Leader Lion (Protection, Inc 5)

Grace

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The rest of the rehearsal felt like it lasted an eternity. Even when it ended, Grace still had to endure watching Paris and Ruth stroll out together, Paris carrying her empty cupcake tray and Ruth her empty rat cage, with their free hands clasped tight. Tycho rode on Ruth’s shoulder. They looked so happy and in love, and walked so close together that Ruth’s brown hair, which she’d never pinned back up, mingled with Paris’s blonde locks.

When everyone had finally left, Grace forced herself to her feet. Time to meet the replacement bodyguard and ask for Rafa’s phone number.

Time to find out if she’d thrown away her own best chance at love.

The night was dark and cold, and a bitter wind struck through her clothes the instant she opened the theatre door. A curvy black woman stood outside, her attitude relaxed but watchful. Just like Rafa.

That thought made Grace feel like she’d been stabbed in the heart with a sliver of glass.

The woman turned around. “Grace?”

“Yes.”

“I’m Rafa’s replacement.”

That one little word enlarged the splinter of glass in Grace’s heart to a shard, its edges cruelly sharp and cutting.

“He had to go home sick,” the woman bodyguard said. “I mean, he didn’t say that, but I assume that’s why he called me in. He looked terrible. You know, Rafa’s a former Navy SEAL, and they’re awfully stoic. And macho. I remember once we got in a throwdown with a gang, and he got his arm slashed open. We came back to our office, and he was bleeding all over the floor. We have a paramedic on staff, and she sewed up his arm. He never flinched. Cracked jokes the entire time. But today, I could see he was hurting.”

The bodyguard shook her head, looking concerned. “Man, I hope he’s all right. He was obviously in pain. And for him to show it at all, it must’ve been bad. I’ve never seen that kind of suffering in a man’s eyes before.”

Forget being stabbed. Grace felt like her heart had been run through a wood chipper. Which was apparently exactly what she’d done to Rafa.

The woman studied her face. And then, bizarrely, she smiled and said cheerfully, “But I’m sure he’ll be fine. He’s a tough guy. Shall I walk you to your car?”

Grace edged a step back. No sane person’s mood changed that fast. “No, thanks. I, uh, I’m not leaving yet. I still have work to do. Can I have Rafa’s phone number, though? I want to tell him to get well soon.”

The woman passed her a piece of paper. “Here you go. Give him my best.”

“Absolutely,” Grace said, and bolted back into the theatre. What a weird woman! She’d have expected a bodyguard—especially a bodyguard from Rafa’s agency—to be more professional.

Once she was backstage, she sank down on the nearest Mars rock, her heart sledgehammering against her ribcage. The slip of paper with Rafa’s number felt like it was burning through her palm. She’d never been more afraid of anything than she was afraid of calling him. What if he hated her? What if he rejected her? What if he couldn’t forgive her?

“Huh,” Grace muttered aloud. “Whatever happened to ‘what if he really is a charming cheater?’”

But speaking those words aloud destroyed the last of their power. She was suddenly certain that he wasn’t. Sure, some people were good actors. But her heart told her that Rafa was exactly what he seemed to be: a good man.

She took a deep breath and dialed the number.

“Rafa?”

“Grace!” Just hearing his voice made her feel warm inside. “I’m so glad you called. Can we talk in person?”

“Yes.” She was relieved that she didn’t have to have an intense conversation over the phone, and also that he didn’t sound either angry with her or as devastated as his weird co-worker had made out. “I’m still at the theatre. Everyone else is gone. Sorry to make you leave and then come back—”

“I’ll be right over.” The phone went dead.

Grace walked around the theatre while she waited for him to arrive, putting props back in place and checking for booby traps. She’d been so distracted that last rehearsal, they’d all been incredibly lucky that the theatre villain hadn’t chosen to strike that day. Or maybe Rafa had scared him off.

When she went to inspect the dressing rooms, she found a paper plate wrapped in tin foil and a post-it note reading, “GRACE - Cupcakes for you. Enjoy. I hope you get to share them. Love, Paris.”

Grace lifted the tin foil. Paris had set aside one each of the caramel-bacon, root beer float, rose, and Snickers cupcakes. How thoughtful! Grace could certainly use a sugar rush right about now.

She took them backstage and put them on a convenient Mars rock. Just then, the door opened.

Rafa stood in the doorway with a bunch of red roses. At the sight of him, all of Grace’s complicated feelings returned in a rush. She wanted to run to him and kiss him. She wanted to yell at him for throwing a monkey wrench into their relationship. She wanted to apologize for yelling at him. She wanted him to tell her everything would be all right.

Grace held out the cupcakes. “Rose cupcake?”

Rafa held out the bouquet. “Actual roses?”

“Trade you,” Grace said.

She took the red roses, and he took a pink cupcake.

“No. Wait.” Rafa began to speak very quickly. “First thing. I want you to know that I’ve sworn that I will never lie to you again. Not a lie of omission, not a lie to make you feel better, not a little white lie, not even a tiny lie of politeness like eating food I don’t like because it’s rude not to take what you’ve offered me.”

He replaced the cupcake on the plate.

Grace blinked at the rush of words, not to mention the return of the cupcake. “So... You don’t actually like rose cupcakes?”

“I don’t,” Rafa said promptly. “They taste like soap. Do you seriously enjoy them?”

“I do! They’re so delicate and perfume-y. Like eating flowers.”

“Yecch. Okay, second thing. Before I say anything else, I want you to know that there’s something else I didn’t tell you. It isn’t anything bad, but I was worried that you wouldn’t understand. Also, it’s kind of, um, a lot to take in. But I’m going to tell you tonight. Right after I tell you what was up with me and Paris. Or before, I guess. Up to you.”

He’d been talking very fast, then stopped as suddenly as if someone had put their hand over his mouth.

“Whoa, cowboy.” Grace marched up and grabbed his arm. The muscle was solid under her palm. She loved how strong he was. But he let her steer him to a Mars rock and sit him down on it.

“You don’t need to tell me all your secrets in the next ten seconds,” she informed him. “First, have a cupcake that you actually want. Unless you hate cupcakes in general. But you sound like you drank about a gallon of coffee and didn’t eat anything all day.”

“Yeah, I guess I did forget to eat,” he admitted. “And I did drink a lot of coffee. It was that or drink a lot of whiskey, which one of my teammates warned me off doing.”

“Smart guy.”

“Smart girl,” Rafa corrected her. “But thanks. I’ll try the Snickers. I’m not much for unusual.”

“More for me.”

She stuck the actual roses in a prop beaker from a lab scene and helped herself to his rejected rose cupcake. Then they sat together on the Mars rock and ate their cupcakes. It felt as companionable as if they were having a picnic. Strange. They still hadn’t hashed out their horrendous fight earlier, and he’d just told her he had another secret. Grace should have felt incredibly on edge. Instead, she felt peaceful. And though Rafa had been practically vibrating with tension when he’d come in, he relaxed as he ate.

“Try the root beer float,” she suggested. “It’s really not that weird.”

“Hmm.” He looked doubtful, and broke off a small piece to try. “Oh, hey, yeah, you’re right. That’s actually good.”

Grace ate the caramel-bacon cupcake without offering him any. She knew perfectly well how weird that one was, even though it was also pure salty-sweet deliciousness.

“Something you should know,” she said as Rafa finished his root beer float cupcake. “Right after you left, Paris came out to the entire theatre. She and Ruth are madly in love.”

“No way!” His face lit up with genuine delight. “Oh, that’s great. I’m so happy for her. That was never a secret she wanted to keep. She just felt like she had to.”

“Well, the cat’s out of the bag now. Sorry, I should have told you as soon as you walked in. I assume you only married her so everyone would think she was straight?”

Rafa ran his fingers through his midnight hair. “Not exactly. You know... I think that story is actually going to make more sense if I tell you something else first.”

“Your other secret?”

“Yeah.” He took a deep breath. “I know this is going to sound weird...”

“I like weird,” Grace pointed out. “I am weird.”

“You’re not weird.” He sounded indignant on her behalf. “You’re different. Quirky. Original.”

“Those are all just nice ways of saying weird. So go on. Tell me your weird secret.”

He seemed to brace himself before he spoke. “You know how every culture has myths about shapeshifters?”

“Oh, sure. There’s a family legend on my mom’s side that some of our ancestors could turn into tigers.”

“There is?!” Rafa sounded much more shocked than she’d expected him to be, especially since he was the one who had brought up shapeshifters.

“Really. In fact...” Grace hesitated, but only from habit. Was he surprised because his secret was the same as hers? How funny and ironic if it was! “Supposedly I have a cousin who’s a were-tiger. It’s this big family secret, though I don’t really get why. I’ve never been able to figure out if it’s a family in-joke to pretend it’s true or if some people really believe it. I assume she’s the female version of ‘Florida Man Claims To Be Tiger, Moves Into Zoo.’ She lives in Santa Martina and I’d never been here till I moved last year, so I’ve never met her. I sure wasn’t about to look her up. So, same for you? Freaky family legends that your great-grandma sprouted fur every full moon?”

Rafa’s dark eyes had grown wider and wider as she spoke. At that, he began to laugh. When he spoke, there was a quiver in his voice, as if he might start cracking up again at any second. “Yeah. There are. But it’s not just on a full moon, it’s not just my great-grandma, and it’s not tigers. It’s lions.”

“No wonder you’ve got a mane,” she teased, giving his hair a tug.

“That’s right. And also... hang on, this is the part I need to show you...” He pulled off his shirt, then his shoes.

Puzzled, Grace watched as he unzipped his jeans. “You have a birthmark shaped like a lion’s paw?”

“Nope.” He pulled off his jeans and boxers, and stood nude before her. But she didn’t have time to enjoy looking at his body, because what he said next captured her attention. “I’m going to show you something much more weird and amazing than that. You see, I think your family legend might not be just a legend. Because mine isn’t.”

With that, Rafa vanished and a lion appeared.

Grace dropped her cupcake plate. “Oh my God!”

The lion shook his head, sending his mane flying. Strands of hair brushed against her bare hands. She could feel their rough texture and smell the lion’s pleasant scent of clean fur. The lion’s breath was warm on her face, and he regarded her calmly with his huge dark eyes.

They were Rafa’s eyes: that soft, deep, amber-touched brown.

Her shock gave way to wonder. So the legends were real. At least, Rafa’s was real. She’d seen plenty of illusion—it was the business of theatre—but this lion was no trick like the painted “Mars rocks” or overhead lights made to look like stars. It was a living, breathing beast that she could touch and smell.

The lion nuzzled her. She stroked his velvety fur. A deep rumble filled her ears, and the lion’s body vibrated against her hands. He was purring.

Grace petted him for a while, lost in amazement at his transformation and the delight of getting to pet the world’s biggest and best cat. She buried her hands in his mane and gave it a little tug. He purred louder.

“Can you turn back?” she asked.

In the next instant, her hands were full of Rafa’s silky hair.

“That’s incredible,” she breathed, letting it slide through her fingers like rain.

“You see why I was nervous about telling you.” He began to dress again. “I was afraid you’d think I was crazy if I told you, and I was afraid I’d scare you if I just suddenly shifted.”

“Shifted,” Grace repeated. “Amazing! Were you born like that, or bitten by a were-lion?”

“Born like that. My family’s always been lion shifters. That’s what I started to say when I was talking about the women in my family. It’s not just that they’re strong. It’s that in the wild, it’s the lionesses who hunt.”

“And the lions laze around and eat the meat,” she teased. “No wonder you’ve got such great hair! It’s your duty to keep your mane perfect for the ladies.”

Rafa’s eyebrows rose. “Were you joking? That’s actually true. Lion shifters believe that a lion’s mane shows his masculinity. That goes for my hair as a man, too. It damn near killed me to get a buzz cut when I joined the Navy. Honestly half the reason I went for SEALs was because Special Forces don’t have to cut their hair short.”

“Like the way the size of your hands is supposed to represent the size of your dick?”

“Not quite, or my hair would be down to my ass.” Rafa ducked as Grace threw a playful punch at his arm. More seriously, he said, “Your mane shows your vitality and masculine energy, and you keep it perfectly groomed to demonstrate that you’re keeping yourself in good shape for the ladies.”

“Lots of masculine energy there. Not to mention perfect grooming,” Grace remarked, stroking his hair. Then she remembered the other thing he’d said. “Wait a second. You said my family legend might not be a legend. Do you think my cousin really can turn into a tiger?”

“Maybe. It’d be unusual if she’s the only one in the family who can, but that happens sometimes. If shifters only marry non-shifters for a long time, sometimes the ability dies out. She might be a throwback—the first person in generations who can shift. I know someone like that. She’s a tiger shifter too, actually. In fact—” He broke off. “What’s your cousin’s name?”

“Destiny Ford.”

Rafa burst out laughing. “She’s on my team! Didn’t you recognize her? She’s the one who gave you my number.”

“No way!” Grace shook her head in amazement, then laughed as well. “I never met her. I’ve seen some photos of her, but they were from years ago. She was in an Army uniform, with no makeup and her hair scraped back. It’s hard to recognize people if you’re not expecting to see them and they looked different in the pictures. If she hasn’t seen any photos of me since I was a teenager, she was probably expecting a pink Mohawk.”

Rafa blinked, clearly trying to visualize her with a pink Mohawk, then apparently gave up the attempt. “I still can’t get over you two being related. Now that I know, you do have a similar body type. But just looking at your face, I can’t see it.”

“I take after Dad’s side of the family,” Grace explained. “His mother’s Portuguese and his father’s Chinese-American. Destiny and I are related through Mom, and that side of the family is African-American. Though maybe they’re also part Indian or something. They don’t have tigers in Africa, right?”

Rafa shook his head. “Tigers, no. Tiger shifters, sure. My family descended from Spanish conquistadores on one side and Aztec royalty on the other. If it went by what big cats lived where my family came from, I should either turn into a jaguar or an Iberian lynx. But no. It’s lions all the way back.”

“And Destiny’s on your team? Do all of you turn into some sort of big cat?”

“No, but we all are shifters. Though now that you mention it, there are a lot of big cats. Fiona’s a snow leopard, Catalina’s a regular leopard, and Shane’s a panther. Our boss, Hal, is a grizzly bear. Nick’s a wolf. I didn’t actually take Melissa’s pants to a lab, I took them to the office and had Nick sniff them.”

“Handy,” Grace remarked.

“And Lucas is a dragon.”

“He is not,” she said instantly, sure he was pulling her leg.

“He is,” Rafa replied, his eyes glinting with amusement. “I promised never to lie to you again, remember? Are you thinking there’s no such thing as dragons? Because five minutes ago, you thought there was no such thing as shifters.”

“How come no one’s ever seen one?”

“I hate to say this, because it’s going to sound even more implausible,” Rafa said. “But dragons can turn invisible.”

Grace opened her mouth to deny it, then closed it again. It was so much to take in. Rafa could turn into a lion. That weird woman he worked with was her black sheep cousin. Her family legend about were-tigers was true. Dragons were real.

“Okay,” she said at last. “I just saw you turn into a lion, so I guess I can believe in bodyguards who turn into invisible dragons. But you said I should know about this before you told me about Paris. What does this have to do with her? Does she turn into a lion too?”

“She does have a good mane, doesn’t she?” Rafa said with a grin. “Though not as pretty as yours. No, she’s not a shifter. At least, not that I know of, and I know her well enough that I think I’d have figured it out.”

“So you can’t just... I don’t know... magically detect each other?”

“Not really. Some types of shifters have identifying marks. And I think some types of shifters can sense each other. But most can’t. Lions can’t.” He put his arm around Grace. She settled into his comforting warmth as he went on, “Shifters don’t just have different animals we turn into, we have different customs and traditions, like non-shifters do. But there’s some things we all have in common. We’re stronger than non-shifters. We’re harder to kill, and we heal much faster. But the most important thing is that we have the ability to recognize our mates.”

“What’s a mate?” Her voice cracked. She had a feeling that she already knew, and it made her nerves sing with hope that she was right, and fear that she was right about what mates were but that Rafa’s mate wasn’t her.

Rafa turned his head to look deep into her eyes. His voice deepened with heartfelt passion as he said, “Your mate is your true love. It’s the person you’re perfectly compatible with, the person you’ll love forever, the person you can never fall out of love with. You’re mine, Grace. I knew from the moment I first saw you. If you’ll have me, I’m yours for as long as we both shall live.”

“Oh, I’ll have you!” The words flew out of her mouth before she could think about them. But she didn’t have the slightest desire to take them back. She knew in her heart that he was the man for her, just as she was the woman for him.

Maybe it was her little bit of shifter ancestry that allowed her to recognize her mate. Or maybe it was just that when you meet your true love, you know.

He bent to kiss her. She kissed back with all the passion she’d had before, but also, for the first time, with trust and certainty.

“I love you,” she said. “I nearly said it earlier. But I didn’t trust myself. I thought it was too soon.”

“I nearly said it earlier, too,” Rafa confessed. “But I didn’t trust in you. I thought you’d think I was coming on too strong.”

“I probably would’ve. Well, you can come on as strong as you like now. I trust you.” She shook her head, amazed at her own words. “That’s a first. I hope you’re okay with a mate who has trust issues.”

“I’m not sure you’re the one with the issues,” Rafa replied. “Not everyone’s trustworthy. There’s nothing wrong with protecting yourself. And I’m sorry as hell that I wasn’t honest with you right away.”

“And I’m sorry I yelled at you and wouldn’t let you explain,” Grace said immediately. “I feel terrible about it. When Destiny gave me your number, she obviously had no idea what had happened—she thought you had to go home because you were sick—but—”

He looked baffled. “What? What did she say to you?”

“She described how awful you looked and how much you were suffering, and I knew it was because of me. I’d obviously really hurt you. I felt so guilty.”

“She hazed you!” Rafa exclaimed. They were sitting so close that she heard the noise as he ground his teeth. “Goddammit. I thought I could get you out of that.”

Then it was her turn to be baffled. “What do you mean?”

He unclenched his jaw enough to say, “My team has this idiotic ritual where every time one of us finds his mate, they run her through the wringer to make sure she truly loves them and will stand by them and is brave and worthy. I warned the rest of them not to do it to you, but I forgot to warn Destiny.”

Grace was first annoyed, then had to laugh. “That explains why she seemed so pleased that I was upset. That was a world-class guilt trip. But I guess it proved that I cared how you felt.”

“I don’t care why she did it,” Rafa said angrily. “I don’t want my team laying guilt trips on you or trying to scare you or any of that other crap they do.”

“I have to ask. Did you haze your teammates’ mates?” Grace asked. Rafa looked so cornered that she burst out laughing. “You did! I guess turnaround’s fair play. Let them haze me. Destiny only got to me because I didn’t know what she was doing. Now that I know it’s coming, it won’t bother me.”

“I hope so. I do want to introduce you to my team. I’ve met your people—your co-workers, at least—but you haven’t met mine.”

“I’ve met Paris,” Grace pointed out. “I guess she’s both of our people. So why did you get married, if it wasn’t to keep up her cover?”

Rafa let out a deep sigh that vibrated through his chest. “Because we both thought we’d never be loved.”