Page 26 of Beautiful Sight

“Let me go. I have to teach the bitch a lesson,” Tessa snarled as she struggled against whoever was holding her.

“I’d say you did,” Jacobi said. He set her down but then pulled her back several steps. “You knocked her unconscious, Tessa.”

“I did?”

“What the fuck is going on out here?” Jefferson asked, his voice only two decibels louder than usual. “Tessa, why is my assistant lying on the floor unconscious?”

Tessa knotted her fingers in front of her middle and took a breath. “She hit me first and I was just defending myself.”

“Why did she hit you?” Jacobi asked as Marla began to moan.

Tessa turned in Jefferson’s arms and looked up at where she hoped his face was. “She’s not the woman you think she is. She had hoped by taking the job as your assistant that you would give up on finding your fated mate and choose her. When you found me and brought me home, she was not happy. And she’s never let me forget that I’m not a shifter. I have a feeling she was biding her time and eventually would have pushed me out a window or something in order to take my place as your mate.”

Her latest adrenaline spike flowing out through her toes, Tessa leaned into Jefferson’s big body.

“Is that true, Marla?”

“She’s a bland. She has no place in our world. I should be your mate and help you rule the city,” the woman cried.

Tessa thought she heard the woman struggling against whoever held her, but was hungry and wanted to go. “Give it up, bitch. He’s mine and I don’t share. Can we go to Mystic’s now?”

“Take her to the basement and lock her up until she can go before the council. I’ll call for replacement guards to meet us in the parking garage,” Jacobi ordered.

Jefferson hugged her once again before releasing her and wrapping her hand around his arm. “Yes, my tigress, we can go to Mystic’s now.”

“So that’s why he calls her tigress,” she heard one guard say to another as they followed her and Jefferson to the elevator.

Tessa couldn’t help but giggle at the comment. With Jefferson’s love and care, she had indeed found her inner tigress. She might not be able to shift into animal form, but she would still be able to help Jefferson rule over the city’s shifters.

She just hoped she didn’t have to kick anyone else’s ass anytime soon. She’d much rather use her words than her fists, and would rather command with kindness than anything else.

“I love you, my alpha,” she said, not caring who else heard her.

“And I love you, my tigress. For the rest of our lives and beyond.”

The End