“Shit,” she barked again and scrambled back.
“What’s wrong?”
“Uh…” The tiger moved forward, his big body raising up out of the grass. He shook himself, the puppy tumbling off. He caught the little beast between his teeth by the back of its neck. Angie flinched. She really had no desire to watch a dog become anyone’s lunch. Really. But the puppy hung from the tiger’s mouth without any fear.
The tiger walked forward slowly, eventually dropping the puppy at Angie’s feet. She scooped him up and backed away until her ass sat back on the lounger.
The tiger watched her for several very long seconds. Then he charged into the woods.
“Are you still there?”
“What? Oh. Yeah. I’m here.”
“What’s going on?”
“Tiger antics.”
“Don’t ever turn your back on one.”
“Excuse me?”
“Tigers. They attack from behind.”
Angie closed her eyes on a sigh. “Good God, you’ve been reading.”
“It’s what I do. Research.”
The tiger returned, a rabbit in his mouth. Unlike the puppy, the rabbit didn’t fair too well. The tiger dropped the bloody carcass in the middle of Nik’s lawn, and looked at her expectantly.
Another tiger, this one’s marking different from Nik’s as well, wandered out of the woods. He caught sight of the other tiger. Looked at Angie. Then the dead rabbit. He turned and charged back into the woods. After a few moments. He trotted in with his own rabbit. A bigger one. He dropped it on top of the first one.
“Uh-oh.”
“What uh-oh?”
The two tigers glared at each other, and charged back into the woods.
“Something’s going on.”
“Something bad?”
“Not for me.”
They returned, each carrying a deer. One held a doe, the other a buck. They dropped their prey, roared at each other, turned and charged back into the woods yet again.
Angie giggled. “Dude, this is gettin’ weird.”
“How weird?”
“Well, I could be wrong but…I think I’m being wooed—tiger style.”
“What does that entail?”
“So far? Rabbit and deer.”
“What?”
The brothers returned, both carrying their own elk. They dragged and dropped them on the pile. Then one slapped the other in the head with his paw. The other hit him back. Before she knew it, they turned into a mass of snarling, biting, slashing stripes.
“What the hell is that noise?”
“Cat fight.”
“They’re fighting over you?”
“I don’t know.”
“They are so fighting over you.” Miki laughed. “Angelina and those mighty legs strike again.”
“Oh, shut up.”
“You’re wearing shorts, aren’t you?”
“Shut up!”
A third tiger charged out of the woods. Nik. She easily recognized his markings now.
Using his massive jaws, he grabbed one brother by the scruff of the neck, flinging him into the woods. The other went to follow, but Nik knocked him back with a well-placed paw. Then he chased that brother in the opposite direction.
“It’s all clear. Big brother handled it.”
“I swear, everywhere you go—”
“Oh, shut up!”
Nik returned. He trotted past Angelina, barely glancing in her direction and ungracefully belly-flopped into his pool.
Angie laughed again.
“What?”
“Nothing. Just Tiger-Nik jumped into his pool. Like that goofy fat kid in eighth grade swim class.”
“Well, I read that tigers love water. And they don’t purr.”
“This one purrs.”
“Really?” Angie could hear Miki “thinking”. “Interesting. Tigers are the one cat that doesn’t. It must be the human in him.”
Shaking her head and smiling, Angie watched the seven-hundred-pound beast splash around like a little kid.
“Look, Angie. Are you sure you’re okay? Really?” Miki’s concern for her bled through the phone connection and it warmed Angie’s hard heart.
“I’m doing fine, Mik. The man took me shopping. I spent twenty thousand dollars of his money, and he didn’t even blink an eye. Nor did he ask for sex.”
“You must have terrified another one.”
I wish. Angie chuckled as she watched Nik pull himself out of his pool.
She froze, that chuckle caught in the back of her throat. He’d shifted back to human. Naked human. Nik stood up, shaking the water from his hair. The bright midday sun made his skin look like the gods had bronzed it just for her. Every muscle perfectly formed and begging to be touched.
Her mind stopped functioning. Her heart felt like it would burst out of her chest and she openly stared at him. She couldn’t help herself. She couldn’t turn away. She was mesmerized.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
“Angie? Are you listening?”
Nope. She couldn’t hear a damn thing. Nothing. Everything else, even her best friend, blocked out by this man’s beauty.
Her eyes trailed down his hard body and she saw it. His cock. And like him, it was perfect.
She swallowed.
“Calling Angelina Santiago! Come in, Angie!”
Nik walked toward her, water dripping down every long, wonderful inch of him. With his long legs, it took him no time to reach her chair. He crouched next to her and gently, with one of those big hands, closed her mouth.
“Catchin’ flies, sugar?”
His hand slid across her chin and down her neck. Then it kept going. For an ecstatic moment, she thought he would cup her breast. But, instead, his hand petted the puppy she still had in her grip.
Nik leaned in close, his hot breath against her ear. Softly, so only she could hear, “And, sugar, if you’re gonna sit out on that balcony at night, half-naked, smellin’ so sweet and sighing like you just had the best fuck of your life, then you might as well put a leash around my neck and call me yours.”
He pulled away, gave her the biggest shit-eatin’ grin she’d ever seen, and went back into his house.
“Angie! Either you answer me or I’m coming out there my goddamn self!”
“Don’t you dare!” Whoa. She didn’t mean to yell that. Or sound so hysterical. But Jesus Christ, who was this guy? She took a calming breath and licked her lips. “I mean. The important thing right now is that Pack baby.”
“Stop calling her that!”
Nik pulled his front door open and his sister and cousin stormed in, carrying armloads of dresses.
“Where is she?” Reena demanded.
“Angelina?”
“You got some other Yankee livin’ with you at the moment?”
“Bite your tongue. Like I’d have a Yankee in my house. She’s a Texan.”
“Come on.” Kisa motioned to the stairs. “She’s probably in her room.”
The two females dashed up the stairs and Nik shook his head. He didn’t know what his sisters were up to, but he saw no claws, so he wasn’t too worried.
He started to close his front door but Ban and Aleksei walked up.
“Hey, bro!”
Nik closed the door in their faces and headed back to his office. He still had dead elk in his backyard.
“That’s not funny,” Ban yelled through the thick oak.
“Yes it is,” Nik cracked back.
Angie stared at herself in the full-length mirror. She wore two different shoes. Both high heels, both exceptionally hot.
She didn’t even look up when the banging on the door started.
“Fuck off. You said we weren’t leaving ’til seven.” She debated which shoes to wear. She didn’t want to think about it too much, but she wanted to look nice tonight.
“It’s us.”
She frowned. There was only one “us” in her life and they didn’t sound anything like that.
“Fuck off until seven.”
With no locks on the doors—damn shapeshifters—nothing stopped the two women from rushing into her room.
“I’m sorry. I don’t think I said come in.”
The smaller one stopped and stared down at Angie’s feet. “Oh, Lord, she’s even got cute shoes. We don’t have cute shoes.”
Turning to face them. “Who are you?”
“Don’t you remember us? You met us yesterday before you left with Nik.”
Angie shrugged. Very few people held her interest, especially from one day to the next.
The bigger one spoke. “I’m Nik’s cousin Reena. This is his sister Kisa.”
“Great. Now I’ve got the whole rootin’, tootin’ clan in here.”
“You gotta help us,” the smaller one begged.
“Help you? How?”
They dumped the clothes they had in their hands on the floor. Angie grabbed the first thing she saw and held it up.
“Going as a nun, are we?”
Reena nodded. “Exactly.”
“Ya see?” Kisa insisted. “Ya gotta help us.”
“Why me?”
“We saw those Pride whores today,” the taller one said. “They looked amazing.”
“It’s all over town you helped ’em.”
“That’s all over town?” Angie snorted. “Not a lot goes on around here in Shifterville, does it?”
“Look, you reek of style,” the smaller one offered. “We, however, don’t.”
Angie looked at the two women. The problem wasn’t their looks. They were gorgeous shapeshifters and you could barely make out those scars on their necks. But the little one could barely look her in the eye. Shy. The other one clearly a hard ass. Probably the one saddled with the constant responsibility of keeping the youngest boys in line. That task always seemed to fall to the oldest females.
Hell, who could it hurt? And, to be honest, she kind of enjoyed helping the fashion helpless.
“All right. Why not?” The two women smiled in relief and she gave a big grin. “But we need champagne to do this.”