Pride. Rachel Vincent

voice. But Marc heard me.

      “Drawing him out,” he murmured as softly as I’d spoken. Memories of us whispering to each other on much more pleasant nights almost made me miss his next words. “We’re going to have to let Jace take him.”

      “He won’t go near Jace,” I whispered. “The claws are too much of a threat. One of us will have to draw him out.”

      “I’ll do it.” His response was automatic, and it was exactly what I’d known he’d say.

      “He won’t be interested in you. I’m better bait.”

      “No.”

      I’d known he’d say that, too. It was a direct quote from my father.

      “Fine. Lose him.” I resisted the urge to shrug and let the stray know we were whispering. “Malone’s just waiting to see all three of us humiliated, and this will make him pretty damn happy.”

      “You can be a real bitch sometimes,” Marc said without pausing even a second in his smooth, relaxed gait. But there was real irritation in his tone.

      “So I’ve heard.” I smiled in the dark, knowing I’d won. “We gonna do this or not?”

      “Fine. You get to play your favorite role. I’ll kiss you, and you slug me. Make it good, then run off.”

      He was going to kiss me? “He’ll never buy that,” I said, stepping over a fallen pine branch. But in truth, my hesitation came from the potential kiss—our first since we broke up. Kissing Marc was not a good idea. It would just make me want more of what I could no longer have.

      “Of course he will. He’ll buy it because he wants to. And so what if he doesn’t? No stray’s going to give up his shot at a tabby. You’ll run off, he’ll follow you, we’ll follow him, me on the ground, Jace in the trees.”

      Jace fake-sneezed to let us know he understood his part.

      Before I could argue further, Marc grabbed my arm and swung me around. He kissed me so hard and fast I didn’t have time to think. Which was bad, because I forgot I was supposed to be resisting. Instead, I settled, sinking into him like I might my favorite armchair.

      Some unacknowledged tension in me eased, and I felt myself relax, both mind and body. Even with Jace listening and the stray no doubt watching from the brush, Marc’s scent and touch—as familiar to me as the planes of my own face—triggered responses I’d thought never to feel again. At least, not until I’d convinced him to give me another chance.

      I tasted Marc, and recollection merged with reality, leaving me hopelessly confused, and craving something that was no longer an option. For several moments I kissed him back, and he let me, our role-playing forgotten amid the assault of memory and craving.

      Then, when I’d nearly forgotten not only where I was, but who I was, his left hand snuck beneath my jacket and up my shirt. He pinched the flesh over my ribs, twisting brutally.

      I gasped and shoved him away, furious until I remembered that I’d missed my cue. “Son of a bitch! That—” fucking hurt! “— was completely out of line!” My right hand curled into a fist, and when I let it fly, Marc didn’t duck. He took the blow as planned, on his left jaw. His head snapped back, and before he could “recover,” I took off through the brush.

      Before I’d gone twenty feet, I stumbled over an exposed root, and had to grab a branch to stay upright. Stupid human feet. I glared at a clump of brush I could have bounded right over on four legs, but had to go around on two, my arms pumping furiously at my sides. I kept one eye on the ground, desperately wishing for my sharper cat’s vision as I searched the shadows in vain for obstacles before I tripped over them.

      I had to concentrate so hard on staying upright and in motion that at first I thought of nothing but outrunning the stray. I paid little attention to where I’d been or where I was headed—or where Marc and Jace had gone—because I was accustomed to running in cat form, with a sensitive nose and ears to guide me.

      After a couple of minutes of running, I realized I was alone. I stopped in a small clearing to listen. My own heartbeat drowned out the ambient chirps, croaks, and slithers of any woodland creatures not scared off by my mad dash through their forest home, but above even that I heard the distant sounds of a human crashing through the woods in my direction. Marc.

      He and Jace had probably hung back at first, to let the stray think he had a chance, but they were no longer playing around. They—though I couldn’t hear Jace, in cat form—were racing toward me now. However, even as I listened, the sounds veered to the west. If they didn’t correct their course, they’d miss me. But if I alerted them too soon, they might arrive before the stray, and ruin our chance to catch him.

      On the other hand, if the stray arrived too early, I’d be well and truly fucked.

      From the south, dry leaves crunched and a twig snapped. It was Marc, not quite as stealthy on two feet as he was on four. Or maybe he was letting me know he was near. I strained against the near silence, listening so hard my own pulse roared in my ears, but I heard nothing from either Jace or the stray. Neither could I smell them, which was starting to make me nervous in spite of the breezeless night and my less capable human nose.

      I turned a slow circle in the clearing, eyes open for any sign of sleek, glossy fur amid the shadows and thick brush. Before I’d completed an entire rotation, a sudden awareness sent chills up my spine, and neither it nor the goose bumps sprouting on my flesh were due to the mid-November cold.

      I was being watched. Some subconscious cat part of me had picked up a subtle scent or sound and raised a red flag for my conscious human half.

      My heart hammered hard enough to bruise me from the inside out, and I could barely hear over it. I turned slowly, and at first saw nothing but more trees and bushes. But then there was a small flash of light in the dark. No, not a flash. Two flashes of white light in the deep night shadows. Moonlight reflecting off cat eyes.

      I slid my right hand slowly into my back pocket and pulled out the folding knife, my finger on the button and ready to press. But I kept it behind my back, out of sight. A surge of adrenaline raced through me, and my free hand curled into a fist. Those were not Jace’s eyes. They were a pale, earthy greenish-brown, with no hint of blue. My pulse rang in my ears.

      The stray had found me first.

       Seven

      The cat blinked, and I shuffled backward. Dead leaves crunched underfoot, and I winced at the sound, as if it might give away my position. But I’d already been found by one tom, and needed to be found by two more. Maybe I should start shouting…

       No.

      Foliage rustled as he stepped out of the bushes, tail swishing slowly, head high, ears pricked and on alert. I studied him, memorizing his form for possible identification later—one of the first things I’d learned as an enforcer. I inhaled, learning his scent, too, which told me without a doubt that he was male. And that he had not infected the stray I’d killed with the meat mallet. But just because he hadn’t scratched that stray didn’t mean he hadn’t infected another. Or done something worse.

      He carried no stench of disease or infection, and he walked without a limp, both of which indicated good health. He looked young—I was guessing early thirties—and was smaller than Marc. Unfortunately, for werecats, size wasn’t the only determining factor for danger; I was proof enough of that.

      But the bottom line was that he was a stray tom, and I was a tabby. He was drawn to me by curiosity, and by an instinct he hadn’t been born with and probably didn’t yet understand. To walk away unscathed, I’d have to satisfy his interest and keep him calm until Marc and Jace arrived.

      “Good kitty, kitty,” I murmured, unwilling to release the blade on my knife until or unless he looked openly hostile. Wielding my weapon too soon would almost surely provoke that