by Erin Havoc
Table of Contents
Opening
Blurb
Chapter 01
Chapter 02
Chapter 03
Chapter 04
Chapter 05
Chapter 06
Chapter 07
Chapter 08
Chapter 09
Chapter 10
Epilogue
Epilogue
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Backmatter
Copyright
MAGNUS
SHIFTER DATING APP SERIES
* * *
ERIN HAVOC
A Curvy Woman Shifter Romance
KAREN
My innocent crush on the hottest senator around was supposed to be just that. A crush.
But now I have to go on a fake date with him to advertise my boss’s app.
And messing it up isn’t even my biggest fear.
Falling in love with him is.
MAGNUS
I’ve spent my life fighting for what’s right.
This woman is right for me. My mate.
But with me, she’s in danger. Her life is on the line.
And I might have to give up more than I bargained for.
1
KAREN
I lied.
Lying is such an unpleasant thing to do. Always I felt like I’d be caught at the very moment I pronounced the untrue words. I wondered if lying stained my face and marked me as a dishonest person. I hate lying.
But here I am, lying to my boss.
She’s one of the greatest persons I’ve ever met. Natalie King will surely be on Time’s top hundred people by the end of this year or the next. Not only because she’s super smart, funny, and a fantastic friend. Not because she’s built the best office for us to work at, pays me well, and buys me all the mocha I want.
But because Natalie has done the unimaginable. She has not only embraced the shifter cause; she turned it into the focus of her life. When the first shifter celebrities came out to the public, explaining how it was genetic and not a choice, and how keeping themselves hidden affected their population, Natalie grasped at the idea of fighting for them tooth and nail. And she didn’t let go.
When she interviewed me for her Virtual Assistant position, I thought she was going to be just one more of those eccentric rich people that release startups and useless apps with their parents’ money. To my surprise, she was totally different. She wanted to know how hard I could work and how well I understood social media (I have a degree in Digital Marketing, so I got that part covered), but the main question, and the one that had shooed the others candidates away, was what I thought of shifters.
She asked this to every employee. The engineers who built the code with her. The front end programmers who helped her with the image of the app. Every single person who did the marketing. Natalie refused to work with specists.
That’s what I love the most about her. She built a dating app from scratch because she wants to help. The money is hers — she had some previous success with other apps she built. And her number one rule is to respect shifters. Every part of the process had gone through some shifter. I’ve lost count of how many we met to ask for insight.
Nat is amazing. Now, with the app up and running, she even found a shifter for herself. A mate. Between making the app grow and mating with her man, she still has time to worry about me.
And when she tells me I’ll soon find my one true furry love, I nod and smile. But my expectation is a lie. It’s also a lie that I have hopes of ever finding him. Also a lie that I’m waiting for the one-hundred percent match.
“Mocha?” Nat asks as she sways into the kitchen, a spring to her step. She’s in love and I’m a tiny bit jealous, but just a little bit. She’s giving off such amazing vibes I can’t be mad at her.
“Please,” I reply with a smile plastered on my face. Nat hums under her breath, swirling around from drawer to coffee machine like the protagonist of some cheesy romance. She’s in love and it’s undeniable.
Minutes later, she props a cup of steaming coffee next to my hand. I stop my typing on the computer to lift my eyes in gratitude. She sips from her coffee, eying me with those hopeful eyes she’s been giving me.
“Nothing yet?”
“Nope.” I shake my head, turning to face the computer and sip from the scalding drink. The coffee burns my lips, too hot for consumption. I hiss between my teeth as she chuckles.
“Don’t burn yourself because of that. He’ll come along soon enough, you’ll see.”
“I know.” That’s another lie. I’ve already gotten used to the idea of him, whoever it is, not showing up. And I don’t care. It’s the same thing as being abandoned by your date in a club. Sad, yes, but I’m not going home and missing the party.
“Waiting for the right guy sucks, but it pays off.” Nat walks away, sitting back on her desk and checking her agenda for the rest of the day. She has a couple of interviews with small newspapers and I already expect a torrent of insults to the specists she will eventually talk to. Her mate is more patient of a person and Nat’s working on that, but it’s a work in progress.
I shrug. “It’s okay. It’s not like I have the time to date now, anyway.”
“True that.” She grins and her attention drops to her computer. I release a sigh, guilt eating up at my stomach.
I’ll never know why I lied, anyway. At first, I think it was to impress her, since she was my new boss. But now, there’s no need. Yet I have no guts to tell her I’m not waiting for this one special guy anymore. The mate I don’t think exists.
I mean, think about it. Many women marry human men and live their happily ever afters. I don’t think they have intended shifter mates. Not everyone will.
And maybe I’m one of those. Maybe I’d be wasting my time waiting for a mate when I could date a human. Which is why I have a couple of human dating apps too. Not because I don’t believe in Nat’s product, but because I don’t believe it’s made for me. It would be silly to wait when I could miss the chance of finding the right guy among non-shifters.
I have chatted with a few, both in the Shifter Dating App and in the non-shifter ones. And I have gone out with a couple. My problem is that shifters are focused on finding their mates. The ones I went out with were gentle and eye candies and all, but they wouldn’t take it further than a couple of dates since I wasn’t over ninety percent compatibility. They would rather wait.
The human ones were... Less than acceptable. It’s so hard to tell a nice guy from a fake one these days. It requires two dates or so, but the fake one comes out of the closet, revealing he was just being kind and agreeable because he wanted to get laid. The moment they put their eyes on my curves, they think I’ll be the easy type.
They’re sorely mistaken.
Because I’m a plus-sized chick who loves her curves, and, just like Natalie, I won’t take anything less than adoration for them. I need no one’s pity. My body is my temple, and I’m not letting any scumbag in.
Nat slaps her phone down and grins at me, shooting two thumbs up. “Wish me luck.”
“Good luck.” I give her two thumbs up too. “Remember, if you manage to finish an interview without offending anyone’s mother, I’ll pay for lunch!”
She chortles and turns to her computer. “There’s a hope I don’t have. I should hire someone to do these interviews for me. Like a spokesperson.”
“Dean would be good,” I suggest, thinking about it for the first time. He’s good looking and careful with his words. From the few times we met, I can’t imagine him insulting anyone. Even if I should — he attacked some protesters the night he went out with Natalie for the first time, after they tried to break into her place. He did that in his wolf form.
No one got hur
t, but that’s a sign even he has a limit.
Nat shakes her head. “Dean’s a shifter. The moment they find out, they’d eat him up. He would need to have more argumentation experience. I wish we had some kind of politician on our side.”
“A politician,” I hum, the image of a dark-skinned, handsome man flashing on the back of my mind. “That Senator Callahan would be nice, wouldn’t he?”
Nice is the last word I would use to describe him, but she’ll get what I mean. Magnus Callahan is a senator highly active in the shifter cause. He’s active because he is a shifter himself, one of the firsts to come out. He’s been fighting for equal rights and fair laws for a year now.
And he’s the most handsome man I’ve ever laid eyes on. Well, not in real life. I’ve never met him. But it’s been enough to make him the center of my wild fantasies.
Tall, dark, and handsome. He’s always in a pressed suit, his hair in a buzz-cut, a flashing-white smile across his face. If that’s not a pantie-melting grin, then I don’t know what is. He looks like he smells good — I can almost picture the musky, woody scent. And the suit never conceals his broad shape and hefty arms.
The man’s so good looking it should be illegal.
“Senator Callahan...” Nat rolls the name on her tongue, looking away. “That would be an amazing addition. Maybe I should contact his press team and ask them if I can send the DNA pack.”
I nod her on. “Would you like me to do that?”
“Please.” She grins then turns to her computer, beginning the interview shortly after.
A wild fantasy takes form on the back of my mind. But being matched to that man when I’ve had no success up to this moment? A fantasy indeed. Maybe the senator already has the app and is just waiting for his match, just like me. Maybe he’s already found her and we don’t know.
Either way, I find the press team’s contact on his website and shoot them an email. Then I spend a couple of minutes gawking at his pictures and daydreaming about being matched. Finally being matched. Finally having someone who understands me and wants me the way I am.
After lunch, I hide in the bathroom to check the app. Nothing new. No shifter with over ninety percent compatibility. I’m stuck in this limbo, being one of the firsts ever to sign up, and not finding a mate. I’m not the only one, but it doesn’t hurt any less.
Pressing my thumb to the muzzle logo on my home screen, I delete the app.
I have been wasting my time thinking about this. What I need is some time off to resettle my priorities and then come back. With a light heart and no worries, it’ll be easier to wait.
And wait I will. There’s no other option, anyway.
2
MAGNUS
Jason shifts where he stands, his back pressed to the column next to us. His eyes hidden by his shades, I stare at him, squinting to figure out where he’s looking at.
“The point of wearing these,” he says, jerking me to attention, “is exactly so no one knows who I’m watching.”
“Still bothering your bodyguard, I see.” Callie chuckles from across of me in the table we share. She sticks broccoli inside her mouth, then looks up and points her fork in my direction. “Is that too much free time? I can find more stuff for you to do.”
Raising my hands in a pacifying gesture, I open one of my diplomatic grins. “I beg of you. I barely have time to sleep these days.” Last night I slept a spooking four hours. Amazing. I was a goner before I hit the pillows.
“And even sleep-deprived, there’s time to joke around.” She clucks her tongue, bringing her glass of wine to her lips. “Some things never change, do they, Magnus?”
Callie and I met back in college. We were not exactly colleagues — she was in public relations and I was pursuing a law degree — but we share similar interests and beliefs. The fact she’s one of the few female shifters I’ve ever met helped us to stick around one another. Now she’s my PR manager, saving my ass a little more every day.
“Life’s already full of worries,” I tell the two as I turn back to my chicken. “Why would I avoid teasing you when it pleases me so?”
Jason, my bodyguard, snickers from where he stands. Callie rolls her eyes but I see the corner of her lip twitching. Her attention flies back to her phone, and she swipes up and down at the screen as she munches on another broccoli.
“Can’t you at least sit with us?” I grin at Jason.
He curls his upper lip as if I’ve just sprouted an extra head. “Of course not. How am I supposed to protect you from a surprise attack if I’m sitting and eating?”
“With a knife?” I offer, bringing my cutlery up. “I’m pretty sure you could do some damage with a fork too.”
“I could, but that’s not the point.” Jason’s always showering me with too much information about how much of a deadly creature he is in both his forms. When I asked for a team of bodyguards composed of shifters only, I intended to prove we could be trusted to work in dangerous situations without having to resort to our inner animals.
I do not and I have never expected to be in danger, so Jason’s practical experience scares me most of the time.
Yes, I am a panther and I hunt and everything. But it’s in my nature to hunt a small deer and eat it. That’s the cycle of things. But the image of Jason sticking a fork to someone’s eye because they threatened me? No, thanks. That’s a whole lot of too much.
“So, as I was saying,” Callie continues from where we left off, “I have good and bad news. And I’m more worried about Jason’s reaction than yours.”
I chuckle, shooting a sideways glance at my bodyguard. “Well, let’s see. Is it some fangirl sending pictures of me sleeping?”
Jason gasps in outrage. “No one would pass my men.” He lowers his glasses and looks straight into Callie’s eyes. “Please, tell me that’s not it.”
“That’s not it.” She shakes her head, looking skyward as if she pleads for patience from above. She takes a deep breath before going on. “I’ll just say it. You know, no more beating around the bush. You drive me half-mad, Magnus.”
I grin, appreciating the compliment. Callie’s round ears and bright eyes don’t give it away, but she’s a hen. Impatience and rush is her thing. And I have challenged that ever since we met.
Pinching two fingers together, I mimic the closing of a zipper across my lips. “Not a word.”
“You’ve just said three words,” Jason points, still staring at Callie with wide eyes. He’s always on edge, always troubled something will come up from under the table, and assail me. I’m surprised he doesn’t taste my food for poisoning.
I mean, yeah, there are people out there who don’t like my face, even if it’s rather handsome. But killing me? Na. I’m not that bad nor that famous. But tell that to Jason. Protective is in his wolf’s nature. His mate must go crazy with his ways too.
Callie glares at me for a full minute before she utters another sound. “Let me get this one out of the way. You’ve received another death threat.”
“Fuck,” Jason grunts, his hand going to the stun gun on his belt for no reason. We don’t use fire weapons in my team. I wouldn’t allow someone to get shot because of me.
“Another?” The word bursts from me. “Since when do I get death threats?”
Callie’s face twists in confusion. “All the freaking time. Don’t you read about yourself on Twitter? God, your name is on the trending topics all the time.”
“I thought that was a splendid thing to happen?” My fingers itch to pick my phone up, but I don’t. I peer at Jason, judging how close he is from a stroke. From the vein pulsing in his temple, too close.
“Not always. You end up in the TTs because people are talking about you,” she says, eating more veggies as if there’s nothing more interesting. “Good things or bad things, doesn’t matter.”
“Why don’t I know about the threats? I’ve never heard about them.”
“Because people say shit on the internet, Magnus,” she offers with a pretenti
ous smile. “Everyone threatens everyone. It’s chaos. Not all of them are serious.”
“But you think this one is?” Jason starts, his resounding voice echoing too loud.
“Yes. It sounds... different from the others. More gory details, you know?” She taps two fingers over her heart. “It made my heart skitter.”
Jason curls his upper lip and roars under his breath. “Where is it? Let me see it.”
Callie brings a hand up. “I’ve sent it to your boss. He’ll fill you in later, so you won’t get distracted.” The words work as a cold shower on Jason. He straightens his spine and steps back, pressing his back to the wall in full professional stance.
I wouldn’t doubt the instincts of a hare. She knows when to go in and when to run. As a politician, I try my best to be cordial and sympathetic. To hear people and say what I believe in with my heart open. But when you speak out for minorities, you get some backlash from whoever doesn’t want to change.
The death threat comes as a surprise. But it doesn’t scare me. No, my panther doesn’t give a shit. He purrs to the taste of chicken, distracted, drowsy. He’s a simple animal. Never asking too much, never distracting me. I have the best of both worlds. And I know I can defend myself if it ever comes to that.
Besides, I have a team of bodyguards. Though I never liked the idea. They’d get themselves in harm’s way before letting me get hurt.
Drinking from my wine, I look up over the rim at Callie. “I’m guessing that’s the bad news?”
She snorts. “Of course it is. And I’m guessing you’ve just dismissed a serious death threat as if it means nothing.”
“Not that, but there’s nothing I can do besides monitoring my surroundings.” I lower my voice, baring my teeth. “My panther already does that. Besides, I always have a bodyguard with me, as you suggested months ago. Even if this person tries to do something, I know they’ll be disheartened to fight several shifters.”