The Panther's Arranged Mate

by Bonnie Burrows

  Things like that always made him more comfortable when he was shifted into the form of a black panther.

  Shifting into the panther form was easier when he stopped taking the suppressants. With them he could still shift, but nothing matched the easy power of the shift when he was off them. He took a moment to appreciate the form before he darted off, determined to find this new mate of his.

  Only she wasn’t here and she wasn’t going to be here for several days. Before he could see her he needed to start his rut first. Without it, this place would be considered nothing more than expensive prostitution.

  When she entered the room clad only in a silk robe, Storm knew that he had made the right choice. She looked like a panther though she was purest human. He had never seen anything more beautiful than she.

  He approached her carefully. All his instincts cried out for him to take her roughly, but he found that he could not. She looked so very frightened. He could smell it on her. He touched her gently and found that she leaned into the touch. He began to stroke her shoulder and warmed to him. Slowly, she stopped smelling of fear and smelled of something that was much more pleasant.

  She took off the silk robe and let it drop to the floor.

  It was then that he lifted her up off the ground and spun her around before carrying her off to the bed. Even then he did not immediately penetrate her. Instead, he worked her over. He used his fingers and his mouth. Shanya had already come twice before he penetrated her. She was beautiful in bed.

  Unlike with other women, she was tall—almost as tall as him—and he was 6”6. He figured that he had nearly six feet of gorgeous black woman underneath him. It was mostly in her long limbs. She was athletic, but not like those people who worked out constantly for big muscles. She was still curvy and soft to the touch.

  He could not remember a partner who had made him happier in bed than she had with her screams and moans of pleasure. It was truly amazing. He was relieved that the rooms were soundproof. He wanted to be the only one to hear the truly amazing sounds she was making. He thrust into her, gently and with a thumb on her clit. He was determined to have this be as pleasurable for her as it was for him.

  Storm was thrilled when he got the call that she was pregnant, but he was shocked at how quickly she’d accepted the terms of the contract. He’d believed that she might not be satisfied when he got the call so quickly. Instead, he’d found out that she had accepted.

  There had barely been time to prepare her rooms before she got there. His mother was pleased. She’d been the one who had helped arrange the contract and was very approving of the fact that he’d decided to settle down. She was even more approving that he had plans to involve Shanya in the raising of their cubs.

  He knew that she hoped that they would eventually marry. Storm normally would have told his mother that he had every intention of marrying this beautiful creature, but she’d nettled him so long about being married that he decided to let her stew a bit.

  Storm was very pleased that she seemed to get along with his sisters. His twin Persephone was a bit annoyed, as this was only going to make Mother more intent on getting Persephone to settle down with a mate. He had a feeling that Persephone wanted to make their mother good and desperate before she did anything. He had given her hope.

  Kennedy and Actracia didn’t seem to have an opinion either way. They were polite and then they left. After talking with Shanya more and drawing her out, it became clear that Jules was going to love having someone to share the library with her. Jules was ever the academic and seemed to derive great pleasure from researching some truly dull subjects.

  However, Shanya wasn’t like that. She brought such energy to anything she talked about and truly thought about the implications of her research. She made history—even the story of Josephine Onca, which read like the marriage of Victoria and Albert to him—sound interesting and relevant.

  But Myst was enamored with her from the moment that Storm described her. She’d been delighted when Shanya had let her completely redecorate her quarters. He’d dropped in a few times to make sure that Shanya wasn’t getting steamrolled. But he’d seen her redirect Myst a few times and wasn’t afraid to put in her own ideas. Of course, it did help that they agreed on several key points. Shanya liked having attention brought to her eyes and had insisted on dark woods and browns so dark they were almost black. Myst worked hard to bring color into the palette, thus setting it apart from the rooms of the house that were mostly gold and black.

  Fortunately, Shanya proved to be a good influence on Myst and kept her love of color from becoming too garish and over powering. Color mostly entered the rooms in tasteful flowering plants.

  Storm realized, belatedly, that he was beginning to fall in love with her. That, perhaps, he had fallen in love with her the first time he saw her and every moment after the first was just him falling more and more in love with her, until now he could no more stop himself from loving her than stop the Niagara Falls from falling.

  But getting Shanya to feel the same way was difficult. He was unfamiliar with human culture and something about the way that Shanya acted made him think better of trying human wooing traditions on Shanya. She was so jumpy and so surprised whenever anyone suggested that she was beautiful or valued.

  He long wondered who had hurt her and made her feel this way. But Shanya said little about her personal life. She didn’t even mention what universities she had studied at. She’d referred to some of the jobs that she had recently and honestly, none of them sounded like the type of thing that a university educated woman would ever be drawn to—unlike Myst, who would get a thrill out of slumming it, all the while convinced that she was living like the protagonist in her favorite novels. Shanya didn’t seem like someone who would do that.

  She also didn’t seem like someone who didn’t need money. But that itself was odd. She didn’t seem unused to the idea of luxury. He’d seen the book of etiquette at her bedside. But there was something about the way that she held herself that seemed inborn. Of course, by inborn, he only meant that she’d been trained to move in high society from a young age.

  He had hoped that the traditional gifts would let her know what he intended. But either the book didn’t cover courting or Shanya didn’t think that would be relevant to her stay here.

  Storm had started with the traditional gifts. He’d given her the pelt of a black bear that he had killed as a panther. Then there were the gifts of food, the attention that he paid to her, how he saw to her needs directly instead of having servants do it. He’d taken to preparing many of their meals himself.

  At first, it seemed to be working. Then, after the last Shifter Ball they attended, Shanya had grown cold and closed off. He was welcomed in her apartments less often and while she was not rude to him, she lacked the warmth that he had come to associate with her. He had no idea what had possibly happened to cause this.

  Storm took time off from work to personally make sure that everything was okay. He couldn’t go away knowing that his pregnant mate was upset about something. He’d tried asking her. Eventually, he’d thought that she had no idea what Shifters considered courting and he’d gone and looked into human courting, only to find that the general principles (gifts, personal attention) were exactly the same.

  He wondered if perhaps she didn’t want a ring (what a silly idea that was) and had been eyeing a ring by the human jeweler, Cartier (he liked the idea of a panther ring on his mate) when Shanya had begun to warm to him again. Whatever it was that had been bothering her had apparently stopped. Storm was relieved.

  Of course, it was then that the London branch of his father’s business needed his attention immediately. Storm had been put out, to say the least. But he had put off dealing with business for long enough. He was sure that there was more to it than just pregnancy (as his mother was convinced) but he couldn’t postpone this trip any longer—especially with his planned hiatus from the business world.

  THE FINAL CHAPTER

&n
bsp; They moved to the country estate during the later stages of Shanya and Persephone’s pregnancies. Storm’s mother, Madira, had insisted on it. Shanya had not thought to protest.

  After the ball, she had realized how she must have looked to the family. She was only a way of providing their beloved son with a family. When her contract was up, she would be no more welcomed here than with her own family. It stung. She’d honestly believed that they liked her.

  Now, seeing the situation with new eyes, Shanya realized they never had.

  She slept most of the way. The estate was far outside of the city. Shanya only woke up when they started driving through green rolling hills. Honestly, she didn’t care where they were and didn’t ask anyone.

  When she got out of the car, Shanya didn’t miss how more people swarmed around Persephone than her. It might have been because Persephone was farther along than she was, but Shanya suspected that it was because they saw her as family—as opposed to a silly human girl who was only carrying family within her womb.

  Jules was the only sibling to personally help her. Shanya smiled as Jules helped her down from the car.

  “Let’s go to your rooms,” Jules said quietly. “I got to help pick them out this time. Myst said she wanted to have you up in a tower.” Jules shook her head. “There are elevators, but it’s so drafty up there.”

  “And where did you pick?” Shanya asked.

  Myst had all but dropped her after the ball. She knew that she wasn’t vivacious enough to keep someone like Myst interested in her for very long. With her belly now beginning to truly show, Shanya was now wearing true maternity clothes. They weren’t very fashionable.

  Still, it stung that Myst dropped her as soon as she stopped being fun to dress up like a doll.

  Jules flushed. She was the only one of the Pantheras that Shanya had ever seen do that. All of the others appeared to lack the shame necessary for that expression.

  “It’s by mine, it’s close to the library and the kitchens,” Jules admitted. “I thought you might not want to have to trek all over the manor to get to the useful areas of the house.”

  “Thank you,” Shanya said. She realized that Jules was one of the few siblings that actually cared for her and it would be very lonely if she lost Jules as well as everyone else.

  “Anyway,” Jules said, leading the way through the large wooden doors.

  Shanya let out a gasp and stared at the entry way. She’d never seen anything like it. Large columns rose up at least three stories high. The entry way seemed to go on for miles. Light streamed in through the windows at the front of the house and lit up the grand staircase across the room.

  “Yeah, our great-great grandfather was not a fan of the foyer,” Jules said. “He preferred to have the ball room just start immediately. More efficient. His second wife had a lot of things to say about his inability to understand the virtue of building anticipation.”

  Shanya laughed. Trust Jules to make it something academic.

  “Yes,” Jules said with a shy smirk. “She wrote extensively about it.”

  “I’d love to read that,” Shanya said.

  “I hate to have that get in the way of your research,” Jules said. “Though it’s not my usual field of study, I have to admit that your perspective and approach is quite thrilling.”

  Jules said it so earnestly that there was no doubting her. Shanya liked to think that even when this all was over, that she might still remain friends with Jules—or no, not friends, colleagues perhaps. That is, if Jules didn’t mind the fact that Shanya was lying to her. She put that out of her mind and followed Jules across the wide expanse of ballroom. At least Jules wasn’t going to forget her pregnant state and lead her on a trek across the grounds.

  Once Shanya was in her room, she turned on her phone. Clara was the only contact in there. She had several voicemails from her (long rambling ones if the previous were any predictor). Shanya liked to listen to them before she went to bed. She’d have to remember to call Clara later.

  Her phone rang and it startled her.

  She was about to hang up but then Shanya recognized the number as belonging to the Were Human Heat Relief Center. She picked it up.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi, Shanya. This is Lauren,” Lauren said.

  “Yes?” Shanya said.

  “I’m just calling to make sure that everything is going well,” Lauren said. “It says that the family is looking after you, is that correct?”

  “Yes,” Shanya said. She didn’t think they would be checking in on her like this.

  “That’s good to hear,” Lauren said. “We have gotten an uptick in requests for surrogates. After this pregnancy would you be interested in repeating the experience?”

  Shanya paused. She had felt so sure before overhearing that conversation. But now she wasn’t sure; she wasn’t sure about anything.

  “I—”

  “If this is a bad time, I can call you back,” Lauren said.

  “No, it’s not that,” Shanya said. “Actually, could you have someone send over the paperwork, I’m at—”

  “Of course,” Lauren said. “I do read the gossip columns. I assume you’re at the large summer manor. Gigantic ballroom first thing you see, right?”

  “Yes,” Shanya said. She felt like she’d been saying that a lot. “How do you know about that?”

  She’d assumed that the people working at the Center would not be moving in the same circles as the Pantheras.

  “Oh, don’t worry about it,” Lauren said. “It’s listed in the contract as possible residences during the latter part of the pregnancy. I’ll send the paperwork over. The envelope will be sealed.”

  “Thank you,” Shanya said and hung up the phone. She set the phone down and stared at it. She wished that she had gotten Storm’s number but he was always around. She hadn’t thought to grab his phone number. They lived in the same building!

  Shanya sighed. She might as well do some more reading of the Onca diaries. She had made scans of the original and would flip through those before bed. This time she got out her pens and notebook and set about taking notes.

  It was a stormy day in the library when Shanya had her breakthrough moment.

  “This is odd,” Shanya muttered. She was still pouring over the diaries of Josephine Onca.

  “Oh?” Jules was sharing the table with her. “What’s so interesting?

  “It’s just that...” Shanya paused. She wasn’t sure how to say this. “Well, it’s just that there’s not much on how she was viewed by the other Shifters.”

  “What are you looking for?” Jules asked. “I did a few projects on this work in high school.”

  “Well, for one, the common human centric theories are that a human bride was for those who were unable to find a Shifter mate—which is pretty clearly not the case,” Shanya said. “I mean, she’s welcomed into society and it seems like the sort of thing that she’d mention.”

  Jules nodded. “What’s the second theory?”

  “That hinges on it being a status symbol to have a human mate,” Shanya said. “But her mate doesn’t seem to be anyone particularly important. He’s powerful, in that he’s able to afford the expense required to capture a mate. But that’s about the same cost in courting gifts for a woman of equal status.”

  “She was a slave,” Jules said simply.

  “What?” Shanya said shocked. “But there’s no reference to it! Nothing about her skin color at all! The most detail I’ve been able to find is that she was servant and the plantation owner valued her.”

  “She was his personal slave,” Jules elaborated. “That’s why the diaries don’t start at once. She didn’t know how to write. Never learned. The whole slave thing. They’re more like memoirs actually.”

  Shanya nodded.

  “That would explain why she tries so hard to return.”

  “Apparently, most of his family expunged the diaries that humans kept a hold of,” Jules said. “The history of them is really f
ascinating. Apparently, it was a big scandal that he couldn’t keep her. It’s also why her attempts to return are ignored and there’s no attempt to get her children back. She’s considered property.”

  Shanya could only nod. That wouldn’t account for how most humans reacted, but it made sense. Shifters wouldn’t want a mate who was historically attractive by human standards. They were drawn to those who were able to fend for themselves. They had no use for useless pampered creatures. They would not target the rich daughter of the lord. No, they would be drawn to someone who was able to pull their weight.

  “Thank you,” Shanya said. “That’s given me a lot to think about.”

  Once a human that was treated as worthy by a Shifter with the means to secure an expensive mate, there was no way they would ever return to human society willingly. Now, the only problem was finding enough sources to back her theory.