Tiger Magic

CHAPTER SIX

Carly yelped and jammed her hand to her chest. “Connor,” she said, gasping. “Don’t do that. I thought you’d gone.”

“Not me.” Connor moved to the counter with natural grace—Feline grace, Carly supposed. “I was told to look out for you, and I’m doing it.” Connor leaned his arms on the counter and gazed with interest at Yvette’s open canvas bag. “Are those shallots in there? And bell peppers? Our Sean makes them into a kick-ass ratatouille. Only he calls it Irish stew.”

Armand came to stand next to Yvette, and Connor extended a young and sinewy hand at them from the end of a well-muscled arm. “I’m Connor. Connor Morrissey. Who are you, if you don’t mind my asking?”

They kept staring at him, taking in his Collar above his T-shirt, his good-natured tanned face, his tall Shifter body. His eyes, cobalt blue like both his uncles’, were watchful. He and Walker had much the same look, Carly realized, except Connor smiled.

“It’s all right,” Carly said quickly to Connor. “This is Armand, my boss, and his wife, Yvette. They’re friends, good friends.”

“I’m seeing that.” Connor leaned the slightest bit forward, inhaling a little. “Not a threat.”

“Where’d you disappear to?” Carly asked nervously. “I thought Dr. Brennan and that Walker guy were a threat.”

“Yes, and it wouldn’t be so good if someone from the Shifter Bureau found a Shifter in your house, would it?” Connor asked, his friendly look unwavering. “I laid low. Not so low I couldn’t get back in here if you needed me, plus I took the opportunity to call Liam.” He showed the cell phone in his hand, then shoved it into his pocket. “I gave him the all clear just now, but he might overreact. Liam does sometimes.” He shrugged, as though the actions of his uncle were unfathomable to him.

“Overreact how?” Carly asked.

“He might send reinforcements. His trackers. Don’t worry, it will take a few minutes for them to get here, and Liam might change his mind.”

“How many more?” Yvette demanded. She took three red peppers out of her bag. “I only brought so much.”

Connor gestured to her. “Cook for Carly. She needs it. Ronan and Ellison aren’t much into fancy food anyway. Sean’s the gourmet.”

Yvette took a chef’s knife out of her bag. Connor watched her very closely, but Yvette only rinsed off the peppers, cored them, and started chopping them, then the shallots. Armand had water boiling on the stove, and Yvette briefly plunged tomatoes into the pot to split their skins so she could peel them and then chop them up.

Carly stood in kind of a daze while Yvette went through the soothing motions of cooking. Connor watched Yvette’s every move as she oiled a sauté pan and tossed the vegetables and tomatoes into it.

Armand uncorked a bottle of dark red wine, poured a glass, and shoved it at Carly. Connor had already helped himself to the beer Carly had left on the counter when Brennan arrived.

“Tell us what happened to you,” Armand said.

The wine, the warmth in the house, and the smell of one of Yvette’s excellent meals in the making loosened Carly’s tongue. She told them the story, without inflection, without crying, holding it all in as the words came out. She told them about giving Tiger a ride, finding Ethan with the other woman, forgetting about Tiger as she rushed away from Ethan’s, and Tiger getting shot by Ethan and ending up in the hospital.

Her friends listened in shock, horror, and sympathy. Yvette took out her anger by banging the vegetables around in the pan.

“He cannot shoot people and get away with it,” Armand said, thunder in his voice. “A Shifter is a person, eh? Like this one.” He gestured with his wineglass at Connor. “I could never shoot him. He looks like my nephew.”

“Glad to hear it.” Connor winked. “I wouldn’t shoot you either.”

“Ethan must be arrested,” Armand said.

“He’ll claim self-defense,” Carly said. She drained her glass and reached for the wine bottle to pour another. “That’s what he did when he shot his new pool man in the leg last year. Poor kid climbed the fence because the gate hadn’t been unlocked for him. Ethan saw him, said he thought he was a burglar, and shot at him. Ethan was very apologetic and paid the hospital bill, but he was never arrested for it, and the kid lost a year’s worth of work. Ethan knows powerful people.”

“As do I,” Armand said without modesty. “I will call my lawyer. The Shifters can sue Ethan if the police will do nothing. And you shall sue him for breach of contract.”

“No.” Carly lifted her hands, still holding her glass of wine. “If the Shifters want to go after him, fine. But I don’t want to face Ethan again. Not in a courtroom, not through lawyers. I’m done. It’s over.” Tears stung her eyes. No use crying, she told herself. Good riddance. “At least I found out he was a lying, cheating scumbag before the wedding.”

The tears spilled from her eyes anyway. Today had been horrible, horrible. A person didn’t walk away from a two-year relationship and an engagement with a laugh and a shrug.

“Carly.” Armand was there with another hug.

“He will be sorry,” Yvette said matter-of-factly.

“Spike and Sean will scare the shite out of him,” Connor said. “Trust me.”

“He’ll shoot them too,” Carly said, worried.

“No, he won’t. Sean’s very good at talking people out of hurting anyone, including himself. And Spike just has to stand there. They’ll be fine.”

Carly broke away from Armand. She drained the last of her wine again and poured another glass. Armand always brought the best wine—smooth, full-bodied, a caress for the tongue. The wine went down easily and made her stomach feel better.

She raised her glass. “To Spike and Sean.” Connor clinked his bottle against her glass, and Carly drank. “And to Tiger. Bless him.”

Again she and Connor toasted and drank. Yvette served up the sauté with thin strips of beef she’d precooked and a smattering of mushrooms. She deglazed the pan with a little of the wine to make a tasty sauce and put everything neatly on a plate for Carly.

“The best medicine,” Yvette said. “Good food, good friends. You eat now.”

Carly sat on a stool next to Connor at the counter and pushed the food around the plate. Because Yvette’s cooking shouldn’t be sneered at, but mostly because Yvette was standing over her giving her a steely look, Carly ate.

The mixture of peppers, mushrooms, tomatoes, meat, and wine was heavenly, but it felt leaden on Carly’s tongue. Life was indeed tragic when she couldn’t appreciate one of Yvette’s meals.

“Let’s not talk about it,” Carly said, pouring herself more wine. The bottle released its last drop, but Armand had brought more. “How was the exhibit opening? From the fact that you didn’t instantly fire me, I take it you sold a piece?”

“Three.” Armand’s smile beamed out. “And interest in more. That young man is on fire.”

“Good,” Carly said. “Good.” At least someone’s day had gone well.

More food and more wine disappeared, but Carly stopped following the conversation. Exhaustion, worry, heartbreak, and too much alcohol was taking its toll, and taking it fast. Connor ate a helping of the meal and talked easily with Yvette and Armand, telling them more about the events of the day. They started discussing Brennan and Walker, speculating about what they really wanted, but Carly was finished.

She slid off the stool, ready to explain that they could all leave now so she could shower and lie down. She found her legs buckling, and only Connor’s strong arms kept her from sliding to the floor.

“I’m all right,” she said. “I jus’ need to rest.” Carly heard the slur in her words and started to laugh.

“I will put you to bed,” Yvette said. “Come.”

She held out her long, slim arm. Carly grabbed the wine bottle and her glass as she let Yvette take her back into her bedroom. Once inside, Carly poured another glass and spun around, laughing. “I feel so free. No more Ethan, no more sitting around his pool or taking one of his fancy cars to go shopping. Damn, I would have hated that life.” Carly stopped spinning, but the room kept on going. “No, I wouldn’t have. I wanted to be a pampered puddle. I mean, a pumpered poodle. A . . .”

“You lie down. You sleep. You will feel better.”

Sure she would. Yvette took the bottle and glass out of Carly’s hands and gently but firmly guided her to the bed.

Carly didn’t remember much after that, but she supposed Yvette had gotten her to settle down and sleep, because the next thing she knew, Carly was waking up, her mouth like cotton, her head pounding, her stomach in knots.

She slid out of bed, noting that the house was dark and silent, the clock beside the bed telling her it was three in the morning. Carly staggered to the bathroom, sacrificed Yvette’s great meal to the toilet, then washed her face and got ready for the next long trek—down the hall to the kitchen. As tempting as it had been to drink from the bathroom tap, Austin water wasn’t the way to go on a roiling stomach. Carly needed bottled water. Cold. Lots of it.

The rest of the house was quiet, but a nightlight shone in the kitchen. Yvette and Armand must have gone home a while ago.

Connor? A glance around the kitchen showed her that it was empty, but at least someone had done the dishes. Everything gleamed. Probably Armand had cleaned up, as he usually did after Yvette cooked. She felt a moment of gratitude toward him.

Carly pulled open the refrigerator and took out a gallon jug of water. She thought about reaching for a glass.

“To hell with it.” She upended the jug and drank straight from it, swallow after swallow. She wiped her mouth, noting that she’d dribbled plenty of water onto her T-shirt, but she felt slightly better.

Not much though. She needed aspirin. Her purse in the living room was closer than the bathroom, which was all the way back down the hall.

Sipping again from the gallon jug, Carly made her way into the dark living room, navigating by the light from the kitchen. She thought she’d dropped the purse behind the chair when the weird professor and his soldier had come in, but she couldn’t remember. She couldn’t remember anything about yesterday except Ethan’s bare butt going back and forth as he banged the woman on the counter, and . . .

Carly snapped on the lamp to look for her purse. And let out a shriek.

Tiger was sitting on her couch. Not really sitting—lounging back with his long legs stretched out in front of him. The light burnished the orange in his black hair, and his yellow eyes glittered.

Connor lay on his back on the floor, his knees up, one arm over his eyes, breathing softly. He was asleep, but Tiger was wide awake and watching Carly.

Carly realized she was in a T-shirt that came to her thighs and a pair of panties, and that was it. Her long legs were bare, and there was nothing between herself and the T-shirt but empty air.

“What in the hell are you doing here?” The words came out as a croak.

“Protecting you,” Tiger said. “You are my mate.”

Carly looked wildly from Tiger to Connor and back again. “Protecting me from what? And what are you doing out of bed? Weren’t you supposed to rest, take your meds, and get better?”

“I am better.” Tiger slid his shirt up his stomach to reveal his abdomen—the skin whole and unbroken, with only round pink scars to show where the bullets had gone in. The rest of his abdomen was as hard, flat, tanned, and well-muscled as the rest of him. The man must work out three times a day.

Carly stared in surprise. “How in the hell . . . ?”

“I heal fast. Andrea helped. So did the touch of my mate.”

“Andrea? Who’s Andrea?”

Connor answered from the floor, sleepy but alert. “Sean’s mate. She’s half Fae. Has healing magic.”

“Oh. Right.”

Tiger lowered his shirt. “I protect you from the man who waits outside for you.”

“What man?” Carly went for the window, but suddenly Tiger was there next to her, holding her back.

“Wait.” Tiger snapped off the lamp, rendering the room dark again.

How he’d gotten off the couch so fast, Carly didn’t know, but he led her to the dark back window, stopping her a few feet from it, and gestured outside.

Carly saw absolutely nothing. No sinister figure waiting in the dark, no figure at all. “Where?”

“He hides well. Connor saw him and called me.”

“I think it’s that Walker guy,” Connor said. He rose from the floor in one sinuous motion, gaining his feet without making any noise. “Or one of his squad.”

“Why?” Carly glanced out the window again, but she still couldn’t see Walker or anyone else. “You have to be dreaming this.”

“He’s there,” Tiger said. “Between the shadow of the fence and the tree. He’s chosen a good place. He can look in here but not be seen. At least, not by a human.”

“Shifters can see in the dark,” Connor said. “Especially Felines. Trust me, he’s there. I called Liam, and Tiger came.”

“Why on earth should Walker be watching my house?”

Carly looked once more where Tiger indicated, but she still couldn’t see anything . . . No, there. Something moved.

The glint vanished as quickly as it had appeared, whoever was out there disappearing into the shadows again.

“They want to know how much you have to do with Shifters,” Connor said. “Brennan asked you to spy on us, right?”

“For his research project or whatever. He’s an anthropologist.”

“Sure,” Connor said. “All I heard from him was he wanted you to get to know us and report to him. He can dress it up, but that sounds like spying to me. He wants Shifter secrets.”

“Shifters have secrets?”

Connor raised his hands and looked innocent. “Do we? I don’t know what you’re talking about. We’re sweet and innocent. Honest.”

“You’re full of shit,” Carly said, wanting to laugh.

“So’s Brennan. He’s tried to get himself into Shiftertown before. Slimy bastard, he is.”

“He creeped me out a little too,” Carly said. “But why does Walker need to spy on me? I don’t know any Shifter secrets. I keep telling everyone, I’d never met any Shifters until today. I mean yesterday.”

“We will ask him,” Tiger said. He started for the kitchen in that fluid, silent way he moved.

Carly ran after him and seized him by the arm. “Wait, wait. What are you doing?”

Connor was across the room to them, his eyes wide as he took in Carly and Tiger. But he was alarmed more, Carly thought, because she’d grabbed hold of Tiger. Body language again. Connor was trying to protect her, but right now, not from the guy outside.

Tiger did nothing but look down at Carly with his golden eyes that no longer held outrageous pain. He’d returned to the quiet watchfulness he’d exhibited when he’d helped her fix the car on the side of the road.

“The best way to find out what he wants is to ask him,” Tiger said, patience in his voice.

“But he has a gun . . .” Carly sighed and released him. “And you’ve already proven those don’t slow you down, not for long anyway.”

“He might have a tranq,” Connor pointed out. “Or two.”

“He does not have a tranquilizer, only a pistol,” Tiger said.

Connor blinked. “And you know that how?”

“Sight and scent.” Tiger spoke in clipped tones, like a soldier readying himself to confront his enemy. “Protect Carly while I find him.”

Connor sighed, resigned. “You’re the super Shifter. Be careful, all right? I don’t want to have to explain to Liam why I lost you.”

Tiger answered by fading down the hall toward Carly’s bedroom. Carly followed, not nearly as silently, her bare feet pattering on the floor.

Tiger ignored Carly’s bed and her clothes, which had been neatly folded over a chair—by Yvette, probably—and noiselessly pulled up the blinds on her window. Then he started taking off his clothes.

Tiger stripped all the way down, getting out of his clothes as smoothly and quietly as he did everything else. He was nicely proportional, strength showing in the sculpted muscles of his shoulders, the flat planes of his chest, the firm length of his back.

He had a great ass too, as tight and good as the rest of him. Carly had seen at the hospital what hung between his legs in front, but even so, looking at it again made her mouth a little dry. “Maybe I’m still drunk,” she said. “But Tiger . . . Oh my God, you are hot.”

Tiger barely acknowledged her, and Carly realized after a moment that he didn’t know what she meant.

The next second, any words of explanation were pouring back down her throat, because Tiger changed into a . . . tiger.

He did it rapidly, easily, limbs sliding from human down into the bent haunches and massive paws of a Bengal. Fur rippled across his body, orange with black stripes, a tail extending to brush the floor.

He was gigantic, bigger than any tiger Carly had seen at a zoo. Her large bedroom was now a tight fit.

Connor sighed as he pressed his way around Tiger to the window. “He always does this. Shifts and then makes me open the windows and doors for him. Quiet now.”

Connor slid up Carly’s double-hung window, which gave on to the side of the house. Tiger put his paws on the sill.

“What’s he doing?” Carly whispered frantically. “He won’t fit.”

“He will. Watch.”

How the hell Tiger got out the window when he was twice the size of the opening, Carly never understood. As a little girl, she’d had a cat that could flatten herself to crawl into the two-inch-high space under her dresser, but this was even more startling.

Maybe it was the magic of being a Shifter, but damned if Tiger didn’t compact himself down and squirt through the window. He landed on the other side, went into an instant predatory crouch, and slunk into the darkness. Carly lost sight of him in a matter of seconds.

“Crap, I thought he’d wait for me.” Connor put his head and shoulders out the window and climbed through with far less grace than Tiger had.

“It’ll be okay, right?” Carly whispered. “Walker can’t hurt Tiger with his gun, and Tiger can’t hurt him.”

Connor landed on his feet outside. “Oh, I’d say Tiger can do whatever the hell he’s wanting to.”

“I mean, Tiger can’t attack him. The Collar will stop him. That’s what it’s for, isn’t it?”

“Shite.” Connor’s whisper was agitated. “Shite. Shite. That’s what he’s after. Stay here.”

Screw that. As Connor faded into the darkness, Carly grabbed her jeans and tugged them on, then stuffed her feet into sandals. She sat on the sill, swung her legs around, slithered through the window, and landed with a thump on a patch of grass that needed mowing. Carly reflected, as she started jogging toward the backyard, that at oh dark thirty in the morning, the air was at least cool.

She heard a muffled shout and then Tiger’s growl, long and low. The rage in the sound was unmistakable, a wild animal ready to kill.

“No!” Carly heard Connor’s agitated voice. “Crap. No. Stop it, now. Aw, Liam’s gonna kill me.”