Cheeks burning, she pressed her palm to the scanner beside the apartment door. “How did you . . . ?”
“I’m changeling, little cat,” he reminded her. “I can scent you”—a deep inhale—“and you’re delicious.”
Certain she’d die of mortification, she wiggled off his body the instant they were inside. “That’s so unfair,” she said, not meeting his gaze.
Wrapping one arm around her waist, he hauled her flush against him, the thick heat of his arousal pushing aggressively against her belly through their clothing. “How’s that?” Pure wickedness in his smile. “Fair enough?”
Kirby went to respond, found her mouth claimed in a kiss sumptuous and lazy, Bastien’s tongue stroking slow and hot over her own. As if he had all the time in the world to kiss her, as if he was savoring the taste of her.
Making a complaining sound in the back of her throat when he broke contact, she rose on tiptoe, hands fisted in the dark red silk of his hair. He groaned, his mouth opening over her own and his palms skimming down her sides, their second kiss as opulent as the first, both their chests heaving by the time he raised his head again.
But this time, he pressed his index finger against her kiss-damp mouth when she sought to initiate another. “No tempting me.” A stern expression, but his body pounded for her, his skin hot. “I am not taking advantage of a sick woman.”
Kissing his throat since she couldn’t reach his mouth without his cooperation, she licked up the taste of him. “I’m fine.”
Another masculine groan, his hand clenching in her hair before he tugged her away, those night-glow eyes slamming passionately into her own. “When we go wild between the sheets,” he said roughly, “I want you healthy and strong enough that I can bite”—a little nip of her lower lip that made her quiver—“pet”—his free hand stroking down her side—“and take you all night, then come back for seconds.”
Narrowing her eyes, she gripped at his shirt, her heartbeat nowhere near steady after that sensual recitation. “You’re terrible.”
Smile feline in its satisfaction, and so, so bad for her self-control, he nudged her toward her bedroom. “Brush your teeth and get into your pajamas.”
Her lips quirked, the heat tangling with a raw wave of affection. “I’ll go as soon as I lock the door behind you, I promise.”
“No need.” Folding his arms, he leaned back against that door. “I’m sleeping on your couch.”
Kirby blinked. “Bastien—”
The hard glint back in his eyes, he shook his head. “Only way I’ll leave is if you call someone else to stay over. You shouldn’t be alone after what happened.”
She’d wanted him to stay, but not because he thought he had to babysit her. Thrusting a hand through her hair, messing up her ponytail, she said, “I’ve been alone before when I’ve been sick.” Every single time since she hit legal adulthood. Even before that, any “company” she’d had had been perfunctory at best. “I—”
“Have you ever before been in that much pain?” Bastien’s growl raised every tiny hair on her body. “You doubled over. I could feel you shivering in my arms from the shock.”
Not capable of lying to him, she admitted the truth. “No. Never anything that violent.” It had hurt, as if something was trying to claw its way out from inside her.
“So I stay.”
“I guess if you do something dastardly,” she muttered, wondering who he was to her, this occasionally infuriating leopard male she already trusted down to the bone, “Vera will hound you forever.”
Sliding his hands into his pockets, muscles no longer bunched up, he shuddered. “You have an evil streak.”
Her mouth cracked open in a huge yawn halfway through her laugh, and all at once, she was exhausted. As if she’d been running a race of which she had no knowledge.
When Bastien took her shoulders and turned her toward the bedroom, she went, crawling straight into bed without bothering to change. She was aware of Bastien turning off her bedside lamp, tugging the blankets over her . . . then nothing.
CONCERNED by Kirby’s rapid descent into deep sleep, Bastien watched over her for several minutes, leaving only after he was certain her breathing was smooth and her scent clean of any signs of sickness. Once in the postage-stamp-size living area—which his leopard tolerated only because it meant Kirby was always in close proximity—he directed a jaundiced glance at her tiny two-seater couch.
Hell, no.
It took less than a minute to strip and shift into his leopard form. Padding around the room, he settled into his new skin before curling up on the carpet. Hopefully Kirby wouldn’t freak if she woke in the night and saw him before he could shift back. The leopard huffed in response to the thought—Kirby might be a little shy now and then, but she had grit.
Her snarl earlier had been beautiful.
Yawning on that proud, pleased thought, he lay his head on his front paws and catnapped, rising regularly to pad into the bedroom to check up on the small woman who lay curled up under three thick blankets. It made the human inside the cat smile, think of how he’d enfold her in his arms at night once she was his, so she’d snuggle into him for warmth.
It was sometime in the morning that his ears picked up rustling noises from the bedroom. He entered to find Kirby twisting and turning, her skin shiny with perspiration and the blankets shoved to the bottom of the bed, the sheets themselves pulled off the mattress to tangle around her arms and legs.
Shifting in a joyous agony of pleasure and pain, his body dissolving into shattered light before re-forming into his human form, he crouched down beside the bed and checked her temperature.
Hot.
Too hot for a human.
About to attempt to wake her so he could determine if she simply had a fever, or if it might be something more serious, he barely escaped being hit by her hand as she flung it out in her sleep. Closing his own hand instinctively around her slender wrist, careful to moderate his strength so he didn’t hurt her, he frowned at the rapid pace of her pulse. It thudded against her skin in a violent drumbeat.
“Kir—” Her name froze on his lips as he truly saw what it was he held in his grasp.
A small, feminine hand, the skin flushed with heat . . . and the tips clawed. Neat little claws, adorable in contrast to his, but very definitely not human. His leopard prowled to the surface of his mind, sniffing at her. She still smelled luscious and intoxicating and human, except for that maddening, wild undertone that tugged at his senses until he could almost identify it . . . right before it slithered out of his grasp.
One thing he’d caught though—she was unquestionably a cat of some kind.
“Kirby,” he said softly, too softly for human ears, his tone near sub-vocal.
Thick lashes fluttered, then rose . . . as the claws sheathed themselves back into her skin, with no sign they’d ever been there. “Bastien?” A sleepy murmur, her skin starting to cool, her heartbeat steadying. “Hurts.”
Protective instincts already violently aroused, his words came out harsh, near to a true growl. “Where, baby?”
“Hurts so much.” Her eyes closed, her breath hitching. “Touch . . .”
She was asleep again, but not at rest, her crying quiet, heartbreaking. Unable to bear it, he got into bed with her and wrapped her in his arms, his need to alleviate her pain such that he forgot he was naked. Kirby didn’t startle awake. Turning immediately into his chest, she tucked up her arms between them, rubbed her cheek against his skin, her own streaked with silent tears.
Touch, she’d said, so that was what he did, petting and stroking her into a calmer state, the sigh she released a benediction. His mate, he realized on a wave of rage that had his own claws slicing out to brush her skin, was touch-starved. A lack of physical affection was painful for humans, but it was agonizing for pack-minded changelings.