Her kitchen had been transformed. A gleaming new stove, the exact model she’d dreamt of, was installed there. Along with the stove was a set of cooking pots and pans, hanging now from the rack above the island. She’d ordered books and they’d arrived and were on the shelves behind her desk.

Emma called her twice. A friend. They’d chatted and laughed and made plans for coffee at Emma’s house. Life had been good—until now. Until this terrible tension had begun to coil in her gut. Until the nightmares had begun again and she couldn’t stop wondering when she would lose it all—because she would. He would come. Rafe would come for her.

She suspected Eli knew something about Rafe. Three days ago, Eli had shut down, become quiet, more watchful, his dark, brooding, moody behavior making her feel more nervous than ever. She’d waited for him to tell her something—anything at all—but he remained stubbornly silent and that only added to the terrors surrounding her nightly.

Just a half hour ago, she’d woken from her nightmare, Eli’s arms around her, his voice soothing, his hands caressing, his lips gentle on her forehead. She clung to him, to his protection, the shelter of his body, as he’d drifted back to sleep, but she couldn’t forget the echoes of the terrible moment when Rafe’s face, a mask of cold fury above her own, had forced her hands into a dying woman, smearing blood everywhere.

Emma. Eli. Emma’s children. If Rafe knew about them, they would live under a death sentence, there was no doubt in her mind. Eli drove her day and night, especially this past week, determined to get her in shape, to be able to fight in either form—human or leopard—as if he believed she could defeat Rafe.

He didn’t know Rafe. He’d never seen Rafe’s leopard. He’d never seen Rafe’s evil glowing eyes, or the madness in them. The rage. Life had not been kind to him, and she knew he was so twisted that the only peace he ever found was in other people’s pain. He enjoyed watching others suffer.

She took another sip of her coffee and stepped closer to the edge of the porch, the very edge of the storm. Sheets of rain pounded into the ground and she felt the spray as the wind shifted just enough to push droplets under the roof.