King's Throne(2)

The truth was, Gina and her parents were tiger shifters. In fact, they were the rarest of the rare—the royal tigre blanche, or white tigers, who were blessed by the Goddess in order to rule over all tiger shifters. Or so the story went. Gina’s dad though, had stepped down from his throne so long ago that Gina barely remembered the ice palace and the traditional seat of power. Her parents lived in seclusion. Exile. All due to the political machinations of her uncle.
Gina had grown up on the isolated acreage her parents owned in the mountains of the northeastern United States. Her father and a few of his most trusted Royal Guards and their families had chosen to settle there after fleeing their homeland. The place was a fortress and larger than any of the surrounding homesteads. The terrain was rugged, rocky and not really suited to farming. Her dad had been able to buy up most of a mountaintop and installed his Guard in snug homes all around the perimeter.
When it came time for Gina to go to school, the Guards’ children had gone with her and they’d all made friends among the human population of their small town. The best way to protect themselves, her father always said, was to fit in. He and her mother still spoke English with a charming accent, but Gina had done all her schooling in the States and she looked and sounded like an American.
She’d gone to college nearer to the city and then on to medical school, with her parents’ blessing—and a few of the Guards’ kids who were around her age. They were her own little Royal Guard, though such a thing was never spoken aloud. But Gina knew her father worried for her safety and had been training the other kids to fill their parents’ roles as protectors for his daughter.
Part of that training had been in hand-to-hand combat. To keep their skills sharp while in the city, most of the shifter youngsters had taken classes at a very elite, human, martial arts dojo run by a trusted human man who had been mated to a shifter. He knew all about the shifter world and still mourned the loss of his wife. His name was Harris and he’d been one of their most trusted human contacts, but as it turned out, even he wasn’t safe from their enemies.
“Sensei Harris’s dojo was attacked and burned to the ground,” Gina continued her explanation. “That’s when Mitch was hurt. He and Cade were there for some kind of big meeting between the pantera Nyx and Harris.”
Gina didn’t need to explain that the Nyx was the queen of the pantera noir, the black panther shifters. If things had been different, Gina’s mom would still be the Tig’Ren and her dad would still reign as Tig’Ra, king and queen of the tigre d’or, the golden-tiger shifters.
“So Ellie brought the Nyx’s Guards to you?” her mother asked, sounding surprised even though Ellie lived one floor below Gina in the same apartment building.
“Not at first. She called me when Mitch started convulsing and asked me to come down to her apartment and take a look.” Gina had enjoyed living just upstairs from her best friend. She doubted they’d ever be able to go back to their carefree lives now. Too much had happened. Too many secrets had been revealed.
“She didn’t warn you they were shifters?” her father wanted to know.
“She didn’t know. Not until I was already there. The men sniffed me out right away, of course. As soon as I walked into the apartment and I scented them, I knew my cover was blown, but I couldn’t let Mitch suffer. He was in really bad shape, so I gave him my blood and he rallied, but it caused some partial shifting while his body fought the poison.”
Gina was one of the rarest—a truly universal shifter blood type—which meant more among shifters than it did among humans. Her blood could actually heal others—shifters and humans alike. Giving Mitch a few milliliters of her blood had been a last-ditch effort to save his life and totally unorthodox as far as human medicine went. Ellie was a nurse and Gina a doctor. Only their lifelong friendship had gained Ellie’s cooperation when Gina had performed the radical procedure.
“Ellie saw?” That was her mother’s worried voice and Gina could almost see the anxious expression on her mom’s face.
“Yeah. That’s when I had to tell her. Mom, you should have seen her. Once she accepted the idea, she was fierce when the pantera Alpha tried to dominate the situation. I don’t think he realized what he was in for. Ellie hasn’t got a submissive bone in her body.”#p#分页标题#e#
Her father chuckled, setting her at ease though she knew she was bringing trouble to her parents’ doorstep.
“Cade and Mitch are both Royal Guards. Cade is keeping an eye on Ellie. They stayed in the city to deal with the ongoing problems there. I promised to take Mitch to safety and look after him. We decided to split up so I could have a shot at keeping my secret from the rest of their shifter friends who’ve been called in for backup. Cade and Mitch know, but Cade promised to keep quiet for now. Mitch is with me, so he’s not about to tell anyone. Especially not in the state he’s in. I couldn’t hide my true nature from them…or from Ellie.” Her voice was subdued as she remembered those tumultuous moments.