Page 4 of Confusing Hearts

I looked at her like she had two heads. “That was high school. This is college. It’s not that simple. Plus, we weren’t in the actual same class. Remember?”

There were definitely benefits to being an identical twin, at least for Tessa. Okay, that wasn’t entirely true. The only class I almost flunked was PE in the ninth grade. I wasn’t really the athletic type, but that was Tessa’s department. She was great at all sports, but especially volleyball. I didn’t really envy her. I had my art, and loved seeing the world through a camera lens, but unfortunately physical education was still mandatory in high school.

You’d think that a panther, sleek in movements with great agility would excel in sports, but not me. I could dance. That was about the closest thing to an actual sport as I got, and that wasn’t offered as a high school course alternative to gym class. The funny part was, while Tessa was extremely athletic, she had no rhythm and couldn’t dance to save her life.

At that time, Tess had been failing algebra, and fortunately for us, the classes were on the same block. So she would pose as me and downplay her athletic skills just enough to get me a passing grade, and I attended her algebra class to do the same for her. It had been beneficial to the both of us.

It wasn’t the only time we had changed places over the years, either. Our own parents had a hard time telling us apart, so it had always worked in our favor.

“Okay, you’re right. Why didn’t I think of this before? We can’t both be in the class. I’m going to go over and see about transferring. Same classes, different schedules, and no one ever has to know, especially Daddy. He’ll just see that we had the same classes and assume we were in them together. Right?”

“I guess so,” I said doubtfully. We were nineteen years old, sophomores in college, and hundreds of miles away from the man. Why did we still care so much?

“Okay, have fun, take good notes for us,” she said, giving me a quick hug as she headed off to student resources in the hopes of changing her class schedule.

I looked around me. Alone. I was alone, or as alone as a person could possibly be on a campus of eight hundred students. I couldn’t stop the smile spreading across my face as I walked to class.

“Tessa, over here.” I saw my friend Anita waving near the door to my class.

“It’s Jenna,” I told her.

“Oh, sorry. I thought Tessa said she was going to be in this class.”

I tried not to laugh. “Tessa? In calculus?”

Anita laughed along with me. “Yeah, it sounded like a long shot to me too. I should have known.”

“She actually did sign up, and then realized I couldn’t do her work for her if she was in the same class with me, so now she’s working on getting her schedule changed.”

“Okay, that sounds much more like Tessa,” Anita said.

I followed her into the classroom to empty seats at the front of the room as she chatted on. Anita was a true friend. I had always liked her, unlike her sister, Ayanna, who came across as condescending. I didn’t have it in me to be as mean and calculating as Ayanna. She would definitely make a far better princess, and if I could give her the job, I would in a heartbeat. Who was I kidding? I just wanted to be left alone.

As the teacher entered and called the class to order, I took in a deep breath. It was something I always did to calm myself before class, but as I inhaled, I was assaulted by an unfamiliar woodsy scent. No, I had smelled it before at the party we hosted over the weekend. It had caused such a tingling sensation across my skin that I had retreated to my room and locked myself in for the night.

I had heard of such a feeling. It was very much like my mother had described as the call of true mates. No, no, no, no, no, that couldn’t happen here. I knew for a fact there were no male black panthers attending Archibald Reynolds. It was one of the things that had attracted me most. There were some male jaguars, though. I said a quick prayer under my breath that my true mate was not a jaguar.

Daddy was very insistent on the purity of the family line. Black panthers were rare enough without polluting the gene pool. I had always assumed my one true mate would be a panther, just like me, but technically there were several species of compatible cats to my kind. I sunk down in my seat, hoping the sensations I was feeling were nothing more than first-day jitters.

As we were settling into class, Anita turned and waved to someone at the back of the room. I wasn’t surprised to find she was already making friends. Most panther shifters were loners. We didn’t naturally run in groups like other shifters. Anita was somewhat of an exception. She loved people and was a quirky sort of extrovert.

“Did you know Matt Williams is in Delta Omega Gamma? The D.O.G. frat. Seriously, I’m not even kidding. I met one of his brothers yesterday and I couldn’t believe it. I mean he was cute and all, but I just assumed he was a jag. Imagine my shock when I went running with a wolf.”

“A wolf? Anita, they’re dangerous, you can’t be hanging out with their kind,” I reminded her.

She just rolled her eyes at me. “Jenna, we’re at the ARC. Why else are we here if not to mingle with all sorts of shifters?”

Because they have the best photography program of any college Daddy would approve, I thought honestly. I wouldn’t dare confess it, though.

The teacher started class before I could answer her, and I got out of there quickly the moment class ended. The scent had continued to haunt me throughout class until it became uncomfortable to just sit there. It had taken everything in my power not to turn around and search out the source of that delicious smell that caused goosebumps to rise on my skin. I just couldn’t do it, though. If my true mate was nearby, and he wasn’t a black panther, it would be best if we just never met at all, because Daddy would never approve.

Keeping our family line pure was more important to him than the bond of true mates. I had always known it, but until that moment, I had never given any thought to how that could affect me. I even briefly considered switching classes. One thing was certain: I needed to stay as far away from that smell as possible.

Chase

Chapter 3

The last thing I had expected when coming back to college for a new semester was to find my one true mate. Walking into calculus, I was paralyzed by the overwhelming urge to go to her. But who was she?

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