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No pouncing on the Atlantean.
Marie glanced back over her shoulder and smiled at him, and he stumbled, his inherent feline grace deserting him. Screw that. There was definitely going to be pouncing.
Marie tried to slow her breathing as she pulled her wrap around her shoulders against the chill of the late afternoon.
In. Out.
Calm. Focus.
She concentrated on the breathing exercises she’d so often taught to women who were with child. In. Out. Measured, even tempo. No flutters or hitches or gasps, no matter that the man following her was burning holes in her back with those shocking golden eyes of his.
She’d worn the dress in an attempt to get a reaction from Ethan, and it had worked so well she’d been caught completely off guard. She’d lived her life surrounded by warriors, so why was this one—this man who wasn’t even Atlantean; wasn’t even fully human—so different?
Maybe because Poseidon’s warriors treated her as a cherished sister, due to their friendship with Bastien. They admired and respected her, certainly, but none had ever desire
d her. At least not that she’d ever known. Her few love affairs had been with men from the scholarly life. Philosophers and historians. Gentle, learned men.
None of them had ever made her blood race the way this panther did. A thrill of pure electricity had sizzled through her blood at his touch when she’d finally dared place her hand in his. She’d pulled away from him as quickly as courtesy would allow, but not before she’d seen the shocked expression on Ethan’s face. This attraction traveled both directions on the path between them, and she was unsure if she could resist it for long.
She glanced at him again and wondered how simple black trousers and a white shirt could be so elegant, when she had seen the high prince dressed in full royal attire on ceremonial occasions. Ethan walked with the pure grace and deadly determination of the ultimate predator. Every line of his body flowed with sinuous movement, and if she narrowed her eyes, she could almost visualize the cat that he could become.
They stopped at his car, some sleek black vehicle that looked fast and expensive, based on what little she knew of cars, and she stared at him as he walked up next to her to open her door. Her breath caught in her throat as he approached, and she blurted out the first thing that popped into her head. “Will you show me?”
He raised an eyebrow and folded his arms across his thickly muscled chest. “Show you what?”
“I…Is it rude? Perhaps…never mind,” she said, then blushed as she realized that she was actually babbling for the first time in her life.
“We don’t stand on ceremony around here, Marie. Just tell me.”
He’d moved closer, so that he stood so near that his breath feathered across her hair, and the spicy warm male scent of him filled her senses, nearly making her forget what she’d been about to ask. She shook her head a little, to counteract the hypnotic effect he had on her, then drew up her courage and asked. “Your panther. I was wondering…Is it rude to ask you to show me the shape change? Or perhaps you would shift your shape in private and then show me the other of your dual natures?”
She was breathless by the time she finished, both from her own temerity and from his nearness. The heat of his body was enchanting her, calling to her, beckoning her to wrap herself in his arms and his warmth. She suddenly felt as if she’d lived her life in the cold and only he could rescue her from it.
Madness. She dug her nails into her palms to shake off the fanciful imaginings and return to normalcy, but he moved even closer until she was backed up against his car. He placed a hand on the metal on either side of her, bracketing her body between the heat of his arms and chest and the icy chill of the car’s metal.
“You want to see my cat, ocean girl? That’s a very personal request,” he murmured, leaning forward and breathing the words into her ear. She shuddered helplessly as heat flamed through her, then put her hands up to his chest to push him away. She was tall, and she was strong, but pushing against his chest was like pushing against the rock wall that bordered the palace garden.
He lifted a hand and tilted her face up to his with one finger beneath her chin. She looked into his eyes, unable to utter a word, and he searched her face for something, then stared fixedly at her mouth. Moments passed, and finally he stepped back from her, muttering an oath under his breath. “Maybe later,” he said roughly. “You make me forget myself, Marie. I’m not sure how to handle that.”
He yanked the car door open for her, then leaned in to show her how to fasten the seat belt, but his touch was brisk and impersonal. When he carefully closed the door and walked around the car to the driver’s side, Marie stared at him through the window and finally released the breath that had been trapped in her lungs.
“As to forgetting yourself, Ethan, you are not alone,” she whispered, wondering what she’d gotten herself into.
Wondering why she didn’t want to get out.
SIX
As they drove through the breathtaking lands of the Big Cypress Swamp, Marie spent several minutes acclimating to the novel experience of riding in a car. When she was sure her stomach would not rebel against the motion and the bumpy ride, she asked Ethan to tell her about this place that he and his kind called home.
“It’s a national preserve, protecting over 720,000 acres of swamp. Basically, the swamplands are crucial to the health of the Everglades, because they support the marine estuaries along Florida’s southwest coast.”
“It’s beautiful, and so diverse,” she observed. “I am so accustomed to the plant life in Atlantis that this seems very exotic to me.”
He pointed to a stand of trees along the side of the narrow road. “Those are dwarf cypress trees. We have a mixture of tropical and temperate plant life, but it’s not just the green and leafy stuff that’s so exotic around here. We’ve also got gator communities, bears, and, of course, panthers.”
She smiled. “Of course. Tell me about the panthers. I have access to your encyclopedias and other reference texts, but I do have some questions. Are panthers the same as cougars?”
“The Florida panther is a subspecies of cougar that has adapted to the temperature here. We’ve fought our way back from extinction for the panthers, but there are still fewer than a hundred remaining.”
