Vision Revealed (2 page)

Times were changing for his kind. Leopards were a stubborn lot, aggressive fighters who

were deadly by nature yet held on to traditions for centuries, refusing to change. The

announcement stating hunters’ identity would now be public knowledge, going as far as

to state the names of current hunters and where their dens were located, appeared on the

website earlier that year. Many howled the leopards ordained to protect their kind should

maintain anonymity while others growled it made sense their identity be public

knowledge.

Kane didn’t care. Protecting all leopards was in his blood. And he knew more than most

the persecution his kind endured. Not only did he fight all his life keeping it a secret

about having visions, especially when Leo Pard decided he wanted to gather all leopards

with visions together and force them to breed and create some kind of better race of

leopards. But he was a white leopard, a rare species shunned even by his own kind. If it

weren’t for his visions, assuring him of his future, Kane might have gotten a complex

over the persecution he’d tolerated since birth.

Once again a scent yanked him from his thoughts. He glanced at his surroundings,

studying the rough terrain on either side of the highway as he strolled slowly. He inhaled

and filled his nostrils with the same scent that grabbed his attention a few minutes before.

Kane wasn’t alone.

Coming to a full stop, he made a circle, taking his time, breathing and searching with his

eyes, focusing on every blade of grass with acute, meticulous detail no human could

match. If he weren’t so attentive, he would have missed her.

Kane smelled her determination and curiosity, but it wasn’t as strong as the sudden panic

that ripped through the air. The little female, who was quite a distance from him across

the field, took off in a high-speed run toward Kenora. It looked as if he wouldn’t be

arriving in Wheeler’s Point tomorrow afternoon as anticipated. With his next breath, he

recognized the scent.

The female in his visions.

Kane leapt over the ditch alongside the highway and broke into a run that was too fast

for his human body. Although the female had a good distance on him and ran faster than

her female body was meant to run, Kane was stronger, more powerful and cleared the

distance between them as he reached the grove of trees.

“Little female, you can’t escape me,” he called out into the trees.

A wicked breeze, cold as hell, wrapped around the trees and stole his breath. It also

cleared out her scent, and for a moment he lost her. If he didn’t know better, he’d swear

the female commanded the elements and distracted him with the wind blowing in his

face. He slowed but continued running and focused on the clearing at the other end of the

trees. He immediately recognized the setting. When a figure appeared out of the shadows,

dressed in an oversized coat and hat, the only part of her that made her a dead giveaway

was the tight-fitting jeans that hugged her perfectly shaped ass.

He knew that ass.

“Don’t jump!” he yelled a fraction of a second before she again disappeared from his

sight.

Kane raced through the trees, his damp shirt hugging his torso as the biting wind fought

to lower his body temperature. As long as he kept moving in his flesh, he wouldn’t suffer.

Either way, if the cold affected him in this form too much, he would change to his fur, in

which case, he’d be fine.

It was just as he saw it in his vision that morning. The female disappeared over the cliff,

her scent trailing after her.

Rocks flew over the edge when Kane slid to a stop. His vision hadn’t bothered sharing

the good twenty-feet drop below. Leopards might have higher metabolisms than humans,

but they weren’t invincible.

“Crap,” he hissed, breathing in the fresh smell of wet dirt and the aromas from the

variety of trees surrounding him. Squinting against the heavy sleet, he scoured the ground

below him until he spotted her. “Are you simply running from me for the obvious

reasons, little female?”

He wasn’t sure if any male leopard anywhere ever confided in a female that running

from them turned males on. If the female held her ground from the moment he spotted

her, although turned-on by her unmated scent, he wouldn’t have mounted her. Not that

he’d attack a female even if she did offer an exhilarating chase. A female turning herself

into the hunted was hotter than hell, but Kane never had problems getting females to put

out for him. He would never take something not offered to him.

But as he sucked in a breath and then jumped, watching the ground come up underneath

him with record-breaking speed, adrenaline exploded inside him, making it harder to

focus on anything but the female who’d become his prey. He hit the ground hard, rocks

and packed, frozen ground slamming against the palms of his hands and balls of his feet.

At the same time, he gulped in her scent, riper and stronger than he’d ever smelled it

before.

Kane cursed loudly when his body was racked by the impact but brought his head up,

blinking a few times and focusing on his surroundings.

There she was, dirty and soaked, but that adorable ass up in the air as she crawled on all

fours away from him. Her coat hung sideways on her and a backpack added to her bulk.

As she stood and started to run, she appeared to trip and again fell to all fours.

“You hurt yourself, little female.” Kane took his time, watching her struggle to her feet

and fail. His heart pounded in his chest and muscles bulged against his wet and dirty

clothes. “Next time think twice before flying off a cliff.”

“Go to hell,” she cursed, rolling over so she sat facing him.

Kane stared into her eyes, shocked at how pale they were. She wore an oversized man’s

jacket, which smelled as if she’d taken it from a human. It also covered her backpack,

which he wouldn’t have noticed if she hadn’t jumped and fell. Her bulky attire hid the

natural shape of her body. Her stocking cap completely covered her hair. If it weren’t for

the undeniable scent that filled his lungs as he stared down at her, Kane would swear this

wasn’t the same female from his visions.

Jin Rose stared at the white leopard approaching her. No wonder he picked up her scent

in spite of her efforts to camouflage them. Her kind was much better at tracking than

other leopards.

“If you’re going to fuck me, get it over with. I’ve got things to do.” She stared into pale

blue eyes but then took in his hardened features. He was soaked and dirty but couldn’t

possibly look as bad as her. If anything, if she was going to be forced to have sex with a

stranger, at least he was well built and absolutely gorgeous.

“If you want laid, you’re going to have to ask nicer than that.”

“You’re the one chasing me,” she growled, crawling backward on her ass and then once

again pushing herself to a standing position. Maybe her leg wasn’t broken but just

sprained. The pain was intense, but she’d broken bones before and knew how terribly it

hurt until cracked bones mended. This pain didn’t appear intolerable.

“You were the one running.” He moved to her before she could stand and reached for her

arm, helping her to her feet. “Where are you going?”

Jin wasn’t used to anyone helping her. She arrived in a crisis situation and came to the

aid of other leopards, not the other way around. “I don’t need any help,” she said, pulling

her arm from his grasp while the strap from her backpack slid down her arm inside her

coat jacket.

Strong fingers slipped away from her forearm and she struggled to turn from him and

maintain her balance. Pain shot up her leg from her ankle. Not broken but definitely

sprained. This time she didn’t fall. But she walked away pissed. How many times had she

seen herself jump over that cliff in her visions? She’d never seen herself running through

the trees prior to jumping, or possibly she would have recognized her surroundings and

stopped before flying over the edge without preparing herself. It was the curse of visions.

A quick flash into her future didn’t do shit to aid her in preparing for a mishap.

Good thing she was no longer chained to her sire’s side. It would be one more

opportunity for him to point out how flawed she was for having visions that only lasted a

mere second or two. Not once did she ever see anything in her future long enough to sniff

out the severity of it.

“It’s going to be a long walk to Kenora,” the male behind her offered.

“Did you just figure that out?” She hated the obvious being thrown in her face.

“Is it broken or sprained?” he asked, ignoring her snide comment.

Jin wasn’t in the mood for conversation. She was in pain, dirty, and with every breath his

all-male scent was burying itself deeper and deeper into her system. It had been too damn

long since she’d had good, rough sex. And with one of her own kind.

She shook her head, willing thoughts of seducing him, if for no other reason than to get

her mind off the pain, and what lay ahead of her, out of her head for a while. “I’m fine.

Go on about your business, male,” she ordered.

It didn’t surprise her when he ignored her.

“You’re my business until I know you’re safe.” His low growl offered a hint of a

promise to it.

Jin couldn’t create enough distance between them. She’d kept a low profile for almost a

year, hiding out deep in the Canadian Mountains after burning her sire’s mansion in

Arizona to the ground. It had been a necessary evil, as well as the actions she’d taken to

convince the world her sire was dead. Someday she would rebuild the name of her litter.

It would take time and a lot of work. Her litter’s name was tarnished and her sire

annihilated any chance of ever being sniffed out without hunting and killing him.

Obviously this male had been under a rock for a while. Although it shouldn’t surprise her

a white leopard wouldn’t know the howlings of the rest of the leopards. Her kind kept to

themselves and never cared for the rough smell of vindictive gossip.

As well, Jin didn’t look the same as she did a year ago. That Jin Rose would resurface

soon enough, just for a while, long enough to do what needed to be done to begin the

restoration of her name. If it was the last thing she did, she would restore honor to her

litter.

From this point forward, Jin Rose was honorable and would run with pride. The first step

was admitting to the hunters the truth about how she became one of them. If they didn’t

kill her first when they smelled the truth.

“And what makes you think I’m safer with you than without?” She wouldn’t understand

the thinking of males no matter how hard she tried. Although over the past year they

hadn’t been foremost on her thoughts, this male was proof they were all the same. There

wasn’t a male alive who believed a female was better off alone.

“You’re hurt. Any other male might take advantage.”

“No. Any male would take advantage. You’re proving that right now by not leaving me

alone.” She was being harsh. She knew it. But he couldn’t keep trailing her.

“Fine,” he grunted.

Jin tried picking up her pace, enduring the slicing pain up her leg with each step over the

uneven ground. She dragged a cool, calming breath into her lungs and breathed in the

rich scent of winter. And it would be a rough one this year. She loved the snow, loved a

cold, crisp morning. It wouldn’t be long before she could burrow through mounds of

snow in her fur, racing at incredible speeds over the drifts and creating clouds of white

around her. She’d loved doing that as a cub. If she endured what she had to do to restore

her honor, she would enjoy the snow as much as an adult.

She breathed in a fresh breath. The male had disappeared. Shooting a furtive glance at

her surroundings and stabilizing herself to turn around and scour the area where she’d

just been, she found herself very much alone. She didn’t see the white leopard anywhere,

and didn’t smell him.

“Not good.” She continued hobbling, the pain now throbbing through her entire leg. A

rogue white leopard male didn’t just appear out of nowhere without good reason. “What’s

he up to anyway?” No good, probably.

It was still too much in her nature to be a hunter. Jin wasn’t sure she could step down

from the title, although technically she’d already done that when she left Kenora a year

ago. When Leo Pard’s home burned to the ground and his death was announced, she’d

had to go into hiding. No way would she endure being questioned as to what happened.

Any of the other hunters—Josh Bard, Thad Pierce, Race Ogden or Tore Mann—would

smell the truth on her. When the howlings reached her that a new hunter was being

sought out, she knew it was time.

“Time to face the teeth and claws,” she growled, and hugged her coat around her human

body when the wind picked up.

The buildings on either side of the street didn’t block the winter cold. A harsh breeze

whipped down the street, making Jin wish she had the money to buy a car. It hadn’t been

a bad trip coming out of the mountains and working her way across Ontario in her fur

from north of Banff to Kenora.

She wasn’t exactly in a hurry to face the other hunters. Jin wouldn’t lead her life without