Loe raamatut: «A Jaguar's Kiss»

Chapter 1

Gabriela Segura slowed her rental truck as she drove down Main Street in Bear Mountain, Montana. A faint smile touched her lips at the name of the town she’d grown up in. Wolf and jaguar shifters lived in a town named after a bear. Unfortunately the man who’d broken her heart also lived here. That thought made her smile wane as a familiar heaviness settled inside her. She mentally shook herself, trying to banish thoughts of the past.

Even though it was five o’clock in the morning, she spotted the bright blue neon OPEN sign at Lucky’s Diner. She mentally sighed in appreciation and found a spot about a block down from the restaurant. After traveling for nearly forty-eight hours straight and living off airport food, she wanted real coffee and a home-cooked meal. And God bless her mother; the woman just couldn’t cook so before she made it home, Lucky’s was calling her name.

The icy-cold wind whipped against her face the moment she opened the truck door, but with her jaguar blood it didn’t bother her much. She scented a wolf shifter nearby but didn’t look around. The Wright pack made their home in Bear Mountain and Gabriela would be fine if she never saw any of them again. Especially Owen Wright, son of the pack’s Alpha. If she hadn’t desperately needed a break from her job and the loss she’d recently experienced, she wouldn’t even be here.

As she opened the front door to the diner, the bell jingled loudly above her head. For a brief moment the place quieted and the dozen or so men in flannel shirts and cowboy hats looked at her with curiosity. She hadn’t been home in almost four years and she knew this place didn’t get many strangers. To many in this town, she would be just that.

Just as quickly the noise resumed, so she hurried to the counter and ordered a coffee before looking at the menu the harried waitress placed in front of her.

“Well, well, well, if it isn’t Gabby Segura. Couldn’t even call to let me know you’d be in town this morning.” A teasing, familiar female voice made her turn.

Her high school best friend, Sharon Damico, slid onto the swivel stool next to her. She talked to Sharon fairly often and her friend had even offered Gabriela a job should she ever want it—she shoved that thought from her mind. A twinge of guilt settled inside her for not calling to tell Sharon she’d caught an earlier flight but seeing her friend in uniform made her giggle.

Gabriela shook her head as she looked her friend up and down, taking in the brown-and-tan polyester uniform that proclaimed Sharon the sheriff of the town. “Nice digs.”

A half grin quirked Sharon’s mouth. “I wouldn’t talk if I were you.”

Gabriela ran a hand through her hair and laughed under her breath. After traveling for so many hours straight, she’d been wearing her now rumpled dark jeans and black sweater for longer than she cared to admit. She might need a shower and a bed but she needed good food more. “I won’t argue with you there.”

Sharon continued grinning and started to say more when the bell jingled again. At the scent of a wolf shifter, Gabriela tensed as she glanced over her shoulder. She inwardly cursed. It was Ethan Wright, brother of the one man on the planet she had no desire to see. Ever.

Gritting her teeth, Gabriela turned back to face Sharon, who had gone quiet. Sharon had no clue about shifters, but she did know about Gabriela’s former relationship with Owen. Gabriela fished out a bill and dropped it on the counter to pay for her coffee. She’d rather eat her mom’s cooking than deal with Ethan. For all she knew, Owen wasn’t far behind him. Seeing him now when she hadn’t showered in days and looked like a freaking hobo? No, thanks. “Mind if I call you later?” she murmured, hating that Ethan could probably hear her anyway, thanks to his oversensitive ears.

Sharon shook her head as she frowned in Ethan’s direction, but smiled softly at Gabriela. “No prob.”

“I promise I’ll call as soon as I’ve settled in. We can grab a drink the next time you have a night off.” Gabriela gave her a quick hug before sliding off the stool. Barely glancing in Ethan’s direction, even though she could feel his eyes on her, she skirted past him and was out the door in seconds. Thankful for the fresh air, she sucked in a deep breath. With his blue-black hair, Ethan resembled his brother so much it was difficult to even look at him.

Her flat boots were quiet against the sidewalk. So were the man’s behind her, but she could scent him, anyway. Out of all the shifter breeds, she could smell wolves the strongest. Probably because of that whole cats and dogs thing.

“Gabriela.” Ethan fell in step with her. He was about four years younger so she didn’t know him as well as she’d known Owen, but he had that same confident swagger now that he’d grown up.

She gave him a quick glance. “That would be my name.”

“What are you doing here?” He sounded genuinely confused.

She hadn’t been gone that long. Okay, well four—actually almost five—years was stretching it. “Uh, my family lives here.”

“I know that. But what…are you here because of the attacks?” Now his voice hardened and when she looked at him again, those blue eyes of his were stony and angry.

She had no idea what he was talking about and she didn’t plan to waste time chatting with him. The last few months at work had been hell. Some dear friends had died and right now she didn’t need any crappy reminders from her past literally staring her in the face and acting all hostile. Remaining silent, she pressed the key fob to the truck she’d rented. As she reached the driver-side door, she turned to look over her shoulder and tell Ethan to get lost.

That’s when she noticed the weapon in his hand. Maybe it was the lack of sleep the past few days, but she blinked once as she stared at the barrel of the gun pointed right at her.

“Step back,” he said quietly, his voice a sharpened blade.

“Are you seriously pointing a gun at me?” she asked, staring at the SIG, surprised her voice didn’t shake. Considering the “retrieval” work she did for the CIA, she dealt with all sorts of guns, but to have one held on her by a semiacquaintance in the middle of her small hometown....She shook her head, certain that this was a mistake. “What—”

“I don’t know why you’re here but if you think you can help your family cover up the attacks, think again,” he growled softly.

“Uh, attacks?” Gabriela hadn’t shifted in days and her reflexes were dulled. Not to mention she was in the beginning stages of heat and was extremely edgy. Something she definitely didn’t want to think about right now. For a moment she contemplated trying to take the weapon from him, but he read her expression.

Ethan shook his head and slid into her front seat, keeping his weapon trained on her. “I’m moving over to the passenger seat and you’re getting in the driver’s seat. Try anything stupid and I’ll pump you full of silver.”

She paused, trying to determine if she could shift to her feline form quick enough to escape. It was possible. He might clip her with a bullet, but she doubted he’d want to make a huge scene in the middle of downtown. Then again, he’d pulled a freaking gun on her. This was way too disturbing and she couldn’t get a read on what he was thinking or if he was even serious. Sure, she and Owen hadn’t parted on the best terms, but there had never been any hostility between her family and his pack. Ethan’s actions were…crazy.

When she spotted two men and Sharon—all humans—walking down the sidewalk, she realized she didn’t have a choice but to go with Ethan.

Most humans didn’t know about the existence of her kind. Her entire family went to great lengths to keep not only their shifter abilities a secret but the fact that jaguars roamed this area. If she decided to turn into a giant jaguar in the middle of Main Street…yeah, that would go over really well. And she couldn’t risk Ethan harming anyone innocent.

She got into the front seat and started the engine. Rage surged through her-potent and strong-and completely drowned out her fear. Though it didn’t smother her common sense. She might be angry but she wasn’t stupid enough to lunge for the weapon. When her claws unsheathed, ripping into the pseudo-leather of the steering wheel, she had to take a deep breath and get her jaguar under control. “Drive east, toward wolf territory.” Ethan’s words were clipped.

“Did you plan this? How did you I’d be at the diner?” No one had known she was coming back early. A slow trail of fear travelled down her spine.

He rolled his eyes, as if she was stupid, and that fear dissipated. “Of course I didn’t plan this, but I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to take you.”

Opportunity? “What’s the matter with you? Why are you doing this to me? I just got back in town. All I want is to see my parents and brothers.” She tried to keep her voice calm but it was difficult when all she wanted to do was shout at him. She shuddered, remembering the last time she’d been shot. It had been in Colombia as she’d escaped a drug lord’s compound with vital information for her team. Even if she could heal at supernatural speeds, a bullet slicing through her body still hurt something fierce.

“Quiet,” he snapped. “I’m taking you to my brother.”

At the mention of Owen, Gabriela had to focus on keeping her heart rate steady. On top of all this, seeing the man who had broken her heart when she’d been a fragile sixteen-year-old? Terrific.

Even though he’d told her to be quiet she couldn’t resist asking one more question. “Seriously, what is this about?”

Ethan leveled the gun at her, his eyes angry. “I can shoot you, dump you in the bed of the truck and drive the rest of the way. I know you’ll heal but it’ll still hurt. Your choice. Stop with the questions or…?” He tipped the gun slightly, making his point clear.

* * *

Gabriela wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but she knew it hadn’t been more than an hour since Ethan had kidnapped her. And no one would be missing her right now. Her parents didn’t know that she’d managed to jump on an earlier flight for her last connection and they weren’t expecting her home until tonight. That psycho Ethan had been tight-lipped the entire drive into wolf territory. It wasn’t until they’d passed a cluster of log cabins she knew the majority of his pack lived in that he’d told her to stop in front of the only two-story cabin. Then he’d snapped metal cuffs on her wrists and dragged her inside. They weren’t silver so they didn’t chafe her skin, but they were titanium. Shifters were stronger than humans, but titanium was still titanium.

Sniffing the air around her, she had a feeling Ethan had dumped her in his brother’s office because she could smell his familiar pine scent. She could also hear Ethan on the phone downstairs talking to who she assumed was Owen and knew her time alone was limited. Since she had on cuffs he probably didn’t think she was much of a threat. It’s not as if she could shift to her jaguar form like this. Well, she could, but her arms and legs in cat form were a lot bigger and she wasn’t positive the change would break the cuffs. If it didn’t, she’d be in serious pain.

She didn’t plan to stick around long enough to see why this crazy wolf had kidnapped her. Thankfully Ethan had cuffed her hands in the front so she had some mobility. Quietly riffling through the top drawers of the giant oak desk, she smiled when she finally found a very slim letter opener. It was as long as a screwdriver but much thinner and flatter. The cuffs on her wrist were thicker than normal and so was the lock opening. Picking up the end of the opener with her mouth, she slid the shiny tip into the circular opening.

A slam sounded from downstairs. Shouts followed. Her heart beat erratically. She recognized that voice. Owen.

No, no, no.

Forcing her hands to remain calm, she began twisting the opener with her mouth. She’d done this before—of course she’d had better tools then but she knew exactly…click. The tiny lever inside sprung free, releasing her manacles.

As they fell from her wrists, the door flew open, slamming against the back wall with a sickening crash. She felt as if her heart actually stopped for a moment. Everything around her funneled out as she stared into the clearest blue eyes she’d ever seen. Owen had always been big, but he’d grown even taller since she’d last seen him. He was probably six-foot three now. And he had that GQ thing going on. Tall, strong jaw, incredibly broad shoulders and muscles that couldn’t be disguised by a mere T-shirt. His blue-black hair and blue eyes gave him an exotic, appealing look. Of course she could see the wolf lurking beneath the surface. Just a hint of danger that even humans wouldn’t be able to ignore.

“Gabriela,” he whispered, some foreign emotion injected into that one word.

That broke the spell. Fisting the cuffs, she chucked them at his head and turned, diving for the glass window. Unlike wolf shifters, her change to animal form was seamless. Her clothes and shoes shredded as she became a jaguar. Vaguely, as if from a great distance, she heard Owen cursing behind her, but she didn’t pause in her escape. Drawing on the strength of her hind legs she used the window frame as a springboard—and tried to ignore the pain of the glass slicing into her paws—to propel herself to the oak tree.

The sun had risen farther in the sky, illuminating everything for her, not that she needed it with her extrasensory abilities. Nimbly, she jumped from branch to branch until she hit the dirt running. She could hear the sound of a growl behind her, but ignored it. If Owen or Ethan thought they could kidnap her and hold her hostage, they’d have to catch her first.

As a jaguar, she was a heck of a lot faster than them. Her family wasn’t native to this area, and with the exception of the local doctor, they were the only jaguar shifters living in Montana that she knew of. Still, she could travel these woods blind. First she needed to know she had outrun her pursuers. Then she was going to figure out why a member of the Wright pack had kidnapped her in broad daylight. And there was going to be hell to pay.

* * *

Owen wrenched his shirt off and raced out of his office, heading down the stairs.

“I’ll radio the guys on perimeter duty to track her,” Ethan said as he hurried after him.

It took all of Owen’s restraint not to knock his brother out right now. He’d actually kidnapped Gabriela in some misguided attempt to force her family to reveal who had been behind the recent jaguar killings in the area. It didn’t matter that Ethan had admitted the gun hadn’t been loaded. Gabriela hadn’t known that.

Owen barely kept from snarling. “Radio everyone and tell them to give her a wide berth. No one is to go after her.” His inner wolf was clawing at the surface and right about now he was ready to slice his brother to shreds for putting shackles on Gabriela.

“But—”

Owen whipped around and had his brother slammed up against the outside wall of the cabin before he even realized he’d curled his fist around Ethan’s neck. “I’m your Alpha and you’ll do as I say. Anyone touches her, they’ll answer to me. And I’ll punish you for it, too.”

With wide eyes, his brother coughed out an “okay.”

Not bothering to wait and see if Ethan followed his orders, Owen finished stripping and shifted to his wolf form. Unlike the beauty of Gabriela’s shift, which he’d seen hundreds of times back when they’d been friends, his was more brutal. He held in a growl as his body underwent the change. Bones broke, shifted and realigned with a painful burst as fur quickly grew, covering what had once been skin.

Then he was running. He raced through the forest, tracking her sweet honeydew scent. When he’d received that call from his brother telling him what Ethan had done, Owen had seen red. He hadn’t seen Gabriela in about nine years and hadn’t spoken to her in ten. Not since he’d been seventeen years old and stupid and had screwed up the best thing in his life.

She’d been his best friend and he’d hoped they’d be more. But he’d lost even her friendship. It had made his decision to join the army at eighteen easy. Some days it was hard to believe so much time had passed since he’d spoken to her.

He bounded over icy patches of dirt and grass, barely feeling the cold. As a shifter he had a higher body temperature anyway, but right now all his focus was on finding Gabriela. He felt practically numb as he strained to run faster, faster.

That familiar sexual hunger he’d experienced when he was a teenager was back, only this time it was stronger, needier. His entire body craved her in a way he didn’t quite understand. Or didn’t want to.

Back then he’d been too stupid to realize what she was to him. Then he’d somehow hurt her and it had been too late to explore what might have been. She’d refused to see him. Absolutely wouldn’t talk to him or take his calls and hell, at seventeen he’d been full of pride. He hadn’t been willing to beg her to explain what he’d done wrong.

Now he had to talk to her. To see her and convince his inner wolf she was real. Her honey-brown hair was shorter than it had been years ago, falling a few inches below her shoulders. She was still tall, about five-feet ten, and lean and lithe. The way she moved as a human mirrored her movements as a jaguar and it had always fascinated him.

Now her speed and agility frustrated him.

The deeper into his territory he went, he realized where she was headed. Owen’s father had been Alpha before him—right up until the day he’d died five years ago—and had given the Segura family an area of the forest to hunt. With the growing attacks against humans lately, Owen had rescinded his father’s offer and taken back his pack’s land. It had been a difficult choice, but he’d needed to calm his pack’s growing anger.

But she wouldn’t know that. She probably assumed the cabin her family had once used to store extra changes of clothes and food was still protected.

Instead of following her trail toward the river bed where he knew she was headed in an attempt to try to cover her scent before doubling back to the cabin, he ran west toward the cabin in her family’s former territory. Why follow her when he could just beat her to her final destination?

Once he neared the small building, he slowly circled, making sure he was alone. Then he rolled around in pine boughs to mask his scent before he shifted to his human form. Using a side window that was unlocked, he climbed inside and found himself in one of the guest rooms. The place had the bare minimum of furniture but he found clothes that fit him and settled down to wait, bracing for the coming confrontation.