Tiger Magic

“That’s not mine. We borrowed it.”

Althea looked at him in confusion. “Then where’s your car, Carly? If you picked him up?”

“I didn’t pick him up today,” Carly said. “My car got wrecked.”

“What?” All four Randal women shrieked, but not in synch. They demanded to know what happened, and Carly had to wait until they quieted before she gave them a truncated version of events, including Tiger being there when she’d caught Ethan. She told them that Tiger’s name was Bram, the first name that popped into her head for some reason.

Carly ended by saying she’d brought Tiger here today, where she thought they’d have a little peace and quiet. Her pointed look was met with oblivious stares.

“What a romantic story,” Zoë said, sighing happily. “A chance meeting, Ethan being a bastard, this guy scaring the crap out of Ethan.”

Tiger didn’t answer her, because he was looking over at Janine. “You have a little one.”

Janine brightened, as she did whenever someone mentioned her son. “Did Carly tell you? Yes, a little boy. He’s almost two.”

“I mean you have another little one.” Tiger pointed at her abdomen. “Soon.”

Another chorus of What? rang around the kitchen, and this one Carly joined. Janine blushed as red as Althea’s wine.

“How did you know?” Janine asked, stammering a little. “I’m about two months. I was going to tell y’all—I got the message when we were driving, but I wanted to wait until we were with Simon.”

Althea and Zoë abandoned Tiger to surround Janine with hugs, kisses, and exclamations of delight. Carly’s mom left the sink, gave Carly a quick hug on the way, and went to Janine.

“Congratulations, Janine,” Carly said, warming all over. Another addition to the family, another niece or nephew to cuddle. Janine deserved the happiness.

Carly saw Tiger watching her. She knew what was going on in his head—if she ran with him, she’d have to leave her sisters and Janine’s new baby. She’d likely never get to see the newest Randal-Johnson.

The lump in her throat was hard. Carly lifted her untouched glass of wine to her lips, tears stinging her eyes.

“Carly is also having a little one,” Tiger said.

Althea’s and Zoë’s voices shut off with a snap. All eyes turned now to Carly.

“Oh my God,” Althea said. “Ethan’s? What a mess. I thought you were on birth control.”

“I am,” Carly said, her body numb. “I don’t know what he’s talking about.”

Tiger rose from the couch and walked to Carly, putting his hands on the kitchen counter and looking over it to her. “The babe is mine. But it’s there. Only a day old.”

Carly tried to answer, but her mouth wouldn’t work. Tiger seemed to know things he couldn’t possibly, so she didn’t scoff at him, tell him he was wrong, that it was too soon to know.

She looked at the wineglass she’d raised and quickly set it down.

“If that’s true, you’d better get off birth control right away,” Janine said. “It could damage the baby, and you.”

“I’m not . . .” Carly stopped. She and Tiger had been having wild and wicked sex, making love more often in the last two days than she had with Ethan collectively over two years.

Shifter sperm, especially Tiger’s, was probably stronger than a human’s. Even if her birth control was meant to keep eggs from falling where they could be fertilized, she wouldn’t be surprised if one of Tiger’s sperm had found one and dragged it out of hiding.

The girls had gone back to talking to Janine, perhaps thinking Tiger was joking. Carly knew he wasn’t. Tears slid from the corners of her eyes, and Tiger reached out and brushed one away.

* * *

At five A.M., Tiger had silently slid open the window of the guest room, preparing to climb out, when he heard Carly’s whisper, felt her touch.

“No.”

“I’m going.” Tiger’s answering whisper held a hint of growl.

“And I’m coming with you.”

Carly. Tiger briefly closed his eyes. If he left her behind, she and his cub would be safe. Liam would protect the cub—Tiger trusted him for that at least.

And if he left Carly behind, Tiger might never see his cub. A fist around his heart tightened.

He remembered the glimpse he’d had of his son—a tiny mite wrapped in a blanket, with a thin down of black hair on his head, touched with the faintest brush of orange. The surge of pride and love Tiger had felt had never been equaled, nor had the surge of grief when they’d told him the cub hadn’t survived.

That Carly was pregnant, he had no doubt. He saw the glow inside her. A Shifter cub, not a full-blood human, not the offspring of the dickhead Ethan. The cub was Tiger’s.

“I’m coming with you,” Carly said stubbornly. “I have money, you don’t. I know how to travel and live in the world. You don’t.”

“I will run as a tiger, hunt.”

“Oh, sure, because no one will notice a Bengal running through the Texas flatlands. You have transportation? I don’t call that thing in the garage transportation.”

“Walker is waiting for me.”

Carly seized his arm. “Wait. What? You can trust him? How do you know he’s waiting?”

“We arranged it while you were sleeping.”

“That’s it. I’m definitely coming. I even packed.” She reached into the shadows beside the bed and pulled up a shoulder bag to go with her purse. “Let’s go meet Walker.”