The Lion's Arranged Mate: A Paranormal Lion Shifter Romance Read Online Free Page A

and his opinion of her seemed to grow with each passing day. At the end of the week, he decided it was time they reward themselves. It was unlikely, he figured, that she’d ever gone camping, so he surreptitiously began to pack all the ingredients: clothes, food, water, all the things they would need.
    “I have a surprise for you,” he said, when he came back late on Friday from his job at the local bar. It had been a slow night, as it usually was – his job as a bouncer was usually compounded with calling taxis for the overly inebriated, or bullshitting with the proprietor and guests. Anastasia was in a nightgown reading by the window – she always waited for him until he returned home, and more often than not, they would nestle into each other, learning the other by touch, though they hadn't made love yet. Irrepressible , he had called her one night, and she had punched him playfully in the arm, but not denied it.
    “Is everything okay?” she asked, thinking it was about the bar.
    “Oh yes, no I was thinking… this weekend we should go camping. The actual marriage ceremony isn’t until next week, so… we have two days to ourselves. What do you think?”
    Her eyes widened in thought. “I… I don’t know. I’ve never camped before,” she admitted. “Is it hard?”
    He wanted to kiss her, she was so cute. “No harder than doing laundry,” he winked.
    The next morning they woke early and he packed up the Triumph’s side-bags with everything they’d needed. Anastasia still wasn’t used to the bike, but she grit her teeth and put the helmet over her coiffed hair. The Triumph was just another challenge to her, and if he knew her as he thought he did, she wanted nothing more than to overcome it as well.
    Luckily, she had worn something a little more casual, and the cut-off shorts seemed like a more appropriate choice of attire. She saw Alan looking at her ponderously as she got onto the back seat and put her hands on his shoulders.
    Alan had deliberately kept the location a secret, even after she had pestered him, but as they took to the open road and the wind howled past, she seemed to find a new sort of thrill in the scenery that flashed by. Both of them, a Wolf and a Lion, were at heart predators, inclined to the power of their own long strides as they hunted through the wilderness, and this act of sailing over the earth on two wheels seemed to beckon and call to an inner power in them.
    She’ll love it , he thought. The place he’d selected was a lake that was up one of the logging roads that Cameron used to access his woodlot. A similarly small cabin had been constructed on one shore of the alpine body of water, and though it was modest, it was cozy enough for two people.
    He could picture it in his mind even now – the tall ridge of granite mountain cliffs to the northeast, hedged by ice and dwindling glaciers, and the long white streaked tendrils of clear water that branched downward like liquid lightning to the glacial blue perimeter of the lake.
    It took them longer than he anticipated to get to the cabin as they left the main road and went up a forked branch. She held on tightly, and if she was alarmed by how far he was taking her into the wilderness, she made no indication – but her embrace tightened on him the further they went.
    At last, the road gave way to a clearing where the trees were shrunken and wide swaths of yellowing tundra grass expanded toward the lake. He didn’t have to see her face to know she was gaping at it. He pulled the bike up beside the cabin and they both hopped off – a chilly wind bit down at them and she held her bare arms and shivered, goosebumps rising on her naked thighs.
    “It’s a bit colder up here,” he said, “but don’t worry, I brought extra clothes.”
    “It’s beautiful… what do you call this place?”
    “It’s an unmarked lake, actually, no name. But Cam calls it Loggerhead Pond – go figure.”
    “I’m surprised at how blue it is… I