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“I think I can manage. But you should take your dress off too.”

“You first,” she said shyly. 

With a little help from Briar, Charlie slipped out of his shirt and kicked off his pants. He reclined against the back of the bed. He felt faintly ridiculous until he saw the way Briar was consuming him with her eyes. 

“Now you.”

She pressed her lips together and nodded, pushing herself up to her knees. With a flexible twist of her arm, she pulled down the zipper at the back of her dress. Charlie’s breath caught as it slipped off her shoulders. It hung on her breasts for a moment, then dropped to the bed of the truck. She was completely naked underneath.

“Oh my God.”

He saw a pretty pink flush cover her skin. “You seem to like it when I’m not wearing underwear.”

“Oh my God,” he mumbled again. 

Her hair was glowing gold in the candlelight, her eyes a deep, rich brown. His eyes trailed down her slim throat, over her plump breasts, across her quivering belly, down to her spread thighs and the treasure that lay between them. 

“You are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.” 

They settled side by side in the truck bed. With the candles holding back the darkness, they could have been the only people in the world. 

“I love you,” he said softly.

“And I love you,” she said, kissing him. 

It was slow and molten hot as he pulled her tight against him. For the moment it was enough to hold her, bask in her silky, soft warmth. His heart was pattering, and he thought he could feel the echoing knock of hers. In that moment, he felt whole again, complete. She loved him, all of him, even the parts that were broken. 

She tasted like the peaches he had fed her; he could smell her hair and the soap on her skin. He had to touch her, run his hands down her narrow back and over her slim thigh. She threw her leg over him, hooking herself even closer, and he groaned when he felt her soft curls brush against his cock. “Please,” she murmured, grinding against him. “Please, Charlie.”

“Not yet,” he said. “I’ve been thinking about this for a long time. For years. Give me some time to explore.” 

He pressed her back so he could arrange himself over her. It hurt his leg, but he had to feel her beneath him, feel her hard nipples brush against his chest as she kissed him. 

Well, that was a lovely invitation
, he thought, and took her heavy breast into the palm of his hand. She was so responsive, so in tune with him. When he slid a hand down her stomach and found her wet and open, a thrill ran through him like brushfire. 

He teased her with open-mouth kisses and light strokes of his finger until she was clutching at his back and bucking her hips into his touch. When he finally slid two fingers into the hot center of her, she broke almost instantly. Her cries echoed into the night, bouncing off the shining stars. 

Unable to resist, he drove her up again, watching as her eyes fluttered open with shocked pleasure. He slid a third finger inside her and felt her clench around him. 

It was his turn to groan when she wormed a hand between them and wrapped it around him. His cock felt like a hot iron spike. 

“I want you inside me,” she whispered wantonly, and Charlie knew he couldn’t hold back any longer. 

“Condom,” he gasped, surprised he’d remembered. 

All those years of sex-ed must have paid off. He rolled off of her, desperately hunting through his pants pockets until he found his wallet. 

She watched, fascinated, as he lay back to roll it over himself. He would have settled back on top of her, but she was quicker; she straddled him before he could protest. “This will be easier,” she said. “I don’t want you to hurt yourself.”

He acquiesced. “As my physical therapist, I would expect nothing less.”

His hands came to her hips as she poised herself over him. “As my lab partner, you can consider this the first of many experiments.”

He went blind for a moment as she sank down upon him. 

So wet, so hot, so tight. 

She paused, adjusting to him, and it took every ounce of his remaining control not to ram his full length inside her. Then, with a moan, she pressed herself lower, lower, until he was buried in her.

“It’s so big,” she moaned, swiveling her hips in tiny adjustments that made Charlie grit his teeth. “You feel so big inside me.”

“Jesus Christ.” 

For once, she didn’t reprimand him for his language. She was too busy teaching him an ancient rhythm his body already seemed to know. 

Her thighs flexed as she rose and fell, driving Charlie slowly insane. Her hair fell over her face, then over her shoulders as she threw her head back in pleasure. Unable to bear it, he pushed himself up so he could wrap his arms around her, run his mouth up her lovely throat. 

The position shifted him deeper inside her and they both groaned. Briar was making desperate panting sounds, squirming anxiously against him, on the edge of imploding. He fell back to the truck bed so he could take her soft breasts in his hands. He plucked at her nipples until she stiffened, screamed. 

Charlie lost control. The universe convulsed around him as he poured himself into her. 

When he came back to himself, he was drowning in a sea of Briar’s hair. She had collapsed on top of him, still quivering with aftershocks. It took him a few moments, but he finally managed to remember how to use his hands to clear her hair out of his face. He ended up stroking his fingers through the curls. That led to caressing her back until she sighed with satisfaction.

“Charlie,” she murmured sleepily.

“
Hmm
?”

“I didn’t know it could be like that.”

He tensed. “Was it … okay?”

“More than okay,” she laughed. 

When she lifted her head, tears sparkled in her lashes. 

“I’ve never felt that way before. I’ve never felt so … so cherished. So desired. The way you look at me—the way you see me—makes me feel like the only girl in the world. And then, God, when you touch me ….”

She quivered and tensed around his half-hard cock. A groan escaped him. She kissed him, open-mouthed and hot. 

His hands slipped down to massage her cute little butt. She began to gyrate in unison with his hands, then groaned. He was fully hard again and aching with arousal. “Can you … so soon …?”

“I don’t know. Let’s experiment,” he said.

After, they ate his mother’s strawberry-rhubarb pie straight from the tin. The candles shrank as the night deepened. 

He loved seeing Briar’s naked body, but when she shivered he insisted she wrap herself in a blanket. 

“I can’t believe it’s almost fall,” she said. “So much has happened this summer, it feels like it only lasted a moment.”

“That’s true,” Charlie said. “But then, it seems like I’ve had my powers forever.”

“I’ve been meaning to ask you. How did you figure out you could transform?”

That was a story he didn’t want to tell her. “Oh, it just … happened.”

“Just happened, huh?” she said with her eyebrow raised.

“Yeah.” 

“Just … poof?”

“Yeah, sort of. Is there any more chicken?”

She pushed the basket toward him and he dug into it, although he wasn’t actually hungry. 

“So, maybe we could go see a movie tomorrow night,” he said, eager to change the subject. 

“I’d like that. As long as you tell me how you discovered your power.”

She wasn’t going to let up. “Well, I fell down the stairs.”

“What? When? Why were you climbing the stairs?”

“It must have been a week or two after the fog. I was home alone, and … well. I, uh ….”

“Just tell me,” she said. “I’ll know if you’re lying, remember.”

“That’s the problem, actually,” he grumbled. 

He couldn’t believe he was about to tell her this story. 

“Well, I was home alone. And I got to thinking about this box up in the attic that I didn’t tell my parents about when they moved all my stuff downstairs. I thought I might go up and get it.”

Her eyebrow was arched. “What was in the box?”

“Look, Briar … sometimes a man has … needs. Needs that can build up and make him feel like an animal if he doesn’t … take matters into his own hands. And sometimes he needs a little … inspiration, a little stimulus, a visual aid, if you will--”

The puzzlement cleared off her face. “You were looking at nudie magazines. You were looking at nudie magazines and playing with yourself.”

Shock clogged his throat. “What? I wasn’t—how do you know about ….”

“Mitzi’s dad has a big collection in his toolshed. I think he brought them back from the war.”

“How do you know … you looked at them?”

“Sure.” She broke off a bit of pie crust to nibble. He could tell from her sly smile that she had enjoyed shocking him. “Norine and I used to try and recreate the poses. We thought it might help boys notice us. Let me tell you, those ladies were flexible. What do you have in your secret stash?”

“A couple of choice magazines I stole from my Uncle Rick.”

“Can I see them?” When he gaped at her, she fluttered her lashes. “I’m curious what you like.” 

Charlie was torn between laughter and a fresh burst of arousal. Her open-minded enthusiasm about sexual matters was the greatest aphrodisiac he could have imagined. “Unfortunately, I don’t have them anymore.”

“Why not?”

He sighed and pulled her close. “All right, I’ll tell you. So, I had gone up to the attic, thinking I’d bring the box back to my room and my parents would never be the wiser. But halfway down the stairs into the living room, my leg gave out.”

“Oh, Charlie.”

“I should have known better,” he said grimly. “I should have rested for a while in the attic after climbing the stairs. But it was hot up there and, well, I was kind of in a hurry.”

“I can imagine,” she said impishly.

“So I’m coming down the stairs and my leg goes. I drop the box and try to catch myself, but it’s too late, I’m going down. I feel this crunching pain, and I think, oh no, I’ve really done it this time, broken myself for real. But when I open my eyes, I see paws where my hands should be.”

She picked up his hand and kissed it. “I like your paws, but I have to say I like your hands even more.”

He laughed softly and snuggled her closer. “So there I am, tumbling down the stairs, slipping and sliding on the magazines that fell out of the box when I dropped it. Naked ladies everywhere. I tried to catch myself on the banister, but I just gouge the post with my claws. Then I hit the floor with a thump. Maybe some cats land on their feet, but not this one.”

“Did you hurt yourself?”

He shook his head. “No, I was fine. Better than fine. I was shocked, of course; I thought maybe I was dreaming, or going crazy. But it felt so good to move. Just running up and down the hall was the most fun I’d had in months.”

“I can imagine. It looked like fun, that first night in the woods.”

“It was. But then I heard my mom opening up the garage door. I had lost track of time. And there I was, a damned mountain lion. Not to mention that there were a bunch of dirty magazines all over the floor.”

“Oh no,” Briar laughed.

“I didn’t know how to turn back—didn’t have time to figure it out. So I just grabbed them all up in my mouth and dumped them in my room. Ruined the lot with teeth marks and slobber.”

She was rolling with laughter now, and he couldn’t help but grin at the memory. “I just barely got everything picked up before my mom came in. Luckily she went right to the kitchen, and I had a couple of minutes to get myself sorted out. Otherwise she would have found out then and there.”

She wiped at her eyes. “I’ll never forget that image. The noble, elegant mountain lion slipping and sliding on nudie magazines.”

“Yeah, now that people know, I should probably come up with a more dignified story. Heroic. Like maybe I was rescuing a basket of drowning kittens.”

“I won’t out you,” she promised, and leaned in for a kiss.

 “You know, I always noticed you.”

“
Hmm
?”

“Earlier, you said you were hoping to get boys to notice you. Well, it worked.”

“You always ignored me.”

“See, there you go. You have to notice someone to ignore them.”

She shook her head. “This is a small town. Everyone notices everyone.”

“Not like I was noticing you,” he said, reaching out to tickle her exposed knee. “There was this dance during senior year. Homecoming, maybe? Angela was mad at me because I got the wrong color corsage, and she refused to dance with me. And you were there, with that dullard Bill Clifford.”

“He was dull,” she laughed. 

“You were wearing a green dress, the color of grass in summer. I sat there like a wallflower all night long, jealous of Bill because he got to dance with you.”

Briar blushed. “I’m sure Bill was jealous of you. I kept making him dance with me to cover up for the fact that we didn’t have a thing to say to each other. I think he got a blister.”

“I wanted to ask you to dance, but I couldn’t do that to Angela. Instead I hung out with the guys from the baseball team, the way I did every night.”

“You could ask me now.”

He scoffed. “I can’t dance anymore. I’ll never dance again.”

“Maybe not, not as a man. But how about as a cat?”

“Are you serious?”

“Why not?” She dropped the blanket and started looking for her dress. Seeing the way her pert butt bounced as she dug in the blankets was enough to have him interested in round three. 

Interest became certainty when she found her dress and stood up in the truck bed so she could pull it over her head. Knowing she was naked under that fabric drove him wild. 

The dress was considerably more wrinkled now, but Briar didn’t seem to mind. She twisted her arms overhead to get the zipper, and amused him when she plumped her breasts in the bodice. “Come on. Please, Charlie? Dance with me.” 

 She was haloed by stars and gleaming in candlelight. There was no way he was going to deny her anything. 

“Oh, why not?” he said, and pushed himself painfully to his knees. “Give me some room.”

She clambered down into the grass to wait for him. Even though the transformation was getting faster now, he still needed some sort of momentum to jump start the process. He fell heavily to his hands, welcoming the pain as his muscles warped and shifted. As long as he could bear it, he kept his eyes on Briar’s fascinated face.