little cat,” he reminded her. “I can scent you”—a deep inhale—“and you’re delicious.”
Certain she’d die of mortification, she wiggled off his body the instant they were inside. “That’s so unfair,” she said, not meeting his gaze.
Wrapping one arm around her waist, he hauled her flush against him, the thick heat of his arousal pushing aggressively against her belly through their clothing. “How’s that?” Pure wickedness in his smile. “Fair enough?”
Kirby went to respond, found her mouth claimed in a kiss sumptuous and lazy, Bastien’s tongue stroking slow and hot over her own. As if he had all the time in the world to kiss her, as if he was savoring the taste of her.
Making a complaining sound in the back of her throat when he broke contact, she rose on tiptoe, hands fisted in the dark red silk of his hair. He groaned, his mouth opening over her own and his palms skimming down her sides, their second kiss as opulent as the first, both their chests heaving by the time he raised his head again.
But this time, he pressed his index finger against her kiss-damp mouth when she sought to initiate another. “No tempting me.” A stern expression, but his body pounded for her, his skin hot. “I am not taking advantage of a sick woman.”
Kissing his throat since she couldn’t reach his mouth without his cooperation, she licked up the taste of him. “I’m fine.”
Another masculine groan, his hand clenching in her hair before he tugged her away, those night-glow eyes slamming passionately into her own. “When we go wild between the sheets,” he said roughly, “I want you healthy and strong enough that I can bite”—a little nip of her lower lip that made her quiver—“pet”—his free hand stroking down her side—“and take you all night, then come back for seconds.”
Narrowing her eyes, she gripped at his shirt, her heartbeat nowhere near steady after that sensual recitation. “You’re terrible.”
Smile feline in its satisfaction, and so, so bad for her self-control, he nudged her toward her bedroom. “Brush your teeth and get into your pajamas.”
Her lips quirked, the heat tangling with a raw wave of affection. “I’ll go as soon as I lock the door behind you, I promise.”
“No need.” Folding his arms, he leaned back against that door. “I’m sleeping on your couch.”
Kirby blinked. “Bastien—”
The hard glint back in his eyes, he shook his head. “Only way I’ll leave is if you call someone else to stay over. You shouldn’t be alone after what happened.”
She’d wanted him to stay, but not because he thought he had to babysit her. Thrusting a hand through her hair, messing up her ponytail, she said, “I’ve been alone before when I’ve been sick.” Every single time since she hit legal adulthood. Even before that, any “company” she’d had had been perfunctory at best. “I—”
“Have you ever before been in that much pain?” Bastien’s growl raised every tiny hair on her body. “You doubled over. I could feel you shivering in my arms from the shock.”
Not capable of lying to him, she admitted the truth. “No. Never anything that violent.�
� It had hurt, as if something was trying to claw its way out from inside her.
“So I stay.”
“I guess if you do something dastardly,” she muttered, wondering who he was to her, this occasionally infuriating leopard male she already trusted down to the bone, “Vera will hound you forever.”
Sliding his hands into his pockets, muscles no longer bunched up, he shuddered. “You have an evil streak.”
Her mouth cracked open in a huge yawn halfway through her laugh, and all at once, she was exhausted. As if she’d been running a race of which she had no knowledge.
When Bastien took her shoulders and turned her toward the bedroom, she went, crawling straight into bed without bothering to change. She was aware of Bastien turning off her bedside lamp, tugging the blankets over her . . . then nothing.
CONCERNED by Kirby’s rapid descent into deep sleep, Bastien watched over her for several minutes, leaving only after he was certain her breathing was smooth and her scent clean of any signs of sickness. Once in the postage-stamp-size living area—which his leopard tolerated only because it meant Kirby was always in close proximity—he directed a jaundiced glance at her tiny two-seater couch.
Hell, no.
It took less than a minute to strip and shift into his leopard form. Padding around the room, he settled into his new skin before curling up on the carpet. Hopefully Kirby wouldn’t freak if she woke in the night and saw him before he could shift back. The leopard huffed in response to the thought—Kirby might be a little shy now and then, but she had grit.
Her snarl earlier had been beautiful.
Yawning on that proud, pleased thought, he lay his head on his front paws and catnapped, rising regularly to pad into the bedroom to check up on the small woman who lay curled up under three thick blankets. It made the human inside the cat smile, think of how he’d enfold her in his arms at night once she was his, so she’d snuggle into him for warmth.
It was sometime in the morning that his ears picked up rustling noises from the bedroom. He entered to find Kirby twisting and turning, her skin shiny with perspiration and the blankets shoved to the bottom of the bed, the sheets themselves pulled off the mattress to tangle around her arms and legs.
Shifting in a joyous agony of pleasure and pain, his body dissolving into shattered light before re-forming into his human form, he crouched down beside the bed and checked her temperature.
Hot.
Too hot for a human.
About to attempt to wake her so he could determine if she simply had a fever, or if it might be something more serious, he barely escaped being hit by her hand as she flung it out in her sleep. Closing his own hand instinctively around her slender wrist, careful to moderate his strength so he didn’t hurt her, he frowned at the rapid pace of her pulse. It thudded against her skin in a violent drumbeat.
“Kir—” Her name froze on his lips as he truly saw what it was he held in his grasp.
A small, feminine hand, the skin flushed with heat . . . and the tips clawed. Neat little claws, adorable in contrast to his, but very definitely not human. His leopard prowled to the surface of his mind, sniffing at her. She still smelled luscious and intoxicating and human, except for that maddening, wild undertone that tugged at his senses until he could almost identify it . . . right before it slithered out of his grasp.
One thing he’d caught though—she was unquestionably a cat of some kind.
“Kirby,” he said softly, too softly for human ears, his tone near sub-vocal.
Thick lashes fluttered, then rose . . . as the claws sheathed themselves back into her skin, with no sign they’d ever been there. “Bastien?” A sleepy murmur, her skin starting to cool, her heartbeat steadying. “Hurts.”
Protective instincts already violently aroused, his words came out harsh, near to a true growl. “Where, baby?”
“Hurts so much.” Her eyes closed, her breath hitching. “Touch . . .”
She was asleep again, but not at rest, her crying quiet, heartbreaking. Unable to bear it, he got into bed with her and wrapped her in his arms, his need to alleviate her pain such that he forgot he was naked. Kirby didn’t startle awake. Turning immediately into his chest, she tucked up her arms between them, rubbed her cheek against his skin, her own streaked with silent tears.
Touch, she’d said, so that was what he did, petting and stroking her into a calmer state, the sigh she released a benediction. His mate, he realized on a wave of rage that had his own claws slicing out to brush her skin, was touch-starved. A lack of physical affection was painful for humans, but it was agonizing for pack-minded changelings.
“Never again,” he promised in a fierce whisper, and, claws retracted, slid one hand just under her T-shirt so it lay against her skin, curving his other over her nape.
It made her release a soft moan before she seemed to slip into a peaceful, deep sleep, the strange, inexplicable undertone in her scent once more dull and hidden. It took time for his anger to abate, but when it did, he had to face the cold, hard facts: Either Kirby was lying about being human rather than changeling or she didn’t know.
The latter should’ve been impossible. Dorian, one of the DarkRiver sentinels, had been latent until approximately a year and a half ago, but though he hadn’t been able to shift into his leopard form, the other man had always known of that leopard. He’d smelled like a cat, had the hearing of a cat, the instincts of one. Not only that, but his movements in human form had immediately marked him out as a feline changeling.
Kirby, on the other hand, smelled wholly—if oddly delicately—human the majority of the time, and while she was as sensual and as affectionate as any DarkRiver changeling underneath her shyness, there was nothing inherently feline about her physical presence. If she knew, she was the best actress he’d ever seen, but even the most gifted actress couldn’t mask her scent to that extent, not from a fellow changeling.
Notwithstanding any of that, one thing was clear: Bastien had to inform his alpha.
The idea of exposing Kirby made his leopard snarl, his arms locking around her trusting form, but Bastien knew he had no choice. If he didn’t tell Lucas and another member of DarkRiver detected Kirby’s secret, she’d face harsh punishment for breaching the iron-clad rule that stated no adult predatory changeling could cross over into another’s territory without permission, except in cases of imminent risk.
Bastien’s scent on her should keep her safe. Lucas wouldn’t mete out the penalty without first contacting him, but Kirby would be terrified in the meantime. And, given that they weren’t yet lovers, he couldn’t be certain his scent would hold on her skin.
No way in hell would he risk it. Lucas had to know.
Bastien would deal with any consequences.
“You’re mine, little cat,” he murmured, brushing his lips over her temple, “and I’m not letting go.” Not now. Not ever.
CHAPTER 5
Bastien got up before Kirby, and was fully dressed when she rose happy and energetic. It soothed man and leopard both to see her that way, and he made sure to sneak in a playful kiss, his body wrapped around hers, before he drove her the short distance to the kindergarten.
Never would his mate hunger for touch again.
Cheeks still flushed¸ she surprised him by leaning across from the passenger seat to claim his mouth in an affectionate good-bye once they reached her workplace. “Will I see you tonight?” She fiddled with the belt of the dark green dress coat she wore over a kindergarten-appropriate outfit of jeans and a white shirt with elbow-length sleeves.
He wanted to tell her he was her mate, would always be there for her, but her life was already complicated—Kirby needed him to be her rock right now, not use her vulnerability to shove her into the passionate intensity of the mating bond. “Unless you plan to seduce another helpless male,” he said with a teasing smile.
Making a face at him, she got out, then leaned down to smile through the open window. “I can’t wait to see you again.”
Her co
urage in saying what was in her heart further enslaved him. Forcing himself to leave once she entered the cheerful little building that would soon fill with children’s voices, he went to his apartment only long enough to shower and change. Ten minutes later, he was dressed in jeans paired with a dark gray T-shirt, and on the phone with his assistant, issuing instructions about what needed to be done in his absence.
Then—staying on the phone using the car’s wireless capabilities—he drove not to DarkRiver’s Chinatown HQ but to the green sprawl of the pack’s Yosemite territory. According to Lucas’s admin assistant, the DarkRiver alpha was working from home today. Bastien’s own assistant continued to touch base with him throughout the drive, but even as he fielded the queries, part of his mind was on the conversation he’d had with Kirby over breakfast.
“Do you have any changeling ancestry?”
Kirby’s laughter had been as sunny as the morning light pouring through the narrow window at one end of her kitchen. “No, plain old human as far as I know.” An open smile that kicked him right in the heart. “Do you mind?”
“I’d think you were perfect even if you were an ice-cold Psy.”
Bastien would stake his life on the fact that there’d been no deceit in her then, or at any time prior. As far as Kirby was concerned, she was human. Except, that was simply not possible. A changeling’s animal was as integral to his or her life as the human half of their nature—Bastien couldn’t be human as he couldn’t be leopard.
He was changeling, accustomed to the feel of his leopard stretching lazily beneath his skin when he wore this form, and to thinking with a man’s mind if necessary while in cat form. The idea that Kirby could’ve separated the two somehow, stifling her animal side . . . it not only made no sense, it should’ve been physiologically impossible according to all known laws of science and nature.
Yet her scent argued otherwise. He’d finally realized why he’d had such trouble tracking her—it was because Kirby’s scent wasn’t integrated as it should be. The feline part was too primal for a changeling, not balanced by the human aspect, while the human part was too gentle without the feline edge to it. Kirby didn’t have the natural depth to her scent a human would have, because she wasn’t human, her scent meant to be a combination of the two sides of her nature.