Tiger Striped Read online

  Tiger Striped

  Shifters Unbound

  Jennifer Ashley

  JA / AG Publishing

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Author’s Note

  Also by Jennifer Ashley

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Chapter One

  Tiger woke in the night, knowing something was wrong in the world.

  Carly, his mate, lay curled into his side, her wispy nightdress tickling his skin. Her golden-brown hair had escaped the ponytail she’d tucked it into, and silken strands brushed her face.

  In his cubbyhole off their room, their son, Seth, slept in his crib, Tiger aware of his every breath. Seth had been born a human baby, as all half Shifter, half humans were, but his hair was tiger striped.

  Carly was safe. Seth was safe. So why had Tiger come abruptly awake in the silence of the night?

  He’d learned not to question what went on in his brain. Tiger wasn’t like the other Shifters of this Shiftertown—he’d been born in a lab, the experiment of genetic engineers who’d really needed something better to do with their time.

  Twenty-two of their experiments had failed. Failed meant the Shifters had died.

  Number Twenty-Three was Tiger. The researchers had abandoned him when the lab shut down, and Tiger had existed in isolation for many years.

  Now he lived here, he reminded himself, as he brushed his fingertips over Carly’s soft skin. In a huge room at the top of a cozy bungalow that had been partitioned into two once Seth arrived. Tiger had a mate who loved him, and a cub of his own, two things he’d never truly believed would happen to him. The rest of this house was taken up with Liam Morrissey’s family—Liam’s mate and cub and his nephew, who’d welcomed Tiger into their home and made him one of their clan.

  The window was open, but the night was quiet—as quiet as it ever got in Austin, near Mueller, the old airport. Tiger heard cars on the distant freeway, the drone of a low-flying helicopter, someone laughing far away.

  He heard Shifters as well, the nocturnal Felines who liked to prowl Shiftertown in the warmth of the September night. They hung out, went for runs under the stars, had sex in the shadows.

  None of that had woken him. Tiger can sleep through a tornado if he wants to, Carly always said, flashing her big smile. She knew that for a fact.

  Rapid thoughts ran through Tiger’s head along with the brief, weird stream of numbers he sometimes saw in the back of his brain. Tiger didn’t know what the numbers meant or where they came from. He only knew they oriented him to things he needed to understand or situations no one but him could handle.

  The uneasy silence was broken by sudden, intense screams. All-out, boiling-in-hell, please-help-me screaming. It filled Tiger’s brain and blotted out everything—the house, his cub, Carly and her soothing touch.

  Wordless. Terrified. In so much torment.

  Tiger slammed his hands to his head, squeezing to make the pain and fear cease, but they wouldn’t be silenced.

  Carly and Seth slept on, oblivious, because the sound wasn’t here, in the air around them. It was inside Tiger’s mind.

  From far, far away, a being cried out, and Tiger heard.

  Search and rescue.

  Tiger had been made for it—his original purpose. Subsequent researchers had changed their tactics and tried to transform him into a super fighter, a living machine, but his idealistic, first creators had wanted to use Tiger to find people lost and on their last hope.

  During the past year, Shifter Bureau had called on Tiger to locate stranded hikers, lost cubs, and the occasional criminal eluding the human police. Tiger had tapped into his abilities and found them, but it had never been like this.

  Not this invading mind-pounding agony, a desperation that tore into Tiger’s psyche.

  He had to find the being in trouble. Now.

  Tiger rose in silence, pulled on his clothes, and left the house.

  Carly woke as soon as their bedroom door shut. She sat up, pushing her hair from her eyes, and looked around the moonlit room. Tiger was gone.

  Seth snoozed happily in his crib beyond the open door to his tiny bedroom. Mothers envied Carly, because Seth had been a good sleeper from day one, and a happy baby. He seemed to know that his father, the indestructible Tiger, would let nothing bad happen to him. Which was true.

  But sometimes Tiger would go remote, listening to voices Carly couldn’t hear. Or he’d simply walk out without a word, like tonight. She always sensed when he disappeared from the bed, her connection to him knowing his agitation.

  Carly rose, pulled on a robe, and checked Seth in his crib. He lay on his stomach, his orange and black hair sticking up every which way, his back rising and falling in contented sleep.

  Carly adjusted his blanket and tiptoed out.

  She reached the stairs to see Tiger come off the last step and make for the front door. He was fully dressed, his muscles hard under the black T-shirt he’d snatched up to go with his jeans.

  Carly ran after him. She didn’t want to wake the rest of the house by calling his name, but she knew that if she didn’t stop him, he’d vanish. The last time this had happened, he’d walked into Faerie via a house in New Orleans into terrible danger. When Carly had finally pried the details of that story from him, he’d looked at her as though he didn’t understand why she’d been worried.

  Wherever he was heading this time, she was going with him. Mates protected each other, and she wasn’t about to lose Tiger to a bunch of mean-ass Fae, or Shifters, or humans, or whatever enemy he’d find this time.

  By the time Carly exited the house, Tiger was on the driveway next door, looking over Dylan Morrissey’s small white pickup as though trying to figure out the mystery of it. Cool air touched Carly through her thin robe as she moved carefully on her bare feet across the thin strip of grass that separated the driveways.

  She made it to the truck and rested her hands on its cool hood. “Where are you going, Tiger?” she asked softly.

  Tiger at last swung to look at her, and Carly took a stunned step back.

  His golden eyes were wide with pain and shock, his black and orange hair pulled awry as though he’d been tearing at it.

  Carly’s heart beat faster. “Tiger?”

  Tiger balled his huge fists. “I have to go.” His voice cracked like he’d swallowed dust.

  “Go where? Back to Faerie?”

  Tiger looked puzzled. “No. Somewhere in the human world.”

  “Sweetie, could you narrow that down just a little bit?” Carly lifted her thumb and forefinger in demonstration.

  Tiger gazed around the dark street, old-growth trees casting deeper shadows on the early twentieth-century bungalows. “No,” he answered.

  “So, what’s your plan? Hot-wire Dylan’s truck and drive off somewhere in the human world? And I can’t believe I’m standing here talking about worlds, like there really is more than one.”

  “There are an infinite number,” Tiger said, but Carly could tell he wasn’t interested in discussing quantum physics right now.

  “You can’t just ask Dylan for the keys? Or for me to take you? Or Connor? You know he’s always up for adventure, anytime of the day or night.”

  Tiger continued to eye the truck, occasionally running a hand through his hair, rumpling it further. Carly realized he wasn’t really hearing her, but listening to the something inside his mind. He did that sometimes.

  She put one hand on her hip. “You know, other women might get the wrong idea w
atching their husband sneak off in the middle of the night.”

  Tiger glanced at her. “Why?”

  “Because she’d think he was sleeping around on her, silly.”

  That got his attention. Tiger stared at Carly in amazement. “You are my mate.” As though the statement said it all.

  “Well, that’s a relief. In that case, let me get dressed and drive you. A question—is it safer to leave Seth at home with a babysitter or to bring him with us?”

  Tiger scowled at her, a flicker of his usual self showing through his glassy-eyed distraction. “Seth will stay home. So will you.”

  “Not a chance, honey.” Carly pointed at him. “Don’t you go anywhere for a sec, all right?”

  Carly turned and fled back into the house and up the stairs to their bedroom. She tore off the robe and cute nighty Kim had bought her for her last birthday, and grabbed clothes and flung them on. She ended up in one of Tiger’s huge T-shirts, a pair of her own denim shorts, and sandals. Carly scraped her hair into a ponytail and caught up her son, who opened one sleepy eye and snuggled into her.

  Carly’s heart throbbed with a sudden ache. She had Tiger and Seth, was as happy as she’d ever been.

  She was going after Tiger tonight to make sure they all stayed a happy family. Tiger walked into dangerous crap all the time—mostly because other Shifters went too far, and Tiger had to rush in and save them.

  Carly was tired of it. His search-and-rescue missions to help people were one thing. Other Shifters getting him into perilous battles, especially with the scary Fae, was something else.

  She put Seth into his carrier, crept down the stairs with him, and stealthily entered the bedroom Kim shared with her mate Liam and their baby daughter.

  Carly tried to move as softly as she could, though she knew she’d never be quiet enough to escape a Shifter’s notice, but she saw that tonight it didn’t matter. Liam wasn’t in the bed. Kim was alone, sleeping soundly, one arm flung across the pillow where Liam was supposed to be.

  Katriona, their two-year-old daughter, was curled up in her small bed with bumpers on the sides. Carly set Seth, still sleeping, on the wide, low dresser next to the bed, where Kim would see him as soon as she woke.

  She didn’t want to leave Seth—everything in her cried out not to—but she knew he would be safe here with Kim and Liam. Tiger, if he raced out into the world, wouldn’t be.

  Carly kissed Seth’s forehead and hurried from the room.

  She saw why Liam wasn’t in his bed as soon as she made it out the door, baggy purse in hand. Liam gazed across the hood of his father’s truck at Tiger, and Tiger scowled back at him.

  “I’m supposed to be taking care of you, lad,” Carly heard Liam say.

  Liam Morrissey, the leader of this Shiftertown, a dark-haired, blue-eyed man who changed into black-maned lion when he was so inclined, was trying to outstare Tiger. He’d been leading the Shiftertown for about three years now, usually in a laid-back way, but when he asserted his authority, everyone took notice.

  Tiger wasn’t answering, a bad sign. Tiger too could be laid-back to the point of comatose, not really minding that cubs crawled all over him or other Shifters used his incredible strength for everything from opening jars to battling insane Fae warriors.

  Usually Tiger shrugged, opened the jar, destroyed the warriors, and went back to lounging on the porch with Carly, Seth in his arms.

  Tonight Tiger snarled as Liam took a step toward him. Liam held up his hands in a placating manner, but Tiger’s warning growls only increased.

  “It’s all right,” Carly said quickly to Liam. “I’m going with him, whatever he’s off to do.”

  Tiger snapped his focus to her, his eyes a hot yellow. “No, you are not.”

  Carly folded her arms, her purse banging against her side. “Yes, I am. You’re in no shape to drive this thing. Besides if I steal Dylan’s pickup, you’ll have to protect me from him once we get back.”

  She finished her declaration, scooted around Tiger before Tiger could gather himself to stop her, and slid into the driver’s seat. No need to hot-wire the truck, she saw once she was behind the wheel. Dylan had left his keys in the ignition.

  Carly shut the door and leaned out the window to Tiger. “Are you coming?”

  Tiger stared down at her a moment, and then he jolted to life, making his silent and swift way around to the passenger door and into the truck. Carly smiled at Liam as he glared at them both.

  “I’ll bring him back in one piece,” she said, starting the ignition. “Promise.”

  “It’s past curfew,” Liam tried. “If he’s caught …”

  … out of Shiftertown in the middle of the night, humans wouldn’t hesitate to arrest Tiger, cage him, put him on trial, execute him, or at least return him to a lab to be studied, maybe forever.

  Carly reached over and unlocked the Collar from around Tiger’s neck. Collars were designed to deeply shock the Shifter who grew violent, and it was against the law to remove them.

  Tiger’s Collar, though, was fake. When he’d been rescued from Area 51 and brought to live in this Shiftertown it was decided that Tiger wouldn’t have to wear a real Collar. The Collars went on painfully, and Tiger was … well, Tiger. After an aborted attempt, no one else was brave enough to try to put a true one around his neck.

  She dropped the black and silver chain into Tiger’s hand. Tiger looked like a Shifter no matter what—large, strong, fierce—and that was when he sat still. But without the Collar, it might take humans a few minutes to figure out what he was, and by that time they could be gone.

  Carly called through the open window to Liam, “Tell Kim I owe her one, and that we’ll be back soon. Buh-bye.”

  She gave him a cheery wave, disguising her qualms. Tiger had gone off before, yes, even in the middle of the night, but not like this. Not with this—obsession. She hadn’t worried about him like this those other times. This was different.

  Carly backed the truck from the driveway and out into the dark street. A single light glowed at the end of the block—Shifters preferred the shadows.

  Liam watched them go, folding his arms over his broad chest. He didn’t run after them or yell or try to alert his father that Carly and Tiger were taking off in his truck.

  Carly wondered why he was letting them go so easily. Liam was crafty, always having about twenty-seven plans up his sleeve. Liam simply backing off didn’t bode well, but Tiger was undeterred.

  Very few roads led out of Shiftertown. When Carly reached the corner of the main street, next to a vacant lot, she asked, “Which way?”

  Tiger pointed to the left. No hesitation. He had his eyes closed, his head back, not even bothering to look. He was trusting that she’d take him where he needed to go and bring him home safely.

  It was Carly who paused uncertainly. If she drove Tiger away from Shiftertown, could she protect him? At home, even with all the restrictions put on Shifters, Tiger was surrounded by powerful friends who would help him and run interference for him with Shifter Bureau. Out in the world, though …

  “He wants you to take a left,” said a male voice behind her.

  Carly shrieked, coming three inches off the seat before she plopped back down.

  A young man rose from the bed of the truck to peer in through the cab’s back window. He was muffled in a hoodie zipped up to his chin, but the dark hair of his uncles and grandfather peeped from under the hood, and Morrissey blue eyes gazed at her.

  “Go on, Carly,” Connor Morrissey said in a voice that had deepened in the last year, the trace of Irish keeping it soft. “Before Uncle Liam figures out I’m with you. Hurry!”

  Chapter Two

  Tiger popped his eyes open and looked back to see Connor grab the window ledge as Carly stepped on the gas and rounded the corner.

  Connor was a cub by Shifter standards, and Tiger’s first priority in his world, after loving and taking care of Carly and Seth, was to protect cubs.

  Tiger rapidly weighed the
pros and cons of turning around to take Connor home versus looking after him. He couldn’t take Connor into danger.

  But then the screaming in his head escalated, begging wordlessly for him to hurry. Tiger chose.

  “Stay close to me,” he told Connor. “No fighting.”

  Carly slammed on the brakes for a red light. “Exactly. You are going to get me into so much trouble, Connor. What are you doing hiding in the back of Dylan’s truck?”

  “Couldn’t sleep in the house,” Connor said without concern. “Too hot. And Uncle Liam and I had a row.”

  A row meant an argument. A word Tiger had learned since he’d come to live with the Morrisseys.

  “What about this time?” Carly asked. She sped off when the traffic light glowed green. “No, don’t tell me. You wanted to go to the fight club again.”

  “I could kick the ass of any Shifter put in front of me.” Connor’s confidence radiated from him. “Okay, maybe except Spike. Or Ronan. But pretty much everyone else. I don’t understand why I have to wait until my Transition.”

  Tiger closed his eyes. The Transition from cubhood to adulthood, which usually happened when a cub was in his twenties, meant restlessness, quick anger, the need to fight, and later, the urgent need to mate. Tiger’s had been unbelievably painful and terrifying, hell to remember.

  The stream of numbers in front of his eyeballs that appeared when he closed his eyes was hard to take, and he opened his eyes again.

  “You’re a cub,” he said to Connor. “Against the fight club rules. They won’t change them for you.”

  “Since when did you follow the rules? Witness—you’re out running around Austin with a delinquent cub in the middle of the night. Where are we going?” Connor sounded interested, not worried.