NocC 024 - Katie Reus - A Jaguar's Kiss - Harlequin 2012-10 Read Free

painful burst as fur quickly grew, covering what had once been skin.
    Then he was running. He raced through the forest, tracking her sweet honeydew scent. When he’d received that call from his brother telling him what Ethan had done, Owen had seen red. He hadn’t seen Gabriela in about nine years and hadn’t spoken to her in ten. Not since he’d been seventeen years old and stupid and had screwed up the best thing in his life.
    She’d been his best friend and he’d hoped they’d be more. But he’d lost even her friendship. It had made his decision to join the army at eighteen easy. Some days it was hard to believe so much time had passed since he’d spoken to her.
    He bounded over icy patches of dirt and grass, barely feeling the cold. As a shifter he had a higher body temperature anyway, but right now all his focus was on finding Gabriela. He felt practically numb as he strained to run faster, faster .
    That familiar sexual hunger he’d experienced when he was a teenager was back, only this time it was stronger, needier. His entire body craved her in a way he didn’t quite understand. Or didn’t want to.
    Back then he’d been too stupid to realize what she was to him. Then he’d somehow hurt her and it had been too late to explore what might have been. She’d refused to see him. Absolutely wouldn’t talk to him or take his calls and hell, at seventeen he’d been full of pride. He hadn’t been willing to beg her to explain what he’d done wrong.
    Now he had to talk to her. To see her and convince his inner wolf she was real. Her honey-brown hair was shorter than it had been years ago, falling a few inches below her shoulders. She was still tall, about five-feet ten, and lean and lithe. The way she moved as a human mirrored her movements as a jaguar and it had always fascinated him.
    Now her speed and agility frustrated him.
    The deeper into his territory he went, he realized where she was headed. Owen’s father had been Alpha before him—right up until the day he’d died five years ago—and had given the Segura family an area of the forest to hunt. With the growing attacks against humans lately, Owen had rescinded his father’s offer and taken back his pack’s land. It had been a difficult choice, but he’d needed to calm his pack’s growing anger.
    But she wouldn’t know that. She probably assumed the cabin her family had once used to store extra changes of clothes and food was still protected.
    Instead of following her trail toward the river bed where he knew she was headed in an attempt to try to cover her scent before doubling back to the cabin, he ran west toward the cabin in her family’s former territory. Why follow her when he could just beat her to her final destination?
    Once he neared the small building, he slowly circled, making sure he was alone. Then he rolled around in pine boughs to mask his scent before he shifted to his human form. Using a side window that was unlocked, he climbed inside and found himself in one of the guest rooms. The place had the bare minimum of furniture but he found clothes that fit him and settled down to wait, bracing for the coming confrontation.
     

Chapter 2
    Gabriela waited until she was on the front porch of her family’s cabin before shifting to her human form. Breathing hard from the run, she glanced around the surrounding forest but didn’t see anyone lurking in the trees. She could faintly scent wolves but the smell didn’t seem recent.
    Not surprisingly the front door wasn’t locked. People rarely ventured out here and there was nothing to steal inside, anyway. The first step she took inside, she realized her mistake. The scent of wolf and pine subtly hit her. Inwardly cursing that she hadn’t smelled it sooner, she tried to move back.
    Before she could run, the door was slammed shut behind her and she found herself pressed up against the door by a very large, very angry-looking Owen. Thank God he was at least clothed, though it didn’t