The Mating Season: A Paranormal Shifter Romance by Jade White Page B

duvet still smelled of Tony’s musky cologne. She shook her head and picked up the blanket and marched it to the washer -- the less stuff around to cloud her judgment, the better.
    Her mind played over the events of the past couple of weeks. She moved to Predator Springs to escape her psychotic ex, Smiley. She was glad that the band had accepted her membership transfer. First Nations communities didn’t like doing that unless it was a real emergency, and escaping a crazed killer did count as such.
    As Kim went through her house, tidying up, she noticed little reminders each man had left, the lone trowel that she had borrowed from Keith, one of Tony’s socks, and the most obvious sign, the garden mounds in the back yard, already beginning to sprout, which she and Keith put in the day after she had moved into the house.
    She couldn’t wait for the results of her hard work. She might have to talk to Rusty’s wife, Betty, for tips and recipes on how to preserve the bounty throughout the year. Wait, she was acting as if she were staying, when in reality she should be trying to find another area to live before Smiley came back and killed Tony and Keith.
    Her sky blue eyes stared dreamily out the back yard. She reminisced about that warm spring day she and Keith planted the garden; the stories they shared, the jokes they shared, and the smell of the earth as they carefully worked in the seeds. Kim remembered the way he held her while she broke down after she told him about Smiley. His smell, from the exertion, heightened his pheromone levels, and it erased all rational thought from Kim’s brain except for one thing.
    Keith was a very sensitive lover. Her body started to tingle at the memory of their one time together. She longed for his strong, sensitive hands to touch her body again. Keith’s powerful body next to hers felt absolutely right, and his soft, earnest face compelled her to feel again after she locked away all her emotions. She shook her head. No. She shouldn’t think such things. She needed to get out of here. Luckily, a good deal of her things were still in boxes. All the recent drama had put unpacking on the back of her priority list. At least it saved her some work.
    Then, there was Tony, cocky, strong, and relentless. His lean body felt like it was always coiled and ready to pounce and his sharp, handsome features gave his face a predatory cast. Once he found out that Smiley had been after her, he had stepped up his attention to the next level. He insisted on staying over, hoping to catch Smiley as he came for her.
    They wound up fucking as well. It was the only way she could put it. Tony was an insatiable animal, now that’s a bit of choice phrasing right there, she thought to herself. She rubbed her shoulder where he bit her. She needed to put some more ointment on it to help heal it.
    Rusty had told her that they were shifters, and the people in the band were isolated from the rest of the Cree community due to their ability to shift into animal form. The people at Predator Springs were able to change into mountain lions, also called cougars. Out of both men, Tony was the more cougarish type. Keith felt like a soft, cuddly housecat. She giggled to herself at the thought of having a giant feline lounging around the house, soaking up the heat from the wood stove. Seriously, though, she did feel quite safe knowing that the local people had that ability.
    She hadn’t seen one yet, or had she? The night Smiley attempted to abduct her; there was a mountain lion that had chased him off. Could that have been, Keith? She shook her head. It couldn’t have been. But all this was so out of this world, that she would probably believe the Pope was a bear in the woods by now. She had little reason to not believe Rusty’s claims.
    When her grandfather stayed here during that winter so long ago, he had witnessed the shifters hunting. He tried to help as much as he could, but the most he could do was dress the animals