Jameson walked to the woods, glanced around just in case, and started quickly taking his clothes off. He hated to leave Cady when he could be spending time with her, but he needed to shift. Give his tiger his body for a while. Work through some of the emotions he was feeling.

Most of it was good. Amazing, really. He’d finally met his mate. and she was more than he ever imagined his mate would be. Gorgeous, sweet, strong, kind. And she was pregnant, which was fulfilling his need for a family even faster than he ever thought possible. It was by no means why he wanted her. He’d want her just as much if she wasn’t expecting a baby. But it was an added bonus.

And they’d been amazing in bed together last night. He’d known it would be great with her. He heard over and over that sex with a true mate was the best there was. Still—he hadn’t thought it would be like that. It was explosive. He didn’t think there was another way of describing it.

But despite all that, there was absolutely no guarantee she’d stay here in Durga with him once her car was fixed. He thought she was as into him as he was to her. But she had shit in her past, bad shit, and it might be enough to keep her from being with him on a permanent basis.

Which brought him to the main reason he needed to shift. He’d been filled with fury, fury he was desperately trying to suppress and hide from her, since he saw the burn marks on her delicate skin. He was hoping if he could roam as his tiger for a bit, he could work through some of it. Before she saw it, and thought it was directed at her. That would terrify her, badly. Maybe badly enough that he couldn’t talk her back down again.

Hunching over, he gave his cat his body. The sound of his bones breaking and reforming echoed through the woods, and a flash of intense pain burst through his body. It all happened in an instant, and then he had all four paws on the ground. Shaking out his fur, he took off, bounding through the woods, dodging trees, pushing himself faster and being more reckless than he usually was.

But the fury was still snaking its way through him, and he had to try to work some of it out. If he ever came across the fucker who marked her, who hurt her—Winston, she said—he didn’t think he’d be able to stop himself from killing him. He’d tear that motherfucker to shreds—

A flash of white barreled next to him and he spun, hackles raised as he hissed, claws digging in the dirt as he slid. Fuck, it was just Karis. He was a white tiger, one of only three in the tribe, so Jameson hadn’t immediately recognized him for what he was.

Karis bounded in front of him, forcing him to stop, and then shifted to his human form. “Shift back, Jameson.”

He couldn’t help his growl. Other than training, he didn’t think he’d ever growled at his best friend before, but dammit, he wasn’t ready to shift back. He wasn’t even close to working through his emotions. He hissed again and started to go around him, but Karis just moved to the side, blocking him again.

“I said shift back. Now. I’m still your boss. You can’t ignore a direct order.”

He wanted to tell Karis to go fuck himself, but he couldn’t speak in this form. So, he’d do what his boss ordered, long enough to tell him where he could shove that shit, and then shift back.

Pushing his shift faster, he bit back a hiss at the pain. Forcing shifts to go faster, or slower, hurt like a bitch, but the sooner he got this over with, the better.

“What the hell do you want, Karis?”

His friend stared at him like he’d suddenly grown two heads. “What in the ever-loving fuck has gotten in to you, Jameson? This isn’t like you at all.”

“You don’t know everything about me,” he muttered.

Karis just cocked an eyebrow and didn’t say a word. But that was enough. Everyone in this tribe knew everyone else, and he and Karis were close. Had played together as kids and been best friends since they were in their teens, despite there being a little more than five years between them. He knew Jameson better than anyone. Fuck.

“I found my mate.”

Karis cocked his head, frowning. “I don’t understand why you’re worked up about it. When I was upset about Arya being my mate, you said you wanted one. You got pissed at me for hesitating to claim her. So I don’t get this at all. Wait—it’s the human staying at your house, isn’t it? Carrie? Is that why you’re upset, because your mate is human? I never thought you were a shifter snob.”

He snorted. “I’m not. And her name is Cady. Yeah, it’s her. And I’m ecstatic. I really am.”

“Excuse the fuck out of me if I don’t believe it. I hear the truth in your voice, but you’re sure as hell not acting like you’re okay with it.”

“Jesus man, you don’t know the whole story.”

“Then tell me.”

Blowing out a breath, he started pacing. “Cady’s pregnant. And before you ask if that’s the problem, it’s not. You know I want a family, know my tiger wants cubs. And I’ll love her baby like it’s my own, you know that. But the baby’s biological father—no, not father, he hasn’t earned that name; he’s the sperm donor, nothing more—he’s an abusive asshole. She hasn’t told me her story, or said the words, but it wasn’t hard to piece together.

“She’s running from him. She kept talking about how she hadn’t gotten far enough away yet, so she had to get back on the road. And then I saw some paperwork, realized she’d changed her name a little. Yesterday, when we went out to eat, she disguised herself. She has these gorgeous freckles, but she put some kind of heavy-duty makeup on to disguise them. She wore glasses she doesn’t need, and she had a wig on. I talked her into taking the wig off, told her it would stand out more than her natural dark brown. But she kept the other stuff.”

Pausing as his fury mounted, he fought to get it back under control. Karis held up his hand. “Stop the pacing, Jameson. It’s driving me crazy and making your dick swing around. No one needs to see that.”

“Stop fucking staring at it and you won’t see it swing around,” he snapped.

“Dammit, Jameson, chill the fuck out.”

Shaking his head, he ran his fingers through his hair, sighing. “Sorry, man. I’m just stressed.”

Karis studied him through narrowed eyes. “Tell me the rest.”

“She’s wary of everyone. Scared, especially of men. You should have seen the way she flinched away from me when we first met. She was always scared she’d made me mad, over some of the littlest shit. But we got past it. She relaxed with me, and we got close. Last night we—well, you know. And fuck, Karis. She took her shirt off, and on her back and hips were burn scars. Eight of them. She didn’t want to talk about it, but she told me they were made with cigars. The son of a bitch held lit cigars to her skin, and fuck all knows what else he did to her.”

Karis stared at him in silence for a few moments, his frown growing dark. “Shit, man. That’s fucked up. And why you’re so worked up.”

“If you found out some asshole dick put his hands on Arya, hurt her enough to make her scared of everyone she meets, scared enough to run—that he literally scarred her for life, would you be okay with it?”

“Fuck no. I’d gut the son of a bitch.”

“Exactly what I want to do. If I knew who he was, or where he lived, I’d go after him in a heartbeat. But all I know about him is his name is Winston, and I only know that much because she freaked over something and asked if I knew him. The fury over what was done to her is consuming me, but I don’t want her to see it. I don’t want to scare her. She’s had enough of that.”

“So you shifted to run the woods, trying to work some of it out. I get it.”

“You fucking interrupted me before I could make much headway, though.”

Karis shrugged. “You were acting erratic, not at all like you. Of course I needed to find out what was going on. Don’t pretend like you wouldn’t have done the same with me.”

He returned his friend’s shrug. He couldn’t deny it, because it was true. Didn’t mean he wasn’t still pissed he’d been stopped though. Karis started pacing, and he glanced over at him, lips quirking when he saw his dick swinging. Okay, now he saw what he was talking about. Jameson didn’t make a habit of staring at men’s cocks—he had nothing against men who wanted to, but it wasn’t his thing—but he couldn’t help glancing at it when he glimpsed movement.

“Have you told Kian? I know you haven’t told the warriors, or I would have known. We need to be on the lookout for this asshole if he follows her here.”

He shook his head. “I’m not sure it’s necessary. You know if a strange man showed up, it would be all over town by nightfall.”

“Nightfall might be too late. He could find her before then, and if he’s that violent, I’m pretty sure it won’t have a happy ending.”

He’s right. The more people who know we should be specifically looking for someone, the better, his tiger said.

“I’m not sure how he’d ever find her. Even if he knows the direction she was heading, the road she was using, he would have no way of knowing this place exists.”

“Don’t underestimate him. If she left and he’s chasing her down, odds are, he won’t stop until he finds her. Men like that never do. And there are always ways. What if he tracks her cell phone or some shit? It sounds extreme, but it could happen, and that’s enough.”

“Fuck. You’re right. I can’t leave this shit to chance. Why the hell didn’t I think of that?”

Karis walked closer and slapped him on the shoulder. “Because you’re a genuinely good guy. You wouldn’t expect it of someone else, because you’d never do it. And you’re too close to the situation. It sounds like you’ve had your hands full with Cady. You probably didn’t have much time to think this out.”

“I still should have. Her safety’s too important. She’s too important.”

“Finish your run, because you’re right, you really do need it. Then go talk to Kian. We can hold a meeting with the warriors later. We don’t have much to tell them, but it’s easy enough to tell them to alert us the moment an unknown man is spotted in Durga.”

Exhaling, Jameson nodded and immediately shifted back to his tiger. It meant more time away from Cady, which he hated, but Karis was right. It was necessary.

Cadence finished cleaning one of the spare bedrooms, resisting the urge to sneeze again. Jameson definitely hadn’t been exaggerating when he said some of the rooms really needed cleaned. There had been a layer of dust half an inch thick in this one, and she felt grimy, like it all transferred to her when she cleaned.

Deciding to leave the cleaning supplies upstairs since she’d need them again tomorrow, she headed to her room to shower. No way was she cooking like this. She pulled off her clothes, grimacing as it caused some dust to float in the air. Glancing absently in the mirror, she froze, eyes wide.

Her hair was up in a messy bun, tendrils escaping, and she had smudges of dirt on her forehead and cheek. But that wasn’t what had her attention. It was the small hickey at the juncture where her neck and shoulder met.

Reaching up, she touched it gently, a smile flirting on her lips. She hadn’t even realized he’d sucked on her neck hard enough to leave a mark, but the evidence was on her skin. And she wasn’t upset in the slightest. To her surprise, she liked the idea of being marked by him in some way. It made her feel like she was his.

Besides, she’d left her teeth marks in his shoulder. It was only fair that he left his own stamp on her, right?

Sighing, she turned the water on and pulled the tie out of her hair, shaking it out and immediately regretting it. How had so much dust ended up in her hair?

Once the water was warm, she stepped in, hoping it would relax the muscles that tensed up a moment ago. Last night had been freakin’ amazing. She never even knew sex could be that good, let alone experienced it before. The things he made her feel, the way he made her body sing—it was unbelievable. If it hadn’t happened to her, she would have said it wasn’t possible.

And she felt so incredibly close to him now. She went into it thinking it was basically scratching an itch, that she could keep it strictly physical. But he obliterated those imaginary boundaries she tried to set the moment he touched her.

Easing her head back, she let the water wash over her head, her mind’s eye conjuring visions of dirt blackened water going down the drain, though she knew that was an exaggeration. The problem was, she shouldn’t be getting closer to him. She shouldn’t like that she bonded with him emotionally last night, shouldn’t enjoy the fact that he left his stamp on her skin.

She was still planning on leaving as soon as her car was fixed.

A few days ago, she’d been anxious to leave. Itching to get back on the road and put more distance between herself and Winston.

Now, she didn’t want to leave. It was the last thing she wanted to do. If it was only her she had to worry about, she’d stay in a heartbeat. Durga Valley wasn’t on any map, and Jameson assured her she was safe here. And she believed him wholeheartedly.

But there wasn’t only herself to think about. She had her baby to consider. Her hands dropped to her belly, that seemed to get bigger with every passing day—she loved that so damn much—and she rubbed it, smiling when she felt the movement underneath her palm. Her little girl. She’d do anything for her. Sacrifice anything for her. Die for her.

Leave this place, and Jameson, behind for her.

Tears pressed against her eyelids as her nose stung, and she didn’t fight it. She just let them come. She’d take the risk if it was just her, but it wasn’t. So she couldn’t. She had to put as much distance possible between herself and Tulsa, the last place she saw Winston.

Yet another thing to hate the bastard for. And as bad as what he’d done to her in the past was, she thought maybe this was what she hated him the most for. Jameson was amazing. Handsome, charming, kind, sweet, and so, so good in bed. Everything she ever wanted in a man, but never thought she’d find, even before Winston.

And she knew he’d love her baby. That he was halfway there already. He’d treat her like she was his own, Cadence knew. Her little girl would want for nothing, and he’d probably spoil her rotten.

Instead, because of Winston, she was going to most likely grow up on the verge of poverty. Cadence never finished her nursing degree, and she had no other skills, besides stripping. And she wouldn’t go back to that. Not with a baby, an impressionable little girl. It wasn’t like she’d whored herself out—nothing like that. But it was the next closest thing. Men paid to watch as she danced, baring her body until all she had on was a barely there thong.

This was sounding all wrong, even in her head. There was nothing inherently wrong with stripping. And she knew a few women who actually enjoyed it. They were doing something they wanted to do. More power to them. But Cadence never enjoyed it. Never wanted to do it. She wanted more from her life.

And she wanted more for her baby, too. She wanted her to know she could do and be anything. If that happened to be stripping, Cadence wouldn’t be too happy about it, to be honest. But if it was what her daughter wanted—well, she’d deal with that if it came to it. But she didn’t want to set an example and give her daughter any ideas, either.

Lord, her mind was all over the place right now. Jameson, Winston, stripping, her daughter. But it just showed how shaken up she was by everything.

And heartbroken. She could admit that. Her heart was cracking right down the middle over not being able to stay here and see where this could lead with Jameson.

It was insanely fast to feel this strongly already, but she couldn’t deny it. Most people would think she was crazy, especially with her past. Hell, a few days ago, she’d think she was insane, too. Ready to be committed to a mental ward. Locked away forever, complete with a straightjacket.

But this all felt so incredibly natural and right. It was a fucking travesty that she wasn’t going to be able to stay here and see it through.

Standing under the spray, she let her tears come, washed away almost immediately by the water. She hoped it would help relieve some of the heartache—crying usually had that effect on her. But not this time. She was feeling everything just as strongly as she had when she started. She had a suspicion that she’d always feel the heartbreak of leaving Jameson this strongly.

Exhaling, she quickly washed her hair and body, and then stepped out and dried off so she could dress. She needed to get dinner started soon. Keep up her end of the bargain. It was later than usual already, but Jameson called earlier and said he had an unexpected meeting and would be late, so she’d taken her time cleaning two of the bedrooms upstairs, wanting them perfect. But now she had to get things started.

Pushing everything from her mind, she finished dressing and headed downstairs. There was no use in crying over things she couldn’t change. No matter how much she wished that she could.