Seduced By The Lion Alpha (3 page)

“So what were you doing in the forest?” I asked after I’d eaten half the sandwich. He watched me with curious eyes. If he was a lion shifter, I wondered what other abilities he had. Could he hear my heartbeat accelerating at his lingering gaze? Could he smell the low thrum of desire humming around my body? Could he see the individual beads of sweat that formed on my forehead, despite the cool air? I wondered if he had other supernatural abilities, or if more existed. Telepaths and empaths, telekinetics and witches, perhaps. Did he possess any of those talents? Was he laughing in his mind as I kept tracing back to the images of him before? I didn’t know, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to. My thoughts kept turning toward the naked man on the riverbank and trying to push him and Leon into one. It worked well, but the images made my heart beat erratically.

“Hmm?” He seemed distracted. There was a quiet smile on his face. He was pleased with himself. Now I was almost positive he could hear my heartbeat, and that just made me flush even more deeply. I tried thinking of something, anything, to stop myself from picturing the man. I turned to the other details I could draw. Like the sculpted jaw he had, or the ripples in his muscles. I could draw them like water, or draw him catching a fish with his bare hands – or claws or jaws, if the image struck me. I nodded to myself, pleased I’d managed to control my urges. I turned back to the conversation at hand and tried to get his attention.

“I’ve never seen you or anyth-
one
like that before in the forest,” I said, frowning. I cringed inwardly at my slip up. He was a man. He might also have been a beast, but first and foremost he was a man. At least, I thought so. It should never have even crossed my mind to call him a thing. But there it was, hanging naked and ashamed in the air before us, waiting to let him judge me for it.

But when he spoke, he ignored my slip up, and turned instead to the question at hand. I was secretly pleased with myself for getting his attention. But he still seemed distracted, although that distraction quickly faded into reluctance and embarrassment. “Ah.” He shook his head, the smile spreading. “Yeah, that’s uh. That’s…” He rubbed the back of his neck, suddenly blushing.

“What?”

“It’s mating season,” he said. I nearly choked on my sandwich. Mating season. That meant he was here for women – and probably other lions at that. The second level of depth had returned to his eyes. He studied me closely, waiting for my reaction.

“Mating season?” I echoed. I stared at him with wide eyes and a shaking head. I wasn’t sure if I was amused or mortified. Both seemed like a viable option at the moment. I couldn’t help a tiny laugh, but then I bit it back. I suddenly realized what that second depth in his eyes was. It was lust. It was want. It was need. During the mating season of any animal, an animal had certain urges. That was what I saw in those deep, beautiful eyes. Him fighting his urges. I wasn’t sure whether or not I wanted him to. I swallowed hard, and tried to speak around the sudden hot lump in my throat.

“That, uh, that still doesn’t answer my question,” I managed. My entire body was hot. I rubbed my hands against my thighs and breathed through my nose. With every ounce of focus I had, I turned my attention to the pine smell of the house, instead of the look in Leon’s eyes. I tried to focus on anything but the look in his eyes. Anything instead of the heat in his gaze, the flex of his muscles, and the smooth expanse of his beautiful face. It wasn’t working well. I had been raised to look people in the eye when they spoke, and with each word Leon was drawing me in. Drawing me deeper and deeper until I thought I could sink into his voice and eyes and never surface again. And I was completely okay with that.

“I need to find more lionesses for the pride,” he said. “Most prides have at least a dozen, in order to ensure we have plenty of cubs to carry on our legacy. Unfortunately, we lost quite a few in the most recent turf war with the tigers. We only have about five at the moment.”

“Polyamory,” I said. The word felt bitter on my lips. He grimaced.

“It is our nature.”

“Some nature.” I wasn’t sure why I was jealous. Polygamy had never bothered me before – I’d seen it in some of my friends more than once. It wasn’t bad, it was simply dependent on the people within the relationship. If that was the nature of prides, I shouldn’t judge. But I couldn’t help but judge. Despite knowing Leon for only hours – perhaps less, depending on how long I was unconscious – I was thinking of him as mine. Hearing that he had women, and several of them, who were free to touch him, to taste him, to know him intimately in a way my hands and my body absolutely
ached
for, it made me jealous. It was petty and it was odd, but it was true. I was jealous of these women I didn’t know, simply because they were closer to a man I had only just met.

“Look,” said Leon, and his voice was firm enough that I jumped. “I understand that human nature is different from our own, but this is how we live. Is that not enough for you to leave it be?” He ran his hands through his hair. “I was trying to find a lioness to keep my pride from dying. That is my duty as a prime. That is my duty to my family. There are always shifters in the city, I just didn’t make it there.” He looked away from me, and I caught the frustration in his eyes as he did so. I bit my lip and tried not to say anything. My eyes watered in shame. I shouldn’t have spoken out. That was a mistake. Leon did not deserve my scorn because of misplaced jealously. That was my fault. I went to say something to lift the tense silence in the room, but I cut myself short. I didn’t know what to say, and I didn’t want to make it worse. Worse still, I didn’t want to impose myself on Leon. We remained silent.

There were a few long moments of silence between us. We both knew why he hadn’t made it to the city – because of me. He had saved me. I had tripped and fallen after freaking out, and he had saved me. I couldn’t thank him enough for that. I would never be able to repay him for that. I ducked my head and clutched my hands together. I stared at the scratches on my hands and tried not to pick at them.

“You know, you’re not bad looking for a human,” said Leon. I snorted.

“That’s a first,” I said.

“Oh?” I gestured to my full figure. To my plump breasts, my wide hips, my thick, powerful legs, and my round stomach. It was a figure I was proud of, one that was in my family history for as long as I could remember. But many weren’t fond of it. Such was the price of modern media. I tried not to let it get to me. Sometimes it did bother me. It bothered me that I wasn’t always looked at the way my friends were. It bothered me that I couldn’t always find clothes that fit. It bothered me that I had to have swimsuits custom-made, which was always expensive. But, for the most part, I liked my body, and I especially liked people who liked it back.

“Ah, the modern media of the world,” he said dryly. “I wouldn’t let it get to you.”

“I don’t. If I did, do you really think I’d still be here?” The words hung between us, and I caught the way he winced, as though he couldn’t quite believe I’d just said that. It was true, however, as dark as it was. I wished I could pull the words back in that moment, despite the truth. He didn’t need to hear that. I was a happy person, and I shouldn’t have let that slip out.

“Still though,” he said, coughing awkwardly. “You are beautiful.” I noticed that this time he forgot the second part of his statement. I filled it in for him.

“For a human?” I asked, leaning back on my hands. It was a good excuse to stare at his body and pretend I was only waiting for a response. He was well built. Not overly muscular, like gung-ho body builders, but enough so that I could enjoy staring at his muscles and imagine him taking me in his arms and lifting me up. I wondered if he had superhuman strength. I licked my lips. That could be interesting to play with.

“For a human,” he echoed. There was a wry smile on his face. The moment between us intensified as we watched each other, each with our own amused smile. I could practically feel the heat coming off of him. My feet were mere inches from his folded legs. I stared at his eyes. The intensity of the barely-contained want in his gaze made my entire body shiver. The hair on my arms and the back of my neck lifted up. The heat rushed in my gut and in my cheeks. I felt a cold sweat break out across my shoulders. My hands shook. I wanted to reach out, to find out how soft his hair was, to see if the callouses on his hands would be able to hold me down. I swallowed and looked away. Our staring contest was over.

“Well, why don’t you tell me about yourself?” asked Leon. The silence cracked again. I felt the intensity of his gaze once more – the depth of his curiosity coupled with his want. I wanted to tell him to stop staring at me the way he was. I wanted to tell him how it made me feel. I didn’t have the courage for either. I didn’t have the courage to tell him I was feeling the exact same way. That I wouldn’t mind if he grabbed me and kissed me with all his might. I swallowed again and tried to find my voice.

“My name is Lauren,” I said. “But I, uh… I already told you that.” I pressed my lips together and looked away for a moment. I fought the urge to fiddle more with my hands, worried that I’d tear open the cuts. Leon smiled and pulled up his legs. He rested his arms on his knees and watched me with patient curiosity. I wondered what he was thinking. I wondered if he was just indulging me or if he was genuinely curious in what I had to say. I hoped it was the latter. To start with, I decided to go with something neutral, something I thought he would relate to, considering all the paintings on the walls. “I’m an artist, and I like to read.”

“You’re an artist?” He seemed to perk up at my words. He smiled brightly, and I knew that I had made the right decision in telling him. I hoped the pictures on the walls were his; I wanted to compliment their beauty and tell him that he was the greatest artist I’d ever met in the flesh. I wondered if he would blush at the compliment the way I had when he spoke to me and looked at me. I wondered if he was capable of blushing like I did, or if he would just cough and look away, like most men I knew. Or get defensive. The last option seemed unlikely, but also the most dangerous.

“I draw,” I said. “Usually I draw the city, but sometimes I like to draw the forest.” I drew the forest far more often than I had led on, but I didn’t want to explain that to him. I didn’t want to explain that I drew things I didn’t know the names of. I didn’t want to explain that most of my drawings were exaggerated proportions of trees and flowers etched into fairy tale creatures. My forest drawings were filled with fantasy and wonder. They were nothing like the beautiful paintings on the wall. Suddenly, I was much less confident in having told Leon about my drawing.

“Was that what you were doing out there, when I met you?” he asked.

I cringed. I wanted to say that yes, I had, if only because I thought it would sound much better than what I had been doing. I loved to read, and I loved romance novels, but I had come to learn over the years that most men did not take well when you showed them a book with a half-naked man on the cover. Most got jealous, I’d noticed, because they looked nothing like the men on the cover. But, now that I thought about it, Leon was just as ripped, if not more so, than the man on the cover. He wouldn’t get jealous, although he might laugh a bit at me.

My sketchpad had been in my bag, but my priority hadn’t been the drawing. I had wanted to finish reading my book. It was a good book, the trashy romance variety. I paused, thinking back. My cheeks were red when I looked back up to Leon. It was a little embarrassing to think about a graphic romance novel in front of a man sitting on my bed. I bit my lip. It wasn’t my bed. It was his bed. That thought made me blush even harder.

“Are you okay?” he asked. I wasn’t, not really. I hadn’t been okay since I’d woken up in his bed. I hadn’t been okay since I’d caught the first glimpse of want in his eyes and realized that he could probably smell my own. And, if I was honest, I hadn’t been okay since I had first seen that tiger. It was hard to believe so much had changed in such a short amount of time, and that all I wanted now was to throw myself at this almost complete stranger. And it shocked me to realize how comfortable I was around him, and in his cabin, and with that idea. It was shocking, but it was easy to adjust to. I squirmed a bit, thinking.

“I wasn’t drawing,” I said. “I was reading.” Leon leaned back and grinned at me. I paled. He had seen the book. Did he think me a fool for reading something like that? Had he read parts of the book out of boredom? What would he think of me now? I pressed my hands tightly together and picked at the edges of the nails without looking. My gaze focused on a point behind Leon’s head. I blushed deeply and looked away from him and his knowing grin.

“Yeah, I figured,” he said. He climbed off the bed with his knowing smirk, and swayed out of the room. I couldn’t help but stare as he went. His jeans hugged his muscular backside in all the right ways and left me aching for a more in-depth and hands-on look at what was beneath them.