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 t
he 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 courage 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.
"Bas." His assistant's voice interrupted his turbulent thoughts. "I just got the report on those shares."
"Go." Wrenching his attention to the topic at hand, he listened, then gave further instructions, after which he switched to speak to another colleague, before handling a minor issue for an elder in the pack.
The work was welcome; it kept his mind from going around in circles.
He was back in contact with his assistant by the time he parked the vehicle in Yosemite, directing the younger male to make several small financial maneuvers designed to benefit the pack. That done, he gave a "do not disturb" order and stuffed his phone into the front left pocket of his jeans before stretching out into a run, the alpha pair's aerie in a part of the forest inaccessible to vehicles.
Though he ran in human form, he gave up control of his body to the leopard. It l
oved the freedom of the forest, loved feeling the wind ripple through its coat, the carpet of forest debris soft and quiet beneath the pads of its paws. That leopard, however, was also very strategy minded and enjoyed what Bastien did for the pack--to the cat, the financial stuff appeared akin to a game, a hunt.
Seeing a young soldier on patrol on the extended perimeter around Lucas's aerie, he halted, the human half of his nature rising to the surface once more. "Luc in?"
The tall auburn-haired male nodded, grin bright. "He's on babysitting detail."
"Thanks."
Ten minutes later, he found Lucas sitting at a small table set below the sprawling canopy of a forest giant, the dwelling cradled in its branches concealed by dense foliage. The cabin the alpha had built when his mate's pregnancy became too advanced for her to climb the rope ladder to the aerie was gone, no trace of it on the forest floor.
Lucas had a tablet computer on his lap, a sleek phone set to one side of the table, and what looked like a set of marked-up contracts on the other. Right then, however, his attention was on the baby girl who lay happily on her back on the blue-and-green picnic blanket beside the table, kicking her legs in the air.
As Bastien watched, Luc set aside the tablet to go down to the blanket. Tickling Naya gently on the bottoms of tiny feet covered by the sunny yellow fabric of her footsie pants, he pushed up her fluffy white sweater to blow a raspberry against her stomach, his hair the same rich black as his cub's.
Naya's giggles floated on the air, her delight infectious.
"She doesn't bite, Bas." An amused glance.
"I was taking a photo for Mom." Sliding away his phone, he sprawled on the blanket on his back, and--with a glance at Lucas--picked Naya up to place her on his chest. She batted at him with baby fists, her smile sweet and innocent. Catching those soft hands, he pretended to bite and growl, which made her convulse in laughter in the way only babies could.
"And the patented Smith charm strikes again." The dry comment had barely left Lucas's mouth when his phone beeped.
Grabbing it from the table without leaving his seated position on the picnic blanket, he spent a couple of minutes discussing a timetable change relating to a construction project for which Bastien was handling the finances. When he hung up, it was to give Bastien his full attention. "What is it?" The question of an alpha to a member of his pack, not one man to another.