Dreams of Wolf [Half-breed Shifter Series Book 2] (10 page)

“Actually,
being only a fourth shifter, they’re natural state is human, so they remain
human when they’re asleep or in pain.”

“Oh. So, um…they’re
jaguars? That’s kind of cool. I’ve never seen a jaguar except in pictures
before.”

“You can see
me. You can see me,” a trio of young voices announced, as they shoved open the
door, revealing a quartet of eavesdroppers, and spilled into the room, clamoring
toward her so they could show off their jaguar sides. When the three children
she loved most on earth morphed into fuzzy little baby jaguars, she gasped.

“Dear Lord, you
can change fast.”

“We can shift
as fast or slow as we like,” Riley said from the doorway. When Jaycee met the
other woman’s gaze, Riley smiled with a relief that made Jaycee realize she’d
reacted to all this with the perfect response. Acceptance.

As sharp little
claws dug through her bed sheets into her knees, she turned to Dane, Rhea and
Brynn, who were jostling each other for her attention. Jaycee petted them,
cooing and telling them what soft fur they had and what pretty stripes they
grew. But all the while her thoughts returned to Knox. He’d wanted—no, he’d
needed
—her
immediate acceptance too. Yet she’d run screaming from him.

Chapter Ten

From the woods,
Knox watched Jaycee. Around her, the three cubs played in their jaguar form,
all three striving to impress her, making her clap and applaud their climbing
and jumping and flipping tricks.

It reminded him
of his own youth, always eager to experiment and show off his newest ability to
his mother. She had become a different woman after Mathis had taken her. Losing
his place in her heart, Knox had been so confused when suddenly all she wanted
to do was sneak away to visit her lover.

Pain pierced
his chest as he glanced at Jaycee, sitting cross-legged in the grass and
throwing back her head to laugh at the male cub’s theatrics. The ache worked up
his throat. Her life had just altered on its axis. The wards she so lovingly
watched had become something new and foreign, yet she did not turn her heart
away from them. She never would’ve done what his mother had. She wouldn’t have
abandoned her only child no matter what man came into her life.

He wished he
could be so certain she wouldn’t abandon him either. But a couple of nights in
the sack did not a commitment make. He had deceived her, become an illusion to
get close, and tricked her into thinking their time together was merely a
dream.

He wasn’t sure
if Jaycee could forgive that.

*
* * * *

An entire new
world had just opened up, and Jaycee was still reeling by the time lunch rolled
around. Since her wards had learned they didn’t need to hide their shifter side
from her, they’d been performing all morning, demonstrating everything they
could think up, competing with each other to see who could amaze her the most.

They were the
cutest little jaguar cubs she’d ever seen. She kept wanting to reach out and
touch their soft fur. The girls, she soon discovered, were much more willing to
play kitty and let her pet them. Dane was a bit pricklier; she could tell he
didn’t like being treated like an animal.

She tried to
adjust to this new side of her babies, wondering how she’d never discovered
their secret before. Now that she knew, they were so free about switching back
and forth—well, the girls were. Dane usually ran inside and to his room before
he became human, not wanting her to see him naked, which made Jaycee roll her
eyes; she’d probably changed his diaper more than anyone else alive.

Yet as she fed
them macaroni and cheese with hot dogs, amazed they acted so human when she’d
just seen exactly what they could become, her thoughts strayed to Knox.

He hadn’t
followed her to the Griffins this morning. She wasn’t sure what to think about
that. Was he mad at her, furious over the way she’d freaked out? Had he already
left, never to return again? Or was he trying to be polite and keep his
distance until she could handle the truth a little more calmly?

Shaw and Riley
had offered to take time off work so she could find the wolf and talk to him,
but she’d declined, worried and ashamed of herself for her immediate reaction
to waking up in a face full of fur.

“Jaycee, can we
go outside and practice climbing trees some more?”

She blinked and
focused on the triplets, surprised to find all three had finished eating.
Clearing her throat, she nodded. “Sure. But be careful; don’t fall off a
branch.”

Dane rolled his
eyes, but Brynn and Rhea chorused they’d be careful. Before her eyes, they
morphed into four-legged, furry bundles of joy and scampered out the opened
back door. She shook her head. This was definitely going to take some getting
used to.

She’d just
piled their dirty plates into the dishwasher when the doorbell rang. Glancing
outside to make sure the children were still being safe, she caught a flash of
orange and black in the branches of the oak tree. Tea towel in hand, she dried
her fingers as she strolled to the front door. Her mind was still on
shapeshifters and wolves and jaguars when she pulled open the lock, forgetting
to check the window first.

“I can’t stop
thinking about you, Jaycee.” Donald swept over the threshold and cupped her
face, tilting it to the side so he could press his mouth to hers.

The kiss did
nothing for her, except maybe make her throw up a little in her mouth. Gagging,
she shoved him back, and immediately wiped at her lips. “Well, try harder. I
told you six months ago; it’s over, Donny. And just because you think I’m some
kind of forbidden fruit now because I’ve moved on and found someone else does
not mean you can start harassing me. Now leave!”

He didn’t. “I
want another chance.”

“Sorry. You’re
not going to get one.”

“Jaycee. God
damn it, we belong together.”

She laughed.
Right in his face. “You are so pathetic. A year ago, you constantly made me
feel like I should be grateful I was able to get a guy as wonderful as you. You
were always belittling me, until I actually believed I wasn’t good enough to be
your woman or anyone’s woman. And now you’re here, begging me to take
you
back. What a joke. I’m sorry, sweetheart, but Knox is a hundred times the man
you’ll ever be—and not just in bed.
He
actually appreciates me.”

Donald’s eyes
flared with anger and hatred a split second before the palm of his hand cracked
against her face. Pain erupted through her cheek, reverberating to the back of
her skull. Her head cranked around from the massive blow, and she hit the floor
a second later, dazed and momentarily knocked silly.

By the time her
brain stopped pinging around in her head like a pinball and she could think
straight, Donald had grabbed a chunk of her hair and was dragging her across
the floor toward the back of the house.

“I’ll teach you
to appreciate me, bitch.”

As her butt
skipped over the carpet, she vaguely realized he was taking her to the
kitchen—the kitchen, where a wall full of windows revealed the backyard,
displaying three shapeshifters currently at play. And the monster above her
just so happened to be a shifter hunter.

“No!” she
screamed, arms and legs flailing to stop him. But she only managed to enrage
him further, because he paused to wallop her again.

This time, her
world went black.

*
* * * *

Knox returned
to Jaycee’s house. He’d stopped by one of her neighbor’s on the way, emancipating
an outfit from some unknown male’s closet. He wasn’t used to clothing, rarely
wore the shit. He usually preferred to stay in his wolf skin, which didn’t
require such frippery. The olive slacks were a bit short, falling well above
his ankles, and the cream-colored shirt fit too snug in the chest. But he
wanted to be presentable when Jaycee made it home.

If he was going
to win her back, he had to prove he could adapt to her world.

Tugging at his
crotch, where his balls were being squished by the seam of his new pants, Knox
froze as a scream sounded in his head. Frowning, he lifted his face and glanced
around Jaycee’s bedroom. The room remained quiet, save for the quickening of
his heartbeat. Skin crawling with a sudden terror he couldn’t explain, he sniffed
the air but smelled nothing off.

His instincts
continued to go crazy, blaring all kinds of warnings. Never one to ignore his
internal radar, he shifted into his wolf, shredding his new clothes all to
hell, and leapt toward the window, busting out the glass in his haste.

Jaycee
,
his panicked heart cried. She was in trouble. He didn’t know how he knew it, he
just did.

*
* * * *

Jaycee came to,
her entire head throbbing, as Donald issued frenzied orders into a cell phone.

“I need
reinforcements. Now. There’s an entire nest of shifters living right here in
town. At Shaw Griffin’s house, no less. Yeah, the fucker’s kids are frickin’
tigers, or leopards, or
something
. I wouldn’t be surprised if Griffin
was a shifter himself, infiltrating the organization all these years to work
against us….yeah. Okay, good. I’ll neutralize the brats and put them down so we
can work out a plan for their parents once your men arrive. We need to be
stealthy to take on the adults.”

Jaycee surged
to her feet just as he hung up, but her lack of equilibrium worked against her,
making her stumble dizzily into the side of a chair.

Donald spun
around and sneered at her. “Been keeping secrets from me, have you, princess?”

“You stay away
from them, you bastard.”

He laughed and
snatched her arm, his rough grip bruising. She struggled but couldn’t break
free as he hauled her to the door of Shaw’s office and shoved her inside.

Tripping over
her own feet, she staggered until she hit the corner of the desk. Spotting the
phone, she tried to crawl across the desktop toward it, knocking over framed
pictures of Riley and the triplets in her haste. Donald caught her ankle and
yanked her back just inches from making contact with the cord. The corner of a
desk calendar gouged her in the stomach, making her cry out.

She twisted,
grappling for a handhold, but Donald was stronger and hauled her off the desk.
She fell and landed in a jarring thump on the floor, busting her tailbone.

Stepping past
her, Donald ground the heel of his boot into her ankle, ripping another scream
from her lungs. He reached for the telephone and yanked it from the wall,
throwing it through the opened doorway and into the hall. As he next shoved the
computer off the desk, killing her chances of going online for help, Jaycee
wrapped her arm around his leg and bit him as hard as she could on the meaty
back part of his shin.

Probably not
her brightest moment. He roared and kicked her off, catching her in the jaw and
sending her tumbling backward.

“Now stay here
and be a good girl,” he sneered.

By the time she
realized what was happening, he slammed his way from the room. She heard a
scraping sound, followed by something large shifting across the floor, then
thumping into the door.

She stumbled
and tripped toward the only exit, feeling like she’d just been run over by a
bus. When she tried to push her way out, she discovered something heavy had
been wedged in front of it. God damn it, he’d trapped her inside.

She slammed her
shoulder against the closed portal, crying out from the pain that spiked
through her shoulder. Sobbing, she did it again. And again. The fucking door
wouldn’t budge.

“No,” she wept.
“Not my babies.” Giving up on the door, she spun from it and dashed to the
window.

Outside, Donald
was already approaching the children, waving them to him. Since he wasn’t a
stranger, they gathered closer, once again dressed and in their human form.

Jaycee pounded
on the glass. With their enhanced animal ears, the children heard her and
glanced her way, but obviously couldn’t make sense of the garbled, hysterical
screams that gushed from her sore jaw.

With Donald’s
back to her, she could see the triplets’ faces. They turned to him with such
innocence, probably seeking his guidance since she’d just alerted them to danger.
She pounded again before her scattered brain told her to slide the damn thing
up. She fumbled a moment to unlock the latch and then shoved with all her
might, opening the window.

“Run!” she
screamed. “Dane! Get out of there. Rhea! Brynn!”

Finally, the
kids realized Donald himself was the threat. Their eyes went huge just as
Donald snarled and leapt for Brynn, catching her arm.

“No!” Jaycee
kicked out the screen.

Wasting no
time, Dane shifted into his jaguar and bit Donald’s leg, making the man release
his sister and swing out a booted foot toward the cub, who leapt stealthily out
his way just as a flash of black, white and gray exploded from the woods.

Jaws gaping and
sharp fangs gleaming, the wolf pounced upon Donald in three bounds, knocking
the human to the ground and going for his jugular. He ripped out Donald’s
throat, leaving the corpse lying limp under his paws.

Knox backed
away from his kill, and the cubs clambered to him, seeking his safety as they
trembled around his legs. No longer feeling pain, Jaycee jumped out the window
and called to her babies.

Morphing into
humans, the children dashed toward her. She fell to her knees and gathered up
all three in one swoop, pulling them close and weeping against them. They
burrowed against her and cried right along with her.

Someone knelt
behind her. She knew it was her lover even before he wrapped his arms around
her, encompassing Dane, Rhea and Brynn in his strong arms.