BLIND TIGER
Wildcats Book 2
Rachel Vincent
Text copyright © 2017 by Rachel Vincent.
Cover art copyright © 2017 by Gaslight Graphics
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the author, Rachel Vincent.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events or locals is entirely coincidental.
Rachelvincent.com
To Jennifer Lynn Barnes.
Because this whole thing was your idea.
ONE
Robyn
Years ago, I saw a documentary about US detention centers. Most of them, it turns out, are made of some combination of steel bars, concrete, and shatter-proof acrylic walls. But there’s another category of prison that neither the US Justice Department nor the producers of that documentary know about.
That category includes a certain large house on the outskirts of Atlanta, decorated by a woman with an excessive fondness for a soft shade of purple and an extravagant collection of ceramic angels.
I’d been a captive in that house for two months and eight days when I walked into the kitchen and saw Dr. Danny Carver cradling a steaming mug of coffee, his medical supply bag hanging from one shoulder. I swallowed a groan and crossed my arms over my chest. “Are you here for the conference, or did you come to break me out?”
His smile was small, but genuine. “No one considers you a prisoner, Robyn.”
“Yet I’m not allowed to leave.”
He set his mug on the counter and opened his bag of medical supplies. “You signed up for this.”
“My options were pretty limited at the time, if you recall.” A few months before, as a newly infected stray suffering from bloodlust and post-traumatic stress, I’d killed four human men. They totally deserved it, but murder is a capital crime in shifter society as it is in human society. However, because female werecats are rare and I am the first female stray confirmed to exist in the US, the territorial council offered me a deal. If I agreed to stay in the Southeast Territory and let them train me to control my inner-shifter, they wouldn’t rip out my incisors. Or chop off the tips of my fingers, along with my claws.
Or execute me.
But the whole house arrest thing was supposed to be temporary. Only until I learned to control my new feline instincts and impulses. Which I never asked for, by the way. I was infected against my will, and that fact chafed my temper as surely as literal bindings would have abraded my wrists.
I considered myself fully rehabilitated, but every time I even hinted at the fact that I felt ready to leave the Southeast Territory, Umberto Di Carlo, my acting Alpha, doubled the guard. So I’d learned to keep my mouth shut.
Or at least to grumble quietly.
“Have a seat and roll your sleeves up please.” Dr. Carver took a sterile syringe and several empty blood collection tubes from his bag and set them on the counter. Despite the disagreeable nature of his visit, he was a difficult man to stay mad at, considering that he legitimately believed that the violation of my veins was for the greater good.
The shifter world was desperate to understand why I’d survived infection when so many other women had died. That was the real reason I was still being held. One of them, anyway.
“You’ve come to poke me three times in one month?” I leaned against the kitchen doorframe, letting my obvious reluctance stand as my official protest. “People are starting to talk.”
The doctor’s chuckle produced a cluster of fine lines at the corners of his mouth and eyes, the only indicators that he was at least twenty years my senior. A handsome doctor with a gentle touch and a good sense of humor. In the human world, he would have been snapped up long before his mid-forties, but like the vast majority of the male shifters I’d met over the past couple of months, Carver was single, and as far as I could tell, completely without romantic prospects.
Not that I had any interest in changing that, even if he’d been closer to my age. I’d sworn off shifter men within minutes of meeting my first tomcat.
Still, it was a damn shame about Carver.
“What’s it going to take to get you to cooperate?” The doctor pulled out a chair at the table for me, but I hardly glanced at it.
“That depends. What contraband were you able to smuggle in?”
His brows rose. “What do you want?”
“You are aware, are you not, that the Di Carlos don’t get movie channels and don’t have Wi-Fi? I’ve seen more History Channel documentaries in the past two months than any girl—even a history major—should ever have to suffer through. Take me to a movie, doc.”
His smile faded a bit. “What would you say to a pint of ice cream and piping hot Starbucks? Venti.”
“Do I get to pick them both up myself?” I asked, and his frown spoke volumes. “Not authorized to take me off the property, are you? Fine.” I lowered my voice. “Give me ten minutes alone with your cell phone, and I’ll bleed into every vial you brought.” My phone was confiscated as part of my official sentence.
“Robyn…” He looked conflicted, but I knew from experience that his sympathy didn’t mean he’d smuggle me off the grounds.
“Forget it.” As frustrated as I was with my predicament, if it weren’t for Dr. Carver’s testimony on my behalf to the territorial council, I’d probably be much worse off. The good doctor was as close to an ally as I had. In the Southeast Territory, anyway.
Instead of sitting at the table, I hopped onto the kitchen counter with a fluid sort of feline grace. When I was a kid, my duplicate set of left feet were my biggest obstacle in life, and I bore the scars to attest to two broken arms, four broken toes, and a particularly traumatic tumble into a recently extinguished campfire.
Yet I hadn’t lost my balance once in the four months since I’d been infected. But the upside was nowhere near enough to balance out my new lack of autonomy, impulse control, and the right to live as anonymously as I pleased. No tabby—the term for a female cat shifter—can live in peace in a society suffering an admittedly devastating gender imbalance.
On average, only one female werecat was born for every seven or eight males. Which meant that while most male shifters dated, few would ever get the chance to marry and have a family, because shifters were forbidden from disclosing their existence to humans.
That left the entire burden of bearing the next generation up to those one-in-seven-or-eight female shifters.
The imbalance was even more severe with strays, obviously.
I sympathized with the difficult situation. But the shifter world’s lack of eligible bachelorettes was neither my fault nor my responsibility. Even if it had become my problem.
“So you’re not going to the meeting?” I said, as Carver tore open the packaging around the sterile syringe.
“It’s a council meeting. I’m not on the territorial council.”
“Because you’re not an Alpha?” I pushed the sleeve of my T-shirt up over my elbow.
Carver wrapped the rubber tourniquet a little tighter than it needed to be around my upper arm. “Go ahead. Rub it in.” But he was still smiling.
In human society, many male doctors would be considered Alpha males, based on ego alone. The stereotypical “God complex” had its basis in truth, at least according to my personal dating history. Yet despite the fact that Dan Carver was the only medic
al doctor among the US shifter territories—though he was actually a medical examiner by trade—he lacked the toxic mix of aggression and ego necessary to claim a leadership position. Or a wife.
Which was fine by me. My opinion of Alphas differed very little from my opinion of tomcats in general.
“Don’t they usually hold these meetings on the council chair’s home turf?” I asked as Carver opened one of the vials.
The council chairman, Rick Wade, was the father of my best friend and former college roommate. I hadn’t been allowed to talk to Abby Wade since my incarceration began, even though she’d saved my life when I was infected and kept me alive during the subsequent confusing, chaotic weeks.
I couldn’t tell whether they were punishing Abby or me. Or both of us. Either way, since she’d renounced her loyalty to the council and defected to the free zone with her boyfriend—a disgraced former Alpha named Jace—everyone seemed worried that if I spoke to her, I might catch whatever rebellious inner demon had made her reject proper shifter society.
As if I needed Abby’s influence for that.
“Yes, usually Rick Wade hosts council meetings.” Carver took my right arm and examined the crook of my elbow for a good vein. “They’re holding this one here because of you.”
“The meeting’s about me?” My pulse spiked at the thought. The last time all ten Alphas had gotten together, their purpose, in part, had been to decide my fate. If they were reconvening for the same reason, this time I would damn well be involved in the process. “Wait, I thought this was about Titus Alexander. I heard him talking through the door.” Where I might have lingered, because the voice of the notorious “stray Alpha” was the only unfamiliar—and deeply sexy—one coming from Bert Di Carlo’s office.
“Yes, the Alphas are officially convening to hear Alexander’s petition. But they’re convening here for the excuse to observe your progress.” Carver slid the needle into my vein with practiced ease. I hardly felt it. “Speaking of which, how’s the training going?”
“Well, I was always good at fighting.” And I found the exertion to be therapeutic. “That was part of the problem, remember?”
The doctor’s small grin eased a little of my tension. My sense of humor functions as a defense mechanism, but no one other than the doctor seemed willing to make light of my crimes, even though every man I’d killed would have been executed by the council if they’d gotten the chance. I’d killed murderers. Very bad men. My actions were only considered crimes in shifter society because I committed them without permission from the council.
A technicality, as far as I was concerned.
“And the exercises? How’s your control?”
“Flawless. I’m a fast learner.” Both of which were only true under ideal circumstances. My impulse was still to shift into feline form when I felt angry or threatened, and resisting that very real physical pull was still the most difficult part of my daily routine. But I really was making progress…
“And the nightmares?”
“A thing of the past.” Mostly because I rarely slept long enough to dream. “So feel free to tell them how very cured I am of the murderous rage. Seriously, I’m an asset to the community. Totally safe around both pets and small children.”
“I’ll be sure to pass that along.” Dr. Carver screwed one of the vials into the plastic sleeve at the end of the syringe, and I watched as my blood began to fill it. The contents of the vial looked so normal. One could never tell just from looking that somewhere in that DNA soup lay the answer to the huge question of my survival—and potentially of the entire shifter community.
Dr. Carver and his brother, a geneticist, were hoping to unlock the secrets of my successful infection. Making strays, including tabbies, is illegal, even though they—we—are in severely short supply. But if they could figure out how I’d survived, they could hopefully save any other women who were infected, whether through accident or intentional criminal act.
I totally supported the cause, which was the only reason I was participating so sweetly in the millionth withdrawal from the Robyn Sheffield Blood Bank.
“So what does the stray Alpha want?” I asked, as my blood continued to bubble into the vial. Titus Alexander was Jace and Abby’s friend, and their host in the free zone, last I’d heard.
“He’s come to request official recognition of his wildcat Pride by the council,” Dr. Carver said as he unscrewed the full vial from the syringe.
“Why are there no stray Prides?”
“Because making strays is illegal, and the council is afraid that giving them official status will encourage the infection of more strays.”
The thought made me feel sick to my stomach.
“So, how close are you to figuring me out?” I asked, as my blood filled the second vial. “I mean, you may as well stick a tap straight into my vein so you can draw more on demand. Like at a bar.”
Carver chuckled again. “We’re not drinking your blood. We’re studying it.”
“Maybe you should be studying how to prevent infection, rather than how to succeed at it, if making more like me is illegal.” But I felt bad for saying that before the words had even faded into silence between us. I knew damn well that Carver wasn’t trying to make more strays.
He disconnected the second vial and set it aside. “The only way to prevent infection is to prevent violent contact between humans and shifters. But that’s a job for psychologists and enforcers, not doctors.”
I thought about that while he removed the needle from my arm, covered the hole in my flesh with a bandage, and untied the tourniquet. Dr. Carver, I decided, was one of the good guys.
While he packed up his supplies and refilled his coffee mug, I wandered out of the kitchen and through the dining room, studying the framed photographs covering one long wall of the Di Carlos’ most formal—and ceramic-angel-free—space. They rarely used the dining room, even though at least four of the territory’s six live-in enforcers were present at every dinner.
I’d decided early on in my confinement that the room’s lack of use was due to the faces staring at the diners from the wall. One face in particular.
“Who is she?”
I spun, startled by the unexpected yet familiar voice, to find a stranger standing behind me, leaning against the doorway. My gaze caught on him and stuck there, and for a moment, I could only stare at him with my mouth hanging open, like most of the toms around here look at me. His strong features and piercing eyes were unfamiliar—an unsettling rarity over the past two months—but one whiff of his scent provided his identity.
Stray.
Titus Alexander.
Why had no one told me the stray Alpha was gorgeous?
I glanced around the dining room, expecting to find one of the Southeast enforcers acting as escort for the guest. Bert Di Carlo never left me alone with strange toms, and this was the strangest—and prettiest—one I’d ever met.
Titus didn’t wear dark clothes like an enforcer—intended to hide the inevitable bloodstains. He wore a suit, like the older generation of Alphas.
Yet he wore his suit nothing like the older generation of Alphas.
His steel-colored jacket exactly matched the shade of his eyes, and the material lay perfectly against every artfully sculpted plane and angle of his body. That suit hadn’t come off a rack. Every stitch and fold was designed specifically for the man wearing it.
“Um…” I blinked, then tore my gaze away from him. I could feel my cheeks warming.
My hesitance seemed to amuse him, which only made my face burn hotter.
“Sara Di Carlo,” I mumbled, forcing my focus back to the photo at the center of the arrangement on the wall. Like most tabbies, she’d been the youngest of her siblings, after a long line of sons.
The stray extended one hand toward me; he thought I was introducing myself.
“Not me. That was Sara.” I gestured at the framed photo. “I’m Robyn.” When I clasped my hands behind me, declining his handshake, he wi
thdrew his hand, yet somehow made the motion look…cool.
“Robyn Sheffield, the only American female stray.” He inhaled subtly, confirming my identity with a whiff of my scent. “I’m Titus Alexander. The only stray Alpha. It seems we’re both somewhat anomalous around here.” His smile kindles an intimate fire deep inside me, and I scramble to put out the flames. I do not like Alphas.
“Marc Ramos is a stray Alpha,” I inform him. Though the truth is that Marc is his wife’s co-Alpha. The council would never let him run a Pride on his own.
His smile falters. “Yes. Of course.” He clears his throat and refocuses on the photograph. “What happened to Sara?”
“She died. She and Abby—” And Faythe Sanders, the only female Alpha. “—um…ran into some trouble several years ago. Sara never made it home.” I turned to point at another picture of a young man with beautiful blue eyes, just like his sister’s. “Anthony died trying to get justice for her.”
“The kidnapping.” Titus nodded solemnly. “I heard about that.”
“Abby told you?” I frowned. Abby never talked about whatever happened to her at the hands of those rogues.
“No.” The realization that he’d said too much seemed to hit him all at once, and he shifted his weight onto one foot.
“Jace,” I guessed.
“He only told me what I needed to know.”
“As an Alpha?”
“And as their host,” Titus clarified. “Sometimes Abby has nightmares.”
Oh.
Whatever trauma Abby had suffered still haunted her. But not like it haunted Bert and Donna Di Carlo. Sara had been their only daughter, thus their Pride’s only hope of producing a next generation. Losing her was both a personal and societal tragedy. I sympathized, though I also understood that when Donna looked at me, more often than not, she was seeing Sara. Figuratively, if not literally.
The Di Carlos seemed determined to protect me where they’d failed Sara. Even if that meant not letting me out of their sight until I was successfully rehabilitated—a moving target, at best.