He slid his hands down Carly’s spine, finding a gap between the waistband of her shorts and her warm back. From there he could dip his fingers inside, brushing the waistband of the panties with the tiny polka dots. Tiger remembered her walking away from Ethan in nothing but her high heels and panties, her legs gorgeous, bare back straight.
He’d already been rock hard from watching her slide off the dress and throw off the bra, and the little wriggle in her hips when she’d walked off in fury had spiraled the mating frenzy through him. Tiger couldn’t help but follow her. He’d told himself he was protecting her, but Tiger knew his reason for going after her had been far more basic.
The skin of her bu**ocks was smooth, hot from the weather and from being enclosed in the shorts. Tiger wanted to push the shorts out of his way, but he couldn’t because it was so tight in this little car. When he got Carly back to Shiftertown, he’d peel the clothes from her and touch her all over.
Carly drew back from the kiss. “What are you doing?”
“Touching you.”
Tiger brought one hand up between them and cupped her breast, easily feeling it through the thin shirt. He lightly pinched her nipple, watching it firm to a point. Carly drew in a little breath, her eyes fixing on him.
“You shouldn’t do that,” she whispered.
“Why not?”
She leaned closer. “It makes me want to do bad things.”
Good. The things wouldn’t be bad though. Sex was never bad with a mate. “Do them with me,” Tiger said, fingers going lower on her bu**ocks.
In the front Ellison reached to the middle of the dashboard. “I’m turning on the radio. Right now.” He pushed buttons until a country song filled the car, a man and a woman singing about kissing each other. Ellison chuckled. “I guess that was just my luck.”
The song seemed to galvanize Carly. She wrapped her arms around him as the strains of the music went on, and kissed his lips again.
Tiger returned the kiss, learning how to match what she did. He tugged at her nipple while their lips met and parted, met again.
Ellison pulled up at a stoplight. A man in a truck next to them looked over, then he started to whoop and honk. Carly lifted her head, her face bright red.
Tiger didn’t care. Let them, as Ellison liked to say, eat their hearts out.
Ellison pulled away through the intersection, and the truck beside them turned off, the man giving a thumbs-up sign as he went.
Carly unwound herself from Tiger, pried his hands from her body, and sat down next to him. “How embarrassing. Sorry, Ellison.”
Ellison was grinning. “Hey, Shifters don’t care. I once came out of a bar to find my back-door neighbor and his human girlfriend going at it, full throttle, on the hood of my pickup. I had to wait ’til they were done. My neighbor said he was being discreet by using my truck instead of a total stranger’s.”
“Nice of him,” Carly said. “So Shifters really don’t care about romantic hotel rooms, rose petals, and champagne?”
“We can,” Ellison answered. “But when the mating frenzy hits, all we need is a surface that doesn’t give too much.”
“Mating frenzy,” Carly repeated. “Connor mentioned that.”
“Every Shifter has it. That crazed need to lock yourself in a room with your mate and go for it as much as and for as long as you can. We don’t come out for days, sometimes.”
“Days.” She sounded hesitant.
“Ellison.” Tiger thought of the phrase Liam and Connor used so often. “Shut it.”
“Goddess, now you’re starting to sound like a Morrissey,” Ellison said, never losing his good-natured drawl. “You’ve been living with them way too long.”
“Why do you live with them?” Carly asked Tiger. “You don’t want a place of your own?”
Ellison answered before Tiger could. “Shifters don’t have a choice. Only so many houses in Shiftertown, and we’re not allowed to live outside it. In my house, there’s my mate, Maria, Deni—she’s my sister—and Deni’s two sons, and hopefully a cub of my own soon.” His voice warmed when he spoke of the potential cub. “Tiger’s from . . . out of town, and there weren’t many houses with room for him when he arrived. Liam’s is one of the largest houses, and after Sean and his mate moved in with Dylan and Glory, Liam had an extra bedroom.”
“And no one else wanted me living in their house,” Tiger finished.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
He spoke the bare truth, but Carly stared at him, aghast. “Why not? Did they say that?”
“They didn’t have to,” Tiger said.
Tiger closed his mouth, unsure how to explain, but Ellison spoke up. “Remember what he did in the hospital room? Yeah, I heard all about it. Plus he nearly took out that human, Walker. The other Shifters are afraid he’ll do something like that.”
“But that’s not fair,” Carly said. “In the hospital, they had you scared to death. You knocked out Walker because he was spying on me and was carrying a loaded pistol. I mean, who does that?”
The warmth in Tiger’s heart escalated. Carly was looking at him in dismay, not fear, radiating anger at others for not understanding him.
They had scared him in the hospital—he’d been afraid he’d never see Carly again.
“And anyway,” Carly went on. “If you were attacking to hurt people, your Collar would have stopped you.” She pointed to the inert black and silver chain around his throat. “Shocks you when you get aggressive, right?”
Again Ellison jumped in before Tiger could speak. “You bet it does. Hurts like a mo fo.”
Tiger remained silent. Carly was his mate, and he trusted her, but he didn’t want to frighten her too soon with the fact that his Collar was a fake.
Carly leaned forward in the seat. “Ellison, you missed the turnoff. You take Koenig so I can get out to the gallery.”
Ellison glanced back through the mirror, looking at Tiger. Tiger gave him a nod.
“Sorry.” Ellison slowed and turned at the next intersection, driving north to make for the 290.
“Thanks. I really appreciate this,” Carly said.
Ellison had been heading for Shiftertown, knowing Tiger wanted to be alone with her. But Tiger was curious to see this gallery where Carly worked, wanted to make sure all was well there.
Carly settled back, her scent sweet and spicy, but also conveying to Tiger her underlying nervousness. Not fear for what Tiger and Ellison could do to her—it was more subtle than that, buried deep. Carly feared to trust at all. The man Ethan had taken her trust in him away from her by blatantly sexing the other woman. His house had still smelled of that encounter, despite the cleaning solution scent over it. The house had also smelled of Tiger’s blood.