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that doesn’t mean that during the time when I am here, on the pride, not threatening exposure to anyone, that I deserve to be treated like a fucking child . I’m not four anymore, Tyler, and you aren’t my father. So back. The fuck. Off.” His claws were out, his teeth sharp, and his shoulders hunched under the urge to shift, but he fought it back and managed to stay in mostly human form.
    Tyler watched him with expressionless passivity. At least he stopped petting the damn claw marks on the Jeep.
    “Respect is earned, Michael,” he said in a quiet rumble, the growl in his voice the only indication that his animal was up too.
    “I’ve earned it,” Michael snapped. “The only thing I haven’t done is what I’m not able to do. In every other way, I’ve been a full, adult member of this pride for six years. All I’m asking is to be treated like one.”
    Michael didn’t give his brother a chance to get in the last word. He was done listening. He slammed out of the garage and ran across the ranch compound to his bungalow. He forced himself to stay in human form, if only to prove that he could. He focused on the heat and the feel of sweat against his furless skin, the beat of his soft-soled shoes against the dirt path. It was pure ornery stubbornness, but he refused to let the lion out. Denying the shift was like ignoring a piece of his soul. He wanted to punish it, even if it was punishing himself. The lion was destroying his life, taking Mara away from him, stealing the respect he deserved.
    Michael ran into his bungalow. He kicked off his shoes and stripped off his shirt, but still he didn’t shift. Instead, he pressed his hands against the door, concentrated on the wood grain beneath his palms, and forced the animal back.

Chapter Five

    “Momma!”
    Mara’s heart lurched as the pigtailed girl streaked across the schoolyard. She flung herself into the air with a blind certainty that her momma would never let her fall. Instinctively, the muscles in Mara’s arms contracted, preparing to catch that squirming bundle of eager young shape-shifter.
    But she wasn’t that momma. She wasn’t anybody’s momma.
    The momma in question looked more like an escapee from cheer practice than anyone’s mother, complete with pink streamers in her high ponytail. She tossed her little girl, Sanka, high into the air and caught her giggling, squirming form.
    A savage pang of jealousy squeezed Mara’s heart. This was why she was leaving the pride, why she’d put Michael through that awful fight last night. So she could be someone’s momma and cuddle that precious baby against her heart whenever she wanted. So she would never again have to experience the jabs of bright green envy when her charges’ mommas and daddies came to fetch them at the end of the school day.
    It wasn’t fair. Tria could skip a birth-control shot at seventeen, get knocked up at the first dirty look from a randy lion, and name her child after a crappy decaf coffee, while Mara devoted her life to teaching and nurturing other shifter’s children, was the prototype for a responsible, stable parent, would never name her child after food or drink, and yet she didn’t have a child of her own. How was that for justice?
    Tria bounded over to her, a puppy in a Playmate’s body. She bounced her daughter on her hip and flashed Mara a sparkling smile—equal parts eager and vacant. Whatever Tria’s failings—and Mara was petty enough to mentally list them whenever the opportunity presented itself—the girl really did love her daughter and was fiendishly invested in her education.
    “How’d she do today? Did she, like, get that L, M, N and O are all separate letters? We’ve totally been practicing,” Tria vowed, as if Sanka’s ABCs were right on par with World Hunger and Nuclear Proliferation in global importance. Which, to Tria, they totally were.
    “She’s doing great,” Mara soothed the nervous mommy. “Sanka’s developing right on