Free Jaguar Sun by Martha Bourke

there’s something I need to tell you, something I just found out.”
    “You’re as white as chalk,” he said. “Maya, what’s wrong? Are you all right?”
    All right? “Well, you know how shifters have only one mate and it’s always another shifter?”
    “Sure. Everyone knows that.”
    “Well, it, uh, it turns out....” Jeez, how could I say this? “It turns out that I’m probably a Mayan Elder.”
    “Really? Well, I guess that’s no surprise. Your Grandma Rosa is one. That’s great, My! I’m proud of you.”
    “Could, could you just let me finish?” I stammered. My hands were shaking, so I tucked them underneath my thighs. “Usually two shifters find each other and they mate for life. It’s almost always two shifters. But, but I’m an Elder and I phased, so you phased too.” I looked into his eyes and waited, waited for the moment that they showed understanding.
    Yep, there it was.
    “So you’re saying that you phased and because I was meant to be your mate, I phased, too?”
    “Yes.” That was all I could think of to say. I looked down at my lap. The tears that had started to run down my cheeks said the rest. But instead of flying into a rage or walking out, he wiped a tear away with his thumb.
    “Did you think I would leave you?”
    “Uh huh,” I said, nodding like an idiot. By now, I was just about ready for full-on snot-a-thon.
    “Maya, look at me,” he said tilting my chin up. “Maybe this is true, maybe it’s not, but if it is, it just means that we’re meant to be together.”
    “But everything you’re going through might be because of me.”
    “It doesn’t matter. Don’t you see? My heart wanted you. And it did whatever it had to do to be with you. I love you, My.”
    “I love you, too.” I sniffled again.
    And then he kissed me. He kissed me in a way he never had before. In a way no one had ever kissed me before. It was hard and deep, hungry. I felt a rush of pleasure that was different from anything I’d ever felt. I reached up to the back of his neck to make sure he didn’t stop. He put his arms around me and lifted me up, then laid me down on the couch. I could feel electricity everywhere our skin touched. I slid my hand down the back of his jeans trying to pull him against me. He moaned. It was like we were channeling the animal spirits within us. We broke away for a moment, panting, looking into each other’s eyes. And I could see that the Wolf was there, but there was love there, too. So much love. I knew then that I would do anything for him. Anything.

CHAPTER SEVEN
    A few minutes later, I saw Dad’s headlights in our driveway as he pulled in. Matt and I walked out into the cool November evening. He took my hand, and I followed him to his car. I felt a sudden pain in my chest with the realization he was leaving. I didn’t want him to go, even though in my head I knew he was just going home. This is what it’s like to be mated, I thought.
    “Maya,” he said, “you have to promise me something. If we ever find out that what you said is true … If we learn that I phased so I that could be with you, promise me that you’ll never ever feel guilty. I would have done anything to be with you. And I still would.”
    “And being Gray Wolf’s not so bad?”
    “I gotta be honest with you, My,” he said with a laugh. “It totally sucks.”
    “Matt, do you feel sort of funny, I mean, about leaving?”
    “You mean here?” He touched the left side of his chest. “Yeah, I felt it the first time the other night, after we first phased together and then we left to go home.”
    “I think it’s because we’re mated, don’t you?”
    “Yeah, it’s like....”
    “It hurts to just think about being apart.”
    “Yep.”
    I touched the side of his face. Instantly, the electricity surged through me. I pulled his neck down and kissed him. It got hotter when he suddenly pulled away. Shocked, I looked up into his face.
    “We’d better not go down that road again,” he