His Prowl

Part 8

Chapter 8

Isaac watched her with narrow eyes.  They may not be shifting or fighting this group of snow leopards, but that doesn’t mean Sydney can let her guard down.  Instead of standing by his side, as she was supposed to do, she was sauntering towards Blake with a small smirk on her face.  What was she doing?

She reached Blake.  Running her hand down his arm, she snagged his hand.  Smiling up at him, she said, “Why don’t you introduce me?”

Isaac stiffened, but quickly relaxed his body.  It would do no good for people to know his emotions.  Showing them his body language was enough for them to learn secrets that could be used against him.  Blake’s blank expression suddenly changed into a smile.  Either the man knew what Sydney was up to, or he was going to go along with the plan either way.

"This is Sydney,” Blake said.

The woman tilted her head to the side, causing her white waves to curtain her face.  Isaac couldn’t see the expression on her face, but he knew that Blake had a clear view.  Sydney held her hand out, palm facing the ground.  The snow leopard stood still, before finally saying, “I’m Kris.”

“Kris?  You mother want a boy?” Sydney asked, keeping her hand out.

Kris reached out and flipped Sydney’s hand.  “You are not superior to me, and to answer your question, no.”

Isaac bit his lip as Sydney’s face turned from calm to outrage.  The girl did not like to be one upped, and Kris had just challenged her.  If they wanted, Sydney could issue a challenge, but Isaac knew she wouldn’t do anything of the sort.

“How would you know?  Who are you?  You obviously are not strong enough to be the leader.”

“I am the future leader of our people,” Kris answered.  “I have more power than you.  If you think that I am lying, ask someone else who can detect who has the most.”

“Someone,” Sydney drawled out, “like Blake?”

Kris flipped her hair behind her back, finally letting Isaac see her controlled expression.  Something was going on between the two girls, and Isaac had no idea what it was.

“Just like Blake.”

Sydney looked up again and fluttered her eyelashes at Blake.  “Blakey, who has more power.”

Since when did Sydney give pet names to anyone?  The entire time he knew her, the nicest thing she called him was not stupid.  To her, that was as good as it got.  What was this girl up too?  Isaac didn’t know, but what he did know was that her excessive touching was bothering him.  Now, if he had been in Blake’s place, it would have been a different story.  It wasn’t his arm she was rubbing though, it was Blake’s.

“She does,” Blake answered, obviously not catching onto the plan because Sydney’s face flashed with exasperation before turning back to its flirty mask. 

“Told you,” Kris said with a tiny smile towards Blake before dropping Sydney’s hand.

Actions began to snap together in Isaac’s mind.  Scenes came together like puzzle pieces, finally giving him the entire image.  Sydney was trying to get Kris to challenge her, not for the power, but for Blake.  Sydney wanted Kris to fight for Blake.  Isaac’s next question was, did she really want Blake?  Or was she just helping a friend in need?

Sydney fought the urge to smack the back of Blake’s head.  A person would think that the kid had problems, because no matter how hard she tried to make him comprehend, he didn’t understand.  He didn’t take her slight hints, or her blunt ones. 

For example, at that exact moment, he was still staring at Kris with slight adoration on his face.  Did the man not know what expression was on his face?  Did he not realize that he was already a little smitten?  There was a problem though.  Kris was scared.

Sydney knew how it was to like a man who was stronger than she was, and with Queen’s power running through him, Blake was more powerful than he believed.  Not only that, but Kris would also have to worry about the bond.  In most cases, if the king happened to die, the bond mate took over.  He came in as a new mate, helped father any children the queen had, and helped run their people.

The entire time Kris was with Blake, she would worry about that situation.  One thing that Kris did not, and would not understand until they saw Sebastian and Alexandria together, was that Alex would never settle for Blake.  She would never be able to switch men.  When Sydney saw a true match, she knew it, and Alexandria and Sebastian were true matches.

“What brings you here?” Kris asked, snapping Sydney out of her thoughts.

Smiling at the beautiful woman, Sydney felt a little intimidated.  She would never admit it though, as she widened her smile.  “We were sent by our queen.  Just as Blake had said.  Now, we need to find a woman.”

“What woman?”

Sydney narrowed her eyes at Kris.  “If you would stop interrupting me, I may be able to tell you the details.”

“Carry on,” Kris commanded while impatiently rolling her hands around in the air.

“Her name is Evelyn,” Sydney explained, “and we have a belief that she may be residing in this area.”

“She isn’t here.”

“Then, you wouldn’t mind to let us have a look around, would you?”

Kris smiled, showing off her sharpened k-9 teeth.  “Not at all, actually, now that I am thinking about it, Zeke may have warned me of your arrival.”

“Isn’t that convenient,” Sydney, mumbled in true relief.  It was about time they were treated as quests.

“He told me to let you fend for yourself.  No help from us whatsoever.”

“Really?” Sydney asked in disbelief.  “What else did he tell you?”

Kris’s eyebrow scrunched up in concentration.  “Hold on, he’s telling me now.  Oh, he also says that the two or three of you need to go through what we did as a child.”

“Another mind thing?” Blake whined.

Kris shook her head at him.  “No, Zeke can just talk to me this way.  We don’t know why, it may have something to do with us sharing the same blood.”

“I have a question,” Isaac said, speaking up for the first time.

Kris turned towards him.  “Hit me.”

“You want me to hit you?” he asked with undisguised confusion in his voice.

Her light blue eyes rolled.  “It’s an expression.  It means, go ahead and ask.”

Isaac gave the snow leopard his signature grin, causing a pang of jealousy to shot through Sydney. “Okay, what exactly did you go through as a child?”

A large evil smile crossed Kris’s face.  “You three are going to have so much fun.”

Looking at her grin, Sydney knew that her words were a lie.  Whatever the snow leopard had planned was not going to be fun.