Why did he find that juxtaposition so damned sexy?
With gentle hands, he placed her on the cool, white blanket, then sat down next to her. His gaze raked over her face. What a fucking vision. Dappled moonlight streamed in through the window to his right, spotlighting her yards of rich, dark hair, beautiful face, pink mouth and long, supple neck. His traitorous gaze moved downward. The tank was gone, now a small, white puddle forgotten in the hallway. All she had on was a bra, and a skimpy one at that. And the creamy slip of lacy fabric barely covered her large breasts.
His mouth watered.
Rein it in, asshole.
The lids of her eyes moved, and she fisted one hand and moaned.
Xavier leaned in and brushed a strand of hair off her pale cheek. Trying not to focus on how soft her skin felt under the rough pads of his fingers, he whispered soothingly, “Everything’s okay, Amalie. You’re home. In your bed.”
Her eyes fluttered open, and for a moment those smoky green orbs displayed extreme confusion. But in seconds, the haze dissipated, and she blinked, her teeth grazing her bottom lip. An action that once again had Xavier’s skin tightening over his muscles.
“Xavier?”
He nodded. “How you feeling?”
She didn’t answer him. Her eyes were pinned to his and her breathing grew labored.
“What?” he asked, concern moving through him. When she’d fallen, had he not caught her in time? Had she hurt herself? “What’s wrong?”
“I’m not a cub.”
Relief moved through him. This wasn’t pain he was seeing in her eyes, but frustration. “I know you’re not,” he said.
“You all treat me like I am.”
“No,” he amended, his voice dark, quiet. “We treat you like you’re special.”
She flinched, then huffed out a breath and looked away, past him. “So I was the last cub born to the Pantera. Who cares? Why does that mean anything different than the second-to-last cub? Or the third? It doesn’t make me special. It just makes me lucky.”
Xavier didn’t want to do this. Have this conversation. Especially not in her moonlit room, sitting on her bed. Granted, he understood the Pantera’s affections and protective ways regarding Amalie, but his actions and reactions were less about her ‘last born’ status and more about his own barely controlled attraction. Truthfully, if she wasn’t Aristide’s sister, he wasn’t all that sure he’d give a good goddamn about the Pantera’s need to keep her sheltered.
“You should sleep now,” he told her.
“I don’t want to sleep.” With a frustrated sigh, she came up on her elbows. “I want to be free. I want to live my own life. I want to be treated like something that can’t be broken with just a simple touch.”
“No touch is simple,” Xavier said quietly. “Trust me.”
“I don’t want to trust you!” she suddenly exploded, sitting all the way up, tears welling in her eyes. “Goddamit!” She threw up her hands. “I want to know it myself! I want to feel it myself!”
“Amalie—”
“I’m a fucking grown female!” she cried, looking down.
“I know.”
Her eyes snapped up to meet his. “Do you?”
His breath caught in his lungs. As much as she was beautiful when she was docile and flirtatious, she was nearly irresistible like this. So impassioned, so vicious, like she wanted to kiss the shit out of him, then knee him in the balls.
His gaze moved over her face, down the smooth column of her neck, then into her spectacular cleavage. Did he know she was a grown female?
Fuck yeah.
“Listen to me, Xavier,” she fairly growled. “If I don’t get broken soon, I’m going to lose my mind.”
“Don’t talk like that,” he growled back, giving her a fierce look, his cock twitching.
“Why not? It’s true. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be touched, wanting to go out and have a good time. Wanting sex.”
Christ, she was killing him. “I’m warning you, Amalie—”
“Just because you don’t see me as a grown female doesn’t mean other males don’t.”
“No males will be getting within ten feet of you,” he declared roughly.
“You can’t say shit like that.”
“I just did.” He stood up. He had to rearrange. He had to get the hell out of this room, out of her airspace before he did something regrettable.
She looked up at him, her eyes deep and dark, her hair wild and falling over her shoulders and between her breasts. “Go home, Xavier.”
He should. He really should.
In fact, he should walk out of this house and never come back. From now on, he and Aristide would meet somewhere else, anywhere else. And when Amalie’s name was brought up, he’d pray for deafness.
Instead, he narrowed his eyes on the half-naked vixen sitting in a pool of white softness before him and said with deadly calm, “I’m not going anywhere.”
One dark eyebrow raised. “Pardonnez-moi?”
“Clearly you can’t be trusted on your own.” He turned and headed for the door, calling over his shoulder, “While Aristide is gone, I’ll be taking care of you.”
CHAPTER THREE
Bastard.
Asshole.
God, she wanted to jump him.
Mal stared, watched Xavier’s exit with hungry, greedy eyes. He looked so good from behind. Even if he was walking away from her.
With a sigh of self-disgust, she dropped back on the pillow and closed her eyes. Truly, it stung that Xavier was staying with her out of obligation—not out of want. Or desire. She’d thought, fantasized, about being alone with him for so long, and now here they were. Not making out as she’d hoped, but residing in two separate rooms, both clothed, both breathing normally, skin not coated in a thin layer of sweat…
She groaned and turned on her side.
And yet, no matter the reason, he was staying.
For three days and three nights.
She wrapped herself around her extra-long pillow and squeezed, a glimmer of something akin to hope and wonder moving through her blood. In her mind, she saw him. Emerging from the bayou, his beautiful brown skin wet, his muscles flexing, his dangerous blue eyes catching hers as he stepped onto the bank.
Naked.
Her skin hummed, and she grinned as old memories and new fantasies collided. She wanted to release this long-held need she had for him, but it just clung so tightly to her. He was perfect. The body of a Hunter, the heart of a Nurturer and the brains of a Geek. He was everything she’d ever wanted.
Well, with one exception.
He refused to see her as grown or sexual or even female.
I’ll be taking care of you.
Her breasts tightened at just the memory of his deep, husky promise, and between her thighs, heat radiated. She was a strong female, passionate, and a truly capable Hunter. Rarely did she lose the prey she sought. And damn, she sought Xavier something fierce. She wanted his touch to be her first. Obligation or not, she’d already ‘captured’ him. Now she just had to make her gorgeous prey see what was right in front of him.
Hugging her pillow close, she drifted off to sleep with a confident, hungry smile.
* * *
I’m @ clinic. Quarantined w/Ashe’s sister. Her blood being tested. Take care of Mal 4 me. 3-4 days, they think. Thx, mon ami. I owe u.
Seated on the couch in Aristide and Amalie’s living room, two of his laptops open on the coffee table in front of him, Xavier read the text from his best friend again. The text he hadn’t even known he’d gotten until one of his Geeks dropped off his phone, along with his laptops, at the house a few hours ago. The thing screamed at him. Gave him the finger. Threatened him with pitchforks, torches and the sharpened claws of a pissed off puma brother.
Goddammit.
Take care of her? Shit, it was like asking a forest fire to take care of a pile of dry brush. But he’d do it. Hell yes, he’d do it. Aristide was his best friend, true, bu
t he was also family. It was Aristide and Amalie’s parents who had helped Xavier’s mother find her smile again after his father’s death. The two Nurturers had always been there for him. For advice, a meal, a place to crash when he was being a hardheaded cub and his mom couldn’t handle him. And he wouldn’t betray them. Not with their own daughter, for fuck’s sake.
His eyes slid to the screen on his right. Along with photos of Isi’s shop, photos of the camera from several different angles and close-ups on the serial number, there was a list of high-end camera shops within a ninety miles radius that carried the model. For the past few hours, he’d been working the web on his second computer, seeing if any of the images from the camera had been uploaded. Then he could backtrack, searching the serial numbers embedded in the jpegs. But so far he hadn’t had any luck. Looked like he was going to have to go through the records of each camera store.
His phone rang, and for a second he thought it might be Aristide. But one glance at the readout and he saw that the call wasn’t coming from the clinic, but from Geek central.
“Xavier.”
“You get anything?” Robby asked. The male Geek had started off as Hunter, but he’d quickly found his home with the other tech heads. Even took on the screen name “Robin Hood” because he was all about stealing information if it helped someone in trouble.
“Not yet,” Xavier told him. “Going to have to do a little breaking and entering.”
“Mmm, my favorite,” he said. “Send me some, I’ve got a few hours to kill before bed.”
“No. I’m going to bring Captain in on this one. I have another job for you.”
“I’m not bringing you pajamas, so don’t even ask.”
Xavier snorted. “Not necessary. First off, because I don’t wear them and second, because Danny brought me everything I need.”
“Too much info, bro. The first part.”
Chuckling, Xavier explained, “I need you to hack into the computer at Isi’s shop, The Care and Feeding of Voodoo.”
“Nice name.”
“Don’t start hatin’, Robin Hood.”
“Fuck you.”
Xavier laughed.
“So, what do you want me to look for, bro?”
“Anything on the computer about Chayton, anything in her emails. Any correspondence with people who have interest in Chayton, or finding her father. Do the store’s website, too. Any posts, questions, comments, that type of thing.”
“You got it.”
“I’m sure she has some kind of firewall up.”
Robby laughed, said arrogantly, “Please.”
“Take it down in under ten seconds and I’ll let you stay on the Geek squad.”
“Under five and I’m the new leader,” Robby countered.
“Keep dreaming, bro.” Staring at the screen, Xavier sobered. “I’m just afraid this guy’s gone completely off the grid.”
“Everyone’s got a footprint, X. You know that.”
“Well, lets hope so. I’ll talk to you later.”
“It is later, bro,” Hood said with a grin in his voice before he hit the end button and killed the connection.
Tossing his cell onto the couch cushions, Xavier glanced at the time on the top of his screen. Five in the morning. Shit, he hadn’t realized how long he’d been at it. Going hard and heavy for five hours straight. Maybe he needed a break. Maybe he needed a drink. Damn, maybe he needed…
Before the thought cleared his brain, his nostrils flared, scenting her arrival seconds before he heard her.
“What’s all this?” Amalie said, moving toward him.
Xavier’s entire body flared with heat, but he didn’t acknowledge her presence until he closed both computers. “Work.”
“More with the human woman?” she asked, her tone only mildly curious as she walked around the side of the couch.
“No, this cybertracking job was a solo all-nighter—”
The words died in his throat, and he inhaled sharply. What the hell—
His breath came out in a rush, and before he could stop it, his puma broke from his control and blazed to the surface of his skin. His hands balled into fists. His mind screamed at the cat to retreat. Never in his life had he experienced such a reaction. Such a wild, instinctual response. To anything or anyone. He didn’t understand it, and quickly forced it back down, beneath his pounding heart where it belonged.
Panting, his eyes raked over the female standing in front of him. “What the hell are you wearing?”
“A towel.” She looked at him like he was crazy. “And was that your puma I just saw? Flashing in and out of your features?”
He shook his head. No. That wasn’t possible. He didn’t do the uncontrolled cat thing. “I’m just tired, that’s all.”
“Then maybe you should get some sleep.” She gestured down the hall, which meant she released the front of her towel with one hand.
Thank fuck she had two.
“Aristide’s bed is available,” she said, her dark eyes glistening. “And mine too, if you’d be more comfortable in a clean and fresh-smelling environment.”
It had been said with halfhearted humor, but once again, the puma inside him rushed upward, flaring to life. What the hell was going on? He glared at Amalie, praying she and her barely clothed self weren’t the cause. Hoping it was truly lack of sleep and maybe lack of food that was making him so edgy.
“Why are you in that goddamn towel?” he ground out.
She cocked her head. “Shower.”
“In the living room?” he countered blackly. “Are you trying to make me crazy?”
Her brows lifted and a smile played about her lips. “Why? Would it work?”
“I’m male, Amalie. And you’re…” His gaze traveled over her and he growled.
“I’m what?” she encouraged.
His eyes narrowed. “A devious brat.”
She laughed. The sound pierced his skin and went straight to his groin.
“Shower’s outside the house remember?” she said.
“Right.” Goddammit. So, this was going to be a regular thing over the next three days? Showering? The untouchable goddess walking around in skimpy towels, making him drool and growl and hunger for things other than food?
“I’m on patrol in an hour,” she said. “Better get soaped up.”
Stay the hell down, he warned his puma. “Next time wear a robe,” he said as she started past him.
She paused, gave him a lopsided smile. “Why?”
“You know why, Amalie.” His tone was like ice. Ice that wanted to be melted in a hot shower with a hotter female.
“You see me as family, right?” she challenged. “So what’s the problem?”
He turned back to his laptops and opened them. “Go. Take your shower. Get to work.”
She chuckled. “Have a good day, Xavier.”
“Yeah, you too,” he muttered to himself.
But she heard him, and called over her shoulder, “Oh, I will.”
Xavier told himself not to turn, not to look, not to watch her move down the hall in that goddamn scrap of white cotton, but it was impossible. Like iron to a magnet, he ripped his eyes from the screen and glanced over his shoulder. With flared nostrils and a tight chest, he watched as her towel slipped down her back to her hips as she sauntered away, giving him a view of her back and the rise of her ass.
This time when his puma rushed to the surface of his skin, he let it.
CHAPTER FOUR
The sun was high in the sky as Mal sprinted along the west border, every so often opening her mouth to taste the air.
It remained.
Always remained.
The sour stench of human intruders. Problem was she couldn’t find the source. She and her partner had been patrolling for six hours straight—and nothing.
Hiss came to an abrupt halt near the footbridge that curved over the small stream that jutted out from the bayou. With a shake of his auburn pelt, he shifted from cat to human male.
Coming up beside him, Mal shifted too. “What? Did you scent something?”
The rugged male Hunter, who wore his dark hair back in a leather thong, shook his head. “It’s the same everywhere we go. Dying land, sour stench, but no clues. No intruders. I don’t get it.”
“They’ll be back. Both human, and any more traitors we harbor.” She gave him a tight grin. “Damn, I’d love to be the one who catches that prey.”
Hiss’s grey eyes flashed. “You and me both.”
“I wonder if they’re camping far enough outside the border to keep their scent quiet.” Releasing a heavy breath, Mal shaded her eyes and looked out over the quiet bayou water. “Maybe we should go take a look.”
A wide grin split the male’s handsome features. “Go hunting across the border?”
“Maybe.”
“Those aren’t our orders.”
She matched his grin and shrugged. “So?”
He laughed. “I like patrolling with you, Mal. Taking risks is important for a Hunter. Keeps us sharp. Keeps our instincts—”
“Oh my god!” Mal exclaimed, cutting him off, her attention suddenly diverted by something she saw out of the corner of her eye.
“What?” Hiss said, alert now. “What is it? Humans?”
Her eyes nearly bugging out of her head, Mal ran to the edge of bayou and waded a foot into the water. “Look.”
Hiss followed her, shading his eyes as he searched the calm surface for whatever she was indicating. When his breath caught in his throat, Mal knew he’d seen it, too.
“I…I didn’t think…” Hiss stumbled over his words. “Merde…with everything that’s happened. With Ashe’s sister, and her strange effects on the land…I didn’t think we’d see it this year. I didn’t think we’d see it ever again. What a miracle.”
Her face growing warm with happiness and pleasure, Mal waded in deeper until she was forced to swim. Her clothes felt heavy in the water, but she didn’t care. She couldn’t believe it. She had to touch it.
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