“There’s one way to find out.”
“Yeah, kid? How’s that?”
“Get Knox to force her change.” The prospect grew nervous then. “Just be sure no one else knows until after you claim her. The hidden can be claimed by anyone if they are found in their shadow cat state.”
Part of me wanted to laugh, but I had seen the little bits of shimmery silver pelt near her skinned calves. “What’s to stop Knox from claiming her after she shifts then?” I asked.
“Nothing. So you better trust him.”
“Saying you don’t trust our Prez, Prospect?”
“Saying that ain’t my mate lying there, but if it was, there wouldn’t be a man on Earth to force her change before I claimed her.”
“Doesn’t matter,” a beautiful feminine voice said, pulling my attention from the prospect to her. “We shadow cats get to choose for ourselves.”
“What does that mean, exactly?” I did my best to hide my unease at her admission. What if she didn’t choose me?
“You wouldn’t have felt the call if I hadn’t wanted you to,” she explained with a slight blush on her cheeks. “I needed your help,” she admitted.
“Are you saying you made me think you were my mate when I wasn’t just so I’d help you?”
“No. I’m saying I am your mate now if you’ll have me. I chose you because I needed help, but when you answered the call, you made the potential mate bond real.”
“Are you going to take it back now?” I asked, feeling like a complete idiot.
“It doesn’t work that way. Once it’s given, it can’t be taken back.”
“My father said that too. Once the hidden ones pick, it can’t be undone, even if you don’t follow through.”
“If I don’t fulfill the bond?” I asked, curiosity getting the better of me.
“It will be as though I was rejected by my true mate and I will lead a half life as a shadow cat until my death.”
“What about the one who may have been my mate before you did this?” Suddenly, it hit me that there could be another woman out there who would be just as affected by this decision as I was.
“She becomes a second chance for someone else, a potential mate for one of her choosing.”
I didn’t know how I felt about that. Somewhere out there was a female meant to be mine, and yet this woman was asking me to choose her instead. Wrapping my brain around that choice was proving difficult. I must have looked as completely fucked in the head as I felt, because a small hand reached out and grabbed hold of my own.
“I don’t know how it all works, but I know the one who was originally meant for you will never know. She’ll just know she has a choice in who she has for a mate.”
“How the fuck does that work? For every person who gets to choose, it seems someone else will lose out?” The woman slowly shook her head.
“No, I meant it when I said it would be a second chance. The man she will be able to choose won’t have a mate.” She hung her head low. “As you know, some have died before they were claimed. Some were gone unclaimed, unfound, or whatever the case may have been and death took the ability for them to match. She will be a second chance for someone who lost what was to be theirs.” She shook her head. “Don’t try to wrap your mind around it. It’s not for us to understand. I’m here. You might never find the other, but it is your choice to accept me or leave me. Either way, my fate is now sealed, and I will thank you for saving my life and my hide.”
“Am I able to see you in your shadow cat form?”
“Of course, but,” she chewed on her bottom lip as a stray strand of white-blond hair fell into her face. “Any other cats here will feel my presence the moment I do. They will know I am unclaimed, and they won’t recognize the fact that I’ve already given myself. Most don’t know that’s possible. It may cause,” she paused, “problems.”
The prospect laughed. I had damn near forgotten he was still there. “That’s the understatement of a lifetime,” he managed to choke out. I turned narrowed eyes on him then.
“How the hell do you know so much?”
“My dad told me about it,” he shrugged. I turned to see the woman on the bed regarding him with interest. “Your mother was of the hidden,” she told him. “You will have daughters, three to be exact, and they will all be shadow cats.”
“What the fuck?” The man hissed.
“You have the gene. It will pass along.”
“I forgot how creepy that could be.”
“What?” I asked, again feeling so far out of my element it wasn’t funny.
“That freaky knowing thing they have. That ability to see the future at the weirdest times.”
I turned back to stare at the woman I had rescued, and realized for the first time that I didn’t even have a name for her. “Leave the room,” I told the prospect without turning back to him. Once I heard the snick of the door shutting, I asked my questions. “You have a name?”
“Chantal,” she whispered to me. “Chantal Piper,” she managed as a blush stole across her cheeks.
“I’m Gray Brewer.” She nodded her head as if she already knew that. I shook off the weird feeling and continued to watch her as I asked the tougher questions. “Can you tell me what happened? What led you to that alley? Who had you?”
She sighed. “I don’t know any of those answers. I can tell you I smelled leopard, panther, and vulture before I blacked out. I’m not sure how I got in that alley as I was leaving my condo in Caledonia. I teach at Duncan Middle
