Look, her lynx said to her. It’s him. Look how big and beautiful he is. Look at that glorious mane.
It was a glorious mane. Auburn like his hair, falling over his face and tumbling down to his back. Lynn wanted to walk right over and bury her hands in it—or shift and curl up next to him on the rock, right up against that warm fur.
What are you thinking? Snap out of it!
There was no reason to be so fascinated by another shifter’s mane, for Pete’s sake. Sure, Lynn had never seen a true lion shifter before. Mountain lions, yes, but this was a real, honest-to-God huge African lion.
Asleep with his chin on his paws, breathing softly in the dawn light.
Lynn had to admit it. The sight moved her. She’d inhaled sharply when she saw him, and that breath pulsed hard in her chest still. She let it out on a sigh, and acknowledged the truth to herself: she was drawn to this man.
To this lion.
Slowly, she walked forward, closer and closer until she was right nearby. She kept expecting him to start awake, but he kept breathing slowly and softly until she was right next to him, almost close enough to touch.
Reach out, her lynx urged. Reach out and touch him. He’s right there. I want to feel his fur under our fingers!
Lynn hovered on the edge of giving in to the impulse. Almost, she was ready to lift her hand—
And then his eyes blinked open.
Lynn jumped. “Excuse me,” she said instantly. And then quickly pulled herself together. She didn’t have anything to be sorry for; it was after five, and time for them to meet. “Good morning,” she tried instead. “Ken, I presume?”
Those tawny eyes blinked at her for a moment. If she’d had any doubts about who the lion was, they would’ve been dispelled by now: his eyes were exactly the same warm golden shade in his lion form as they were when he was a man.
Blinking, he lifted his head from his paws, then shook out his mane. Lynn watched. It really was glorious.
Then he stretched. His claws flexed, his muscles rippled, and he yawned a great yawn, revealing huge teeth and a pink tongue.
Let’s shift, her lynx suggested. We could go on a run together! He probably wants to run, now that he’s awake.
No, Lynn told her lynx firmly. Half her attention was still on the majestically wonderful sight of the male lion coming fully awake.
He shook himself once more, then padded to the edge of the rock and hopped down. Lynn was struck all over again by how enormous he was: standing on all fours, his head was almost level with hers, on two legs.
Then he shivered, blurred, and shifted, and she was looking at Ken Turner, wearing a T-shirt and boxers and standing barefoot and human on the forest floor.
His auburn hair, she couldn’t help but note, was in the same messy tumble his mane had been.
“Good morning,” Lynn managed.
“Good morning,” he said, sounding remarkably composed. “Sorry for oversleepi
ng. I was sure the sun would wake me up.”
“It’s only just barely risen,” Lynn said. “Not as bright here in the thick forest as it is elsewhere, also. Ready to get going?”
“Mmm, just about,” he said, and gave another jaw-cracking yawn. It was funny—he was in his human form, but she felt like she could see echoes of the lion’s enormous yawn in his. “Let me get my things together.”
He turned to gather up a few belongings, tugging on jeans and a clean shirt as he did. Lynn caught herself watching the muscles of his bare chest and deliberately looked away, just as Ken said over his shoulder, “So you don’t seem too surprised that I’m a shifter.”
“I heard you and Cal served under Colonel Hanes, back in the Marines,” said Lynn, aiming for a calm and composed tone, and—she thought—managing it okay. “An all-shifter unit, apparently. So I guessed you must be, although I didn’t know what your form was.”
“I don’t shift much unless I’m sure I’m alone.” He hefted his pack and stood up, striding back over. “Hard to explain a lion roaming free in an American forest.”
Lynn started off with him. Should she tell him she was a shifter, too?
She should. It would make sense to mention it. It didn’t make sense not to mention it. He might even have figured it out, if he was so careless about his lion form around her.