Page 6 of Wedding the Werepanther

“Here? Now?” Kayla asks, her finger dancing back and forth between us. “With only the two of us?”

“Yes.”

Kayla’s expression goes thoughtful for a moment, then clears. “Okay.”

A fierce joy pierces my chest. My witch will marry me!

“Face each other and hold hands.”

“Better do as she says.” Kayla’s lips twist into a wry little smile, but her grip on my fingers is strong.

My own tighten around hers, thrilling at the contact. After a life spent in fur, my fae skin is amazingly sensitive.

“Repeat after me. Shadow first.”The photos glide and dip, forming the next phrase a few words at a time, which I repeat.

“I, Shadow, take thee, Kayla, to be my wife.”

Then it’s Kayla’s turn. “I, Kayla, take thee, Shadow, to be my husband.”

“I now pronounce you husband and wife.”The pictures slide, moving quickly with a feeling of excitement as the tingle of the house’s magic bursts outward.“You may kiss the bride.”

“Better do as she says.” I grin, repeating Kayla’s words. Then I move in a blur, pulling her to me as I lean over and cover her mouth with mine. Kissing is another new delight for me, and I’m too much a cat to resist giving her lips a little lick. Her taste explodes across my tongue, sweet and heady and so right I’ll never get enough.

CHAPTER THREE

Kayla

The second Shadow’s lips touch mine, I lose all ability to think.

It’s a soft kiss, but his body jolts as if electrified, and he lets out a deep groan. I don’t know exactly what kind of game he’s playing, but he’s not lying about this. The werepanther really does desire me.

The thought makes my knees go weak, and I sway toward him, only catching myself at the last minute.

“My wife,” he growls, the sound bypassing my entire cerebral cortex and landing straight in some long-buried instinct that wants sex and nothing but sex. My girl parts tingle like I’ve been hit with a Lust Spell.

I jolt backward, telling my heart to stop racing, but the heated look in Shadow’s eyes doesn’t help one little bit.

What the flipping hell are you doing, Kayla? I ask myself. This is Shadow, the guy who smirks like it’s an Olympic sport and he’s going for the gold, the guy who’s never serious about anything, treating every encounter like a game. He eventoldme this is all a game to him.

Nope. I shake my head, trying to wake up. It’s not as if any of this is real. A house can’t marry us. That little charade we went through isn’t anything legally binding. It’s why I did it—it’s the loophole I found. Make the house happy without actually committing to anything.

“Open the front door, Victoria,” I gasp, forcing out the words.

“I will, but first…”

She uses the three smallest pictures on the wall to form the ellipses, pulling them from the oldest section back when people didn’t smile for photos, and the couples’ frowning faces send a shiver of unease rippling up my spine.

“First what?”

“First, you need to read the fine print.”

“Umm.” My eyes flick back and forth. “What fine print? How can you evendofine print? You’re making letters out of flipping photographs!”

Those photos form an arrow, pointing to the lower-right section of the wall. There are several lines of burgundy, where the velvety flocking of the wallpaper has been reshaped from its floral pattern to make rows of text too small to read.

Shadow leans over and squints at it. “Even with my excellent eyesight, I can barely make it out.”

“Here. Let me.” I squat, snap a pic, and send it to my work computer. Then I lead him into my office. It used to be my grandfather’s study, and his old rolltop desk still stands pushed up against one wall, now more for decoration than use.