Teasing The Tiger (Seneca Falls Shifters Book 5) Read online

  He collapsed on top of me, nuzzling my neck, his warm breath making me shiver. “Now, what was that you were saying about props?” he rasped.

  Chapter Seven

  Hannah

  I snuggled deeper into the blankets, feeling completely sated and enjoying the last remnants of a dream that involved Mitch and wildflowers. I slid my hand along the sheet, searching for his warm body, and found his side of the bed cool and empty. After the numerous times we’d made love, then spent the rest of the night entangled in each other’s arms, I’d hoped he cared enough to be around when I woke up in the morning.

  I should have known better than to want or expect something more from him. From what Leah had shared with me about her brother, I’d gleaned that he liked his solitary life and avoided relationships and the complications associated with them. It shouldn’t matter that I’d come to care for him a great deal over the last week. He wasn’t my mate, and in a few days, my vacation would end. I’d be going home and would most likely never see him again.

  I rolled onto my side, tamping down my disappointment at the upcoming loss and feeling as if I was a discarded one-night stand. Knowing I couldn’t hide from him forever and needed to get out of bed, I forced my eyes open with a groan and was greeted by a beautiful handpicked bouquet of pale purple blossoms he’d left for me on his pillow.

  Warmed by his thoughtfulness, I picked up one of the stems and placed the soft petals beneath my nose. “Oh my gosh.” I couldn’t believe I could actually smell its floral aroma. Giddy with the new revelation, I quickly sat up and sniffed to see if I could detect any other scents.

  Normally, I’d have to be standing close to something before I could get a good whiff of it, but not today. Today, I could smell the odors coming from the kitchen—freshly brewed coffee, along with pancakes and bacon.

  I rolled out of bed, pausing at the door when I remembered I was naked. Too excited to search for my nightgown or go back to my room for some clothes, I grabbed the nearest thing I could find, which happened to be Mitch’s T-shirt. His scent still clung to the fabric, and inhaling the enticing aroma as I slipped it over my head had my cat purring.

  I’d been able to smell Mitch before, but now that my allergies seemed to have cleared and weren’t hindering my cat’s sniffing abilities, his scent had grown even stronger, along with the urgent desire to find him.

  When I arrived in the kitchen, I found him standing in front of the stove, flipping pancakes. He had his back to me, so I took a moment to admire the way his pale blue shirt and black slacks conformed perfectly to his body. I could tell by his damp hair that he’d recently showered, and after one whiff knew he’d used a body wash scented with sandalwood and a hint of musk.

  I wasn’t entirely sure how he’d react if I walked up behind him and slipped my arms around his waist, so I resisted the urge. “Good morning,” I said as I padded across the cool tiles toward the kitchen island.

  “Good morning to you too.” He glanced over his shoulder, his dark gaze landing on the T-shirt I was wearing, his grin growing wider.

  I leaned against the edge of the counter. “You should have woken me up. I would’ve been more than happy to help with breakfast.”

  “You looked so peaceful that I didn’t have the heart to wake you. I have to go to work, but I was hoping to serve you breakfast in bed before I left.” He nodded toward the tray on the counter containing a set of silverware and an empty plate. He’d even added a clear glass vase and filled it with a single wildflower.

  No male had ever gone to this much trouble to impress me, and I felt guilty for ruining his surprise. “I could always go back to bed and pretend I’m sleeping.”

  After turning off the flame under the pan, he removed the last two cakes and dropped them on the plate containing the rest of the stack. “I have a better idea.” He set the spatula aside, then lifted me by the waist and sat me on the counter.

  Since I’d explored every inch of his body the previous night, I was familiar with the firm, rippling muscles on his shoulders I felt beneath my hands. What I hadn’t expected was the electrical tingle pulsing along my fingertips or the exhilarating sense of recognition that surged through my body and increased the beat of my heart.

  I gasped, afraid my difficulty breathing was the beginning of another panic attack.

  “Hannah, are you okay?” Mitch rubbed my arms.

  “I…” Leaning forward, I took another sniff of his neck to make sure I hadn’t imagined what my senses were telling me was true. “You’re…” I gasped some more.

  His brow furrowed. “Hannah, you need to breathe. You’re not making any sense.” He cupped my cheek, sending more pleasant tingles across my skin.

  Why I could feel the electrical charges now and not when he’d touched me before was baffling. Had my inability to scent properly been the reason I hadn’t recognized him earlier? “The pills…allergies gone…can smell everything.”

  “That’s a good thing, right?”

  For me, it was a wonderful thing. How Mitch was going to feel about it was an uncertainty I dreaded. After a bob of my head and a hard swallow, I rasped, “You’re my mate.”

  “What?” Shock flickered in his gaze, and the thumb caressing my cheek froze. “How is that possible?”

  I wanted to ask him if he was kidding and point out that he knew darned well it was possible because his sister was mated to a bear. Instead, I held my tongue.

  “Are you sure you’re not mistaken?”

  “Do you think I’d make something like this up?” I could accept him being as shocked as I was, but to ask me if I’d made a mistake over something this important was unacceptable. My temper flared, and I pushed against his chest until he moved so I could slide off the counter.

  He snagged my wrist to keep me from leaving. “No, that’s not what I’m saying at all. It’s just that I never imagined…”

  We were interrupted by the melodic chirp of his cell phone. By the third ring, he was growling and reaching around me to grab it off the counter. After glaring at whatever number had popped up, he roughly swiped his thumb across the screen. “This is Mitch.” He’d kept the anger out of his voice, but his frown deepened the longer he listened. “Tell him to keep her calm, that I’ll be there as fast as I can,” he said to whoever was on the other end of the line.

  After tucking his phone in his back pocket, he put his hands on my hips. “That was my afterhours service. There’s been an emergency, and I need to go.”

  “I understand.” I wanted to hear what he’d been about to say, but I wasn’t about to keep him from a life-threatening situation.

  “Can we talk about this when I get back?”

  If Mitch believed me, it was unclear whether or not he was happy about the revelation. “Yeah.” I agreed, hoping that whatever he had to say didn’t end with a rejection.

  He gave me a worried glance, pressed a kiss to my forehead, then hurried from the room.

  I’d lost my appetite and was no longer interested in the pancakes and bacon he’d made me for breakfast. I spent the next ten minutes putting the food in containers and cleaning up the kitchen before heading for my bedroom. At the moment, I couldn’t deal with reminders of the wonderful night we’d shared and didn’t bother stopping to grab my nightgown and underwear from Mitch’s room.

  When I reached my room, I plopped on the edge of the bed, wishing I hadn’t told Mitch he was my mate. If I had it to do over again, I would take my time, not blurt it out without preparing him first. I thought about the bottle of pills sitting in the kitchen and wondered if my life might have been better if I’d never taken the darn things. At least when I left Colorado, I would’ve had great memories of the time he and I had spent together, not the pain tearing me apart, knowing there was a good chance my mate didn’t want me.

  Chapter Eight

  Mitch

  I was Hannah’s mate.

  At first, I was shocked, but once reality set in, I was elated. It was all I could think abo
ut during the drive to Gabe Miller’s place. Gabe owned a nearby horse ranch that offered trail rides to visiting tourists. And because Berkley was a fantastic marketer who’d been able to work out a referral program with Gabe, both their businesses had benefitted financially.

  The emergency I’d been called to assist with was a mare who was having trouble delivering her first foal. The little guy had been breech, the delivery difficult. If I hadn’t arrived when I did there was a good chance Gabe would have lost the foal for sure, and possibly the mare.

  Luckily, his arrival into the world had gone well, with mother and son doing fine. I stood near the wall inside the stall and watched the foal wobble on unsteady legs as he attempted to suckle from his mother. His chestnut coat was the same rich shade as hers, but the white patch covering his forehead was much larger.

  “Thanks, Doc. I don’t know what I would have done if I’d lost both of them.” Gabe clapped me on the shoulder and gave me a haggard smile, no doubt the result of worry and exhaustion.

  A year ago, he’d installed cameras in the barn so he could monitor progress for any of his birthing mares. I had no idea if he used them, since I’d seen a rumpled sleeping bag and pillow on a portable cot in the walkway next to the row of stalls, a sure sign he’d spent most of the night in the building watching over her.

  “I’m glad everything turned out okay.” I grabbed a clean towel off a nearby stack and began wiping the drying blood off my arms.

  Gabe glanced at the sullied condition of my clothes. “You’re welcome to come inside and clean up, if you like.”

  I followed the direction of his gaze. The front of my shirt and the knees of my pants were covered in grime. No amount of scrubbing was going to make either of them presentable. “Thanks for the offer, but I think I’ll head home and change before going into town.”

  Now that the emergency was over, my thoughts returned to Hannah. I’d called Noah on my way to Gabe’s letting him know I’d be late and to make sure he didn’t have a problem covering my appointments.

  I was still kicking myself for the way I’d overreacted when she’d shared her news. Even worse was the guilt from seeing the pained expression on her face and knowing it was because she thought I was going to reject her.

  If not for the untimely call from my afterhours service, I would have taken her back to bed and shown her, possibly for hours, how important she was to me. I needed to make things right with Hannah and was sure Noah wouldn’t mind if I missed a couple more hours.

  “Not a problem. I’ll walk you out,” Gabe said.

  I picked my medical bag up off the straw covered ground as I walked out of the stall, then waited for Gabe to close the gate behind us. My truck was parked right outside the entrance to the barn, so we didn’t have far to go.

  “They both should be okay,” I said as I set my bag behind the driver’s seat, then hopped inside the vehicle. “But if you run into any problems, don’t hesitate to call me.”

  “Will do, and thanks again.”

  I waited for Gabe to move away from my truck before backing up and heading down the drive that would take me back to the main highway. I had just turned left onto the two-lane road when the automatic link to my phone rang through the truck’s speakers and Leah’s name appeared in the small screen on the dashboard.

  She was due to have the baby any day now, and I was concerned this might be the call. Not that I wasn’t excited for my new niece or nephew to arrive, but I wasn’t looking forward to any more interruptions that would keep me from getting home to Hannah. “Leah, is everything okay?”

  “No, everything is not okay.” Her tone grew anxious. It sounded like she was in a vehicle and had her phone on speaker.

  “Is it time? Do you need me to take you to the hospital? Do you need me to find Bryson?” I was rambling worse than Hannah did when she was close to panicking.

  “No, no, and no,” she stated emphatically.

  I tipped my head from side to side, trying to work out the tension in my neck. Lately, my sister’s hormones ruled her emotions. I hoped I wasn’t going to spend the next half hour placating her like I had the one and only time Bryson had teased her about looking like a basketball.

  “Then what’s wrong?”

  “It’s Hannah.”

  Hearing her name sent dread inching down my spine. “What about Hannah? Did something happen to her?”

  “I… She…”

  I heard some grumbling in the background, then Berkley’s much calmer voice came on the line. “Hey, Mitch, where are you?”

  “I just left Gabe’s place, and I’m on my way home.”

  “Good, that’s good,” she said.

  Having lost all patience, I snarled, “Berkley, what aren’t you telling me?”

  “Leah got a call from Glenda, who got a call from one of her cousins, who told her the rangers got a report that there was a tiger running loose on your property.”

  “How the heck could anyone have seen Hannah in her animal form on my property? She’s only been on one run since she started staying at my place, and that was a couple of days ago.” Then I remembered what Hannah had said about hearing something else in the woods with us. My land was secluded, too far off the main road to access accidentally. Was it possible my assumption that we’d disturbed a small creature been wrong, that someone had been following us?

  If that was the case, whoever had reported Hannah’s cat had to have seen her before she’d shifted. Since she heard the noise after she’d transformed, there was a good chance the person was also a shifter. If they were human and were hanging around before and after her change, they would have freaked out and reported what they’d seen to the local newspaper, not the ranger station.

  I couldn’t shake the feeling that this was somehow personal, but no matter how much I analyzed what I knew, I couldn’t figure out why.

  “I don’t know, but it’s only a matter of time before someone shows up at your place to verify the information,” Berkley said.

  Hannah had no way of knowing about the new report or that someone might show up to try to trap her cat. “Did you call Hannah to let her know?” I asked, tempted to disconnect the line and make the call myself. If she stayed in the house and didn’t shift when she went outside, it wouldn’t matter if she got a visit from a ranger. But now that she no longer had any issues with allergies and could scent the way she was supposed to, I worried she might decide to go for a run without me.

  “We’ve tried a few times, but she’s not answering,” Leah interrupted.

  The pressure squeezing my chest tightened. I understood why my sister was so distraught. We were both worried that something might have happened to Hannah.

  Going too fast on the winding road made traveling dangerous. Even so, I gripped the steering wheel harder and pushed the speed of my truck past what I considered safe.

  I took the next curve a little faster than I should have and had to swerve back in my own lane to avoid hitting an oncoming car.

  “We just left the lodge, but it sounds like you’re a lot closer and should get there before we do,” Berkley said.

  “I’ll see you there,” I said, reaching for the Disconnect button on the dashboard

  “Mitch, you need to be careful,” Berkley warned before I could end the call. “There might be more going on than we know about.”

  It sounded as if she’d come to a similar conclusion. “That’s what I’m afraid of.”

  Chapter Nine

  Hannah

  Several hours had passed since Mitch left. I’d been sitting at the table in the kitchen nook and staring at the computer screen of my laptop for what seemed like forever, too upset to compose a single sentence.

  Staying with him had been great for my writing. I had one chapter left to complete my book and thought after I’d taken a shower and gotten dressed that I’d be able to finish my work without any difficulty. I had been terribly wrong.

  The longer he was gone, the more anxious my cat and I g
ot. I had no idea what emergency he was taking care of, but since it was a workday, I was certain he’d be heading to his clinic in Ashbury once he was done.

  My cat was in worse shape than I was. She was confused and didn’t understand what had happened with Mitch. Her whining had grown more frequent, and so had her insistence that we track him down.

  If Mitch had been a shifter, he would have recognized me as his mate from the moment we met, and I wouldn’t be sitting here worrying about the outcome of the talk he wanted to have when he returned.

  Since he was human and didn’t have the same animalistic instincts I did, he wouldn’t be experiencing the same overwhelming need to bond, to claim, to solidify our relationship for the rest of our lives.

  I’d thought about calling Leah and asking her advice on the best way to deal with her brother. But I didn’t think Mitch would appreciate me sharing the news with his sister. If he chose to refuse our connection, he might not want anyone else to be aware of the situation.

  So far, attempting to write wasn’t helping my frustration, and neither was sitting around waiting. Maybe going outside and getting some fresh air would take my mind off Mitch and stimulate my creative energies.

  Now that I could scent everything vividly, it would be easier to keep track of where I was going. As far as I knew, the rangers had stopped searching for me, so I didn’t see any reason why I couldn’t go on a run without him, not if I kept it short and stayed on his property.

  Even if my cat and I got distracted and strayed a little, I’d be able to find my way back to his house without any problems. Feeling minutely better, I stripped out of my clothes and draped them neatly over a kitchen chair. Once outside, I quickened my steps, then sprang from the end of the deck. By the time I hit the ground, I’d transformed into my cat.

  I paused at the tree line and lifted my head, taking in the forest scents, a combination of damp leaves and pine from the surrounding trees. If I wasn’t mistaken, a squirrel or two had recently been in the area.