Page 37 of So I Won a Werelion

“What about Bibi?” I felt much safer with her than I did with any of the local shifters.

“She doesn’t have a long history here. Not all the local shifters trust her.”

“Big surprise there.” I rolled my eyes. “But you don’t have much history here anymore.”

“I’m Woodland Pack pride.” His words rumbled. “Born and raised.”

“Why did you come back, Gabe?”

He shifted his gaze. “Not the time to talk about that.”

I was hoping he’d say he came back for me.

No, I wasn’t.

“When will it be?” I asked.

“You’ll know.”

“Are you in trouble?”

He shrugged. The silence was thick between us.

“Can I see the relic?” he finally asked.

I nodded and handed it to him. He ran his fingers over the curves of the design, and the movement made goosebumps blossom over my skin.

“This has power,” he said softly. “Different than the last one. But it still makes me want to…”

He shook his head and pushed the vase into my stomach. I hastily put it into my bag.

“Makes you want to do what?”

He’d become like a statue, like he’d fallen into the same trance-like state that had overtaken him with the Sempiternal Scepter. I was willing to bet the value of this entire housing development that we’d found something just as important.

“Gabe,” I said way too loudly, forgetting we were somewhere we didn’t belong. I shook his arm.

He blinked repeatedly, like he was coming back to consciousness.

“What happened?” I asked. We were in way over our heads. We needed to find out what these artifacts were and who they belonged to. Most importantly, if we were pissing anyone off—in the earthly realm or beyond—by having them in our possession.

He leaned in close, putting his hands on my arms. That delicious heat rolled off him and his body vibrated, like he was purring.

“You’re scaring me,” I whispered.

“I’m not the one you need to be afraid of,” he whispered back. “No one’s gonna hurt you on my watch.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Kiss me.”

My brain wanted to protest. Tell him to stop changing the subject. Demand he tell me what he was seeing. Maybe I wouldn’t understand, but between his shifter instincts and my background, we could make history.

And I had no business kissing him. Not while we were here, or anywhere else for that matter.

But my body was having none of that. It was matching his heat, specifically deep in my core. There was no way a lion like him couldn’t scent my arousal.

Maybe it was time to start listening to my instincts.

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