Panther's Passion (Veteran Shifters 3)

Then he shivered and blurred, and there in the place where he’d been was a panther.

A panther. Stella had never seen one in person before—never met anyone who’d even known a panther shifter.

His fur was so black it took on a blue sheen in the sunlight. Muscles rippled over his form as he padded over to her, one ear twitching as a bird took off from a nearby tree. Stella’s breath caught at the compact strength in his movements. It was clear to her that at any moment, if a threat appeared, Nate could be at its throat, and it would stand absolutely no chance.

She reached out before she realized what she was doing. It wasn’t polite, wasn’t good shifter manners, not while he was shifted and she was still human. But she couldn’t seem to stop herself from trying to touch.

And he responded, padding over to her, and leaning into her touch. She slid her fingers through his fur, feeling the warmth and coiled power beneath her hand.

This was what was protecting her. This creature of grace and strength. His claws flexed as she rubbed his neck, and she shivered.

Then she pulled her hand back, concentrated for a second, and shifted as well.

In her lynx’s body, Nate’s form suddenly seemed huge. Lynxes were among the smaller big cats—Lynn had always had a larger, more powerful shifted form, but Stella was on the average side. She wasn’t anything to compare to a panther.

As they started out—Stella keeping a habitual eye on Eva, although Eva didn’t need anyone’s supervision at this point—Nate hung back, keeping up the rear while Ken and Lynn led the way. Stella and Eva were between everyone, in the center of the group. Protected.

It was nice. Although at last, Stella could feel that old contrary independence asserting itself: she wanted to break free and run unencumbered through the forest, leaping without any concern from rock to tree to ledge.

With some effort, she stuffed the instinct back down. It wasn’t a hardship to run with this group, after all. Her family.

And once they got further away from the house, into the mountains where Todd would have no reason to be, she’d be free to do whatever she wanted to do.

For now, she trotted along at Eva’s side and tried to keep from glancing back at Nate every five minutes.

She just wanted to see. He moved with such a sense of restraint. It was different from Ken, the lion, who ambled along with the smaller cats as though he was just pleased to be keeping an easy, lazy pace. Nate was...measured. Purposeful. Like he was waiting for the moment when he’d explode into motion.

Stella didn’t want to miss it.

Slowly, they moved further into the mountains. After a little while, Eva picked up the pace, running forward impatiently to take a spot alongside Ken and Lynn. Ken gave her a grin, lazy, with his tongue hanging out, and ran ahead, leaving Eva to chase after him.

Stella took that as a cue. She glanced back at Nate, who was watching the impromptu game of tag, and twitched an ear.

His attention was immediately on her. She held his gaze for one long, deliberate moment—and then darted away.

He was after her immediately. She’d been right—he was a whirlwind of motion, blowing past her in a blue-black blur, landing hard and solid right in front of her.

Stella hung a right at the last second and leapt for a tree. A small one, one that could easily take a lynx’s weight but might bend under a panther’s. She scrambled up, ran out on a small branch, and crouched to spring across to the next tree, catching the trunk in her claws.

Fun! her lynx exulted. It’s been so long since we’ve run like this!

It was true. Stella had been coming out to watch the dawn in Glacier park several times a week for months. But it wasn’t like this. She’d go out as a human, with her sketchbook, and draw the trees and rocks. Or she’d shift and trot up to a good viewpoint, slow and steady.

And she always went alone.

This was something else.

She leapt from tree to tree until she was far away from the first one—maybe too far? She probably shouldn’t separate herself too much; people might worry.

Guiltily, she paused in the branches of a big pine and started eyeing the descent. Down to that branch, and then that one, and finally that one, and now she was jumping distance from the ground—

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And a shadow detached itself from a bush and came up to the trunk, sitting on his haunches with, Stella was certain, a self-satisfied expression on his face.

Laughing to herself, Stella leapt to the ground. He’d kept up with her the whole way. She always lost other shifters like that. She was small and agile enough to just disappear into the upper reaches of the trees, leaving wolves, bears, and smaller shifters behind.

But not this man.