Joining the Jaguar: BBW Paranormal Jaguar Shifter Romance Read online

  Joining the Jaguar

  By Zoe Chant

  Copyright Zoe Chant 2015

  All Rights Reserved

  "Are you seriously already working?"

  "What does it look like?" Jake Brown responded dryly, looking up from the enormous stack of files on his desk. "Morning, Vince," he added, smiling up at Vincent Ericsson, his best friend and second in command.

  "It looks like you need to get a life," Vincent said, perching on the desk with a sigh. "It's not even six am, and you were here till, what, nine o' clock yesterday?"

  Ten, actually, but Jake wasn't going to mention that if Vince didn't already know. "I've got a life. And the town's not going to—"

  "— run itself, I know. You're a great alpha, and I know it's a lot of work. But you don't have to do it all yourself. We're here to help, you know that, right?" Vincent said, gently knocking his shoulder against Jake's.

  Jake braced himself, pushing back affectionately. Like most bear shifters, Vincent was a giant of a man, and even a playful shove from him could knock you over if you weren't expecting it. Not that he ever meant to hurt anyone. Vince was one of the most gentle people Jake had ever met, and always ready to help out where he was needed. With friends like that and his town to look after, what else did Jake really need?

  You need a mate, his jaguar reminded him. Well, that wasn't likely to happen anytime soon. Jake had been looking for his mate for so long, he'd almost given up hope that it would ever happen. As the alpha of the town, he knew almost every woman in Brooksville at least in passing, and none of them had ever called to him the way a true mate was supposed to.

  And anyway, when did he have time to date? What woman would be willing to put up with the long hours he worked, the constant demands on his time and the emergencies in the middle of the night?

  No. Jake had resigned himself to being alone a long time ago. It wasn't a bad life. Sure, he got lonely sometimes. But who didn't? The hollow ache in his soul, the place where a mate bond was supposed to be, was a small price to pay for being able to take care of his pack and his town.

  "At least promise me you'll take a break and have some breakfast, later," Vince said. "And don't forget the new doctor's coming in today."

  "I know," Jake said with a grimace. That worry had been on his mind all night, and was half the reason he'd come into the office so early. He'd needed a distraction.

  "If it's another damn biker spy—" Vince started worriedly.

  Jake sighed. "We'll deal with it if we have to."

  Brooksville had had a string of rotten luck with doctors. This wasn't a rich town. Ambitious and capable doctors flocked to the big cities, where the money was. Brooksville got the people who couldn't hack it elsewhere.

  Dr. Miller, the last GP, had been spying for the biker gang. The gang had been running the city before Jake and his pack had tossed them out, and they'd almost ran it into the ground. Drugs, poverty and crime had been rampant before Jake and his shifters had cleaned up the place. Now Brooksville was a safe community again, a good place to raise your kids. But the bikers kept trying to regain control of the town, and sending Dr. Miller to spy on them had been their latest ploy.

  As a doctor, Miller had been lazy and uncaring. Jake had tolerated it for far too long, figuring they didn't have much choice, and a lazy GP was better than no doctor at all. But then Miller had sent little Emily Johnson home with a hundred degree fever, a raging headache, and an instruction to take some Tylenol. It'd been Jake who'd driven Emily and her desperate mom to the nearest children's hospital, where they'd gotten to her just in time to stop her dying from meningitis.

  That kind of thing wasn't happening again, not on his watch. A spy he could put up with, but if they'd sent him someone lazy, incompetent or uncaring again, he was going to toss them out before they could do any more damage to his people.

  Brooksville was getting a competent doctor, even if he had to bribe someone to come here with his own personal funds.

  "I'll bring her by later," Vincent said. "You can talk to her, see if she's a good fit. And if you think she's a spy… Well, you're good at being intimidating if you want to." As always, Vince seemed cheerfully oblivious to the fact that at 6'5'', he cut a pretty intimidating figure himself. Jake smiled.

  "Yeah, that's a good idea," he said.

  "See you later, then. Don't work too hard." Vince tilted his head to the side, baring his throat for a moment in the old pack gesture of respect, and closed the door behind himself. Jake sighed and bent his head back over his files.

  ***

  Oh hell, I look like Cinderella in rags, Sarah Andrews thought, catching sight of herself in the mirror. And not a prince in sight.

  She'd spent the last hour scrubbing the floor, and it showed. Her blouse was soaked with splatters of soapy water, so it stuck damply to the generous curves of her breasts and her soft stomach. Her ash-blonde hair had escaped its ponytail and was tangled wildly around her face. Prince Charming would probably run screaming at the sight of her.

  Today was her first day in Brooksville. She'd come in on the 6 am flight, ready and excited to take over her new practice and start her career as a GP after three exhausting years of residency. Her day had hit the first snag when she'd discovered that her suitcase had gone on to Guatemala without her.

  "Nothing I can do about it now. Check back with us tomorrow, it'll probably be here by then," the disinterested baggage claim attendant had told her.

  So here she was, still wearing the nice blouse and skirt she'd put on for the flight, and nothing to change into while she went on the biggest cleaning spree of her life.

  When she'd bought the office, the real estate agent had told her it was going to need some cosmetic repairs. Now that she was seeing it in person for the first time, Sarah could see what an understatement that had been. Cosmetic repairs, hell. The place was a pigsty. This Dr. Miller, her predecessor, must have been one hell of a lazy slob.

  Sarah took a deep breath. She wasn't going to let this discourage her. She'd never been afraid to get her hands dirty, and this was nothing that couldn't be fixed with a scrub brush and some elbow grease.

  Well, she corrected that thought, eyeing the dubious brown stain on the waiting room wall, a scrub brush and a big bucket of paint.

  She was halfway through cleaning the waiting room when the doorbell rang. Sarah ignored it. Someone must have seen the light through the windows and figured the practice was open for business.

  The doorbell rang again. And again. And then someone started knocking on the window beside the door.

  Sarah straightened up with a sigh. She glanced at herself in the mirror again. Her blouse was still damp, her hair was slowly turning into a rat's nest, and she'd somehow acquired a sooty stain on her cheek. Sarah scrubbed at it with the back of her hand. If those were potential patients, she was going to make a great first impression.

  Through the window beside the door, she could see a man waiting outside. He was dressed all in black, a patch on his shoulder showing some kind of sigil she couldn't make out from here.

  "We're closed!" Sarah called, demonstratively lifting the mop in her hand. With any luck, he'd think she was the cleaning lady. Hell, in the hospital half the time people had taken her for the cleaning lady even when she was wearing her doctor's coat. Sarah knew she didn't look like much; she was small and plump, and her hair was a boring, mousy color.

  The man called out something she couldn't make out through the closed door. Sarah sighed. She'd never been good at saying no to people who might need her help.

  She opened the door. "Look, if you've got an
actual medical emergency I'll do my best to help, but—"

  The man gave her a smile. He was a huge guy, towering over her, his shoulders easily twice the width of hers. His hair fell in blonde locks down his back. He looked like a Viking right out of legend. "The boss wants to see you," Viking Guy said.

  "Then your boss, whoever he is, can make an appointment as soon as this practice is open for business, just like anyone else," Sarah replied.

  In fact, she could make a pretty good guess who this boss was. Now that she was closer, she could recognize the sign on the man's shoulder as the sigil of the pack of shifters that formed the town's unofficial government. The "boss" had to be their alpha then. Jake Brown. The Jaguar. The man who'd united a ragtag bunch of shifters into a force to be reckoned with and thrown out the drug dealers and gangs who'd used to control the town.

  Brown was a legend. Even if half of what people said about him was exaggerated and the rest made up, the Jaguar was still a powerful and dangerous man. But Sarah had spent the last two years of her life working in a crowded, chaotic emergency room. She'd faced down addicts, drunks, and obstinate relatives; she wasn't exactly easily intimidated these days.

  Sarah squared her shoulders and reached down inside herself for the air of authority her job had taught her to project. Her voice came out like the crack of a whip.

  "You're going to leave my practice and you're not going to bother me again. If your boss wants to talk to me, he's welcome to make an appointment."

  For a moment she was almost certain it would work. The Viking took an uncertain step back. But then he shook his head, breaking the spell.

  "Sorry, miss. But I got my orders," he said. He took her gently by the arm.

  Her first instinct was to slap him across the face for touching her. Then she thought about at least slapping his hand off her arm. And then she thought about the likely consequences of five-foot-nothing her getting physical with a man who probably outweighed her by about a hundred pounds, and decided to save herself the humiliation.

  "Fine," she said, exasperated. "Tomorrow, then. I don't even have any clothes to change into right now."

  But the Viking was already hustling her along with his hand on her arm. "Can't keep the boss waiting," he said, a hint of apology in his tone.

  Pack headquarters was a sprawling warren of a building, an old mansion that had sprouted a number of additions in every direction, as if several generations had added a couple extra rooms whenever things had gotten crowded.

  The Viking—who'd introduced himself as Vincent Ericsson—put a guiding hand on her arm again. She shook him off with a glare. He might have dragged her here wearing soaked-through cleaning clothes, her hair in a hopeless rat's nest, but at least she could walk in with her head held high.

  Sarah's nervousness grew with every step she took towards Brown's office. She still had no idea what he wanted from her. Protection money, probably. 'Nice office you got there, shame if anything happened to it', that kind of thing. Or maybe he'd want her to report on her patients. Doctors heard everyone's secrets, after all. Well, she wouldn't, either way. And if he thought she was so easy to intimidate, he could go screw himself.

  She'd worked up a pretty good head of steam by the time they came to his office, so much so that she almost forgot to be scared. In her mind she had a clear picture of Brown already. A figure like Don Corleone, an old white guy with a mustache, sitting smugly behind an enormous leather-covered desk and smirking down at her.

  And then Vincent opened the office door for her, and her train of screeched to a halt.

  Oh no, he's gorgeous! she thought.

  Brown was the most attractive man she'd ever seen in her life. His tight black t-shirt showed off broad shoulders and tanned, muscular arms. When he rose to greet her, he moved with the effortless grace of a hunting cat. His hair was thick, silky black, and slightly tousled; she instantly wanted to run her hand through it.

  "Dr. Anderson, hello," he said. His voice was a smooth dark purr. The hint of menace in it chased a shiver down her back, even as it set an echoing tingle alive between her thighs. Her body couldn't help reacting to him and the powerful presence he projected.

  Get it together, woman, she thought. He was still a smug bastard who'd had her all but kidnapped, and that didn't change just because he had beautiful eyes and a perfect body.

  Brown came around his desk with confident, unhurried steps, and suddenly Sarah had to fight to stand her ground. Some deep, primal part of her mind could feel the predator in him, like a gazelle pinned down by a hunting cat.

  He's a rude bastard. You're not impressed, she reminded herself sternly.

  Sarah crossed her arms across her chest and gave him a glare. "What do you want?

  ***

  Hearing steps approaching his office, Jake closed his eyes for a moment. His people's lives depended on what kind of person their new doctor would turn out to be. He had to make sure she wouldn't let them down.

  Jake let the jaguar push to the forefront of his mind. Sounds grew louder, smells sharper. His jaguar always knew when people were lying.

  And then the door opened, Dr. Sarah Anderson walked in, and for a moment, he completely forgot what he'd been going to say.

  Oh no, she's beautiful! he thought helplessly.

  Vince must have interrupted her in the middle of some physical activity. Her blouse clung damply to her generous curves, leaving nothing and everything to the imagination. Her hair was tousled wildly, in a way that made it entirely too easy to imagine the way she'd look sprawled out in his sheets, sweaty and flushed for a much more pleasurable reason.

  She had wide, rounded hips and soft, full breasts. Her belly was a gentle, sensuous curve. The cat inside him wanted to purr at the thought of how good it would be to curl up against her soft, warm body.

  Blake swallowed hard and tried to regain his intimidating aura. Just because she was beautiful didn't mean she'd be the doctor his people deserved.

  "Dr. Anderson, hello," he said, slowly stalking towards her. He could smell her nervousness, but to her credit, none of it showed on her face. She crossed her arms in front of her chest and gave him a defiant glare.

  "What do you want?"

  "Have a seat," Jake said, pulling out a chair for her. She sat, giving him a deeply unimpressed look.

  God, she was amazing; it was clear she could feel the predator inside him, but she wasn't backing down one bit. If nothing else, this woman had guts. His jaguar roared approvingly, intrigued by the challenge she presented.

  Instead of going back to his own chair, Jake leaned against the desk, looking down at her. "A small town like Brooksville's a bit of an unusual choice to settle down for someone who's not from here, isn't it?" he asked.

  In this position, she had to look up at him. She still didn't look intimidated. His respect for her rose another notch.

  "Why don't you tell me why you want to know, first?" she replied. "You didn't ask me here for small talk." She slapped her hands down on the arms of her chair and pushed back to her feet. "I've had a rotten day. My office is a mess, my suitcase is in Guatemala, I've ruined a very nice blouse, and if you think you can make me sit around and waste my time just because you're the big bad jaguar, think again! Get on with it and tell me what you want from me."

  Her eyes were flashing furiously, but her voice cracked at the end of that speech, and he could hear the exhausted frustration beneath the words. He'd known Miller had left the office in a terrible state, lazy slob that he was. For the first time he thought about what it must've been like for her, arriving in a new town where she had no relatives or friends, and finding herself faced with that mess.

  And then he'd had her dragged here with no warning, too.

  He opened his mouth to apologize—she was right, this wasn't fair to her, and he'd gotten so caught up in worrying about his people that he hadn't thought of her feelings at all—and then a gunshot split the silence outside.

  Someone screamed. Jeremy. On
e of his pack. His jaguar roared in fury.

  "Wait here," Jake snapped.

  He yanked his shirt off and leaped, shifting in mid-air, hitting the floor on four paws. Sarah gasped. Jake flew through the building, claws digging into the floor for traction.

  Outside, Jeremy, a wolf shifter and one of the youngest members of the pack, was hobbling towards the gate. There was blood streaming down one of his legs. John and Amy, the other two wolf shifters, were supporting him on both sides. They were being chased by two members of the biker gang.

  Whoever had fired the shot had already flown. Lucky for them. Inside Jake's head, the jaguar was howling in rage. They'd hurt one of his pups, and they were going to pay for it.

  The two remaining bikers had knifes as long as their hands, but they weren't a match for the jaguar's speed.

  Jake barreled into the first one without slowing down, throwing him against the pavement hard enough to stun him. He dodged a clumsy knife slash from the second man, jumped, and knocked the man down beneath his weight.

  The man lifted the knife again, stabbing clumsily at Jake's side. Jake closed his teeth around the man's wrist, letting him feel the razor sharp tip of his fangs. He growled low and deep in his throat.

  The man froze.

  And then the rest of Jake's pack was there, surrounding them. John and Amy tied up the stunned man, while Vince crouched down next to the man Jake was holding and plucked the knife from his slack hand.

  Jake reared up on his hind legs and shifted back in one smooth motion. "Get them secured. I've got to check on Jeremy," he said.

  Jeremy sat on the front steps, looking dazed. His face was sickly pale and clammy with sweat. His leg was still bleeding sluggishly.

  "Are you all right? What happened?" Jake asked, crouching down to inspect the wound on Jeremy's leg.

  "Bikers jumped us, two blocks from here. One of them had a gun. Ricochet hit me."

  "We'll take you to the hospital," Jake said.

  "I don't need a hospital," Jeremy said, hunching in on himself. "It's not that deep. You can just slap a bandage on it, I'll be fine. You know my mom can't afford-"