Precious Angel (Alpha Province #4)(14)

Although over the last half an hour, she'd begun to get restless,  tossing, turning, and moaning in her sleep. A few times she'd actually  flinched and cried out, her eyes moving rapidly beneath her lowered lids  as she dreamed. He'd tried caressing over her hair and head, hoping his  touch would ease her back into a deep sleep. A few times she'd sighed  and quietened down again, but all too soon, she was shifting again.

"No!" she cried out. Jay tensed, ready to try and wake her and pull her  out of her tortured nightmare, but he didn't want to scare her. "Please  don't hit me! What did I do? Why are you hurting me?"

Jay sucked in a ragged breath as two tears leaked out from under her  lowered lids. "I'm sorry, Dad, for whatever I did to make you mad. I'm  sorry. Please don't hurt me anymore."

Tears burned the back of his own eyes when he heard the bewilderment in  her slurred words. His panther snarled with anger and concern as it  crouched down, readying to leap and protect his mate from the unseen  threat. Jay shifted closer to Kenzie, pushed his arm in under her neck,  and carefully pulled her body closer to his.

Her breath hitched in her throat as if she were crying and when he  glanced at her face, and he saw more tears, his animal hissed and  charged forward.

He tried to keep his animal from escaping, but he was fighting a losing  battle. Fur erupted from his paws, his claws lengthened and sharpened,  and his body began to reshape. His clothes ripped at the seams as his  inner cat pushed the man aside. He scrambled back away from Kenzie, not  wanting to inadvertently hurt her with his claws, or by knocking against  her smaller, sore body with his big muscular one.

The remnants of his clothes were in tatters wrapped around his body, and  his shoes had fallen to the floor with a dull thud. He swatted the rags  aside and hissed with annoyance when he felt the restrictive socks over  his back paws and legs. He shook each leg, one after the other until  the socks flew across the room. His panther licked his lips as he stared  at the exposed creamy skin where Kenzie's neck and shoulder met, and he  started to purr as he imagined sinking his needle-sharp canines into  that flesh and claiming his mate for all time.

When he noticed he was crawling toward her on his belly and paws, he  shook his head and backed away again. The last thing he needed was his  mate angry with him for taking her choices away from her.

He loved her so damn much. She was already entrenched in his heart and  soul so deeply, he didn't even want to think about her not accepting to  be theirs.

He turned his gaze back toward her when she gasped and bolted upright.  She was panting, and perspiration was covering her forehead and upper  lip. Her eyes widened with shock when she gazed at him, and he waited  for her to scream and run, but she remained as still as a statue. Jay  scented the air and began to purr when he didn't scent any fear from  her.                       
       
           



       

"What are you doing?" She glanced toward the bedroom door and then met  his eyes again. She squinted as she locked gazes with him and he  wondered if she was trying to figure out who he was. "Jay?"

He blinked and smiled. She knew who he was. He mentally rolled his eyes  when he realized that it wasn't hard to figure out since he still had  his eye patch on. His eye was still intact, but even he didn't like  seeing his own face in the mirror without his patch. The spiderweb of  scars on and around his eye wasn't something he wanted people staring  at, and since he was totally blind, he'd covered it.

Jay watched her intently as she shoved the covers aside, then carefully  rolled to her hands and knees and slowly, tentatively crawled toward  him. His cat's rumbling purr grew louder the closer she came, and his  tail started swishing back and forth.

"Are you all right, Jay?"

His heart melted. His mate was hurt and had just had a nightmare. He'd  expected her to be crying her heart out, but she'd pushed her terrifying  dreams aside with her concern for him. His answer of "yes" ended  sounding more like a hiss, and Kenzie paused on her hands and knees as  she watched him warily. Jay lowered his head down onto his paws and  closed his eyes.

"You're so damn big," Kenzie whispered. "Your cat and your human form.  You could kill me with one swipe of your paw or one punch. You don't  scare me, Jay." His swishing tail stilled when she stroked a hand over  his head and down his back.

His cat arched its back into her touch and began to purr louder than  ever. He opened his eyes when she shifted closer and scratched behind  his ears. He had the weirdest urge to roll over onto his belly and  expose his throat. That had never happened to him before. Not with a  human. He'd humbled himself to Tatum once when he'd pissed the lion  shifter off, but never had he wanted to be vulnerable to a human. Until  now.

It wasn't that his panther wanted to be dominated by Kenzie, but his  inner animal wanted to show her that she didn't have anything to fear  from his wild side.

His ears twitched when he heard Jordan and Jenson running toward the  house and while he knew they were going to give him shit over finding  his clothes in rags and him in his panther form, he couldn't care less.  He'd do anything to make Kenzie happy. Even give his own life if that  was what she asked of him.

She was the most important person in his life. Even before his brothers and his friends.

His mate had melted the ice around his heart and brought the dormant  organ back to life. She'd made him feel again, and he didn't want to  lose that, lose her, now that she was here.

Kenzie pressed her forehead against the top of his head and sighed. He  gently rubbed his face against her chin. She wrapped her arms around his  neck and buried her face into his fur. Jay wanted to move so he could  wrap one of his legs around her and hold her close, but he remained  still. He was worried that if he moved he'd end up sinking his teeth  into her. Saliva was already pooling in his mouth as her scent wrapped  around him. All it would take was to open his mouth and bite down. His  chin was resting on her shoulder, her skin pressed against his black  coat.

The front door opened and closed, but he didn't think Kenzie was aware  that Jordan and Jenson were home. He loved his brothers, but he hoped  they stayed away for a while so he could cherish this moment with his  woman. There was nothing sexual in their hug. They were just two living  beings savoring a moment of comfort with each other.

He should have known that his siblings would want to see their mate as  soon as they got home. He could hear them walking toward the bedroom.  Jay hoped that they'd bought her some clothes from the store like he'd  asked them to. He'd used the telepathic link and told them to get help  from Emmy, Pixie, and Dusty, if they had the time. Dusty and Kenzie were  relatively the same size. Kenzie was a couple of inches taller than  Dusty. Pixie was so tiny, Jay was scared to breathe on the other woman.  Emmy was inches taller than all of them. The women were all so  different, and yet they seemed to get along just fine. Maybe that was  because they'd all endured adversity at the hands of evil, dangerous  men.

What worried the shit out of him was that the men after Kenzie's were  still at large, but they weren't going to get anywhere near her if he  could help it.





Kenzie had been scared out of her mind when she'd come out of her  horrible dream, but that fear making her heart pound had quickly waned  when she'd seen Jay on the bed in his panther form. When she'd seen the  tattered remnants of his clothes scattered about, she'd had to bite her  lip to keep from laughing. She had a feeling if she'd laughed at the  big, sexy man he would have been offended and hurt.                       
       
           



       

The urge to pet the big cat had been too strong to ignore and now that  she was hugging him, she couldn't seem to make herself let go. There was  so much comfort, so much rightness in her heart and soul when she was  touching or hugging one of the Cannon men.

Even though she hardly knew them, she'd already made her decision about  staying with them. Her heart and soul were so drawn to them, she  couldn't imagine turning away from them, couldn't imagine not accepting  being their mate. The soul-deep yearning to be with them intimately was a  gut-wrenching need and if she hadn't been hurting, she might already  have been in their bed.

She wanted to tell them that she'd made up her mind, but since there was  no way she could be intimate with them until her ribs had healed more,  she kept her mouth shut.

"What the hell?" Jordan asked as soon as he entered the room.

Kenzie startled since she hadn't known he was even there. He and his  brothers moved around like great big jungle cats. Silent and predatory  just like their inner animals. She lifted her face from Jay's cat's neck  and gazed at Jordan and Jenson.