A Jaguar's Kiss (2 page)

east, toward wolf territory.” Ethan’s words were clipped.

“Did you plan this? How did you I’d be at the diner?” No

one had known she was coming back early. A slow trail of

fear travel ed down her spine.

He rol ed his eyes, as if she was stupid, and that fear

dissipated. “Of course I didn’t plan this, but I couldn’t pass

up the opportunity to take you.”

Opportunity?
“What’s the matter with you? Why are you

doing this to me? I just got back in town. Al I want is to see

my parents and brothers.” She tried to keep her voice calm

but it was difficult when al she wanted to do was shout at

him. She shuddered, remembering the last time she’d been

shot. It had been in Colombia as she’d escaped a drug

lord’s compound with vital information for her team. Even if

she could heal at supernatural speeds, a bul et slicing

through her body stil hurt something fierce.

“Quiet,” he snapped. “I’m taking you to my brother.”

At the mention of Owen, Gabriela had to focus on

keeping her heart rate steady. On top of al this, seeing the

man who had broken her heart when she’d been a fragile

sixteen-year-old?
Terrific.

Even though he’d told her to be quiet she couldn’t resist

asking one more question. “Seriously, what is this about?”

Ethan leveled the gun at her, his eyes angry. “I can shoot

you, dump you in the bed of the truck and drive the rest of

the way. I know you’l heal but it’l stil hurt. Your choice. Stop

with the questions or…?” He tipped the gun slightly, making

his point clear.

* * *

knew it hadn’t been more than an hour since Ethan had

kidnapped her. And no one would be missing her right now.

Her parents didn’t know that she’d managed to jump on an

earlier flight for her last connection and they weren’t

expecting her home until tonight. That psycho Ethan had

been tight-lipped the entire drive into wolf territory. It wasn’t

until they’d passed a cluster of log cabins she knew the

majority of his pack lived in that he’d told her to stop in front

of the only two-story cabin. Then he’d snapped metal cuffs

on her wrists and dragged her inside. They weren’t silver so

they didn’t chafe her skin, but they were titanium. Shifters

were stronger than humans, but titanium was stil titanium.

Sniffing the air around her, she had a feeling Ethan had

dumped her in his brother’s office because she could smel

his familiar pine scent. She could also hear Ethan on the

phone downstairs talking to who she assumed was Owen

and knew her time alone was limited. Since she had on

cuffs he probably didn’t think she was much of a threat. It’s

not as if she could shift to her jaguar form like this. Wel , she

could, but her arms and legs in cat form were a lot bigger

and she wasn’t positive the change would break the cuffs. If

it didn’t, she’d be in serious pain.

She didn’t plan to stick around long enough to see why

this crazy wolf had kidnapped her. Thankful y Ethan had

cuffed her hands in the front so she had some mobility.

Quietly riffling through the top drawers of the giant oak

desk, she smiled when she final y found a very slim letter

opener. It was as long as a screwdriver but much thinner

and flatter. The cuffs on her wrist were thicker than normal

and so was the lock opening. Picking up the end of the

opener with her mouth, she slid the shiny tip into the circular

opening.

A slam sounded from downstairs. Shouts fol owed. Her

heart beat erratical y. She recognized that voice. Owen.

No, no, no.

Forcing her hands to remain calm, she began twisting

the opener with her mouth. She’d done this before—of

course she’d had better tools then but she knew

exactly…
click
. The tiny lever inside sprung free, releasing

her manacles.

As they fel from her wrists, the door flew open, slamming

against the back wal with a sickening crash. She felt as if

her heart actual y stopped for a moment. Everything around

her funneled out as she stared into the clearest blue eyes

she’d ever seen. Owen had always been big, but he’d

grown even tal er since she’d last seen him. He was

probably six-foot three now. And he had that GQ thing

going on. Tal , strong jaw, incredibly broad shoulders and

muscles that couldn’t be disguised by a mere T-shirt. His

blue-black hair and blue eyes gave him an exotic,

appealing look. Of course she could see the wolf lurking

beneath the surface. Just a hint of danger that even humans

wouldn’t be able to ignore.

“Gabriela,” he whispered, some foreign emotion injected

into that one word.

That broke the spel . Fisting the cuffs, she chucked them

at his head and turned, diving for the glass window. Unlike

wolf shifters, her change to animal form was seamless. Her

clothes and shoes shredded as she became a jaguar.

Vaguely, as if from a great distance, she heard Owen

cursing behind her, but she didn’t pause in her escape.

Drawing on the strength of her hind legs she used the

window frame as a springboard—and tried to ignore the

pain of the glass slicing into her paws—to propel herself to

the oak tree.

The sun had risen farther in the sky, il uminating

everything for her, not that she needed it with her

extrasensory abilities. Nimbly, she jumped from branch to

branch until she hit the dirt running. She could hear the

sound of a growl behind her, but ignored it. If Owen or

Ethan thought they could kidnap her and hold her hostage,

they’d have to catch her first.

As a jaguar, she was a heck of a lot faster than them. Her

family wasn’t native to this area, and with the exception of

the local doctor, they were the only jaguar shifters living in

Montana that she knew of. Stil , she could travel these

woods blind. First she needed to know she had outrun her

pursuers. Then she was going to figure out why a member

of the Wright pack had kidnapped her in broad daylight.

And there was going to be hel to pay.

* * *

heading down the stairs.

“I’l radio the guys on perimeter duty to track her,” Ethan

said as he hurried after him.

It took al of Owen’s restraint not to knock his brother out

right now. He’d actual y kidnapped Gabriela in some

misguided attempt to force her family to reveal who had

been behind the recent jaguar kil ings in the area. It didn’t

matter that Ethan had admitted the gun hadn’t been loaded.

Gabriela hadn’t known that.

Owen barely kept from snarling. “Radio everyone and tel

them to give her a wide berth. No one is to go after her.”

His inner wolf was clawing at the surface and right about

now he was ready to slice his brother to shreds for putting

shackles on Gabriela.

“But—”

Owen whipped around and had his brother slammed up

against the outside wal of the cabin before he even

realized he’d curled his fist around Ethan’s neck. “I’m your

Alpha and you’l do as I say. Anyone touches her, they’l

answer to me. And I’l punish you for it, too.”

With wide eyes, his brother coughed out an “okay.”

Not bothering to wait and see if Ethan fol owed his

orders, Owen finished stripping and shifted to his wolf form.

Unlike the beauty of Gabriela’s shift, which he’d seen

hundreds of times back when they’d been friends, his was

more brutal. He held in a growl as his body underwent the

change. Bones broke, shifted and realigned with a painful

burst as fur quickly grew, covering what had once been

skin.

Then he was running. He raced through the forest,

tracking her sweet honeydew scent. When he’d received

that cal from his brother tel ing him what Ethan had done,

Owen had seen red. He hadn’t seen Gabriela in about nine

years and hadn’t spoken to her in ten. Not since he’d been

seventeen years old and stupid and had screwed up the

best thing in his life.

She’d been his best friend and he’d hoped they’d be

more. But he’d lost even her friendship. It had made his

decision to join the army at eighteen easy. Some days it

was hard to believe so much time had passed since he’d

spoken to her.

He bounded over icy patches of dirt and grass, barely

feeling the cold. As a shifter he had a higher body

temperature anyway, but right now al his focus was on

finding Gabriela. He felt practical y numb as he strained to

run faster,
faster
.

That familiar sexual hunger he’d experienced when he

was a teenager was back, only this time it was stronger,

needier. His entire body craved her in a way he didn’t quite

understand. Or didn’t want to.

Back then he’d been too stupid to realize what she was

to him. Then he’d somehow hurt her and it had been too

late to explore what might have been. She’d refused to see

him. Absolutely wouldn’t talk to him or take his cal s and

hel , at seventeen he’d been ful of pride. He hadn’t been

wil ing to beg her to explain what he’d done wrong.

Now he had to talk to her. To see her and convince his

inner wolf she was real. Her honey-brown hair was shorter

than it had been years ago, fal ing a few inches below her

shoulders. She was stil tal , about five-feet ten, and lean

and lithe. The way she moved as a human mirrored her

movements as a jaguar and it had always fascinated him.

Now her speed and agility frustrated him.

The deeper into his territory he went, he realized where

she was headed. Owen’s father had been Alpha before him

—right up until the day he’d died five years ago—and had

given the Segura family an area of the forest to hunt. With

the growing attacks against humans lately, Owen had

rescinded his father’s offer and taken back his pack’s land.

It had been a difficult choice, but he’d needed to calm his

pack’s growing anger.

But she wouldn’t know that. She probably assumed the

cabin her family had once used to store extra changes of

clothes and food was stil protected.

Instead of fol owing her trail toward the river bed where

he knew she was headed in an attempt to try to cover her

scent before doubling back to the cabin, he ran west

toward the cabin in her family’s former territory. Why fol ow

her when he could just beat her to her final destination?

Once he neared the smal building, he slowly circled,

making sure he was alone. Then he rol ed around in pine

boughs to mask his scent before he shifted to his human

form. Using a side window that was unlocked, he climbed

inside and found himself in one of the guest rooms. The

place had the bare minimum of furniture but he found

clothes that fit him and settled down to wait, bracing for the

coming confrontation.

Gabriela waited until she was on the front porch of her

family’s cabin before shifting to her human form. Breathing

hard from the run, she glanced around the surrounding

forest but didn’t see anyone lurking in the trees. She could

faintly scent wolves but the smel didn’t seem recent.

Not surprisingly the front door wasn’t locked. People

rarely ventured out here and there was nothing to steal

inside, anyway. The first step she took inside, she realized

her mistake. The scent of wolf and pine subtly hit her.

Inwardly cursing that she hadn’t smel ed it sooner, she tried

to move back.

Before she could run, the door was slammed shut behind

her and she found herself pressed up against the door by a

very large, very angry-looking Owen. Thank God he was at

least clothed, though it didn’t matter because she wasn’t.

She could feel the heat and muscles of his body through the

shirt and pants she was pretty sure he’d stolen from one of

the closets.

When she swung out at him, he easily caught her wrist

and pinned it against the door above her. Angry at his

strength, she let out a growl. Faking a blow with her other

hand, she slammed her knee into his groin when he went to

grab her other wrist. She wasn’t afraid he’d physical y or

sexual y assault her but she wasn’t going to let him hold her

hostage. And she’d fight him to escape.