You Had Me at Cougar by Terry Spear

Chapter 1

Heart pounding, Ava Lamar, cougar shifter and baker extraordinaire, was running away from a large male cougar. He was angry and in hot pursuit. She didn't know why he was targeting her, but she felt he was dangerous and if she didn’t lose him before he caught up to her, she could die.

She needed to reach the river well ahead of him and hide her scent to escape the danger. But he was hunting her with fierce determination. If, as a cougar she could sweat, she would have been melting.

She made it to the river, no sign of him and she had hope that she could actually lose him. She started to swim across the river. Don’t look back. Don’t look back. It will only slow you down.

She wished she could swim faster, but the current was strong, and she was only making negligible headway.

When she finally reached the riverbank, she looked back. He was leaping into the water. Damn it.

She headed straight for the forest. He would be able to track her scent. She wished she was a wolf and she could howl her distress. She ran through the forest, her thoughts switching from where she needed to go to how far he had made it across the river.

Through the woods, the cliffs were looming ahead. She knew she couldn’t outfight him or even outrun him now. She wasn’t sure what she was going to do, but she had to keep her wits about her. All she could think of was getting to the top of the cliffs and then deciding what to do next.

She was certain no one would find her missing until it was too late.

The phone rang and Ava was suddenly yanked out of the world she’d found herself. She glanced at the phone. And blinked. She was in her living room, watching a movie that night, and she'd totally zoned out. She wasn't having a nightmare. She hadn't lived the experience. She'd been having a premonition, as real as it had been. And, judging by the color of leaves on the trees, it was still summer when she would be on the run for her life.

* * *

Early the next morning,a special agent with the Cougar Special Forces, CSF, who took down rogue cougar shifters and humans who killed cougars, Chet Kensington had finally finished up a big case of eliminating three cougar shifters who had been killing cougars for the sport of it, hunting out of season, without licenses, and leaving the carcasses behind. And they had killed five hunters who had tried to turn them in. It made no sense to Chet that anyone, especially shifters who understood how it felt to be in cougar form and hunted, would be so cruel to any of the cougar kind. But rogues were rogues, and they didn't have to have a lot of motivation to kill.

Chet was so ready to take a well-deserved break and enjoy a fun 4th of July holiday with the cougars of Yuma Town. They took care of their own and everyone got along exceptionally well. He envisioned swimming in Lake Buchanan at Chase and Shannon Buchanan’s Pinyon Pines Resort, getting some fishing in, water sports, fireworks, visiting with his friends. That’s what he was looking forward to. Besides, his boss, Chuck Warner, had put him on sick leave after being injured in the fight with the rogue cougars.

Chet called up his former partner and friend, Travis MacKay, in the Cougar Special Forces branch located in Yuma Town, to see if he, or someone else, could put him up for the next couple of nights. Chet usually stayed at the CSF safe house for special agents when he visited Yuma Town, but Travis had told him that they were doing a lot of renovations, so he was going to see if anyone else could take him in.

As soon as Chet arrived at Travis and Bridget’s house—Bridget also worked for CSF—they had him come in and have a beer. He'd had the fleeting notion while he'd been working with Bridget on cases out of Cheyenne, Wyoming, where they had all worked until Travis and Bridget came here, that he could even date her. But Bridget and Travis had connected in a way that Chet and she hadn't. He was glad for them. Though he was still looking for that special cougar to be his one and only.

“So,” Bridget said, “Stryker said his mate, Nina, is checking with her sister, Ava, to see if she can take you in.”

Stryker Hill was their deputy sheriff and so was Nina. Ava was a baker at Fitz’s Bakery and Coffee Shop.

“She’s a single she-cat.” Not that Chet was averse to staying with a single she-cat, but she might be averse to having a bachelor male staying with her.

“Right. But she’s the only one we could find who might have some space for you to stay,” Bridget said. “As far as we know, she has an extra bedroom and no guests. Now, you know she is psychic and that means she needs some alone time. Downtime, if she starts to get her premonitions.”

He wondered about that since Bridget could read minds, and he had learned Ava’s twin sister could see future events too. Did Nina need the space from others after working all day as a deputy sheriff? Bridget would work long hours with the CSF too. Maybe it all had to do with using their abilities and if they didn’t, they wouldn’t need to take time to rest from them.

“I will give her the space she needs.” That was saying she would even allow Chet to stay with her.

“I’m ready to head over to the lake now. What about you?” Travis asked Chet.

“I sure am.” Chet was so ready to just have fun and let loose.

“Ava will be at the lake later. Tell her thanks when you see her, if she lets you stay with her,” Bridget said.

“I will. See you in a little bit.” Chet really hadn't expected to be staying with someone other than his good friends.

“You did a fantastic job taking down those three men who were killing the cougars and human hunters,” Travis said to Chet.

“Thanks. I sure could have used your help. Or Bridget’s. Leyton’s too. I’ve been crazy busy out that way because I haven't had much backup.”

"I hear Chuck's going to hire a couple of more agents to work that region."

"Yeah, he is. He just hasn't found anyone qualified enough yet." Chet was even hoping that one of the agents he hired was a woman. Chet had the notion that if Chuck did, maybe Chet would work with her and fall in love with the she-cat like Travis and Bridget had done.

“We have been really busy too, but hopefully next time, one of us can come out to assist you.” Travis got a call and smiled. “Yeah, Nina, Chet’s here. I’ll tell him.” He got off the phone and they climbed into his car. “Nina’s going to talk to her sister at the bakery, if she can spare her guest bedroom. We’ll have an answer soon.”

“Okay. I mean, I could just sleep at the lake in my cougar coat, somewhere safe.”

“You could, but we’ll give you a room somewhere. Sleeping on the couch at one of our places even. We'll manage,” Travis said.

* * *

Ava Lamar wasbusy baking at Fitz’s Bakery and Coffee Shop, preparing cakes for all the July fourth birthdays and party cakes and cookies for the 4th of July celebration. It was a sunny, 96 degrees outside and despite the air conditioning inside she was sweltering just doing all the baking in the kitchen. She was so ready to strip off her clothes and throw on a bikini and dive into the lake, lie around on a float for a few hours, and just enjoy herself. The heat was perfect for that.

Her brother-in-law, Deputy Sheriff Stryker Hill, was in charge of crowds for the morning, until everything was set up. Then she saw her sister bounce into the shop. Ava swore Nina bounced—her step springy because she was so excited about all the celebrations. She had the day off from serving as a deputy sheriff and was helping to organize all the events. Ava knew that gleam in her sister’s eye meant she was about to ask her to do something for the celebration when Ava felt she’d done quite enough. She was helping to provide a lot of the baked treats for the event after all.

She wanted to just kick back and enjoy the rest of the day. The shop was closing in an hour and she was thrilled. The owner, Florence Fitzgerald, had already headed over to the celebration, to supervise the setting up of the tables to display their baked goods. Ava didn’t think she’d ever worked this hard at the bakery since she started working there.

“Before you say no, I have a favor to ask of you,” Nina said.

Ava rolled her eyes. “You know”—she motioned to all the cakes and cookies she’d made—“you could ask how I was doing first. Or say, happy Fourth of July to me or something.” She loved her sister, but really…

“Happy Fourth to you.”

Ava finished cleaning up. “What do you want me to do?”

“Well, if you really don’t want to do it, I’ll try to find someone else to ask, but—”

“Just spill it.” Because her sister was so hesitant to just come out with it, Ava figured it was something she really wouldn’t want to do.

“Just for an hour, if you can manage our fortune telling booth from one to two, I would be forever grateful. The proceeds go to the Big Cat Rescue and we had a couple of people who were willing to be the gypsy fortune tellers, but something came up. I would do it, but I’ve got to be in charge of the sack races for the kids and if someone else doesn’t volunteer to take over the fortune telling job before you’re done with your shift, I’ll take over for you.”

Ava let out her breath. “You know if someone comes up to the booth and I see something in their future that is going to affect them, I'll feel obligated to tell them what's bound to happen.”

“Well, you can just fake it.”

“Yeah, but everyone knows we have second vision, and if I just say something silly, they’re going to think that will really happen.” Because it had. Both Ava and Nina had done that when they were growing up, not wanting to tell people who plagued them about learning something about their futures—mostly because others didn't believe they could see premonitions of future events so they were testing them—just silly stuff—like so and so was breaking up with them, or seeing someone else. But making up stuff had really backfired. Boy, were others mad at them. So in Yuma Town, where people really did know they could see future events sometimes, they had to be more careful.

“Okay, well, I’ll try to get someone else to volunteer then.” Nina glanced at all the cakes and cookies Ava had made. “You've outdone yourself."

“Thanks. I’ll do it, all right? Just for an hour. I need to get some float time in.” Ava couldn't believe how Nina could always make her feel guilty if she didn't do something for her. Maybe because Nina was working her butt off during the festivities, when all Ava wanted to do was go out and play.

Nina smiled and gave her a hug, getting remnants of flour all over her. “You are the best sister in the world.”

“You say so now, but if I see something someone doesn’t like, I’m sending them to tell you all about it.” Ava smiled.

“Works for me.” Nina hurried out of the shop as if she were afraid Ava would change her mind.

Not that Ava would. Once she promised to do something, she would do it. She packed up all the baked goods and Florence picked them up to deliver to the resort.

An hour later, Ava turned the shop sign from open to closed and locked the shop up after finishing to clean up.

She drove home to her own little townhouse that she’d just moved into and couldn’t be happier. The place was all decorated in turquoise with accessories of purple and light gray as the base color. Her own place. Even her garden was filled with purple flowers of salvia, sage, lupine, violets, bellflower, iris, veronica, buddelia, lavender, tulips, purple statice, lilacs, liatris, larkspur, columbine, and ageratum.

She arrived home and hurried inside, stripping out of her clothes from the front door, that was now closed and locked, and up the stairs to the bedrooms, kicking off her sandals, stripping out of her skirt, shirt, bra, and panties. Naked, she made it to the landing and raced into the bedroom to put on her swimsuit, shorts, a shirt, and shoved her feet into her flipflops. She grabbed her beach bag off the chest of drawers that she'd already filled with sunscreen, a beach towel, and a bottle of water. She hurried down the stairs to the kitchen, dropping her bag on the dining table, and then threw together a ham sandwich—off-the-bone sliced ham, white bread, lettuce, mayonnaise, and mustard and stood at the island counter eating it. She had every intention of swimming before she had to do her part as a fortune teller, passing along all kinds of good news, she hoped. And then swimming again afterward.

Then she got a call and looked at the caller ID. It was her sister's mate, Stryker, calling. Now what? She answered her phone. “Yeah?”

“Hey, I hate to ask, but—”

Ava sighed. “Nina already asked me to be the fortune teller for an hour.”

“I thought we had that covered.”

Uh-oh, if Stryker wasn't calling about that, then what did he want her to do?

“Apparently, someone fell through on the fortune-telling booth assignment,” Ava said.

“Oh, okay. Well, no, that wasn’t what I was calling about. But thanks for helping out with it. Nina was going to tell you that Chet Kensington needs a place to stay for the night, or two. She said she had forgotten to ask you and was headed out to the lake. Chet thought he would still be working on the case he was dealing with, but he managed to get free and wanted to join us, but everyone has got house guests and the Pinyon Pines Resort at Lake Buchanan and local hotels are booked.”

Ava wanted to snarl as a cougar. She didn’t want anyone to stay with her. She would have to pick up her place and be ready for a guest. And if she had a guest, she wanted to be the one who invited him or her. She’d met Chet before, naturally, as he came to see his old buddy, Leyton, who was her brother-in-law’s brother, Travis, and his mate, Bridget, all of whom had worked with him in the Cougar Special Forces in Cheyenne, Wyoming. But he had always stayed at the safe house before.

“He can't stay at the safe house?” Ava knew the answer to her question before Stryker answered her, because if Chet could have stayed there, Stryker wouldn't be asking her if Chet could stay with her.

“It's currently under renovations."

She let out her breath in a huff. “All right.” That didn’t mean she wanted to take him in as an overnight guest or anything else, so when did she become such a pushover? What if she became interested in someone who lived in Yuma Town, and he learned she’d had a bachelor cougar stay with her? Ugh.

“I’ve got to go,” she said.

“I’ll tell him to talk to you at the fortune telling booth then.” Stryker sounded vastly relieved that she would take Chet in.

“Great.” And she didn’t mean it in a good way. Of course then she felt guilty about being kind of a curmudgeon about it.

She quickly ended the call. If she didn’t hurry, she wasn’t going to have one minute to swim. She rushed to Lake Buchanan in her neon green Honda and arrived there with forty minutes to spare. Yes. She pumped her fist and hurried to get out of the car. Cougars were everywhere, in human form, naturally, at the by-invitation-only event. Which meant anyone there had to be a cougar to attend.

Everyone was hurrying to get ready for all the activities. Moms and dads were trying to keep track of all the little ones, most wearing floaties so they wouldn’t get themselves in trouble in the shallower water at the lake’s edge.

As soon as Ava headed for the water, she saw the dreaded fortune teller booth, all decorated in purples and golds and little castle flags, near the concession stands where people were already grabbing lunches to go. It looked like it belonged at a medieval fair, and she thought it appeared magical and entertaining. And that made her feel better about working there. Especially since she was going to get a dip in the lake first.

She set her mermaid bag down on the beach, kicked off her flipflops, tugged off her T-shirt and shorts, grabbed her mermaid float, and raced into the water.

“Hey, Ava.” a male voice shouted at her.

No, no, no. She was going to get some swimming time in before she did anything else. She could just imagine someone telling her she needed to start even earlier at the fortune telling booth. She hadn’t paid attention to see if there was a line at it, or anyone working it yet, just that the concession stands were crowded, and the booth was pretty. She just wanted to get away from the beach and into the water.

She continued to ignore the man belonging to the deep voice. When she was far enough away, she turned to see who it was. Chet Kensington, pulling off his shirt, kicking off his shoes, and pulling down his shorts. Her jaw dropped in surprise. Oh, he had board shorts on underneath his Bermuda shorts. And a gorgeously bared chest. He waded out into the warm water. She frowned. Where did he think he was going?

She wanted, needed solitude before she began to give up her psychic secrets. The problem with her serving as a fortune teller was that she made an awful actress. Keeping a straight face, if she thought something bad was going to happen to someone, and just making up something else that would be lame and not upset anyone wasn’t something she could do—and make it believable. Part of the problem was they were all cougars and could smell fear or deception on someone.

She sighed. Even when she had seen Chet stripping out of his clothes, she had envisioned him wearing form-fitting boxer briefs, or…ahem, nothing at all and her mouth had gaped wide open. She was sure, if he’d seen her surprised expression, he would have been amused.

He began swimming out to her, powerful muscles flexing as he pulled the water past him and drew closer. If he’d been her boyfriend, she could imagine him reaching her, pulling her from her float into his arms, and kissing the daylights out of her. It was a good thing he couldn’t read her mind and didn’t have any psychic abilities whatsoever. But after Chet had worked with Bridget, who could read minds, he had become a firm believer in psychics. Which she appreciated. Skeptics were one thing. She understood when they wouldn't believe in her abilities. But when they tried to say she was a charlatan, that was another thing.

Maybe he was going to tell her that he had found a place to bunk, other than her place. Now she felt guilty for ignoring him when he was calling out to her from the beach.

When he reached her, he sent ripples of water her way, rocking her float, but it was in a lulling manner and that was nice.

“Hey, sorry about putting you out when you have to give me a place to stay for the weekend, but I really appreciate it,” he said.

For the whole weekend? She sighed. “No problem.” So much for getting a reprieve.

“Ava said that after spending the day with a lot of people, you need time to recuperate.”

“I do, thanks, when I have psychic visions. It just wears me out. Baking in a hot kitchen does too.” Which made her seem lame—here she was a powerful cougar with lots of stamina. Not only that but he had some tough cases to handle and here she was talking about being worn out from baking cookies and cakes? He must have thought she was an idiot.

“I’ll spend some time with the guys I work with and come to your place just to sleep then.”

Now she felt really guilty. “You can, if that’s what you want to do, but if it doesn’t work out, you’re free to come and have a bite to eat with me at my house tonight, watch TV, or whatever you want to do.” What was the matter with her? He just gave her an out, and she was telling him it was okay to forgo other plans and chill out with her? When it was the furthest thing from what she wanted to do?

“We’ll see.” He was treading water next to her, being nice, which he should be, considering she was giving him a free room for a couple of nights, and she felt grouchy—but mostly because all of a sudden she had to be a gypsy fortune teller and now allow a near stranger—male cougar hot—to stay with her. “Can I pay you something for the stay?”

Yes. He made a lot more money than she did as a special agent of the CSF when she just worked as a baker. But that wouldn't be very nice to make him pay for his stay. Though if he'd stayed at a hotel or one of the cabins, he would have paid top dollar for the summer. “No, thanks. I appreciate the offer though.”

If he had been her boyfriend, and she had to admit he had the looks that counted—blond hair, blue eyes that peered right into her soul, and a nicely manly chin, and the rest of him wasn’t shabby either, especially the rest of him—she could envision his arms resting on her float, his chin on top of them as he smiled up at her.

But he wasn’t her boyfriend, and he wasn’t touching the float or smiling. She would say he appeared to be at a loss of what to say or do next. She hadn’t expected that of the special agent who, according to Bridget, was good at taking the bad guys down without a moment’s hesitation. He never flinched. He was always up for the challenge. She knew he had been dating on and off in Cheyenne, Wyoming where he was from and worked out of, but she didn’t think he would be so tongue-tied with her.

“Okay, well, I’ll leave you to it,” he said, hesitating, as if he hoped she would say something to encourage him to visit a while longer when here she thought he had come to Yuma Town to visit with his friends.

“Uh, they’re having fireworks until eleven tonight. I’ll be at the townhouse after that.” She realized she wasn’t going to be chilling at the house either, but out here all day, and until late tonight. Which meant no dinner plans at home, just grabbing barbecued chicken, ribs or fish, chips, and drinks, and watching the fireworks out here.

“Oh, sure, that's true. Okay, well, thanks. See you then.” He began to swim away.

“Wait, do you know what time it is?” She wondered how much time she had to swim before she had to become a gypsy fortune teller.

“When I looked at my phone before I swam out here, it was a quarter of one.”

Quarter of one already? That’s when Ava saw her sister waving from the shore with a gypsy outfit in hand. Great. Just great. So much for swimming in solitude.

“I hope Nina is waving at you with that garb and not me.” Chet cast a smile over his shoulder at Ava. He had a nice, sexy smile that said he could easily win a woman over and break her heart afterward.

She chuckled. She liked a man with a sense of humor. "She needed a volunteer and volunteered me when someone else couldn't make it. But I don't see why a guy couldn't be a fortune teller. Kind of like a genie in a lamp, except not granting wishes but glimpses of their future. Not for real though."

"Not like you can offer. I know I couldn't fit in that garb, so I'll give it a pass."

She smiled. Then she sighed. Okay, so with dating men, Ava hadn’t had much luck. Not that she was interested in jumping Chet's bones. Well, maybe a little.

She flipped over on her belly, but hadn’t judged just how much room she had, or kept her balance, and ended up in the drink. She was a cougar, for heaven’s sake. She should have had better balance and sense than that.

She came up for air and found Chet treading water, watching her to make sure she was okay. That wasn’t necessary, but nice of him, she thought. Though she was thoroughly embarrassed, and she felt like she'd received an instant sunburn, her face was so hot. She climbed back onto the float, settling herself on her stomach, and began swimming for shore.

He joined her. Though she figured he could swim faster than she could swim on a float, he was keeping pace with her.

When they finally reached the shore, she dried off and then took the gypsy costume from Nina. It had a bikini kind of top with tassels and sheer fabric on the arms, banded at the wrists. The pants were made similarly, and she felt like Jeannie in I Dream of Jeannie as she grabbed her bag and clothes she’d had over her swimsuit, went into the booth, closed the curtains and stripped out of her wet bathing suit. She pulled the towel out of her bag and dried off, then slipped on her bra and panties. Once she was wearing the gold and purple genie costume and her sandals, she brushed out her damp hair and wrapped it in a chignon.

When she looked at her phone, she saw it was showtime. She sighed and opened the curtains to the booth and found a dripping wet Chet standing in front of her booth, first in line. “Madame Ava, I wish to have my fortune read.” Chet handed her a one-hundred-dollar bill.

“Is it real?” She couldn't believe he would give her that much money for a reading.

He chuckled. “I take down the bad guys, remember? So I wouldn't give you a counterfeit bill.”

“Uh, sure.” She smiled and put the money in a box on a shelf below the window of her booth. "And thanks. The big cats at the reserve will appreciate it."

“Anything for the cougars. So how do we do this?” he asked.

“I can make something up,” she offered helpfully. She noticed a line was already forming behind him and she heard someone say, "One of the psychic twins is giving fortunes."

“Or?” He smiled at her.

She thought he was too masculine, too adventurous for his own good and would want to know the truth. And he had contributed a lot of money to the Big Cat Reserve for this. But she didn't want to learn that anything bad was coming up in his life and with the kind of job he worked, it could.

“I can read your palm,” she said.

He reached his hand out to her, palm up.

She knew this wasn’t a good idea one iota. Not if she learned something really bad was going to happen to him, though she figured if she did, maybe a warning would help him avoid getting killed over it.