The Snow Leopard's Baby (Glacier Leopards 2)

“They will definitely be compensated,” Jeff promised. “No need to worry about that.”

Leah finished her oatmeal and sat back, jouncing Emily on her lap. “So how are we going to get out of here? The snowplows will come through, and...do you have a truck or something? How did you get so far out here in the snow last night?”

He wouldn’t find a more obvious opening than this. Jeff pushed his own bowl aside and said, “No, I don’t have a truck. Leah, there’s something I want to tell you about me.”

***

Leah was wallowing in the laziness that was sitting around and letting someone else make you breakfast.

Sure, she had to change and nurse Emily, but she could’ve done that in her sleep (and she was pretty sure she had, some nights in those first few months). Other than that, she felt like a woman of leisure while Jeff chopped apples and boiled milk.

Jeff wasn’t just a man with an attractive body, she thought as she watched him move around the kitchen. He was also graceful. He had a supple strength to his movements, like everything he did was carefully calculated to use just the right amount of power...but if he’d wanted to, he could’ve unleashed an enormous strength.

It was incredibly hot.

Equally hot was the fact that he really could cook. It wasn’t like Leah hadn’t believed him, but she wasn’t used to men being able to cook anything more than barbecued hamburgers and cold cereal. Jeff delivered perfectly-textured oatmeal—which wasn’t as easy as he made it sound, using plain oats from the cabin cupboards without any packaging directions—with just the right amount of fruit and sugar.

Leah devoured it, hungrier than she’d realized. All that walking in the snow last night had used up a lot of energy...not

to mention the most amazing sex of her life. She smiled to herself over her last bite.

Then it occurred to her to ask how they were going to get back to civilization, and somehow that question led to Jeff saying, “Leah, there’s something I want to tell you about me.”

Leah frowned. What on earth could he be talking about?

A dozen ideas crowded immediately into her brain, each of them worse than the last. Maybe he was secretly married?

No, that was just her paranoia. They’d been talking about how they were going to get out of the cabin in the snow. Unless his secret wife was a snowplow driver, that couldn’t be it.

Well, there was only one way to learn what it was. “I’m listening.” She gave Emily an apple slice to gnaw on and focused all her attention on Jeff.

“It’s a bit of a...family secret,” Jeff said, looking a bit shy. Even in the face of dark family secrets, Leah couldn’t help but melt a little at the sight of it. He was so confident and competent otherwise that watching him be unsure about something was like seeing something special, something that was usually hidden.

“See, some of the people in my family are...special. Unusual.”

Leah could not imagine what this was leading up to. “Special how?” she asked cautiously.

“We have a supernatural ability.”

A supernatural ability?

He looked absolutely serious. Leah frowned. “Jeff, if you’re kidding around with me, I want you to know that I do not put up with stuff like that.” Or she hadn’t since Rob left, anyway. She’d decided right out of the gate that she’d never date anyone who liked to mess with her head ever again.

“Leah, I swear to you I’m being completely honest. This isn’t a joke.”

His face wasn’t showing any smile, or anything but a straight and unwavering gaze. Leah stared into his deep gray eyes.

For some reason, she couldn’t believe that he was joking. She didn’t know why, but she believed him, even though by rights, she should be telling him he was crazy.

“Okay,” she said finally. “What’s this supernatural ability?” It must have something to do with getting them home, or he wouldn’t have brought it up right at that point in the conversation. “Teleporting?”

Now he laughed. “No, it’s not teleporting. That would be handy, though.”

“Tell me about it.” If Leah could get herself and Emily from place to place in an instant, her life would be so much easier.

Although then she never would have met Jeff, because she would never have been stranded in the mountains.

But she also wouldn’t have a no-doubt-daunting auto mechanic bill about to come her way.