Free The Jaguar Prince by Karen Kelley

chastise herself for being as crazy as Rogar for even thinking she quite possibly could be part alien, she took a deep breath and closed her eyes, then exhaled. After a few seconds, she opened her eyes, and looked at her arms. They still looked like her arms.
    Rogar had said she needed to concentrate. She took another deep breath, exhaled, and relaxed her whole body. She pictured fields of green grass waving in the breeze, and could almost feel the wind on her face. Animal guide, are you there? The sun raced across the sky. The moon came out. There was strength in the magical orb in the sky. She could hear people speaking, and knew it was her ancestors who had crossed before her. She felt her body changing.
    What was happening? Was she dying? Had Rogar come back and killed her while she wasn’t looking, and she didn’t know she was dead yet?
    Ridiculous, she wasn’t dead. At least, she was pretty sure she wasn’t, but she hurt. Her body ached in places she didn’t know she could ache. And burned with an intensity she didn’t know existed.
    She tried to open her eyes, but she couldn’t, and yet, she felt the damp fog surrounding her. Weakness enveloped her, and she slowly sank to the floor and curled into a ball as her heart began to race. The blood rushed through her veins. Her skin stretched, then tightened.
    This wasn’t funny. Stop!
    No sound came from her.
    Oh, God, she couldn’t speak! She couldn’t see!
    She whimpered.
    As she lay there, everything began to return to normal. She heard a dog barking outside. A car zoomed past. A neighbor called her children to come inside.
    For a moment, Callie just lay on the floor, trying to catch her breath, letting the world catch up to her. The pain wasn’t so bad now. At least, she didn’t feel as though her body was going to explode.
    Finally, she opened her eyes. Something wasn’t right. She felt different. The room looked the same, only bigger. Why did everything look so big?
    Her movements were disjointed as she made her way to the bedroom. Rogar better have some answers, and he’d better have them damned fast. She paused in front of the full-length mirror in the hallway, which was the only place she had space for it.
    There was a rabbit in her house. Why was there a white furry rabbit in her house? And where was her reflection? She only saw the damned rabbit.
    She had her explanation, Rogar was a vampire! They did exist. He’d probably bitten her that first night and now she was a vampire, too, and that was why she had no reflection. She’d never be able to go into the daylight again. Oh, God, no more Krispy Kremes.
    Oh, great, the rabbit crapped in her floor. Black pellets were on her clean floor.
    “You’ve changed form,” Rogar said from her bedroom doorway at the end of the hall.
    He was still talking crazy. Why didn’t he just admit she was a vampire and now would be doomed to live forever? Never to know if her makeup was on straight because she had no reflection.
    She thought about that for a moment. If she lived forever, she was bound to get the animal keeper job. But then, she couldn’t go into the light of day. It might be kind of difficult to work only at night.
    Rogar came toward her. Good, because she was about to lay into him. He would regret ever turning her. Bleh, she was not about to drink blood to stay alive.
    He stooped and picked up the rabbit, except she knew he was picking her up.
    “I know things are confusing right now, but it will all get easier in time.”
    What the hell was he talking about?
    “You make a cute rabbit,” he said.
    Rabbit? Rabbit! She’d shifted into a freakin’ rabbit? That was her guide? Hey guide, I don’t want to be a rabbit. If I’m going to be anything, I want to be a sexy animal. Rabbits were anything but sexy.
    Oh, this was fantastic. Didn’t jaguars eat rabbits? Rogar had probably wanted her to change form so he could have a late-night snack.
    She didn’t want to be a rabbit. She wanted to be Callie