Free Savage Hunger by Terry Spear

there?” Maya asked cautiously, praying that Kat didn’t have.
    “No. I was raised in foster homes, which is a subject better left alone.” She gave a small shrug.
    The family situation couldn’t be better. Maya was already feeling overprotective toward Kat, and she wanted Kat to feel as though she could talk about anything with her.
    But still, important issues needed to be discussed that had to do with Connor right now. “No boyfriend?”
    Kat smiled at her, as if she could read her thoughts. Yeah, she was trying to matchmake Kat with her brother.
    “Connor’s shy with women, if you didn’t notice. And he doesn’t have a girlfriend.” Not that he was the least bit shy, only reluctant to really get to know a woman for fear of losing his heart to her. And then where would he be?
    “Probably hard to find one who likes to vacation in the Amazon jungle on occasion,” Kat said with a small smile.
    “Yeah, exactly.” Maya wanted to say that Kat seemed to like the jungle, but she figured that would be too blatant.
    When Kat tried to stand, she wavered, nearly falling back on the bed. Maya grabbed Kat’s arm to steady her, then helped her into her panties. Maya’s skin prickled with fresh concern at seeing Kat still so unsteady on her feet, and she grabbed Kat’s arms to steady her again. “Are you going to be all right?”
    “Yes. Thanks, Maya. I’m just a little dizzy.”
    A lot dizzy, Maya thought. Not feeling totally reassured, she managed to get a good look at Kat’s scratches, or where they had been. They were all healed up with not even a scar. Maya let out a relieved breath.
    But did that mean Kat had the shifter genes now or not? If she didn’t, wouldn’t a small scar still be visible?
    The battle scars . Maya said, “Gonzales’s men shot you?”
    “Um, yeah,” Kat said, her expression turning dark all at once.
    Maya worried that maybe it wasn’t a good subject to bring up yet, at least not so soon after Kat was starting to feel better.
    Kat took a deep breath. “It’s classified.”
    Maya stared at her in disbelief. “Classified?” Omigod, she hadn’t thought of it, but what if Kat was still in the military? If she had an obligation, a contract, or whatever they called it, she couldn’t just quit her job with the Army, could she?
    Connor would kill Maya when he learned what she’d done. What if Kat didn’t show up for whatever job she had or missed her next mission and they came looking for her? Maya could just envision a SWAT team swarming the Amazon looking for whoever was detaining their fellow operative.
    Kat didn’t say anything further, but Maya’s heart was pounding with fresh anxiety. This changed everything. Maya ground her teeth. Okay, so they could deal with this new issue somehow. They would have to. Kat couldn’t belong to the military any longer. She might have to keep her other missions secret from Connor and Maya, but Kat definitely would have to keep her new condition—if she had been turned—top secret from everyone else.
    Maya suddenly smelled something burning.
    “The fish,” Maya squeaked as they started to crackle and smoke in the skillet. She helped Kat sit safely on the bed, then hurried to scrape the fish off the pan and flip them over. She sighed. “Cajun style. Blackened.”
    Kat chuckled. “I’ll have to remember that the next time I cook a blackened meal.”
    Maya smiled at her, loving that her new sister had a sense of humor. She would be her new sister, whether Kat was turned already or not. “Connor and I have a nursery in eastern Texas. It’s really beautiful. It’s surrounded by forests, and we have a huge tropical greenhouse. And a small lake is located on the property. We’d love for you to come and stay with us for a while if you’d like.”
    “Stay permanently” was what Maya was dying to say. The truth of the matter was that if Maya had managed to turn Kat, she couldn’t go anywhere but with them, permanently. She wouldn’t be