Beneath the Skin: de La Vega Cats, Book 3

by Lauren Dane

  Gibson grabbed Mia’s hand and squeezed it a moment, the hint of a smile on his lips.

  Mia leaned close and told him, “My brothers once got blood all over one of my mom’s rugs, and she made them both camp out in the backyard in a tent for a week.”

  Kendra’s gaze lit with amusement. “Your mom sounds pretty awesome. Max, maybe your father needs to make you and Galen work out of the parking lot instead of letting you in the building. He’s still mad you two broke the chair in his office.”

  Jaguar males tended to be very physical with those they trusted and loved. So it often meant brothers and friends would get into knock-down, drag-out brawls over silly stuff. Because they healed so fast, it wasn’t unusual to include broken bones.

  She was glad Gibson didn’t seem to do it like Max and Galen, though. She supposed he had less freedom to do such things because he was the Bringer. He was very serious about his job, and if he started popping people in the nose, it might seem like punishment instead of roughhousing.

  Max and Galen picked up the stuff they’d knocked over and then looked to Mia and Gibson. “Hey you two. Come watch the game with us. Super Bowl 43.”

  “Nice! But first I have work-related things to discuss.”

  Max’s smile dimmed as he got serious. “All right. Let’s all sit down.”

  They did and Gibson briefed them on the info he’d discovered and the plan to go down to Tennessee the following day.

  “I’m going to take Dario and leave Matt and Robby here on you two.”

  Max nodded. “Fine, fine. Take however many cats you need to. I can’t believe I missed the Bertram/Alberto connection.”

  “I didn’t see it either.” Gibson shrugged.

  “I want you to report back frequently. And if for a moment you think Bob and the new jamboree leadership has anything to do with it, you’ll get the fuck out of there and contact me.”

  “This can’t go unanswered.” Gibson paused to take a drink.

  “We don’t know for sure that it’s really Tito. It’s a hunch.”

  “Your hunches are spectacularly accurate, Gibson.” Max blew out a breath. “Mia, you stay safe, please.”

  “Of course.”

  “And keep Gibson safe too.” Renee tipped her chin toward Gibson.

  She grinned, but it was more feral than amused. “I will.”

  “I’m going to hold off telling Dad. It’s best to wait. If we have to hurt him with this all over again, I’d rather be totally sure.”

  Max agreed. “Yes, that’s best I think. You’ve gone up the chain correctly by telling me. Mia, don’t get hurt. I’m totally afraid of your grandmother.”

  Mia laughed as the tension in the room eased a little. “She’d totally eat you up and spit you out if she had to.”

  “It’s a good trait in a female.” Max looked to his wife with a smile.

  Two steps inside the front door and Gibson had his hands on her as he pressed her against the wall, holding her there with his body. The need was always between them, just waiting to explode. But that evening had been… Well he’d known they’d stepped into a whole new stage of their relationship.

  She understood him in ways he’d never experienced outside his family. She didn’t judge him for what he had to do. And when she did judge, it was legitimate, even if he didn’t agree.

  “You’re a singular female,” he managed to say as he broke the kiss.

  “I am?” A smile quirked up one side of her mouth and he had to kiss it.

  “Yes. Goddamn, I want you, Mia.”

  “Take me then.”

  He pulled the front of her blouse open, sending buttons flying. She gasped, and the sound caressed his skin, driving his cat mad with need. Her bra was open just seconds later and he dipped to taste her skin, growling when she tugged his dreads. As if he was going anywhere now that his mouth was on her nipple.

  She moaned. “I’m going to knock this photo off the wall. My head is too close.”

  He picked her up, his mouth still on her, and she held on as he walked her into the living room and deposited her on the arm of the couch. “Now, I can’t very well eat your pussy with your pants on.”

  She made quick work of them and stood there bare to the bone. What she felt was in her gaze, and it humbled both man and cat. She gave herself to him like the gift she was. And there was no denying what she was. Not then. Not when she’d been so raw and honest with him.

  He dropped to his knees before her, hugging around her waist, simply breathing her in for a moment. Her arousal spiced the air, teasing his senses. “Sit on the couch arm. I’m going to lick you until you scream and then I’m going to fuck you. I’ve wanted to bend you over this couch pretty much since I met you.”

  She sat, her fingertips tracing over his brows, down his nose and over his lips. “You’re beautiful.”

  He snorted, but he knew she meant it. And that humbled.

  He kissed her ankle, always so delighted by the softness that wrapped the iron-hard strength of muscles just beneath. Up her calf to that spot behind her knee that always made her gasp. And she did.

  Up the velvet softness of her inner thigh and to her pussy where she was desire swollen and slick. Just waiting for him. He growled against her flesh and she gasped. This was his. She was his and that was that.

  He took a long lick. Over and over as her taste owned him. Marked him as assuredly as his teeth had marked her shoulder. He scooted her a little forward so he could get at her better, holding her open with his shoulders as he went back to her cunt. Beautiful as the rest of her. Her taste dug in with sharp claws as he tickled the underside of her clit with the tip of his tongue. His thumb slid back and forth over her asshole, and she shivered as he kept licking and sucking.

  Her hand was on his shoulder for purchase, and he knew he’d have half-moon marks from where her nails were digging into his flesh. His cat approved of her for that. His female marking him, letting anyone who looked close know there was a female who’d claw and scratch if anyone got too close.

  She shook all over as he sucked her clit into his mouth, in between his lips over and over and over until she exploded all around him, as he eagerly lapped her up while she calmed a little.

  He stood moments later, and she watched through half-open eyes as he undid his belt and jeans to pull his cock out.

  There was no time to get undressed. He needed her right then. He helped her up and spun her to bend her over the back of the couch. The arm was too low to get in deep and hard.

  And that’s what he needed.

  He was inside and hissing at how good it felt within the space of two breaths. She pushed back against him, taking him in all the way. He looked at the line of her back. Her scars were fading more each day as she got better, as her outside healed. He knew the inside would take longer.

  She was elegant, this little cat. Petite but strong. Demanding. Vicious when she needed to be.

  Her skin glistened with sweat as he fucked into her body. Her muscles bunched and relaxed under the hands he had at her waist to control his speed and depth.

  His cat was restless just beneath the skin. Wanting to claim. He needed to run with her, he realized. But right then? He leaned down and licked. Licked at the salt of her skin, groaning as it mixed with the spice of her pussy, still on his lips.

  His mouth watered and then he bit hard. Marking her. On purpose this time. With full knowledge and desire to do so. This was not merely a heat-of-the-moment bite. He was marking her as a declaration of intent.

  She gasped and said his name so very softly, and yet filled with so much emotion that he couldn’t hold back a second longer. He increased his pace, harder and harder, faster and faster until he spun finally over that edge and came so hard he had to close his eyes against it.

  Chapter Twelve

  “She’s carrying? You two are a perfect match,” Dario muttered as they waited for her to get into the rental car.

  He’d loved to watch her fly the plane, and
she’d been kind enough to let him sit in the cockpit with her for some time as she did. Her attention was totally different when she worked. Intense at times. So intense it was like nothing else existed but that.

  And they’d arrived. She’d suggested they do so an hour before he’d told Bob they were arriving. She was sneaky that way. Another trait he liked about her. She’d handled the rental car, insisting on keeping that low profile.

  “She’s certainly not a female who needs to be babied or taken care of.” She was self-sufficient. His mother had said she had moxie and that was totally true. Independent enough to drive him crazy. But there was something amazing in the way she let him take care of her when it mattered most.

  She had baggage. As did he. But she was a full-grown female who knew her mind and that was the sexiest thing ever.

  She got in. “All right. The paperwork is fine. Let’s go.”

  It was Dario who drove them to the first stop, Bertram’s home.

  “Park a few blocks away. Let’s take the alley. I don’t want to be seen just yet.”

  She approached with him, pausing to peek into the trashcans. Which were full. “Karl, I want you on this. Bring this into the garage or the backyard and look through the bags.”

  “I can’t believe they haven’t done this by now,” Mia said quietly.

  “They’re having to start from scratch. This is a small jamboree. I think it’s more a matter of just not having the training to run an investigation rather than incompetence or collusion with Bertram.”

  She snorted but held her tongue.

  They looked around the backyard and then let themselves into the house. The nearest neighbor was on the other side of a very large hedge and fence, and the houses were on big lots so he was hopeful they hadn’t been noticed.

  “I’ll take these rooms. Dario, you take the second floor. Mia, the basement.”

  She nodded and he wanted very much to tell her to be careful. But he didn’t because he didn’t say it to Dario and he knew she would be anyway.

  He wasn’t more than five minutes into searching the kitchen when she came back up the stairs. “Found a hidey-hole.”

  He called Dario and they headed downstairs. There was a washer and dryer at one end and a pool table at the other. And a panel she must have removed just behind the washer.

  “There was a lockbox in it.” She indicated the large box on the pool table. He popped the lock and opened it up to find pictures, birth certificates, property deeds and other types of paperwork.

  Most of it was for Bertram and Sharon Cole. But the pictures were another story.

  “It’s him.” Gibson held a picture of his uncle with his grandfather and had to swallow back the lump in his throat.

  Dario took the property deeds. “This is for the house we’re in now. But there are others. They might offer some clues as to his current whereabouts.”

  “Call it in to Galen so he can look into it.”

  Dario moved to do exactly that.

  “No passports,” Mia spoke up. “And the birth certificates are photocopies. It’s easier to carry off a fake with a photocopy. That’s probably how they got the original documents with the new names.”

  “Why assume they had passports?”

  “They had a hidey-hole. They have all these other documents. I bet they had a lot of cash stashed around too. It costs a lot of money to run.”

  “He didn’t run though. He’s orchestrating this entire thing.”

  “While he’s on the run. Not to South America, I never thought that story was true. But he’s away from home. He can’t use his bank accounts. They ran before too. He’s got to have been prepared enough to have passports just in case. I would have. You would have too.”

  Gibson nodded. He did indeed have stashes of cash here and there should he ever have to run.

  “Let’s see how many other hidey-holes we can find.”

  In the end there had been three more hidden stashes around the property. Mia had a great eye. And apparently a penchant for great hiding places.

  As they’d had all the assorted things spread out on the bed of their hotel room, he’d turned to her. “How did you find them all?”

  “I was a teenage girl. I had a hidey-hole of my own. I’m sure my parents didn’t care about my diary, but I have two brothers and they would have. So I learned to hide things. And I got some training for it.”

  “As a teenage girl?”

  She laughed. “No, silly. How to spot someone who might be strapped with a suicide bomb. Or how to notice when cars looked a little different, or the road. Lots of IEDs killed our soldiers, you know. Anyway, it wasn’t what I did personally, thank God. But I thought the training would be useful and so I took it. I learned a lot, but I never imagined I’d need it back here.”

  “Whatever the reason, I’m glad for it.”

  She looked at him, reaching out to touch his face. He leaned into her palm, settling a little at the simple gesture. “I’m glad too. It’s hard for you.” She kissed him softly. Dario was off in his room working with the others on all the data they’d found that day, so it was just them and he could be soft.

  She gave him that. That solace.

  “I wish it wasn’t this way. But you didn’t make it so. They started it, but you have to end it. And I’m sorry. But I have confidence in you. The Bringer is the heart of the jamboree. Sometimes justice comes with blood.”

  He swallowed words he didn’t know how to say. They’d declared war when they came into de La Vega territory. There was no way around it. And no way around how he had to respond.

  With that spooky second sense she had, she seemed to understand he needed to back off and process the emotions that’d been stirred that day. “Take a shower. I’ll keep looking through this. You’re supposed to be meeting Bob in forty-five minutes.”

  She turned back to the bed, sifting through the papers and making notes.

  “You should join me.”

  She rolled her eyes. “We’d be really late if that happened.”

  “Sure, but it’d be worth it,” he tossed over a shoulder as he went into the bathroom.

  He had incontrovertible evidence that Bertram Cole was really his cousin Alberto. He sighed as he soaped up. He hadn’t wanted it to be so. He’d wanted it to be about something other than this. Anything other than this, damn it. He hated that his father would hurt anew over it. Max was on his way over to their parents’ home right then to tell him face to face. He felt for Max, who also wanted to avoid hurting Cesar.

  They’d met with a few neighbors and went to the school Tito’s kids had attended. They’d disappeared the day before their father had sent all those cats into de La Vega territory.

  What a fucking mess this whole thing was.

  Yet, what a boon she’d been on the trip. He’d thought he’d ceased to be amazed at how good she was at things, but that day had shown him she was even better than he’d thought. Her military training had been a blessing. He wasn’t sure he’d have found everything without her eye.

  And he liked having her at his side. Liked knowing that she understood how upsetting it was for him. Liked that she pushed on, knowing it had to be done. It was entirely new for him, letting himself depend on another in such a way. Sure he was fine with the investigation and the work of a Bringer. But she knew him on a different level and that was comforting in a way he wasn’t quite sure he understood fully.

  “So, for fifteen years Alberto built a base of power here. He bided his time and gathered resources. This was not a momentary explosion of anger. This was premeditated. With their foray into de La Vega territory without permission they flirted with war, but when they shot me they declared it.”

  But not openly and honestly. And that offended Gibson. No, everything his cousin had done was cowardly. And cowards were far worse than other kinds of threats because cowards had no core values. They had no honor. One couldn’t palaver with a coward because you couldn’t trust their word or deed. And if
you had no options to avoid war, you had to fight and you had to win.

  And he could see Bob understood that clearly.

  “Whatever you need from us, you have. We take responsibility for what Bertram, um, Alberto and our other cats have done. But we ask for your mercy.”

  He’d checked in with Max before they’d arrived, and his brother didn’t want to punish Smithville for what their cousin and his men had done. If they found no one in the current leadership or general membership was involved. They were a very small jamboree. Less than ten remaining members after Alberto had left. Each member was being investigated by de La Vega and if a single shred of evidence was raised, the tenuous deal they made now would be null and de La Vega would extract their price.

  “My Alpha has decreed that so long as no one left here is in league with, or, having aided our cousin, you will be spared. But if we find out different, Bob, you know the price.”

  The other Alpha nodded. “I do. Thank you.”

  They finished their dinner, having questioned Bob and his inner circle, and went back to the hotel.

  “I don’t think he’s here in Tennessee,” Gibson said in the dark as he and Mia lay naked, limbs entwined.

  “I don’t think so either.”

  “Tell me why.”

  He’d taken to doing that. He asked her opinion, but wanted to know how she came up with it. Gibson understood the world in ways most didn’t. He liked to know the why of things, not just the facts. It made him even better at his job and it flattered her that he cared to know.

  “Jamborees are like the military. When they’re run well anyway. There’s a clear chain of command. Rules of conduct. Certain people do certain things. These cats who attacked you are true believers, but I don’t know that any we’ve seen so far have been strong enough to continue to run this operation without a leader. And not over the phone.” Cats didn’t work that way anyway. The power of an alpha was far stronger in person. “He’s in Boston or nearby.”

  “This is personal for Alberto. He wants to see the carnage firsthand. It won’t be enough to get a report.”