Page 2 of Tiger Bitten

Chapter Two

Ren had been running late this morning. It was so unlike her. She just felt frazzled and unorganized.

She set her purse behind the counter and used her key to unlock the safe and pull out the stack of rare records for the front display. Her parents had opened this shop twenty years ago, and for two straight decades, they had locked up the rare records at nights. Sure, they were insured, but these belonged in someone’s personal collection, not in some thief’s hands.

She set up the display in a rush and locked the glass cabinet, then took a healthy sip of her coffee and remembered she hadn’t locked her car. “Shoot,” she muttered, shoving her sunglasses up on her head and aiming her car key at the front window. From here, she could see her headlights flash. Sweet. This key fob reached pretty far.

Goodness, she loved her new car. She’d been saving for it for two years. Her hair was in a constant state of messy right now with that convertible top down, but she didn’t care. Who did she need to impress?

Herself. That was all.

Ren smiled and made her way to the front door, flipped the sign to open, and bustled to the back room to toss a frozen breakfast sandwich into the microwave in the break room. She was starving this morning. Well, she was starving every morning. This would be her third breakfast.

The hunger came with the territory.

The bell dinged over the front door, and for some reason, a soft growl escaped her. Huh. Weird. She hadn’t heard that in a year at least.

The breakfast sandwich had another thirty seconds to heat, but she left it and headed into the main room of the store to greet the customer.

She smelled him at the exact moment she saw him.

Cat.

Ren froze in the breakroom doorway.

The man was tall and had probably had to duck under the top of the door. He stood with impeccable posture, his head cocked. He wore sunglasses. His dark hair was messy on top, but the purposeful kind. The sides of his hair had been cut short and blended into a dark beard. She could see his jawline was chiseled, and his throat muscular. He wore a hoodie, but through it, she could tell he was freaking jacked.

He filled up the entire room. At least, that’s what it felt like.

Ren swallowed hard and pulled her sunglasses over her eyes. “Welcome in,” she said politely.

He parted his lips to say something, but the ding of the microwave seemed to cause him to change his mind. He gestured to the breakroom, like he was dismissing her.

Strange.

“Um, feel free to look around. We have a sale running on the records on the back wall. It’s buy one, get one half off today. Well, every Tuesday we run that sale.” She forced a smile. “Um, I don’t want any trouble. I’m not in the culture.” She didn’t know why she’d felt the need to say that.

He didn’t answer, just stared at her.

The microwave gave a warning beep that she hadn’t opened the door yet. Right.

She cleared her throat and backed into the breakroom. She shouldn’t give a dominant Cat her back.

Ren grabbed her steaming breakfast sandwich, plopped it onto a plate, and meandered past the Cat to the cash register. She hadn’t even opened it for the day, so she busied herself doing that while her third breakfast cooled.

He was looking through the records at the back wall now, slowly flipping through organized rows of them. Ren could feel his attention on her though.

“I’m Ren,” she introduced herself lamely.

The man slid her a glance. “You don’t have to wear the sunglasses. I could smell you from across the street.”

Ren crossed her arms over her chest and glanced down at the handgun safe under the register. She could have it open in seconds.

“You’re wearing sunglasses too,” she pointed out pointedly.

The man removed his glasses, exposing bright blue eyes.

Ren froze. Shit. He was a white tiger. They were the only Cats in existence that she knew of who had blue eyes. His animal would be enormous. So much for hoping he was a cheetah or cougar.