She mentally shook herself. Snap out of it, MacDermot. She crouched down by her bed and looked under it. And, to her utter disbelief, she found her two dogs. Cowering.

She reached for Sig. "Come here, baby."

Mace crouched down next to her and that's when Sig gingerly gripped her wrist in his maw and dragged her under the bed. He didn't hurt her. If she didn't know better, she'd swear the dog simply wanted to protect her.

"What in the hell?"

"You okay?" Mace held on to her ankle and she suddenly felt like a wishbone.

She pulled her arm away from Sig and slid back out from under the bed. Mace grabbed her hand and helped her to her feet. She snatched her hand away. She had to. His touch made her uncomfortably warm.

"What did you do to my dogs?" She had no idea where that came from, but she couldn't shake the feeling they were hiding from Mace.

"Me? What makes you think I did anything?"

"Sig once took down a two-hundred-and-fifty-pound professional football player because he got a little too close to me in the park. And Sauer took on three, out-of-control pit bulls to protect me. These are not dogs that hide under the bed. And then you come to my house..."

Mace didn't say anything, he simply watched her.

Dez sat down at the foot of the bed. She ran her hands through her hair. Someone obviously drugged me. Why else would she sit on her bed, hardly worried about the unsightly rolls it would cause in her less-than-taut stomach, wearing her favorite lace Christmas bra and jeans, in front of the one man she'd happily wrap herself around like a boa constrictor? Meanwhile, her vicious, well-trained dogs cowered under her bed. Something was going on and she wanted to know what. And she wanted to know what right-goddamn-now.

"My dogs are hiding from you, Llewellyn. And I wanna know why. Or you can get the fuck outta my house." Christ, less than twenty-four hours around Mace and Bronx Dez came roaring back. But her intense anger kept her from feeling ashamed.

Mace watched her from under a mass of hair practically covering his eyes. Hair that had not been there the day before.

What in the hell is going on?

Damn dogs ruin everything. Typical. If he told her anything but the absolute truth, Dez and her detective mind would see through it in two seconds. That would be it for him too. For them. Dez needed to trust her partners, Mace knew that just from the few precious hours he'd spent in the woman's company. He couldn't lie to her. Not if he ever wanted her screaming his name while she came.

So, throwing centuries of Druid tradition and secrecy out the window, he faced Detective Desiree MacDermot head-on and told her the truth.

"I'm a shapeshifter. Specifically lion. My Pride is descended from Welsh Druids. Your dogs sense that and that's why they're hiding under the bed. That and they're big pussies."

She stared at him. He could almost read her thoughts. She was thinking, I have a nut in my house. How do I get the nut out of my house? He was expecting her to start inching toward the door any second. Or pull her gun and shoot him between the eyes.

But she didn't. Instead, Dez crossed her arms in front of those beautiful red lacecovered tits. "Prove it."

Mace gaped at her. "What?"

"Is this a full moon kind of thing?"

He stifled his roar. Insulting little bitch. "I'm not a werewolf."

"Then prove it. Right here. Right now."

"You want me to prove it?"

"Right here. Right now."

Mace smiled. "If that's what you want..."

Yup. Leave it to Dez to find the one rich nut in New York City who wasn't afraid to drive out to Brooklyn. The one rich nut who thought he was a-what was it?-shapeshifter? Oiy.

Of course, Dez didn't grab the phone, lock herself in the bathroom, and call 911. No, she challenged the nut to "prove it."

Sure. Why not? Besides, she was wearing her gun and she had a lovely shotgun in her closet. Plus, it wasn't like she hadn't dealt with nuts before.

Still her dogs' whimpering, heard clearly even though they were still under her bed, gave her the first clue something really wasn't right. Mace's eyes started to look different too. Becoming glassy and reflective. And his scent became stronger. Filling the room, swirling around her.

Dez uncrossed her arms and let them hang loose by her side as she watched Mace carefully. She blinked several times, her brain unwilling or unable to process what she thought she was seeing. Jesus Christ, were those fangs!?

She stopped breathing when the hair on his head spread across his entire body. The gold locks burst into a full-on mane while spreading across his back. The brown hair that tumbled from under the gold covered his chest like a thick winter sweater. Then his limbs altered so he went on all fours.

The whole process took all of forty-five seconds, but it seemed like years. And with a shake of his body, Mace's unnecessary clothes flew across the room.

With those gold eyes she'd recognize anywhere staring straight at her, he shook out his mane and roared.

Her dogs bolted from under the bed and out the bedroom door. Dez wasn't sure she'd ever see them again.

She analyzed the situation quickly. Her .9mm probably wouldn't do any good. Nope. Not with this one. She needed the shotgun.

Dez shot off the bed and made it to the closet in record time, but before she even had her hand on the doorknob he slammed her up against the hard wood. The body against her, though, wasn't lion, but human. And all male if the erection pushing into her back was any indication.

"Breathe, Dez. Just breathe."

Breathe? How was she supposed to breathe? She leaned her head against the door and wondered why she couldn't pass out like any other normal woman. She shouldn't be strong. She should be weak and frail. By the time she woke up, he'd have eaten her legs off and she could die from loss of blood. Anything had to be better than dealing with the reality of this situation.

"I don't think you're breathing."

"Get off me, Mace. Now." Amazing. She sounded completely calm and rational. She tried to push away from the door, but that big, hard body refused to budge one inch. His hands held her hands flat against the wood so she couldn't go for her weapon. His naked flesh practically seared her exposed skin with its heat.

"You said you wanted me to prove it," that low voice purred in her ear. "And that's what I did, Dez."

He was right, of course. The fuck. Although he didn't have to sound so haughty about it. But who knew the world actually had people who could shift into something other than human? She happily went through life thinking people who believed in vampires, werewolves, and witches were nutcases. As a cop, she believed what she could see and it always had a plausible explanation.

Of course, a lot more things made sense now. All those weird "quirky" things that Mace always used to do so clearly spoke of...well...an animal. Smelling the back of her neck. The growling. The purring. That time he actually bared his fangs at a sophomore who tried to take his grilled cheese sandwich in the cafeteria.

Yet none of that made any of this easier. Especially not with her body being pinned by a guy who three minutes ago had shifted himself into the king of the jungle. A guy who scared her one-hundred-and-fifty pound Rottweiler dogs to death.

A guy kissing her neck.

"What are you doing?"

"What do you think I'm doing?" He asked just before his tongue swirled around that spot where her neck and her spine met. Her knees almost buckled, but she stopped by reminding herself that the guy wasn't human.

Her fingers dug into the wood. "Is this really the time for you to get horny?"

"Sorry, shifting does that to me. Shifting and you."

No, no, no! He wasn't going to get away with being charming now. "Mace-"

He cut her off. "I've wanted you since Mr. Shotsky's biology class."

Unbelievable. A naked freak has her slammed up against her own closet door so she can't get to her gun, but some trite bullshit about ninth grade had her creaming like a porn star. Exactly what was wrong with her? And could she pass it on to any children she may have?

Mace's hips pushed up against her, and she had to bite her lip to keep from moaning. "Christ, Dez. I wanna fuck you so bad, my whole body hurts."

Okay. She had two choices here. She could tell Mace what he wanted to hear. Get free and splatter pieces of him all over her nice wood bedroom furniture. As human she could probably use her .9mm on him.

Or...she could be honest with the big idiot.

"Mace..." She took a deep breath. "If you let me go now, I'm going to blow your brains out."

Mace didn't move. He barely breathed. This was the moment. This. Right now. If Dez really wanted him dead, she would have lied her ass off to get away from him and...well...blown his brains out. Instead, she warned him. Warned him that if he let her go, she'd kill him.

Okay. The woman had completely confused him. And how he handled it from here would decide everything for them.

"That's kind of a problem, baby. Me being partial to breathing and all." He nuzzled her neck and her heart started beating faster, but he didn't smell fear. He took that as a good sign and decided to barrel forward-slowly.

"Why don't we do this..." He slid one arm down her body, feeling the soft skin under his fingers. "Let's get rid of all this unnecessary paraphernalia. Make it easier for us to have a civilized discussion." He grasped Dez's holster with her .9mm in it, pulling it off her jeans and with practiced aim tossed it to her dresser across the room. It landed with a rather loud thunk, and Dez's body jumped next to his. But he still didn't smell fear. He smelled something else altogether.

Lust.

He lightly kissed the tip of her ear. "Any other weapons, Dez?"

Her forehead resting on the door, she muttered, "You don't expect me to answer that honestly, do you?"

He leered. "I guess I'll have to check then."

"Guess so."

Mace slowly dragged his hands down Dez's arms. He used every ounce of his self-control to not rip her jeans off and start fucking her from behind. A sudden move like that could blow it all. Dez trusted him. Trusting him even though she knew he wasn't human. Not completely. That meant more than he could ever say, and he wasn't about to ruin it by being...ya know...a guy.

Dez closed her eyes as his hands slid down her body, across her breasts, lingering for a moment at her nipples, which caused her entire body to convulse. Damn sensitive nipples. Every time her ex had touched them, she practically ripped his throat out. That wasn't the response she had with Mace, though. She wanted him more than she ever had before. And she'd wanted him a lot before. Yet knowing he was only partially human had changed everything for her. She dealt with humans every day. Every day she found herself disgusted and appalled by their bullshit. Trusting human-Mace seemed like a stupid idea to her. She didn't trust, understand, or really even like humans. She knew what they could do. The damage they could cause.

Animals, though, were all about survival. Mating, hunting, feeding-simply keeping their species alive. They didn't hurt each other out of spite. They didn't humiliate others to make themselves feel better. When they hunt and kill it is only for food, and they never do anything morally reprehensible to the corpse afterward. Dez understood animals. She always had. Now she understood Mace, and that made all the difference in the world for her. He was the first man she could ever truly trust.

Although that particular thought made her want to pass out.

"You stopped breathing again, Dez." She let out the breath she had been holding. "Good, baby. Keep doing that and you'll be fine."

His hands slid around her waist and he crouched low, bringing them down the outside of her legs. He found her secondary weapon in an ankle holster and a small blade strapped to the other ankle. He took those and tossed them on the dresser.

He returned to his crouch behind her. "Spread your legs," he ordered. She caught that moan before it could pour out of her mouth along with the potential begging that might follow. Silently, she complied.

Mace slowly dragged his hands up between her legs, his right hand sliding between her thighs and pushing against her crotch. Her whole body jerked like someone attached a live wire to her. She knew she was wet. Now he knew it, too, if that very primal grunt of satisfaction rumbling up from his chest proved anything.

He rubbed his hand against her crotch, and Dez dug her short nails into the closet door. "Anything else I need to be on the lookout for, Dez?"

She didn't answer him. Instead, she shook her head.

"What's the matter?" And she could hear the smile in his voice. "Cat got your crotch?"

By far, one of the stupidest things anyone had ever said to her, and in response, she burst out laughing.

He turned her to face him, and she looked down into that gorgeous face.

"It's going to be okay, ya know. I promise."

His body, still crouched in front of her, seemed more naked than most. Not that she'd never seen a naked man before. Hell, she arrested a lot of naked males over the years. But none of them, even the best-built Marines, had ever been like this. Something so raw and male exuded from Mace, the thought of not fucking him was becoming an impossibility.

"Now, if you're not going to tell me if there are other weapons, I guess we'll have to get the rest of these clothes off you." He grinned. A wicked, evil grin that almost dropped her to the floor. "Just so we can get a closer inspection, of course."

He unzipped her jeans, pulling them down her hips and legs until they puddled onto the floor. He tossed the jeans aside while he pulled his body out of its crouch and kneeled in front of her. He slid his hands back up her legs as he kissed the exposed flesh above her red lace panties. His hands slid under the lace to grip her ass, his tongue swirling right under her belly button.

Dez bit her lip. "At this point, Mace, I'm not exactly sure what you're searching for."

Gold eyes, so dark with lust they seemed black, focused on her face. "Do you really care?"

She blinked. "Care about what?"

"You're not paying attention, Desiree." He nipped the sensitive flesh of her lower abdomen. "I guess I'll have to work a little harder to make sure you don't lose interest."

Mace slid her panties off, and Dez wondered what the hell was going on. What the hell was she doing? And what exactly was Mace doing with his finger?

"Mace!"

He stopped, clearly annoyed. Although his forefinger seemed damn happy to have slid past her clit and buried itself deep inside her pussy. "What now?"

"Maybe we should-" before the word wait could come out, Mace started slowly finger-fucking her. Dez's back arched off the closet door. Tricky fuckin' cat!

Dez dug deep lines in the wood of her poor door. It had been so long since she'd been with anyone. So long since she had a man touch her in any way but friendship or while trying to outrun her after doing something illegal. She didn't want to blow this, but to be honest she had no freakin' idea what the hell she'd gotten herself into. Add in the fact Mace's cock was freakin' huge and you have a recipe for a Dez disaster.

Mace's free hand slid around her waist, pulling her close to him. He kissed and nipped her stomach and hips. "Touch me, Dez. I need to feel your hands on me."

Why did that surprise her? Maybe because Mace never seemed like he ever needed anything or anyone. "I thought cats didn't like to be touched, Llewellyn."

He licked her belly button. "Damn dog people. That's propaganda." He rubbed his face across her belly and thighs, his unshaven cheeks and jaw feeling rough against her skin. "We need affection, Dez. We just don't beg for it."

Dez grinned as she slid her hands into his hair. She now understood why Mace's hair was always out of control in high school. Because it had been growing into a mane. A real, honest-to-God lion's mane.

She closed her eyes and plunged forward. "I need you to kiss me, Mace."

Mace stopped moving. Even his fingers paused in their slow, steady movements.

"I loved the way you kissed me today." She looked down at him, brushing his hair out of his eyes. He watched her silently, and Dez realized how much she wanted all this. How much she wanted him. "Do you know I would have given anything for you to kiss me like that in high school? I would have given anything for you to even try."

Mace's gold eyes locked with hers. He slid his finger out of her and, as he slowly stood, he slipped it in his mouth, sucking it clean. Dez groaned as his exquisite body towered over her. He took her hands, their fingers interlacing. Palms against palms. Then he slammed them against the door, his body once again pinning her to the hard wood.