Page 11 of Stripe Theory

“You document breakthrough genetic research... on sticky notes?” Rehan asked, pained.

“Don’t worry, it’s all backed up digitally.” She patted his arm sympathetically. The casual touch sent electricity racing through him. “The notes help me think. Science needs room to breathe, Mr. Kedi. To play. To make terrible puns about amino acids.”

“Please don’t.”

“Would you say that request is... purr-emptive?”

His tiger actually laughed – a warm rumble in his chest that he barely contained. This woman would be the death of his dignity.

“Doctor Sky?—”

“Alora,” she corrected. “If we’re going to cure this virus together, you should probably use my first name. Unless you’d prefer I call you Mr. Big Bad Alpha Tiger?”

Hunter didn’t even try to hide his laughter this time.

“Rehan,” he ground out, wondering how this tiny scientist had managed to demolish his carefully constructed walls in less than ten minutes. “My name is Rehan.”

“Well, Rehan,” she said, his name in her accent doing dangerous things to his control, “want to see what else I’ve discovered? I promise to keep the cat puns to a minimum. Well, a meow-nimum.”

His tiger purred. His human side contemplated jumping out the window. Somewhere in between, Rehan found himself nodding.

“Show me everything.”

Her brilliant smile hit him like sunlight, warming places in his soul he’d thought long frozen. As she launched into another explanation, hands dancing through the air like she was conducting a symphony of science, Rehan accepted three undeniable truths:

One: Dr. Alora Sky was the most brilliant scientist he’d ever met. Two: She would either save his pride or drive him insane with her chaos. And three: His tiger had already decided she was their mate, and no amount of human denial would change that fact.

He was, quite simply, doomed.

SEVEN

Aweek later, Alora, along with Maya, hummed along to “Roar” as she arranged her test tubes in what she considered a perfectly logical order.

Her new lab in the Biogenetics building in Manhattan buzzed with controlled chaos: equipment whirred, data scrolled across multiple screens, and Stripes the cat supervised from his perch atop a stack of research papers.

The lab door slid open with a soft hiss. Rehan Kedi strode in, immaculate in a charcoal suit that probably cost more than her monthly rent. His amber eyes scanned the room, taking in the tiger-striped sticky notes decorating her monitors, the scattered papers covered in her looping handwriting, and the array of coffee mugs sporting science puns.

“This isn’t a lab,” he muttered under his breath. “It’s a zoo.”

“Welcome to the jungle, Mr. Kedi.” Alora grinned, catching his comment with her back turned.

His lips thinned. “Your research protocols?—”

“—have produced more breakthroughs in tiger shifter genetics than any other lab.” She spun in her chair to face him, raising an eyebrow. “But please, tell me how my coffee mug collection offends your sensibilities.”

“The mug isn’t the issue.” He picked up one that read ‘Schrödinger’s Cat Lives!’ with two fingers as if it might bite. “Your entire approach lacks structure.”

“Structure?” Alora bounced to her feet, energy coursing through her as it always did when defending her methods. “Science isn’t about rigid rules, Mr. Kedi. It’s about adaptation, creativity?—”

“And safety protocols?” His gaze fixed on the centrifuge she’d modified yesterday. “That machine isn’t meant to run at those speeds.”

“Sometimes you have to push boundaries to get results.” She moved to the centrifuge, adjusting settings with practiced confidence. “Watch.”

The machine hummed to life, spinning faster than its original specifications allowed. Rehan’s shoulders tensed, his predator’s instincts clearly sensing trouble. “Dr. Sky?—”

“Trust the process,” she said, typing commands into the control panel. “If we combine the viral samples at this speed while introducing the catalyst?—”

A loud pop cut off her words. Purple smoke billowed from the centrifuge, accompanied by a shower of papers as the air displacement sent her carefully sorted stacks flying.

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