Mateo, a jaguar nagual descended from Mayan shamans, attends the Northern Nevada Con-fur-ence furry convention to hide in plain sight. Who will look twice at a long, black tail and inhuman yellow eyes when there are neon huskies and dancing dragons around? There Mateo meets Dazi, a mountain lion skin-walker who is at the con with friends from his Shoshone-Paiute reservation. They want to find out if the furries are close to stumbling across their tribe of shifters. When these two big cats rub up against each other, their cultures collide in a way neither Mateo nor Dazi could predict. But Mateo has trouble being entirely human around his alluring new companion, and Dazi puts his tribe at risk when he reveals their secrets to an outsider. Can Mateo and Dazi overcome their natural secretive and bestial instincts to find their purr-fect ending?

Beasts Like Us

“He will mention you, of course,” Kuhma told Mateo. “If we knew exactly what you were, he would tell them more, but he’ll most likely describe you as that guy who probably knows everything by now. They won’t like that.”


Mateo started whispering in Kuhma’s ear. Dazi could pick up snatches of what he said, and it was nothing new. However, seeing Mateo so close to Kuhma like that, even for such an innocuous reason, Dazi felt jealousy and shame. Mateo was right. Dazi had been acting like a cornered animal since they got back, but in his defense this was all strange to him. He was used to being around his own kin, and keeping silent around anyone else. Here, he could say little truths, so long as he made it sound like wishful thinking. It made him feel sick to his stomach, and the guilt from upsetting Mateo wasn’t helping.


Chapter 22