“Okay.” She got up and walked to the bathroom.
Since her back was turned, Shane took the opportunity to check out the swing of her wide hips and the peach-like outline of her ass. His mate was perfect from every angle, and even more beautiful in motion than sitting still.
Catalina returned with a wet washcloth. She sat down beside him and rubbed at the place where he’d been cut. The water was warm and her hands were gentle, and it would have felt good if he didn’t know what was coming. He knew what she saw— a mostly-healed cut, looking like it had been inflicted days rather than hours ago— when the motion of her hands stopped.
“That’s impossible. We can’t have been here that long.” She glanced at her watch. “Unless they messed with my watch... But I’d feel different if I’d been unconscious for days, I’m sure I would!”
“It’s not your watch. It’s me.” He held her gaze, willing her to believe the evidence of her own eyes. “Those cracked ribs will be completely healed in a day or two. Same as the cut on my head. Same as why one tranquilizer dart paralyzed you almost instantly and knocked you unconscious a minute later, but it took two to knock me out. Maybe more than two. I’m not sure how many times I was hit before you found me.”
He watched the flicker of reactions play across her pretty face, from disbelief to acceptance to curiosity. “Is that why those people grabbed you?”
“Yeah. Well, that’s part of it.”
She was quick to catch on. “They wanted me as a subject— like, an experimental subject? Were you one too? Is that how you can scare people just by looking at them?”
“Yeah.”
“Is it a government experiment to create the ultimate soldier?” Catalina asked excitedly.
Shane was very conscious of the panther within him as he spoke. He controlled his voice to make sure it had none of his animal’s hiss. “It was an experiment to create the ultimate predator. 2.0 must be their second try at the ultimate predator process. I went through 1.0. I can terrify people and I can sneak up on them without being noticed. I heal fast, and I move fast, and I’m stronger than I was before. And I can turn into a panther.”
“No way!” She looked thrilled. It made his heart sink. “And I get to do it too!”
“No, you don’t. I won’t let them.”
“But...” Catalina frowned, her enthusiasm dying down. “I mean, it’s not all right that they kidnapped us. Talk about not getting consent for treatment! But being an ultimate predator sounds great. Fast healing, special powers, and you get to turn into a panther! Seriously, you can do that?”
Show her, his panther suggested.
For once, he and his panther were on the same page. “Yeah. I’ll show you. Just give me a second.”
He went into the bathroom, closed the door, and stripped. Then he wrapped a thin white towel around his waist and came back out.
Catalina looked him over with open appreciation. Mischievously, she asked, “‘Panther’ isn’t slang for something else, is it?”
Shane didn’t know how she kept managing to make him laugh. It made him realize how little he’d done it in the last couple years. His chuckle came out rusty, like he’d almost forgotten how. “No. I didn’t want to rip up my jeans. Watch.”
He closed his eyes and focused on being a predator.
To hunt, to kill, to lurk unseen, to pad silently after his prey, to blend into the darkness and become one with it...
The panther opened his yellow eyes. Now he could scent Catalina, from the aroma of green apple shampoo lingering in her hair to her own individual scent. His hearing was more acute, allowing him to catch the accelerating rhythm of her heartbeat.
She’s afraid, he thought. I should shift back.
Then she walked right up to him. No trace of fear showed in her face as her hand came down to stroke his fur.
“Wow,” she breathed.
She’s excited, his panther corrected. The big cat sounded smug. Of course she is. She’s our mate.
Catalina scratched behind his ears. It felt surprisingly good. No one had ever done that before. No one had ever touched his panther at all, except to perform experiments or chain him up.
He found himself turning his head to give her better access. She obligingly kept scratching. He shouldn’t have been able to relax, imprisoned again and with the threat of death or worse hanging over his mate, but he did. A strange vibration began to thrum within his chest, making an audible rumble.
What the hell is that? Shane wondered.
He hadn’t meant to ask his panther, but the big cat replied anyway. It’s called purring.