Page 67 of Remington’s Mate

“That’s what I’m counting on.”

Chapter 27

Brock Reilly arrived a few days later, in the middle of the night. He was in the kitchen when Remy and Jaeda went down for breakfast, standing at the kitchen island eating bacon and eggs.

He was tall and gorgeous, like most shifter men, as tall as Brandon but a little more heavily muscled. His hair was chestnut-brown with a little curl, and his eyes were hazel, changing colors according to his mood.

He looked tired, Jaeda thought. Not just the kind of tired you get from driving halfway across the country, but a bone-deep kind of exhaustion, with shadows under his eyes.

But when he looked up and saw her, his eyes lit up, and his smile transformed his whole face. There was nothing false or guarded about Brock. That had always been his problem.

He saw too deeply into other people, and cared too much. And he had too few defenses.

Jaeda ran up and threw her arms around him, and Brock lifted her into the air. “Jae-Jae,” he said. “I leave you with sensible wolf-people, and the next thing I know you’ve gone and turned into a cat. What the hell is wrong with you?”

Kitty came in from the porch in time to hear that. “Don’t talk bad about cats here,” she said in a stage whisper. “We’re outnumbered.”

Kitty was a wolf shifter, Jaeda remembered, although her mother was a jaguar.

Brock just grinned. “We can take them,” he said to Kitty. “Woofs rule.”

Remy growled, “If you don’t put my mate down, we’ll soon find out who rules.”

Brock set Jaeda on the floor, the grin not leaving his face. “Hey, Remy,” he said, holding out his hand. “Long time no see.”

Remy was still growling faintly. Brock clapped him on the shoulder. “Relax. Nobody’s moving in on your mate.”

Unsurprisingly, Remy did relax under Brock’s touch. Most shifters did. There was something innately kind about Brock—something soothing. It was hard to stay mad when he was around you.

Remy gave a rueful smile and clasped Brock’s hand in a bro grip. “Sorry about that,” he said. “Thanks for coming. I hope you can help Jaeda.”

“Me too. Maybe I can even get her to turn wolf.” He winked at Kitty.

“Not if I have to give up my leopard,” Jaeda said. “I had retractable claws. And whiskers. It was cool as fuck.”

Brock looked into her eyes, with that sweet heartbreaking smile and the gaze that saw all the way inside you. The same one that Squatch had, she realized.

The big polar bear had silently appeared sometime during their conversation, and was watching Brock intently with his steady silver gaze. Brock turned and their eyes met, and everything went still for a minute.

Then Squatch broke into a smile. Jaeda realized she hadn’t seen him smile before. “I’m Titan,” he rumbled. “Sometimes they call me Squatch.”

Just like yesterday, he was wearing nothing but a pair of buckskin pants that ended in ragged edges just below his knees. But there was a calmness about him, and deep intelligence in his eyes.

“Good to meet you, Titan,” Brock said. They were still staring at each other, like they were both seeing things no one else could.

It gave Jaeda goosebumps.

Brock didn’t waste any time starting to figure out how she had become a leopard. He peppered her and Remy with questions while they ate, and Titan chimed in with what he knew about the spirit world part of it.

As soon as they were done eating, they went out to see if she could Change.

Jaeda started out by being excited, but she hadn’t realized how hard it would be to Change at will—or how exhausting.

First Brock had her turn into a leopard again, with Remy right next to her in leopard form and Brock somehow helping her. She did that on the third try, and then Brock helped her Change back.

Then she tried Changing to leopard while Remy was human. Fail.

After that, Colt Changed to leopard and stood next to Jaeda while Brock helped her Change to leopard again. This time it worked.