FUR FOR ALL, Book 5 in FIXED (2 page)

Oh, right. Grandfather’s standard answer. “Because I said so.” She grumbled to herself and pressed the button on the side of her watch to illuminate the dial. According to the information the Council had provided, the werecat she’d come to see was already ten minutes late from his regular timetable. Apparently he didn’t realize he had a stalker with a schedule to keep.

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Sighing, she trained her gaze back on the door to Vircolac and settled in for an extended wait. She didn’t get one. Almost as soon as she had the carved oak doors back in her sight, the right side opened and a figure stepped out. It paused for a moment to speak to someone on the threshold.

“Finally,” she breathed, freezing in place, gaze fastened on the man across the street. She got a brief look at his face while he stood in the pool of light cast by the fixture over the club’s doors, so she knew it was her guy. His features had the angular, slightly exotic cast of his Latin ancestors, and even in the artificial light, she saw the bronze hue of his skin and the way his black hair gave off almost blue highlights. Add that to the tailored fit of his suit, the arrogant, graceful way he held himself and the liquid quality to the way he moved, and Tess had no doubts. She had a bead on Rafael De Santos.

The problem was that she hadn’t expected him to be gorgeous.

Tess sat mesmerized for several minutes before a moth flying perilously close to her cheek reminded her that not only was her mouth gaping open like the legs of a cheerleader on prom night, her tongue was probably hanging out, too. She clamped her jaw shut with a click, but her reaction seemed to be beyond her control.

The man took her breath away. For some reason she’d had this picture in her head that the man would be unappealing, sort of bestial and feral, his humanity a thin film over his more savage nature. She knew that image didn’t exactly mesh with his reputation as a charming if feckless rogue, more Casanova than killer, but her mind had apparently discounted the stories as rumor. And now, here she was, finding them to be absolute fact. The only evidence she saw of his bestial side was the animal magnetism she could feel rolling off him, even from fifty feet away. It made her fingers itch, her mouth dry out, and her…

Well, she really didn’t want to think about what her other parts were doing.

Focus, Tess. Focus
.

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Christine Warren

Dragging her eyes off the werecat’s butt—conveniently positioned toward her as he spoke with the figure in the doorway—Tess ordered her heart to slow down and her thighs to unclench so she could get back to the task at hand. She’d need all her faculties operational for this one. She could just feel it.

Why does he have to be so gorgeous
? She eased herself to her feet and hugged the side of the stairway, completely engulfed in the shadows.
I’d be a lot more
relaxed about taking a message to the leader of the Council of Others if he were a short,
ugly weregopher, instead of a mouthwatering, take-me-now leopard man. Where’s the
justice in this
?

She got no answer.

Great. Now even my own subconscious is ignoring me
.

She waited for him to wave farewell to the doorman and start off down the deserted street before easing from her hiding space and trailing after him in the shadows. She made it approximately three steps before she tripped over her own feet and went stumbling sideways into someone’s trashcan. Thankfully, it was plastic and not the old-fashioned metal kind. With that much noise, she might as well just have shouted his name.

She felt kind of stupid following him like this, instead of just walking right up to him, introducing herself and taking care of business like a reasonable adult, but not stupid enough to change anything. She told herself she was just taking a few minutes to build up her courage before taking the plunge. She just wished she were naïve enough to believe it.

Okay, so how about, “Excuse me, Mr. De Santos? I have some information you
might be interested in.” No. Too Jehovah’s Witness
.

Um…”Hey, are you Rafael De Santos, the famous wereleopard and leader of the
Council of Others?” Nope. Too Bellevue escapee
.

“Mr. De Santos, I come bearing an urgent message from the High Priest of the
Witches’ Council.” Ugh! Too sci-fi B movie
.

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Hm, maybe, “Mr. De Santos, my name is Tess Menzies, and I’m
—oof!” The “oof!” was never intended to be part of the speech, but it’s what burst out of her mouth when two hundred and some-odd pounds of male muscle barreled into her from the side and drove her deep into a service alley halfway down the street. Before she had time to yell, “Hey!” —and she called herself a native New Yorker! —she was pressed flat against the brick wall of one of the adjacent buildings with her hands yanked over her head and six feet of man pinning her in place.

“Who are you, and why the hell have you been following me?” His growl rumbled through her with a menace she could feel down in her bones, and she knew instinctively that if he’d given her a full-fledged roar, she’d be fighting for control of her bladder right about now. Even so, his efforts would probably have made a normal person cry. The man had intimidation down to an art. He projected pure rage and menace, and the snarl he pressed right up against her face did manage to make her take a hearty gulp. But she rallied quickly and dealt with the situation the way she always did. She brazened through it.

“Sheesh.” She managed to get it out without squeaking and congratulated herself. “If you usually come on to women this strongly, I have to wonder that you ever get a date.”

What the hell are you doing
? a voice inside her demanded.

I have absolutely no idea
, she answered.

He snarled again. Lower this time. More menacing. “I said, who the hell are you?”

“I heard you.” She swallowed a knot of fear and lifted her chin. “I just didn’t think it was any of your business.”

His expression, which she could see clearly given its current location about a nanometer away from hers—he had really great skin, she noticed, all smooth and even and bronze—turned incredulous.

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Christine Warren

“Pardon me? Unless I’m very much mistaken—and I know I’m not—you’ve been tailing me for three blocks. That makes your name, rank, serial number and intention very much my business.”

She grinned and watched his golden eyes blaze. “My name’s Tess, my rank is absolutely nothing, I’m horrible with numbers and my intentions are a little too complicated to explain to you in a dark alley. Plus, I generally talk with my hands, and you’re currently making that a wee bit difficult.” He snarled. “I have no time for smart-aleck retorts. Why are you following me?”

She blinked up at him with wide blue eyes that generally made men smile at her indulgently and tell her to let them handle things and not worry her pretty little head over it. “Well, I thought that would be obvious. I wanted to know where you’re going.”

He ignored the eyes.
How could he ignore the eyes
?

“Not good enough. Explain. Now.”

Tess blinked, her mouth curving into a backup-plan pout. “That’s the truth. I wanted to know where you were going. You know, for someone with such a reputation for being a ladies’ man, you could use a little work on your manners.”

“My manners are fine when I’m with a lady. I’m not entirely sure you qualify.”

“Hey! What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means that in my experience, ladies don’t follow men through deserted streets at two-thirty in the morning. That’s what criminals and cowards do.” The pout had clearly failed as miserably as the big blue eyes and suddenly Tess felt a lot less confident about her Plan B. It didn’t seem to be working. At all.

Instead of being smitten with her, the werecat seemed to be pissed off at her. His exotic amber eyes looked hard and impatient, and his sensual mouth looked 14

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tight and unamused. This was not the sort of reaction she was used to getting from men.

Shifting nervously, she tried tugging her hands free, but his grip only tightened. She gave a hard yank and he responded with a low warning growl.

Before she could seriously give in to panic and start struggling, he leaned into her and used his body to keep her immobile against the cold brick wall.

“Your explanation. Now.”

Tess swallowed hard. It was about the only movement she could make. He kept her hands pinned above her and now his chest crushed her flat and his hips pressed tightly against hers. She could feel the way he bent his legs to even out their heights, because those legs crowded against hers to keep her still. She couldn’t move a damned muscle, which meant she also couldn’t cast any damned spells. She was helpless. Time for Plan C—the truth. Just not too much of it.

“I already explained, sort of. I was supposed to wait for you outside Vircolac until you came out. Then I was supposed to deliver a message and leave. But I got curious to see where you were going at two-forty-five in the morning.” She made her tone and expression sullen, as if she had given in reluctantly. That much was true. “If you hadn’t jumped me, you’d never have known I was following you. I was just going to see if you were going to a nightclub or something. I’ve never been to one and thought it would be fun to see where the cool ones are. I didn’t mean anything by it.” That last part wasn’t.

“What message?”

“Don’t ask me. It’s written down in a sealed envelope. It’s not like I read it or anything.” Neither was that.

She saw his nostrils flare as he inhaled deeply. His eyes narrowed. “You’re lying. I can smell it on you. I can smell something else, too. There’s something…different about you.”

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Christine Warren

Tess felt her eyes widen before she caught herself. “Well, I showered right before I left home,” she joked weakly, trying to shift even an inch away from him. “If you can smell me, I think I need to switch soaps.” He didn’t appear to be listening. Instead he leaned forward and pressed his face into the curve of her neck. She froze as her stomach clenched. She felt the stir of his breath against her skin and felt a swift shock of arousal. Apparently, her body hadn’t forgotten its first impression of him. It remembered quite clearly how attracted she’d been and it chose now to remind her.

“That’s not it,” he muttered and she could feel the movement of his lips as he spoke. “You smell…different…” Sniff. “Exotic…” Sniff… “Powerful…” Sniff, sniff. Then the dart of a tongue that rasped against her throat. “Other.” His head turned and Tess found herself staring into golden eyes that blazed with impossible heat.

“You smell like a witch.”

Tess stared up into those amber eyes and felt her first wave of fear. Suddenly she remembered that this man wasn’t just a man. He was a Felix, the most powerful Feline in the history of the city, and he could tear out her throat with a swipe of his finger. With the tension radiating off of him, she wasn’t sure he didn’t intend to do just that.

“Well? Are you a witch?” He asked it in that rasping growl as he shook her by the hands he held pinned. “You aren’t human. I can smell it.”

“You smell wrong.” She could feel how wide her eyes had grown, but this time it wasn’t a ploy. It was fear. “I am human. My name is Tess Menzies.” He pressed his nose against the hollow below her ear and inhaled, and she had to bite back a moan as her pussy clenched in reaction.

“You’re not. Humans smell…muddy. Thick. You smell clear. Sweet. Spicy.” Again that tongue, rasping like damp sandpaper across her skin. “Taste that way, too. Not human at all.”

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Fear prodded her into temper. “Eaten many humans, have you?” She felt his mouth shift into a grin. “A few here and there. Want me to eat you?”

That sensual, amused purr had nothing to do with food, but a hell of a lot to do with sex. Sheesh. Did the man usually come on to women when he had them pinned against the wall during an interrogation? The image brought a flood of moisture between her legs and she cursed.

“Hmm, smells like you like the idea.” A lazy stroke of the tongue. The soft, delicate scrape of teeth. “I’d love to taste that cream I can smell. I bet it’s thick and rich and hot.” His legs shifted, forced hers apart. He settled between them until she could feel the ridge of an impressive erection nestling against her mound. “I’d like to lap it all up. And I will. Just as soon as you answer my question.”

“Qu—question?”

Her stammer made him chuckle, and she gritted her teeth.

“Yes, question.” He nuzzled the sweet spot below her ear and pressed his hips against hers when she tried to squirm away. “The one where I asked if you’re a witch.”

Horny was the most honest answer, but she didn’t feel inclined to share it. “I told you. My name is Tess and I’m as human as the next person.”

“Considering the next person at the moment is not human at all, that fails to convince me of anything.”

This time when she felt the scrape of his teeth, she could feel the elongated canines and she gasped. He didn’t sink them into her flesh, and she didn’t expect him to, but the message was clear. He was far from human and far from civilized, no matter what he looked like on the surface.

“It’s the truth.”

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Christine Warren

He pulled back at that and stared down at her with eyes that had gone molten. Even in the darkness, she could see the way his pupils had elongated to feline slits.

“You’re very stubborn, and very wrong. Also very unsurprised to find a man with fangs and cats’ eyes pinning you up against an alley wall. Would you care to explain why?”

She raised an eyebrow. “Not really.”

“Do it anyway.”

Stalling for time seemed like her best bet. Well, honestly, it seemed about as hopeless as anything else, but it made her feel better. “How about you let go of my hands first and give me some breathing room? This Spanish Inquisition thing is getting kind of uncomfortable.”