Shifting Crossroads 8 - Ocelot of Trouble by Zenina Masters Read Free Book Online

Alenfleur.”
    “Well, the Lancasters are an old family, we are simply middle class.” She smiled, “My mother’s family are Ekhearts. Two steady ocelot lines.”
    He finished his burger and grinned, “So, do you think our children will be ocelots or foxes?”
    “I really don’t know. It isn’t something I have thought about. Heck, they could even be turtles. I have some in my lineage a few generations back, and they pop up when you least expect them.” She blinked. Children. Well, she supposed that it was the logical outcome of the sort of activity she had just engaged in. Fortunately, she could not bear more than one child every two years. It would help her keep things in perspective.
    “You hadn’t thought about children, had you? Your face just went blank.”
    She sighed. “It is just all a little more than I was thinking about. I was concentrating on getting past my gentlemen callers being struck by passing objects or set on fire. I hadn’t thought about what would happen next.”
    Robar laughed. “Understandable. My mother and grandmother confronted me and ordered me to come here. I only thought to find a mate and go home, but now that I have met you, the future seems something that I am very interested in. For example, where would you like to live?”
    “I don’t know. Somewhere near a thick forest where I can run and hide when I like.” She finished her fries and moved on to her salad.
    “You don’t have a preference for a certain location?”
    “No. I will go where my mate is and make a new territory.”
    “Is that traditional in ocelot shifters?” He asked her the question as if he knew the answer.
    “No. My family is not traditional in our beast’s sense. We remain with our mates. We don’t simply mate and kick the male out so we can raise our offspring. Both my parents are steady influences in my life, but they want me to strike out on my own.”
    “So, we both have strong parents who are shoving us toward a settled life. We have something in common beyond the basics.” Robar smiled and took her hand.
    “Apparently.” She finished her salad and tucked everything back under the silver dome.
    “Now, how did you come to be the victim of a curse?”
    She sighed and sat back. “I didn’t realise that anything was wrong for the longest time.”
    “How did you figure it out?”
    “It was my senior prom. My date was David Twist, and he was very gallant and cheerful, just what I needed at the time. We were dancing, and one of the spotlights that the gym was using fell and shattered, embedding a piece into his leg that required extraction at the hospital. It was the fifth date that had ended in trouble.”
    “Ah, that would do it. What did you think was causing it?”
    “I thought I was a jinx. Unlucky and unlikely to find a man who could survive being near me. My family didn’t believe it; they kept setting me up with any eligible male they could find. I merely kept going on round after round of first dates, all ending in disaster.”
    “What caused the curse?”
    “Teebie is looking into it, but her theory is that one of the boys that I knew in high school was a curse master and he marked me as his own.”
    “Why couldn’t you ask him to remove the curse?”
    “His family moved three months after the first dating disaster. I had no idea what was going on at the time. It never even occurred to me that he could have been a human mage.”
    “They are hard to spot.” He chuckled. “Would you care to take an afternoon nap?”
    She smiled and felt the aches and pains in her body. “It is a very attractive idea.”
    He rose to his feet and discarded the towel.
    “Alright, now it is more than an idea.” Mina smiled and got to her feet. “I know an order when I see one.”
    He laughed and walked her over to the bed, folding the sheets back before lifting them to allow her to slide in. Instead of walking around to the other side of the bed, he slid in next to her, curling her against