Finders Keepers [Alpha Eye 2] (Siren Publishing Classic ManLove) Read online

  Alpha Eye 2

  Finders Keepers

  For years, submissive tabby cat shifter Dan was held captive by a man who was supposed to protect him. Although Dan manages to escape, he can no longer face reality. Letting his animal take over, Dan is on the verge of losing his human half when he chances upon Asher in the park.

  Asher’s an Alpha werewolf who bears his own scars. Since his mate died, Asher is barely living. When Asher discovers a rogue cat shifter in the park, he has no idea why he brings the cat home. Everyone knows shifters who lose to their animal half can’t come back, but Asher remains hopeful.

  When Asher comes home one day to discover his stray cat is replaced by a wary and gorgeous young man, Asher comes to the realization that Dan is his mate. But the past can’t be easily forgotten, and it will take the strength of both men to overcome their demons.

  Genre: Alternative (M/M, Gay), Paranormal, Romantic Suspense, Shape-shifter

  Length: 25,196 words

  FINDERS KEEPERS

  Alpha Eye 2

  Fel Fern

  

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK

  FINDERS KEEPERS

  Copyright © 2017 by Fel Fern

  ISBN: 978-1-64010-640-6

  First Publication: October 2017

  Cover design by Harris Channing

  All art and logo copyright © 2017 by Siren Publishing, Inc.

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.

  If you find a Siren-BookStrand e-book or print book being sold or shared illegally, please let us know at

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  PUBLISHER

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Felicia Fern works as a graphic designer during the day and loves penning M/M paranormal erotic romance at night.

  For all titles by Fel Fern, please visit

  www.bookstrand.com/fel-fern

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  About the Author

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Landmarks

  Cover

  FINDERS KEEPERS

  Alpha Eye 2

  FEL FERN

  Copyright © 2017

  Prologue

  Hearing the door to the basement shut, Dan slowly sat up. All the aches and bruises he’d sustained over the course of the past few days started to act up, his body protesting at the smallest movement. He’d had worse, though, always did.

  Dan gripped the bars of the cage Chris made for him. The foot of the stairs looked back at him. He waited seconds, minutes, he couldn’t tell time anymore, not when it felt like an eternity he’d been here. His stomach did strange flops. Did he dare chance his escape? He stared at the lock on the floor.

  Chris was usually meticulous, never careless. A test? He did smell alcohol on Chris’s breath, though. Shifters seldom got drunk, but drink alcohol in excessive amounts and they eventually did. His breathing turned ragged.

  Even though Chris had been gone for a while, he remained there, thinking, debating. He bit his bottom lip. Test or no, he had to try. Dan pushed the door opened. Memories of the first time Chris stuffed him in here came flooding back to him.

  Right after their mating and marriage ceremony, just after he said good-bye to his teary-eyed mom and stoic dad and the rest of the clan, he’d thought he was the luckiest man alive. There were plenty of Omega tabby shifters in his clan, but Chris—the prince of tigers, practically royalty—chose him.

  In the present, he let out a horrid, rasping sound which he realized was laughter. That laugh sounded wrong, desperate. He clenched at his ribs to let it all out, the effort painful. Invisible claws raked at his inside, and he shut his eyes. Shifters, no matter from what animal group, weren’t meant to live in a cage.

  Chris knew that, too, of course, but then Chris wanted to find out how long before he broke.

  Apparently, Dan was the longest toy that lasted. Chris said that with twisted pride in his voice. Too bad Chris was wrong. Dan broke a long time ago, the cat inside of him about to turn wild, but he made a bargain with his animal.

  That they’d wait and play out Chris’ game. Someday, Chris would make a mistake, would let his guard down. That was today. Once he tasted the fresh air again, not the damp of the basement, then he’d give himself over to the animal in return for helping him survive the past few weeks, or was it months? Maybe it had been years, he wouldn’t know.

  He told time by Chris’ visits. Dan used to wonder at the start of his captivity what Chris told his parents, his clan. That he died in an unfortunate accident, his body too unrecognizable to fit inside an open casket?

  These days, Dan ceased to wonder. He knew deep down, if he did manage to get back in the outside world, he’d never be the same. The old Dan his parents and clan knew died in this cage. Whoever occupied his flesh now was a living zombie, a walking dead man.

  On his hands and knees, he crawled out of the cage meant to contain a human. He stared at the horrendous contraption that had been his home for God knew how long. Dan felt it again, claws and teeth ripping its way out of him. His cat wanted out, to be free, to no longer be confined in their half-starved and weak human frame.

  Dan took his eyes off the cage, gaze landing on the only window in the room. It was small, square, and welded with bars, but a silver of moonlight touched those bars. It whispered of temptation, freedom.

  Long ago, he wouldn’t be able to squeeze himself between those bars in cat form. Dan ran his trembling fingers down his bare skin, tracing the ribs sticking out of his skin. Now, he had a chance.

  Dan reached for his inner animal, one that had gotten used to prowling and roaming the sprawling neighborhoods of the city.

  The change came quickly, brutally. Orange fur covered his chest and shoulders. Bones and organs rearranged themselves. A tail appeared, so did claws and teeth. Then, he landed on all fours, feeling slightly dizzy.

  Footsteps near the door. Dan froze, heard Chris’s distinctive whistling. Damn it. So close. Dan looked at the stairs, the sound of jiggling keys then to the window. Not a hard choice to make. Dan would rather risk freedom than being forced back to that cage. He jumped to the boxes stacked against the wall. A few toppled off.

  The door open, light streaming down the window. “What the fuck’s going on in there?”

  Fear rooted him to the spot, froze every muscle in his body. Chris’s boots thundered down the stairs. It was on purpose, he knew, because a feline shifter could move more silently and gracefully than any other shifter gr
oup.

  He broke his paralysis, the will to live stronger than defeat. If Chris caught him now, the tiger prince might just make good on his promise of using the hammer to break his legs. The wretched image rose in his head. That equated to painful months of lying on the floor. Omega tabby cat shifters healed human slow, unlike the average shifter.

  Dan jumped to the next box, paws scrambling for a foothold. It had been so long since he changed forms that he was clumsy, unused to being in his second form. Panting, he hurried up a few more boxes. Adrenaline spiked through his system, but he knew he wouldn’t last. He’d been starved too long, still injured, but he’d make use of his spurt of energy before he collapsed. By then, he’d hopefully be far away from this hell.

  “Fuck,” Chris swore, appearing near the cage, a cruel, golden-haired prince.

  Dan gave his captor one last contemptuous look before squeezing his body past the bars. Night air hit his face. Freedom. Dan pushed forward and broke into a run, never looking back.

  Chapter One

  “You sure about this? This place looks like shit,” Asher’s best friend, Raul, commented.

  The werewolf set the box containing some of his workout equipment on the floor. Asher didn’t fail to notice Raul casually grabbed all of the heavier items. He suppressed the urge to roll his eyes.

  A week ago, he’d been shot in the chest by three silver bullets. True, even a powerful, dominant werewolf male like him would take time to completely recover from a silver-lined bullet, but Raul and his other friends didn’t need to keep treating him like some invalid.

  “This studio is fine,” he said. “Besides, rent is cheap.”

  “You could pay the same amount living with Tom and me,” Raul pointed out, referring to his mate.

  Asher took another look at his new apartment. Furnished with basic furniture, it also had a bathroom. “It serves its purpose.”

  Besides, Raul and Tom were recently mated. The last thing he wanted was to become the third wheel in their lives. He’d never seen Raul, who was like a brother to him, so happy. They were both products of the foster system, damaged boys no family wanted to take in, because they’d been terrified of the dominant predators that lived inside them.

  Raul and he didn’t trust others easily, much less believed in the mating bond, and yet Raul had let one defiant little human into his heart. That gave him and the others, including Jax and Winter, hope. He took out one of the photo frames sticking out from one of his moving boxes. In it was a picture of him, Raul, Jax, and Winter, grinning like fools, holding out their private investigator licenses.

  He smiled at the memory of the four of them meeting for the first time. Both Raul and he had been working for a detective agency before deciding to open up Alpha Eye Investigations. Jax and Winter were ex-cops. He thought it would just be the four of them forever. Asher never factored mates into the equation.

  Asher had been reluctant of Tom at first, worried the human was merely playing around with Raul. In the end, Tom proved him wrong when he accepted Raul’s mating mark. Asher had to admit that when the five of them went out for dinner, envy hit him at the sight of Tom and Raul being comfortable with each other.

  He set the photo down.

  “Thanks for helping me move,” he said instead. “Anyway, I asked for your help because I wanted to talk to you. I’m ready to get back to taking up cases.”

  Raul crossed his arms, frowning at him. “Your wounds aren’t healed.”

  He snorted. Sure, he felt the ache sometimes, but the bullet wounds would close up sooner or later. Besides, he was made of tougher stuff. Raul was merely an ass, but he knew his best friend meant well. “I’m bored out of my mind. Give me something to do.”

  “There is one case I’m confident you can handle,” Raul eventually ventured.

  That perked his interest. “Yeah? With plenty of action?”

  Asher had been itching to go back to work for days, but his asshole friends insisted he take time to rest up. Even his wolf turned restless in him, eager to go on a hunt or chase. Most of the time, being a PI amounted to plenty of waiting and watching, but his wolf liked the stalking part. A wolf was built to hunt prey, after all, even if prey in this instance referred mostly to cheating spouses.

  Those were their most popular cases. He supposed he couldn’t complain, since investigative work provided most of their income.

  “Of course, I’ll email you the details later.” Raul’s phone beeped and he cursed, fishing it out. “Shit, I need to go. Client meeting.”

  “Hey, what about my job?” Asher demanded, but his best friend was already out his front door. Bristling, he busied himself with unpacking and waited for Raul to text him the details of his job.

  * * * *

  Hours later, Asher had driven to a residential neighborhood, beyond pissed Raul set him up. Parking his restored Harley on the side of the road, he got off and took out his phone again. Looking at Raul’s text only made him mad.

  “A fucking lost cat? Seriously?” he muttered out loud, flicking to the photo.

  A well-fed tabby cat looked back at him, mocking him. What the hell? Asher was a freaking dominant werewolf male in his prime, and this was what he was reduced to? Still, Asher was a professional. He’d pay a visit to Raul at the office later, demand Raul give him a real job after he retrieved this damn lost pet. At least the owner was willing to pay a decent amount for the search.

  Sighing, he started walking around the neighborhood. The search turned out more challenging than he thought, because every tabby cat he spotted seemed indistinguishable from the next.

  Asher looked at the photo on his phone again, frowning. Maybe Raul set him up, maybe this was some kind of lame joke to keep him busy, to prevent him from doing something reckless. He ended up buying a couple of sandwiches from a nearby grocer and heading to the local park, collapsing on the nearest park bench. Looking up, he saw the sun setting. It had been hours since he started this ridiculous search for one fat cat.

  Asher had better things to do, thank you very much. He took out his food, stomach growling, then took a huge bite of his first sandwich Oh, he was tempted to wring Raul’s neck. A flicker of movement from the corner of his eye. He turned his head, spotted a scrawny looking striped orange cat with his bacon and chicken sandwich secured in its mouth.

  Already having a bad day, Asher considered some stray cat taking his meal a final straw. A warning growl tickled between his lips. The tabby cat froze, green eyes boring into his, weary, terrified. Almost human.

  That startling thought froze him completely. The cat took it as an opportunity to dart away, jumping nimbly from the bench. Asher stood and chased after the small animal, past the bench and into the nearest line of trees. The animal led him deeper into the grove of trees, outwitting him by climbing up a tall tree, sprawling on one of the branches.

  Asher furrowed his brows, watching the animal gobble up his sandwich. No longer mad, but curious. The more he watched the animal, the more he began to suspect it wasn’t a normal cat. He didn’t think he was going insane or imagining it.

  Even the wolf inside of him showed interest, awake and alert. He circled the tree, then did something unorthodox. Using his wolf, he brushed against the animal’s mind. Most of the time, he felt nothing, but not this time. His animal brushed against something. Not something, but something, a human mind trapped underneath.

  “Little cat,” he called out. The cat finally lifted its head to peer at him, licking at one paw. On closer examination, he saw the cat had old scars on its body, claw marks. This little one was no stranger to violence. “Why don’t you come down, and we can have a little talk?”

  No response. After devouring its meal and certain the predator underneath couldn’t reach him, the cat flopped on the branch, tail lazily swaying back and forth. Asher sat on the ground, patient. He knew some shifters turned rogue, their animal halves slowly taking over, eroding the human half until there was nothing left. This rogue tabby cat shifter, t
hough, wasn’t completely gone.

  He didn’t know why he hadn’t left. Every shifter knew rogues had no chance of turning back. At least this little tabby wasn’t a predatory animal, a potential threat to the community. Still, it tore up Asher’s heart to see another shifter choosing to live out the rest of their lives as an animal.

  Had the cat shifter’s reality been too much for him?

  “I can wait here for a long time,” he told the cat. The fact it hadn’t run away, simply watched, was a good sign. Asher wondered if it was better if he dispensed with his human form. He rose to his feet, noticed the cat stood up, ears and tail raised in alarm.

  “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m just getting comfortable,” he said, peeling off his shirt, then the rest of his clothes. He rolled his personal belongings into a neat ball. The cat settled back down, intelligent green gaze on his chest.

  “These?” He touched the healing bullet wounds on his chest. “I got them from protecting my best friend’s mate.”

  Jesus. Raul would definitely think he was out of his rocker, talking to a cat as if it understood him. He liked to believe the rogue shifter still did, still had enough humanity inside of him to comprehend. Asher didn’t know what possessed him to do this.

  Hard statistics was proof rogue shifters had a one percent chance of turning back. Was he arrogant enough to think he could save this little cat? Still, his animal told him not to give up, that maybe fate sent him to this tabby cat shifter for a reason.

  He reached for his wolf. Fur covered his body. A muzzle appeared. The cat tensed up again, probably realizing it was in the presence of a predator. Asher knew he was a monster in wolf form, but perhaps seeing another shifter in animal form would soothe the tabby cat. Once on all fours, he lay down on the leaf-strewn ground, rested his head on his paws. Harmless.