A Game of Cat & Mouse (2 page)

Catching up to her twitching tail, he made his beast stay back, allowing her room to run. Caleb didn’t want to lose her.

He just wanted to follow her. We must catch her. Caleb agreed wholeheartedly with his cougar. Allowing a burst of speed, he pounced, careful to capture the precious little mouse in his paws – claws retracted of course.

***

Caleb caught her! Miranda had been

sure she’d lost him. Not that she knew where she was going in the first place because the fact still remained—she was lost. The paws that had once cradled her with surprising care faded to the calloused hands of a man. Caleb smiled down at her, his even white teeth curling into a cat-got-the-cream smile.

“Now, little mouse, can you shift back and maybe I can help you out of these woods?”

Caleb placed her on the ground and

stared at her expectantly. Didn’t he know how disconcerting it was for her to be in her birthday suit? Apparently, it wasn’t that big of a deal for him, and considering his impressive physique, Miranda could understand his comfort with nudity.

Miranda allowed herself to change and, once again, stood naked before him. She immediately attempted to cover herself and felt her face heat. Caleb’s hand under her chin pulled her gaze back to his mesmerizing golden brown eyes.

“How can you be so uncomfortable being naked? Don’t you have to undress before you shift?”

Miranda shook her head. Caleb looked puzzled, and Miranda laughed. “I’m a mouse.”

Caleb nodded, but Miranda could tell he still didn’t get what she was trying to tell him.

“When I shift, I compress, but when you shift, I’m assuming you enlarge, right?”

Caleb nodded, a spark igniting in those eyes of his. Almost there.

“That means I can shift and just burrow out of my pile of clothes.”

“But you still shouldn’t be ashamed to stand in front of me naked.”

Caleb’s words were soft like his fingers that traced her collarbone causing

gooseflesh to erupt on her skin.

“Why is that?” Miranda winced at how shaky her voice sounded. Caleb was affecting her more than she wanted to admit.

“You are my mate,” Caleb said his words laced with awe.

Mate? But that can’t be right. I’m a mouse, and he… well, he is a freaking cat!

Surely not! Miranda leaned forward and took a deep pull of his intoxicating scent.

Soap. Someone had an apple for lunch. Oh my! There under all the scents he had encountered throughout the day was his own personal fragrance. It was like nighttime and rain all rolled into one. It bombarded her olfactory system and sent Miranda’s mind into meltdown.

Miranda leaned forward, intent on

becoming one with that intoxicating aroma. It made her want to roll around in it to cover herself with it and blend it with her own. Miranda placed her hands on Caleb’s shoulders and rubbed her face along his muscled pectorals, basking in his warmth and scent. Mate!

Caleb was her mate. Miranda stepped back, her mind finally catching up to the wanton way she squirmed against Caleb’s delectable body in an attempt to get closer. Before she could get too far, Caleb grasped her and pulled her back into his embrace.

Miranda could not dismiss the feeling of rightness that came from his embrace.

“How can this be?” she whispered, her mind racing.

Caleb didn’t answer. Miranda’s breath left her in a whoosh at the look of tension on his face. Cautiously Miranda lifted her hand, smoothing the line that furrowed between his brows, smiling when he

relaxed slightly.

Caleb’s focus turned to her mouth, and Miranda watched as Caleb seemed to have some type of internal debate. Then he was there, his fist grasping her hair and pulling her head back before angling his mouth over hers and taking her lips.

Caleb’s well-muscled arm circled her waist, holding her pinned to him – naked flesh to naked flesh.

Miranda gasped in shock and attempted to extricate herself from Caleb’s grasp, but the first foray of his tongue halted her.

Miranda sighed and relaxed, her arms encircling his neck as Caleb plundered and teased her mouth.

Past kisses faded from her mind as

Caleb’s mouth turned from teasing to determined, proving his intent to claim that which belonged to him. Caleb’s restraining arms relaxed with her compliance, his hand around her waist drifting lower to clasp her buttocks and pull her to straddle his lap.

Caleb’s erection pressed against her mound.

Miranda couldn’t recall a time when she’d felt this ready, this needy. She wasn’t a complete prude, although her family often teased her with said title, and had indulged in a few lovers. None of them had ever elicited a fraction of the reactions that Caleb managed with just one look. I don’t even know him! With that thought, she groaned as she realized, despite the need coursing through her body, her family’s teasing was coming back to bite her in the ass. Despite her belief that women had the same right to be as promiscuous as men, she could not bring herself to answer her body’s demands, especially with a man she did not know.

Miranda turned her head, effectively breaking Caleb’s intent assault upon her mouth. His mouth descended to the side of her neck she exposed with her evasive technique. She felt the scrape of sharp teeth, and her heart began to race in equal parts fear and arousal. “Caleb?”

***

A haze of lust descended upon Caleb, his cougar demanding he take his mate. Take her! Every bit of his control was tested when he sensed his claws extend. His worry over harming Miranda with them pulled him back from the edge of his control and allowed him to retract them.

Caleb knew he would never get enough of the beauty he held within his arms, sampling her as she released small

squeaks of arousal within his mouth. He was lost in the scent of her arousal permeating the air.

Miranda suddenly moved, tearing her lips away from his and exposing her neck to him. Caleb almost cried out in triumph, as the moment he had waited his entire life for suddenly became a reality. He allowed his incisors to lengthen as he gave the graceful curve of her neck teasing scrapes with his teeth. Anticipation was growing with each second as his mate beckoned him to claim her. Take her!

The sudden scent of fear nearly choked Caleb, his cougar growling within himself, pushing to be released to eradicate that which would dare to scare his mate, his Miranda. The potency of the fear enraged him since smell was not one of a cougar’s best assets. He pulled back, peering down into the dark brown eyes filled with unshed tears. His heart clenched, and he noticed the press of her hands was not from passion but from resistance. He released her and turned away, taking deep breaths as the cause of her fear finally made it into his lust-filled mind – him.

Caleb never dreamed finding his mate would be this way. His previous

expectations were shattered when he’d first seen Miranda. He assumed his mate would be a cougar, perhaps one from another pride. She would be fierce and everything an alpha female should be.

Now, his dream had changed into that of a little mouse whose fear caused his gut to clench and his cougar to pace restlessly.

Caleb’s muscles relaxed, his agitation melting away with the simple touch of her hand on his arm. Miranda was still there.

He expected her to run, but his mate surprised him.

“Caleb?”

Her hesitant tone brought him back from his thoughts. Caleb turned to find her dark brown eyes regarding him warily, her mouth turned into a frown. Though he knew it might scare her, he could not help clasping her cheek and brushing his lips against hers. Miranda sighed, and her body relaxed as the tension drained from her tiny frame.

“Don’t fear me. I would never hurt you.”

Miranda nodded almost imperceptibly before stepping closer and burrowing her face in his chest. Caleb’s arms embraced her automatically, and just like that, everything was right in his universe again.

It amazed him how one little mouse could become so important so quickly.

“I’m sorry. But you have to understand I don’t know you. I need time.”

Miranda’s lost little voice worried Caleb.

All the matings he had witnessed were intense, one of the many things separating them from humans. After finding their mate, most shifters were helpless against the pull, and the fact that Miranda was going to try to resist scared him. His mate needed time, and that was exactly what he was going to give her.

“Let’s get you home, Miranda.”

Caleb, true to his word, led her back home where she quickly slipped into the summer dress she’d left on her small back porch. Caleb smiled down at her, almost as if amused by her modesty. His hands lifted to brush across her cheeks, and she closed her eyes to bask in the momentary bliss of Caleb’s hands on her skin.

“Let me take you out tomorrow?”

Miranda opened her eyes in surprise and searched his golden brown eyes for

confirmation that she’d heard correctly.

She felt her mouth turn into a smile, and her heart executed a flutter that she was sure could not be healthy. He wanted to see her again. Well, of course he does; he is your mate! A sobering thought that her mouse side thought was apparent. Caleb wanted her and always would, but only because nature had deemed it so. Miranda wanted love, had dreamed of love. But did she want to be loved simply because their bodies decided for them? Was it truly love if she wanted him with every fiber of her being but did not know the first thing about him? Wasn’t that just lust?

And there lay the root of her hesitancy.

Miranda was afraid that they would mate and he wouldn’t truly love her.

Her mother told her that finding a true mate was dependent on body chemistry and genetics. The fact that she was a mouse shifter and Caleb was a cougar shifter was weird, but maybe she held some kind of genetic material that would be beneficial for their future offspring.

Whatever the reason, her body clamored for Caleb. Despite a chemical attraction that would ultimately tie the two together for life, no matter the species of shifter they may be, it did not guarantee love.

Most true-mated pairs were in love, but love was not required to produce offspring.

“Miranda?”

Miranda blinked and focused her

attention back on Caleb, his golden brown eyes regarding her expectantly. She nodded slowly, accepting his invitation because, despite her reservations about this mating, she couldn’t deny that she needed him. He smiled before brushing his lips feather light against her own.

“I’ll see you tomorrow night at six o’clock. Be ready for dinner.”

Miranda sighed as she stepped back and closed the door, resisting the urge to throw herself in his arms. Beg him to take her.

Now Miranda tossed on the bed, her skin tingling with each movement. Her

pajamas lay in a long forgotten pile on the floor, their constraints too much tactile stimulation for her to handle. What was happening to her? Of course, on some level, Miranda knew, but she ignored the idea, relegated it to being impossible. But no matter how she denied it, the truth remained— Miranda was in heat.

Miranda wished she could go back in time and do just that–throw herself into his arms and beg Caleb to take her. Why did she ever think she could resist something ingrained within their species?

Miranda writhed as her skin became

even more sensitive, the nerves firing over and over, the feeling turning almost painful. She knew it would progress from tactile sensitivity to cramps and finally intense pain as her whole body demanded his touch.

Miranda, tired of resisting, allowed her hands to slide over her skin, cupping her breasts and massaging them. Pinching the hardened and sensitive nipples, aroused since her afternoon encounter with Caleb, she imagined his large hands cupping her breasts and teasing her nipples. She parted her thighs, allowing the cool air to hit her molten center. She moaned and trailed her hand down her stomach to the aching and clenching flesh at the apex of her thighs.

The first touch to her sensitive clit caused her flinch, her back arching and her vagina clenching at nothing. Miranda cried out, and a fine sheen of sweat coated her body. She circled her clit and moaned as the pleasure began to build, her whole body demanding she crash over the

precipice. Her other fingers left the torment of her breasts to sink within her sheath demanding to be filled. Her hips moved in time with her ministrations, but her body never quite reached the peak she so desperately needed.

Miranda’s hands fell away as she caught her breath. The pain took her by surprise, her stomach clenching in cramps as she moaned and curled her body into a fetal position. Tears pricked her eyes as she realized that she needed Caleb. She needed something from him she didn’t want to take until she knew that he loved her – until she loved him.

***

Caleb paced in his cougar form in the

woods outside of Miranda’s house, his cougar becoming more agitated by the second. He wanted it’s mate. He knew his Miranda was suffering because he’d

witnessed some of the pride females go through heat. They would begin with sensitive skin that would turn to painful with any tactile stimulation, followed by cramping that nearly incapacitated them.

Most of the pride females assured him that although excruciating, a good orgasm could quell the worst of the pain.

Leaving Miranda when he’d walked her home had to be the hardest thing he’d ever had to do. Her big brown eyes regarded him warily as she dressed. Her modesty was amusing and oddly refreshing. But left her he had because Caleb knew that she wasn’t sure of what was happening. Hell, he wasn’t too sure himself. A mating usually occurred amongst one’s own

species of shifter. Rarely did a mating occur between two types of shifters, but it was not unheard of. Rarer still was a mating between shifter and human.

Caleb knew that Miranda would have a hell of a time, becoming the alpha female of a cougar pride, and he wasn’t apt to tell her before she agreed to be his mate.

The pride females already had their hackles raised when they scented Miranda upon his return. Brenna James, one of Caleb’s most adamant admirers, had even had the audacity to hiss at her alpha. After reminding her who ruled the pride, Caleb had spent a torturous few hours ensuring his pride was running smooth–as smooth as it had since he had become alpha–before returning to pace like a stalker outside of Miranda’s house.