with fear and excitement. Deep inside she felt that feral creature rising toward the surface to meet the male leopard. Even though she couldn’t see him, Ania knew it was a leopard and he was big. Very large. Very strong. She could feel his power and absolute determination. For a moment she felt the two leopards come together, male and female. Bonding. She knew that was what it was. Her female wholly embraced the male as her mate.
Then her female subsided, sliding away so there was barely a trace of her, leaving Ania alone and afraid. She felt the burn as the leopard released her and then the rough rasp of his tongue over the bite marks. A slide of fur and he was gone, leaving her shaking so hard she was afraid she would have fallen had Mitya not been holding her.
His hands soothed her, moving over her gently, shaping her curves, stroking her skin. He rubbed some kind of ointment into the bites and covered them both with Band-Aids. Clearly he’d come prepared. He kissed his way over her shoulder and down her back, slowly allowing her top to drop back into place. He turned her into his arms and pulled her tight against his chest. Ania did her best to calm her ragged breathing.
“What just happened?” Her voice was muffled, but she didn’t care. She needed him to hold her.
“Your female is going into heat, Ania. Were you aware of your leopard?”
Was she? She knew about shifters. Her father was one. Once, he’d showed her how he could shift, and he told her never to be afraid if her leopard suddenly revealed herself. He claimed it was freedom to run in the form of a leopard. It was one of the reasons they had bought so many acres there in the hills rather than having a home in the city.
“I don’t know. Sometimes I felt her,” she admitted. She ran every evening after she spent time with her father, mostly to rid herself of excess energy and the ever-present grief and anger she felt after seeing the once-vibrant man slowly reduced to a vegetable. When she ran, she was faster than she believed was possible. She could leap distances and could often jump over fallen tree trunks when they were in her way.
“She will be emerging soon.” Mitya kissed the top of her head and walked her back to the table. “When she does, my leopard will act on his claim. They are a bonded pair.”
Ania sank into the seat and pressed her hand over her eyes. She had always hoped she would have a leopard, that she was born with the shifter genes, but now, she wasn’t so certain. When she thought Mitya wanted her for her, it was heady, wonderful and an unexpected gift. She felt so alone all the time. Even if she knew on some level that it wasn’t a good idea to give in to her attraction to him, it was amazing to have a sensual man like him want her. She needed to feel as if she was his entire focus. Now she knew it wasn’t her at all. It was his leopard and her female.
“I see that your mind is busy setting up barriers between us once again,” Mitya said, picking up his knife and fork. He regarded her steadily with his unusual blue-green eyes.
“I don’t do that.” She could hear the lie. The steady gaze never left her face, and she found herself turning red and squirming. “All right, maybe I do. But in this instance, I think I need some breathing room to think this entire thing through.”
“What’s to think about? I’m still here because you are the only woman I want to be with.”
“And it just so happens that I have a female your leopard wants.”
“When I was a young boy, my father would force my leopard out to protect me and his leopard would viciously rip him to shreds. This happened over and over. I was beaten and sometimes even attacked by his leopard. I have the scars everywhere.” He touched one of the slashes on his face and then rubbed his palm over his chest. “The things he did to my leopard were worse than what I suffered.”
Ania forgot all about why she was feeling hurt. “Why would he do that?” She was shocked that anyone would treat a child that way. She’d been loved by her grandparents and parents from the moment she was