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Becca Duran cursed in Spanish.

“Why are Latinas such hot heads?” her best friend Lyssa asked. “And why are you being so obstinate?”

Becca glanced from the window to Lyssa sitting at the kitchen counter.

“I’m not. You weren’t there, Lyssa. You didn’t hear what the elders suggested I do to fix things.”

“Things? What things?” she asked, pouring a glass of wine.

Becca threw a hand in the air. “The lack of men things.”

Lyssa smirked. “Flesh and blood men things or battery-operated men things?”

Becca cracked a smile. “You’re not helping.”

“Oh, contraire, good vibrations would have the old biddies on the council happily buzzing away and off your back. Problem solved.” She waggled her eyebrows.

“Again, not helping, Lys.”

Lyssa grinned. “Maybe not, but at least my suggestion would put a smile on their wrinkly faces, which is more than I can say for you.”

“I am not wrinkly.” A smirk tugged at Becca’s lips despite herself.

“No, but neither are you smiling. Like ever. Since you took over as Prowl Leader, you aren’t you anymore.”

Humor fading, she eyed her friend. “That’s not fair, Lys. I didn’t ask for this or for what happened.”

“I know you didn’t and I didn’t mean it that way. This whole situation is unfair, most of all to you.” Lyssa topped off Becca’s wine glass. “Drink up and tell me what the council said.”

Becca slid onto the barstool across from Lyssa and picked up her drink. “You don’t want to know. Their suggestions ran the gamut from the surreal to the ridiculous.”

“C’mon. How bad could they be?” Lys asked.

Becca lifted her glass and took a sip. “Bad.”

“Try me.”

“One proposal suggested capturing males from a rival clan or setting traps for humans hiking in the Pine Barrens.”

Lyssa snorted into her wine, coughing.

“See?” Becca nodded. “Like we’re some kind of Amazon tribe.” She ran a frustrated hand over her long, dark hair. “Though with a three-to-one, female-to-male ratio, it’s only a matter of time.”

“What did Lucilla say?”

Becca shrugged again. “She vetoed the idea of booty raids.”

“Don’t tell me she was in favor of man-traps?” Lys raised an eyebrow.

Becca shook her head with a chuckle. “No, of course not. She’s the only elder with any kind of sense. The rest are super old and bat shit crazy and demand I find an appropriate mate to legitimize me as Prowl Leader.”

“So where does that leave us?”

“I have no idea.” Becca exhaled. “We need an alliance with a strong shifter pack. The council would prefer me to parlay with another Leap, but I don’t see how. We are the last North American leopards in a five-hundred-mile radius. It’s not an option.”

Lyssa chewed on the side of her lip and then grabbed her purse, fishing inside.”

“What are you looking for?”

Her friend glanced up from rummaging. “Don’t fly off the handle, but I think I have the answer to your dilemma.”

Becca drained her wine glass. “It’s not my dilemma, Lys. It’s our dilemma. All of us.”

“Exactly.” Lyssa held out her phone.

“How is your cellphone going to solve our problem?”

“No, dummy. Look at the pic on my screen.” Lys motioned again.

Becca took her friend’s phone and glanced at the screen. “It’s a business card.”

Lyssa exhaled. “Yes, very good. It’s also a rectangle. Jeez, Bec…read the damn card!”

Becca’s eyes scanned the slightly blurry writing. “Gerri Wilder. Paranormal Dat—” Her eyes flew to her friend. “Oh, no. I am not calling a dating service.”

“It’s not a service, it’s an agency, Bec, and from what I overheard this woman is the real deal.”

Now it was Becca’s turn to raise an eyebrow. “Overheard?”

Lyssa shrugged. “Can I help it if I happen to be sitting at the bar in Caesar’s Palace and happen to overhear the girl next to me bragging?”

“That’s not overhearing, that’s eavesdropping, and the answer is still no. It’s probably an escort scam.”

Lyssa took her phone from Becca’s fingers and put it on counter, tapping the screen. “The elders will never let up until you actually do something about our man issues. Email the woman, Bec. What have you got to lose?”

“My dignity.”

“C’mon, Becca. I googled her. Gerri Wilder is the shit. The real deal. Very discreet and very professional. If anyone can find you an ‘appropriate’ mate, it’s her.” She paused, giving her friend a sneaky grin. “Hey, maybe she can arrange a private booty raid just for you.”

“Not funny, Lys.”

“Yes, it is. It’s hilarious.” She eyed Becca’s face, and her friend’s miserable expression sobered her immediately. “Call her. If not for yourself, then for the rest of us. Council elders aren’t the only ones counting on you.”

Grudgingly, Becca took the phone from the counter and looked at the woman’s card again. With an exhale, she nodded. “Okay, you win. I’ll send her an email, but I’m not promising anything.”

“Good.” Lys gestured to her cellphone in Becca’s hand. “Go ahead.”

Becca balked. “I’m not emailing her now. I need time to think.”

Lyssa nodded. “Right. Why window shop when you’ve got money in your pocket to spend. Go for what you want.”

“Window shop?” Becca laughed. “Next you’ll be asking if she’s got a layaway program for you.”

Lyssa eyed her friend. “You do know you’ll have to tell her about you, right?”

Becca glanced at the long-stemmed glass in her hand. “I realize that.”

“You okay with that?”

“One step at a time, Lys.”

She covered Becca’s hand with her own. Neither your father nor your brother’s deaths are on your head.”

“That’s easy for you to say. You don’t have to live with the guilt.”

“I’m not buying, and I don’t care what culpability the council spews to manipulate you. Neither was your fault. You’re alive and in one piece because of your father, and as for Charlie—it was a raid, Bec. More than just your brother died that night.”

“Again, because of me. I may be alive, but the number of pieces I’m in is still up for debate.”

Lys squeezed Becca’s fingers. “AGAIN, not YOUR fault. You were barely eighteen when it all started and the raid that took Charlie from us was a decade later. It’s been two years since, Becca. You’ve got to get past this for all of us.”

“I suppose.” Becca pulled herself out of her memories and shook her head. “Okay, back to the present. What makes you so sure this matchmaker will have someone who fits our needs?”

Lys shrugged. “A strong male shifter with working parts. What more do we need?”

Becca crumpled her napkin and threw it at her friend. “A lot. Besides, it might be harder for her to match me to someone and not the other way around.”

“For heaven’s sake, why?” Lyssa lifted a frustrated hand.

“I’m not exactly a spring chicken.”

Laughing out loud, Lyssa threw the crumpled napkin back. “Jeez, Bec. You make it sound like you’re ancient. You’re thirty.”

Becca made a face. “Thirty and thick.”

“Curvy, yes, but like the song says, it’s all about that bass,” Lys replied with a wink.

“Ha!”

“Scoff all you want, but I know I’m right.” Lyssa shrugged. “You should have heard what that chick at Caesar’s was saying. Gerri’s guys prefer a little sumpin’ sumpin’ when it comes to woman. If it’s good enough for the human girls she’s matching, then it’s certainly good enough for a shifter. You bring more to the game.”

Bec pushed her wine glass away. “More indeed.”

Lyssa got up from the counter and took Becca by the arm, turning her toward the mirror on the far wall. “This is your hunt, leopard queen. Take no prisoners.” She winked. “Unless you bring one home for me.”

Becca hugged her friend. “Okay, okay…stop pushing and get your laptop.”