CHAPTER SIX
Cat’s Head Cove, West Haven
Ryan~
He was exhausted by the time he got to the Rutherford compound. He had been told to stay in the main house on Cat’s Head, because the Victorian cottage was the only place in the compound still open this late in the year. The caretakers had been told to fill the fridge and make up his bed. It was also the cottage closest to the old lighthouse where Claudia lived with her cub.
Not that he minded. The old house held only happy memories for him. Every summer as far back as he could remember Grandmother had held court here. In a family with many queens, she was the matriarch. He and his brothers and cousins had adored her and served her willingly.
He was going to use his first two days to try to heal himself. Starting by taking cougar and checking out his new family. In the morning, after he had had a rest. It was the pits being constantly fatigued after a lifetime of boundless energy.
This late in October, there was at best only another hour of full sun. After that the woods would be dark. Not that it mattered to a cougar. Ryan had excellent night vision. But he longed for sunshine, as if the sun’s heat could bake out this fucking fever.
The Marines had taught him the value of a quick change. He was unpacked and slipping naked out the back door in five minutes. His change into cougar took lots longer. Another side effect of the poison. In their teens, he and his brothers had practiced their shifts until they could do them in the twinkling of an eye. Not so much now.
But at last he was done. He took stock. The best he could say was that whatever the doctors thought, it was less painful being a great cat than a man. He limped towards the woods. The sights and smells of the trees and the moss revived him. This green forest was paradise on earth. He shook off the weariness compounded by two back-to-back ferry rides and his wound.
Already he could feel the stiffness in his right leg working out and new vigor energizing his entire body. He opened his jaws wide and inhaled deeply, letting the aromas of nature suffuse his senses. Stretched. The delicious scent of the pines and the larches were sweeter than perfume. The moss was cool to his burning feet.
Yup, this felt like home, as Portland never did. The larches were turning gold and beginning to drop their leaves. They lay scattered over the pine needles like gold coins over dirt. He lifted a pile with one giant paw and flung the leaves into the air. They fluttered down like golden rain. He pounced.
The joy of being able to move without agony was more exhilarating than skydiving. Not that he was pain free. Maybe it was just that his beast was less focused on the pain? He tossed and stalked and tussled with the small golden leaves as if he were indeed a cougar cub again. He was so caught up in his game that it was some time before he realized that he himself was being stalked.
He spun around. If he hadn’t had that fever there was no way anyone could have sneaked up on him. There on all fours was a very small boy. Jimmy looked like his photograph. Blond. Golden eyed. Purring like a fool. Purring exactly as Ryan was. He approached the boy cautiously. He didn’t want to frighten his son. He didn’t. Jimmy crept forward until he was right in front of Ryan.
He put his little nose in the air, inviting acknowledgment.
Amused, Ryan touched his huge nose to the small, sunburned one. The boy’s purring was replaced by a giggle. Two hands hugged his face and tugged on his whiskers. While he was recovering from this audacity, the kid rose to his feet and darted away, still giggling.
The little bugger was fast. Even for a cougar cub. He turned around and grinned impishly over his shoulder, and went back to running on his itty-bitty sneakers. Ryan wanted to laugh. He stalked the child, pretending he could not find him when he slipped behind a tree.
The kid peeped out. Laughed. Dashed left and crouched down behind a shrub. Ryan could see him through the bare branches, but the child acted as if he were invisible. Probably thought he was. Ryan mimed hunting. He ignored the giggles until the boy popped out of his hidey-hole, hugged him, and took off again. And disappeared.
Jimmy should have been perfectly visible. But Ryan couldn’t make him out in the half-light. And then there he was. He popped into view and winked out again. Giggling happily the whole time. Ryan concentrated. But even with his preternaturally good cougar vision, even with every paranormal sense on high, he could not keep the kid in sight.
He was blinking on and off like a Christmas light. Fortunately he couldn’t eliminate his scent. Ryan knew where he was. He padded around the little clearing pretending he couldn’t locate the cub, while monitoring him by smell.
Like any three-year-old, the child emerged from hiding, laughing gleefully. “You couldn’t find me, Cat,” he boasted.
They played the game until Ryan realized they were losing the light. The shadows were growing longer. Jimmy would be missed soon. Better get him home. He stopped the game by sitting quietly. As he had expected, the curious little guy came up. Ryan flattened himself. The boy climbed onto his back.
A female voice shouted, “Jimmy.” Ryan’s sensitive hearing caught the note of panic in the soft contralto.
His passenger stiffened. “That’s my mommy,” he whispered in Ryan’s ear.
He only had to follow the sound of the boy’s name, repeated with rising exasperation, to find the woman. He learned a few things. The cub was well aware that he had been naughty. And that lust at first sight was entirely possible.
Claudia looked exactly like her photograph. Little, round, honey-haired. As soft as butter. And twice as sweet. As soon as Jimmy scurried out of the woods, her anxious shouting ceased. She knelt in the leaf litter and gathered her son against a generous bosom and held him tightly.
Ryan sniffed the air. Her scent, rich and powerful, and deeply feminine, clouded his senses and made him think of tangled sheets and long, hot nights. Wasn’t he a lucky son of a queen? Jimmy’s real father was an idiot if he had abandoned this woman. That jackass better not show up to claim her or his son. She was Ryan’s and he would keep what was his.
Jimmy tugged at her hand and started to tell her about his adventures. His mom lifted him into her arms and let him ride her hip home.
Lucky Jimmy.
The boy chattered on. He told Mommy all about his new ‘friend’ the big cat. Mommy didn’t even glance around, she just murmured affectionate encouragement. Probably thought Ryan was an imaginary friend. Probably best if he stayed that way – for now.