Page 23 of Purrfectly Trapped

At first, Reg wasn’t so happy about the way the guy was loud and flirty, but he recognized it as playful banter. He was funny and was obviously a friend.

“There you go, Mr. Cray. Sign here. Now, boss lady, you just say yes now so this sexy man can leave, and get on with his day,” Marion replied and winked at Reg. He also whistled wolfishly, looking reg up and down and shaking his head. Reg blushed at the appraisal, hoping he made the grade.

“Yeah, say yes, Gretchen,” Reg added, nodding in agreement.

He grinned wickedly at the object of his affections, liking the way she seemed surprised by his question. Reg didn’t mind being admired by Marion or anyone else, but his focus was on Gretchen. He wanted her approval and hers alone. A pink blush crept across her cheeks and his heart raced at the sight.

Damn, she was pretty.

“Um, okay, yeah, sure,” she finally agreed.

“Great. I’ll pick you up tonight at 8. Is that alright?”

“Yes,” Marion prompted.

“Um, yeah that is fine. We close at 7, so 8 is good. I live upstairs, the entrance is right on the side of the salon,” she said and pointed.

“Fantastic, I’ll see you then,” Reg replied, reaching out to touch her hand gently. He smiled and let go reluctantly.

“Alright,” she said and waved goodbye.

Once he was outside, in the brisk spring air, doubt began to set in. Holy crap. Reg had a date with the most important woman in the entire world.

She was to him, at any rate.

Gretchen Kaepernick, he bit his lip as he played her name in his mind over and over again, picturing her curvy, petite frame, and her fascinating baby blue eyes. Finally, he’d found his one true mate. The person he was destined to be with forever.

Gulp.

He couldn’t afford to fuck this up.Reg needed a strategy. A surefire way to woo his mate. A perfect plan to trap her in his more than willing arms for all time.

Yes, we need to set the purrfect trap,his Tiger agreed.

As a hunter, the animal inside him appreciated this line of thinking. Now he just had to execute it.

Grrr.

ChapterEight

“Excuse me, Neta? Can I speak with you?”

Reg knocked on Hunter’s office door. The Maverick Pride was smaller than most Shifter Groups, especially the Wolf Packs who seemed to breed like rabbits in Reg’s opinion. But they had something special there in Maverick Point and he knew it. Fuck, he still could not believe he had almost fucked it up.

The Maverick Pride House was not only where the Neta and Nari lived and spent much of their time, but it was a place that all the Tigers within the Pride could access.

The private dwelling of the Alpha family, and the members of the Tiger Guard who lived there, were not open for tours, of course. But it was understood that this was a haven for them all.

Hunter prided himself on his easy accessibility to his Pride, and though Reg was still feeling his way, he knew the Neta would welcome his questions. Reg waited until the powerful Alpha Tiger’s voice boomed from inside.

“Come in, Reg,” he called, scenting Reg from inside.

Sitting behind his desk with his mate perched on his lap, Hunter looked Reg in the eye until the younger man looked away. The man’s naturally dominant Tiger demanded submission from every single Tiger in his Pride. Reg was no fool. He would never challenge his Neta. He averted his gaze and bared his throat in a sign of willing submission to the man’s power and rank.

In the wild, tigers were solitary creatures, but in the Shifter world, being alone usually meant being unstable. Shifters needed social bonds. That was why Tiger Prides, Wolf Packs, Rabbit Fluffles, Bear Clans, and more existed. Plus all the groups for supernatural creatures other than Shifters. Like Witch Covens and Fairy Circles.

Humans ignored or pretended not to notice the paranormal world, but that mattered very little either way. Shifters, like other supes, existed. In fact, they thrived right alongside normals. Keepingthe secretwas tantamount. It was the single most important rule in the supernatural handbook.

Normals could not handle knowing supernaturals existed without trying to harness and take power they could not possibly understand. Anyway, supes were much better at policing their own than with interference from outsiders.

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