Spotting His Leopard (Shifters, Inc.) Read Online Free

in their jaguar form, leaping along the tops of cars and carriages, jumping from one fire escape or awning to the next; it was faster that way.
                  Despite the poverty and the ancient creaking vehicles, the streets had a festive air.  The street-lamps were festooned with garlands of flowers in preparation for the parade, and in everey shop window, there were giant posters and banners with garishly color portraits of the king and his two wives.
                    Finally they caught up with her.  Tyler saw her head into a coffee shop.
                    “I’ll meet you back at my hotel in an hour. I’m staying at the Acacia Hotel of the Bountiful Litters,” he said to Maji, scrambling out of the cab.
                    He casually strolled into the souvenir store next door and bought a few little trinkets.  He pulled out his spy camera, which he’d designed himself.  While it appeared he was taking pictures of the scenery, the hidden lens on the side of the camera was taking pictures of her.  The natives weren’t permitted to own cameras, but the authorities grudgingly allowed their use by tourists.
                     Tyler waited until she’d purchased a bottle of soda and left.  He followed her at a distance for several blocks.
                    When she finished her drink and tossed it into the garbage, he made his move. He walked up to the trash can and pretended he was throwing away a bottle of water, but instead he palmed her bottle and slid it into his rucksack.  He didn’t bother trying to follow her any more. The island wasn’t that big; he’d be able to find out what hotel she was staying at without any difficulty.
                    Instead he went to a pharmacy and bought a few supplies, including baby powder and Scotch tape. Makeshift fingerprinting kit.
                    Next he went back to his room and pulled out his cell phone.   He’d made the phone into a mini-computer that held an international database of fingerprints. He couldn’t connect to the internet, but he could at least find out who she was.
                    He carefully dusted her bottle for prints with baby powder and then lifted the prints with the Scotch tape. Then he ran her prints. And came up with…nothing.
                    He stared at the screen in frustration, shaking his head. That couldn’t be.
                    He ran another print from the other side of the cup. Same result. Nothing.
                    She didn’t exist.
                    He tapped his fingers impatiently as he considered this. It just wasn’t possible. She was American, she was in her mid-twenties, which meant that there had to be some record of her somewhere.  The fact that he couldn’t find her in his database was just as revealing as if he’d actually been able to track down some results – because it almost certainly meant she was wearing something over her fingers to disguise her fingerprints. 
    Again, that was leaning in the direction of her being a pro who was working hard to cover her tracks. The island was too hot for her to get away with wearing gloves, so she had donned fake fingerprints so she wouldn’t leave a single trace of herself behind.  They’d be good enough that unless someone was staring right at her fingers, close up, nobody would notice.
                    He considered his options, and finally decided to head to the island’s one airport and book a charter flight back to the mainland for the day.  There, he’d have access to the internet.  He’d see if facial recognition software could pull up anything. He hadn’t been able to fit that database in his cell phone.
    He needed to know who she was.
                    He was hoping he’d prove himself wrong somehow. He wanted to find out that