She took it from Jayde, examining the small half-moon logo. "Midnight Liaisons. A dating agency? Seriously?"
"A dating agency for, you know." She sniffed meaningfully as if pointing out her unique shifter scent, and gave Estrella a firm look. "You should call them."
"I don't know. Like they're going to have more luck finding me a guy who wants to be a dad as of next week?
"Just do it," Jayde told her. "I've gone out on lots of dates through them. There's a lot out there if you don't mind a little....variety in the gene pool."
"Mind? Remember that you're talking to a liger?"
Jayde pretended to crane her neck to stare up at Estrella. "Oh, I didn't forget."
"All right, ladies! Gather around and we'll begin." The too-chipper blonde at the back of the room waved a hand tipped with hot-pink nails, indicating that they should all move closer to her.
Estrella took a deep sigh to settle her nerves. She got up from the empty table she was occupying and moved to the center of the room, in front of the blonde. She counted five other women clustered nearby, and sized up the competition. Badger, rat, lynx, fox, and harpy, if her nose told her anything. Okay, well, she was the largest predator of the group. She supposed that was good.
She was a foot taller than anyone except the harpy, whom she only towered over by six inches. Damn. She was going to stick out like a sore thumb.
"Hi everyone! My name is Ryder, and I'll be the coordinator for our event tonight." The event hostess flashed them all a dimpled, candy-pink smile, her big blue eyes bright with excitement. "For those of you that have never participated in the 'Speed Mating' event, I'll go over the rules of our game very quickly. Does everyone have their name badge?"
Estrella touched the "Hello, My Name Is #6" badge stuck to her sweater, trying not to feel like an idiot. An optimistic idiot, which made things worse, because this was a set-up that seemed bound for failure, and yet the dating coordinators had assured her that they had great success with these kinds of events.
So she was hopeful. The more she thought about it, the more she wanted this possible baby, which meant finding someone who could be the father she needed for her child...within the space of about a week. Someone whom she could see sharing such a big part of her life with. Someone who wouldn't gross her out when she thought about sharing her heat with them. God.
"Each one of you has been assigned a number," Ryder said in a chirpy voice that was almost shrill as she strove to speak over the group. "You're going to sit at your numbered tables and one man will join each of you. You will have the chance to talk for five minutes, and then I'm going to ring the bell. When I ring the bell, each man is going to get up and move to the next table, and we'll cycle through all of our bachelors in that manner." She held up a small scorecard. "You'll have a card at each of your tables. If you like the man, make a mark under his number. You'll be turning in your card to me. If you and your date both mark your card as interested in the other, we have a match and I'll be contacting you both to coordinate a date. If there's no match, you can always come back next week. Any questions, ladies?"
The group was silent. Estrella wondered if they were half as impatient as she was. She just wanted to get things moving.
"All right, then! Please take a seat at your table and once everyone is ready, we'll bring in the men."
Estrella found table number six in the corner. A bottle of wine had been left, uncorked, on the table. That was nice - get them all boozed up before the men came in so the odds of making a match were better. She poured herself a glass and tipped it back, drinking quickly. Thanks to her liger metabolism, she'd need a couple more glasses downed at the same speed to even give her a bit of a buzz. It seemed to help her frame of mind, though.
She poured another glass and sipped as she picked up the card, examining it. There were no names - not surprising, since she was wearing a sticker that said her name was 'Six,' but it seemed a bit silly and juvenile to her. What was the harm in sharing names? She'd be able to tell what kind of shifter each man was as soon as he sat down, thanks to her enhanced senses. It'd be a parade of men - and a variety of shifters if the female pool was any indication.
For some reason, that thought made her uneasy, and she reached for the wine again, pouring herself another glass. Maybe she needed to get good and sauced before this started. It'd probably be her last opportunity to get drunk before the baby thing, or at least it would be if she got a decent date out of this.
The bell rang. "Date number one is about to arrive, ladies," Ryder announced. "As soon as everyone is seated, the timer will begin. Remember, you'll have five minutes for each date."
Estrella finished draining her wine and began to pour another glass as men filed into the back room of the restaurant. Each table was sequestered away from the others, and no one wandered too close. She could have craned her neck and peered at everyone, but that would have seemed overly obvious – and eager – so she forced herself not to. She flared her nostrils instead, trying to pick out individual scents. She smelled cougar, and the harpy, and...garlic bread. Lots and lots of garlic bread. Damn it. Now she was hungry.
A familiar scent enveloped her nostrils a split second before a massive, hulking form pulled the chair out and sat down across from her. Estrella looked up in surprise to see Vic, his hair still wet from a shower, black t-shirt stretched tight over his chest.
She sputtered at the sight of him, nearly spraying wine across the white linen tablecloth. When she was able to choke down a gasp of breath, she wheezed, "What are you doing here?"
He scowled blackly. "I came to supervise and that horrible little blonde insisted that I sit down on these stupid dates because she had someone cancel."
"Supervise? Excuse me?"
"Supervise," he agreed. "You're in a special situation, so the agency reached out to your alpha just to be on the safe side."
"Oh, I didn't know that."
"You should have. It was in the paperwork."
That would assume that she had actually paid attention to the paperwork. She'd been a little too fidgety to sit and read the ten-page disclosure. Estrella fiddled with her wine glass. "Well, it's nice of you to take an interest, I suppose."
"I have to take an interest. Your child is going to be part of my clan. I'll be his - or her - alpha." His dark gaze settled on her face. "Even if you can't find a decent father for your child, your alpha will be at your side."
Tears welled up in her eyes. That was so sweet. Hell, now she was getting emotional. Her own father hadn't stuck around to take care of her mother, and her mother had never forgotten it. Estrella couldn't forget it either. "What if I find a different kind of shifter? A fox or a wolf or something? Then my child will only be one eighth tiger--"
"Still a tiger," he told her firmly. "Or I wouldn't be here."
For some reason, that made her feel warm with acceptance. She'd never seen this side of Vic. He'd never told her that he didn't care how much tiger blood someone had running through their veins. She'd always felt like such an outsider. But, looking at his determined face, she wondered how much of it was truly real and how much of her insecurities she had projected on the others.
She couldn’t know. "Thank you," she said softly again.
"Don't thank me. Just keep me away from that matchmaker woman before she signs me up for another event."
Estrella smothered the laugh bubbling in her throat, because she knew Vic wouldn't appreciate it. "So Ryder talked you into speed dating?"
"Speed mating," he corrected. "And that woman doesn't seem to understand the meaning of the word 'no'."
"I'm sure it comes in handy for her job." Estrella could just imagine the small, perky blonde trying to deal with the assortment of customers the agency probably saw over a regular basis. "Cheer up, Vic. Maybe you'll find yourself a nice mate."