Once she could read enough, she’d used the Internet to find places for math and science. For history lessons. But always, always, she read. Newspapers, magazines, every book in Rafe’s house. She read dictionaries and the labels of cans. She read the ingredients of everything that came into the house. She didn’t want Rafe to know she could read and she made certain she never made a mistake in front of him.

She knew he tracked her computer, reading everything she did on it, learning everywhere she went, so she used his computer, the one in his sacred office, the one he never once considered she might touch. She’d used his own computer to educate herself and she’d done it right under his nose.

The moment she knew Rafe was a shifter, she tried to find out more about them, but there wasn’t really information anywhere, so she read up on leopards and studied their behavior. Clearly shifters were different. Leopards were loners, they didn’t live in groups as Eli hinted some shifters did. Leopards had multiple mates and the females raised their offspring alone. She had the feeling shifters didn’t do that either, but she didn’t know. It was a possibility and that needed to be addressed at some point if she didn’t get away from Eli.

She could do this. She could think her way out of this, or at least hit on some kind of a plan. Part of the problem was Eli. He did more than just melt her body every time he looked at her. She still remembered sweet. Worse, he still gave her sweet. He treated her as if she mattered. He didn’t need to look after her the way he did, but then he’d done it before, drawing her in, only to stomp on her.

Eli had tons of experience when it came to sex, she at least recognized that. She knew she could be somewhat submissive. It was impossible not to be, raised the way she was, but it didn’t make sense that she found his commanding voice so absolutely compelling. Each time he gave her an order, delivered in a low, sexy tone, her body went up in flames. Was that something to do with being a shifter? His cat dominant over hers? She didn’t know. She didn’t know why she liked caring for him so much. Or why she liked obeying him when they had wild sex. She just didn’t know.

She slipped from the tailgate, caught up his clothing and brought it with her back to the cab. Her gaze slid to the ignition. He’d left the keys in the truck. She’d been fairly certain she’d noticed that little detail, and if she noticed it, he had. So, what was he playing at? Testing her? If so, she ought to drive back to the house and let him walk home. She bit her lip, for the first time finding a little humor in the situation. That was, if she could find the house and if she could figure out how to drive.

She climbed into the relative warmth of the cab. The sun shone through the windows, warming the leather interior. She took the keys out of the ignition and stared at them, before folding each item of his clothing carefully and setting them on the backseat in plain sight.

She was exhausted from all the sex and trying to figure out a future. Her leopard was no help, sleeping or something rather than giving her any clues as to what to do. She went through the glove compartment and found a set of handcuffs, but nothing else that might give her something to get an advantage over Eli.

Catarina found herself shivering at the thought. He wasn’t the kind of man to cross. Not in the same way as Rafe; he wouldn’t kill someone and tell her their blood was on her hands, but he’d make it known he wasn’t happy. She wasn’t certain she wanted to find out how.

The leopard stretched its legs, running along the road and winding through the trees, but always in a tight circle that kept the truck in the center. He detoured when the scent of three men he recognized drifted from just over the edge of his property line. His acreage butted up next to Jake Bannaconni’s estate. His neighbor was a billionaire with oil on his property, and twice he’d mentioned to Eli that he was certain there was oil on his property as well.

Eli hadn’t cared much one way or the other. Not then. He had plenty of money from his trust and a job that kept him gone most of the time. Still, if Bannaconni said there was oil, there probably was.

He’d met the man through a mutual friend, Drake Donovan. Eli had spent weeks with Drake in the Borneo rain forest, and Drake had taught him more about shifters in those few weeks than his father had ever had a chance to teach him. Bannaconni had somehow tracked him down, explaining Drake needed a bone graft from a shifter, that if he didn’t get one soon, he would never shift again and they’d lose him. Eli had immediately volunteered for testing and had been compatible, grateful he could repay Drake for his friendship and knowledge.

He’d refused to take the considerable sum of money Bannaconni had offered him, but he’d let it be known he was interested in acreage out of the way where his leopard could run free, and to call if they stumbled on anything suitable. Bannaconni contacted him the instant the property next to his came up for sale.

Eli had a lot of respect for Jake Bannaconni. He could have purchased the prime real estate and added it to what he already had, especially suspecting oil on it, but he’d let Eli know it was coming up for sale and when Eli was interested quietly arranged the sale and hid it under multiple layers of his own corporations.

It was Jake’s wife, Emma, whom he emailed when he was coming to the property. She personally didn’t stock his fridge, he knew better than that, but she had the supplies bought and delivered. The Bannaconnis were good neighbors and Jake certainly deserved a heads-up that a rogue would eventually be coming their way.

He shifted as he got closer. As a rule shifters weren’t in the least bit modest, but he was always careful to know who was close by before he allowed himself to be seen.