Jennifer Ashley - Wild Cat

Diego shrugged as he sipped his coffee. “This is good.” He gave Jace an admiring look. “Do you always make the coffee?”

Jace gestured to the old-fashioned coffeepot with the percolator on top. “Just call me coffee king.”

Diego looked around. “Where’s Eric? I’m going back out to that rock cave to look around, and he might want to come too.”

Cassidy opened her mouth to say she’d join them, then she remembered that she was grounded. Damn humans and their stupid laws. Shifters had never worried about going everywhere they pleased before the Collar. She sat down, head pounding, and filled her mouth with beautiful coffee.

She sensed warmth next to her. Diego had sat down with her and now smiled into her face. “You all right, mi ja ?”

Cassidy loved it when he called her that, the beautiful syllables rolling in his dark voice. She heard Xavier and Jace in the background, the two men walking out the back door, but she barely registered them.

“Headache,” Cassidy said.

“I thought Shifters didn’t get drunk.”

Cassidy blushed again. “Hey, last night was rough for me.”

Diego’s arm rested across the back of her chair. His body heat touched her through her thin T-shirt, making her want to squirm. She inhaled his scent… and stopped.

What met her nose was Diego’s usual musk and spice, but something touched it a tiny bit, a hint of acrid smoke and mint she’d smelled last night at the place where the hunter had hidden. Cassidy turned her head and sniffed his suit jacket. No, she hadn’t mistaken it, though it was very faint.

Maybe something lingering from last night? Could be. Diego had showered-she smelled the soap, and he was wearing a different jacket today. Plus, she hadn’t noticed the same kind of smell on Eric.

“What are you doing?”

Diego’s low voice arrested her. Cassidy looked up at him so close, noting his face was clean-shaven again this morning. She liked his dark skin, his hair as black as midnight, and his eyes nearly as dark.

“You smell… interesting,” she said.

“Oh, great. Do I need more aftershave?”

“No.” Cassidy inhaled the scent of his coat again while Diego sat very still. Eric had told her, when she’d limped out this morning, feeling like shit, what the smell up in the mountains had been.

Fae.

Cassidy had never met or seen a Fae in her long life. Fae hadn’t lived in the human world for centuries, leaving finally for Faerie after the Fae-Shifter war. Shifters had elected to remain in the human world and live the best they could, while the Fae had gone. The Fae had already begun leaving when humans started using more and more iron. Fae hated iron.

Cassidy’s head was too fuzzy to puzzle it all out this morning. Eric hadn’t given her a long explanation. Cassidy had just sort of mumbled, “Fae, right,” before sitting down and begging for coffee.

But now she wondered. The shooter had been using a rifle-which was made of steel. Plus he’d vanished in a bright light, just as he had up in the construction site. Did Fae do that? And why did Diego smell like one now?

“Cass.”

Cassidy looked up at Diego, who was watching her with dark eyes. “Hmm?”

“I shouldn’t have kissed you last night,” he was saying. “Or let you kiss me. I was way out of line. But I haven’t been doing anything right since I met you.”

Cassidy could only look at him. She should think of something witty to say. She’d always been able to be witty with Donovan. Their mutual wisecracks had filled every room. Now, with Diego, Cassidy sat tongue-tied. She couldn’t think of anything more witty to say than, “Oh?”

“But I don’t regret it,” Diego said. He drew his thumb along the back of Cassidy’s neck. “I don’t regret it at all.”

Cassidy shook her head. “Me either.”

Diego grinned down at her. Damn, he had a nice smile. “Good. But if I try anything like that again, you stop me, all right?”

Oh, sure, stop him. Cassidy had been the one pretty much climbing up him last night. “OK,” she said. Could she carry on a brilliant conversation, or what?

“I’m supposed to be watching over you,” Diego said. “I’m the arresting officer, and you’re under probation. I don’t have any business kissing you. Or wanting to kiss you.”

Cassidy casually leaned back until her head rested on his shoulder. “What about after my probation is over?”

His smile widened, his dark eyes warming. “We’ll see what happens after that.”

Cassidy’s heart started pounding off the scale. The promise in his smile sent hot things through her body, awakening a frenzy she thought had died the day Donovan had.

Oh, no.

Oh, yes. It was happening, the tingling in her fingers, the buzzing in her head, the hot need that flushed her body. She felt warm, open, needy. And it wasn’t just the hangover. Crap.

Cassidy rubbed her head on Diego’s arm again, and again, he sat unmoving. She didn’t like the Fae-like scent, but if she nuzzled hers on him, she could cover it.

“ Mi ja, ” Diego said softly.

Her mating frenzy wanted to answer. It wanted Cassidy to turn around and straddle him in the chair, strip off his tie and open his shirt. She wanted to unbuckle his pants, open them, reach inside to find him hard for her.

She’d shed her own shirt and jeans, let him lick her bare skin, touch her all over. Some Shifters liked to have sex only in their animal forms, but Cassidy loved the feel of human skin against human skin, where she could make love face-to-face. Kissing was the best thing, mouths melding as male and female joined.

Diego’s breath came faster. Cassidy looked up into his eyes, her heart thumping as she saw the naked need in them.

He wanted her. Whatever he was fantasizing right now, it was driving him as crazy as Cassidy’s fantasies were driving her.

But Diego was holding himself back. He was a strong man, would be an alpha if he were Shifter. Diego had rules he had to follow, and by Goddess, he was following them.

Cassidy was about to throw the rules to the wind and let her frenzy out when Eric walked in the back door. Her brother took in Cassidy and Diego sitting so close, and his nostrils widened.

Eric must have smelled the faint Fae scent, because he stopped, sniffed, and riveted his gaze to Cassidy. She shook her head the slightest bit.

Diego was definitely human, not Fae, not even half Fae. Though Cassidy had never seen a Fae, she knew what signs to look for; every Shifter did. Full-blood Fae had pointed ears, white blond hair, and cold, cold eyes. Half human, half Fae could look human, but their eyes were just as cold.

Eric didn’t pursue it. “Your brother says you want to have a look at that outcropping where the shooter was,” he said to Diego. “Good idea. You can drive.”

Cassidy itched and burned. She wanted to go with them; she wanted to find out why this hunter was stalking her, and whether he had anything to do with Donovan’s death. Despite her awakening frenzy, she wasn’t letting go of her quest to bring down the hunters who’d killed Donovan. He’d been her mate and hadn’t deserved to die.

She knew that if she told Diego she wanted to hunt and kill the men who’d shot Donovan, he’d do his best to stop her. Shifters were Collared, tamed. Supposed to be anyway. Diego would say it was his job to stop her.

Cassidy had things to do, anyway. She folded her arms as Diego stood up, his warmth going away. She had this hangover to get rid of, for one, and people she had to take care of. Being Eric’s second meant she helped Shifters with their troubles, keeping Eric from being overwhelmed with all but the direst problems. People came to Cassidy first.