Eli's eyes had closed after that one brief acknowledgement of her presence, but she had the feeling he was alert. Ready. Coiled to strike. She didn't know how that could be possible, and maybe it was only because she was so terrified and needed to believe it, but she did. That gave her the added confidence to look around her.
She knew he would be there. She had thought he would come alone, but he hadn't. His three top lieutenants, all leopard, were with him. They stood on the ground, just past Eli's body. One held cables in his hands, another the hose. She felt her leopard rise. Fury shook her, replacing terror. But she didn't move a muscle. Only her eyes moved.
He was there somewhere, waiting in silence, wanting her terror to mount. She could feel his anger. The weight of it crushing her, just as it had crushed her when she'd been a helpless child seeking love and approval in his home. She couldn't afford to be crushed by him. Not now. Not when Eli hung from chains and the three leopard lieutenants had obviously been given carte blanche to torture him. She lifted her chin, inhaled, and knew immediately where he was. She turned away from Eli, hating to lose sight of him, but she had to face Rafe.
The moment her gaze found him, at the opposite end of the porch, standing upright in the shadows, he took a step toward her. He was a big man. Built strong and powerful. His features were cut from the same powerful cloth. His cold stare could stop a grown man in full battle mode from moving an inch toward him--even if they had a gun in their hand. She'd seen it happen more than once. Rafe Cordeau had that kind of power. He was handsome. She'd never really noticed that before. And he had charisma. She had noticed that.
"So you found me again," she greeted softly.
"I told you I would always find you, Catarina," he answered, his voice equally as soft.
The tone made her shiver. He never sounded angry. Not like Eli. Rafe didn't give away emotion. His expression was blank, his eyes cold and his tone low and carrying, but with no inflection one way or the other.
"Rafe, I hope you believe me when I tell you that if you hurt him any more--if you kill him--if you do anything at all to him, I will kill myself. You will never have me. Never have any part of me. I'm done with you ruling my life by hurting others."
"He touched you. He's been inside of you. No man lives if he's been inside of you," Rafe said.
"Then I won't live either." She didn't raise her voice, or lose control. This was too important. If Rafe had spent all this time and money hunting her down, it was to dispose of her himself, or to take her back. If he wanted her, she had to make him believe he couldn't keep her alive if he killed another person she cared about. "I can't live like that. I couldn't live with you knowing what you'd done to April."
"I didn't do that to April, you did. You've always known the consequences of running, and you did it anyway."
She shook her head. "I was a child, Rafe. You made me take that responsibility and guilt but it wasn't mine to take. That was you. You chose to hurt her. You took pleasure in hurting her. You knew she was my friend and you killed her in front of me. Did you think I would want to stay with you after that?"
He took another step toward her, glided fluidly, like the leopard he was. She saw his leopard now in his eyes. The need to dominate because she was arguing, defying him. His eyes glittered, focused on her like he would on prey.
"It doesn't matter what you want, Catarina. You belong to me. You always have. The moment I knew that bitch of a woman had something so precious, I knew I would take you from her and protect you." Again there was no inflection in his voice.
The sound of water and then Eli crying out had her spinning around. They were shocking him, running electricity through his wet body. She forced herself to remain still. Lifting one hand she shifted only her arm and hand, a difficult feat that had taken weeks of practice to accomplish. A paw formed where her fingers had been, long, curved razor-sharp claws springing out of them.
She didn't hesitate, bringing the claw to the artery in her neck. Blood trickled. Rafe leapt toward her, covering the distance between them in the blink of an eye, yanking her arm down and away from her jugular.
"You won't be able to stop me, Rafe. They hurt him, I'll do it. I'll kill myself. I'll find a way. That's the deal."
Rafe swore, the first sign of emotion he'd shown. He lifted his hand and instantly the water cut off and Eli stopped twisting and jerking.
"Please let go of me." His touch confused her. His grip on her was gentle, not hard. He held her arm firmly but without any force. She couldn't sustain the shift to just one body part and her leopard subsided, staying just below the surface in case Catarina needed her again.
"Promise me you won't try to harm yourself. We'll work out a deal."
She nodded. "As long as you don't kill or torture him, or harm anyone else I care about, I'll listen to what you have to say, Rafe."
Rafe waved his three lieutenants back, ensuring Eli's safety for the time being. "We'll go in the kitchen and talk," he said, making it an order.
"I don't trust them to stay away from Eli. Get him down from there, first."
"Not a chance, Catarina. I'm giving you this one concession. Go into the kitchen where we can talk alone."
She turned her body toward the screen door, allowing her gaze to sweep over Eli. His head was down as if in defeat, but his eyes had narrowed to slits. She saw the blaze of power there and it steadied her. He had a plan. So did she.
Catarina lifted her chin. "Give me your word that they won't touch him while we're in the house, Rafe."
"Will you believe me?"
She lowered her lashes. "I always believed you, Rafe. You're all I've ever had."
He might say he knew she was precious and he wanted to protect her, but he had known she was a shifter long before he ever removed her from that house of drugs and pain. His home, any home would have been better for a child to be raised in. But he'd left her there until she'd had her first period. Until he feared her leopard might emerge. He hadn't taken any chances, forcing her to live with him then.
She knew he could have taken her earlier, but he hadn't wanted the inconvenience of a small child. He would have had to hire a nanny, someone who might suspect what he did. More--and she suspected it was the real reason--he didn't want to risk her being attached to anyone else.
Catarina knew the soft statement I always believed you, Rafe had gotten to him. She saw his eyes change, the leopard backing off just a little.
"No one will harm him." Rafe lifted his head and pinned his lieutenants with his cold, steely eyes. "I don't want him comfortable, but do nothing more until you're given the order."
She hesitated. There was something in what he said that she'd missed. How he'd said it. She wasn't certain what to do. She needed to comply with Rafe's demands, make him believe she was listening to him, that there was a chance she'd go peacefully with him, but now she was afraid to leave Eli alone with Rafe's shifter lieutenants.
She glanced again at Eli out of the corner of her eye. His nod was nearly imperceptible, meant only for her. She squared her shoulders and moved immediately to stand at the screen. Waiting. Forcing Rafe to open it for her. To acknowledge she was a grown woman and had to be treated with respect. Eli opened doors for her, Rafe needed to do the same.
She stood there nearly a minute before Rafe's hand moved past her to yank the screen open. She swept through it like royalty.
"Would you like a coffee? I can make almost anything."
His gaze scanned the room, landed on the dough she had ready to make the beignets with. He inhaled deeply, dragging in the scent of sex. He couldn't fail to notice it. Fury burned across his expression, making her shiver, and then it was gone and his cool mask was back in place.
"Sit down, Catarina," he said. It was an order, but as usual, he couched it in low, soft tones.
He wanted to build her terror. She could see it was important to him that she feared him. Most of his employees were frightened of him for good reason. If they did something he did
n't like, he took them into a room and scared the hell out of them without ever raising his voice. They did it again, they disappeared, never to be seen, and Rafe's leopard was a very satisfied hunter.
She complied, moving to the chair at the end of the table. She should have known it wouldn't work to try to keep a distance from him. He simply toed a chair close and straddled it, face-to-face with her, his demon eyes burning into her.
"You left again. I told you what would happen. Why did you leave me?"
"You killed April."
"That's it? That's the reason?"
She pressed her lips together and then tugged her lower lip between her teeth briefly to show him she was nervous. "You didn't like me very much, Rafe. I tried so hard and no matter what I did, you pushed me away from you. I hated what you did to April, but even after that I tried to take care of you the only way I knew how, but then you . . ." Deliberately she trailed off. Ducked her head. Looked at her hands, twisting her fingers together in the way she knew he didn't like.
Rafe preferred stillness and he'd been on her all the time about learning to be absolutely still. Now, she realized he'd been preparing her for her leopard in his own way.
He reached out and gently laid his hand over hers to stop the movement of her fingers. "Be still, Catarina," he said, in the same low tone, but his dominant male leopard retreated even a little more.
Without the leopard driving him to dominate or kill, Rafe would be easier to manipulate. She nodded her head and allowed her hands to relax under his. She remembered his hands forcing hers into the well of April's blood and she nearly jerked away from him, the memory was so vivid. She could actually smell the blood for a moment, but she held it together.
This was for Eli. She could do this because Eli made her aware of her own strength. She had outsmarted Rafe once and she could do it again, because it didn't matter right then that she wasn't formally educated. It didn't mean she wasn't intelligent enough to turn the table on Rafe Cordeau. She knew she was.
"You left me because you think I didn't want you?"
She swallowed hard. It was difficult to tell him, because it was the truth. She had tried so hard and felt so alone and unloved. She'd gone to try to see her stepmother, hoping the memories of her childhood were skewed and maybe the woman did love her. Then she'd lost April, and she'd retreated from everyone, horrified, ashamed and guilty. She'd needed Rafe to reassure her. To come to her and hold her. To make things right, even when intellectually she knew there was no right to what he'd done. He hadn't. He'd left her alone with her nightmares, guilt and shame.
She knew Rafe could hear the ring of truth in her voice, she could see it in his eyes, in the way he looked at her. His thumb slid over the back of her hand.
"Don't stop, Catarina. I need to know everything. I need to understand. If I understand what happened, what drove you away from me, it will help determine how all this ends and if that man will live out his life safely or not."
Her stomach muscles clenched. Hard knots formed. It took a lot of control to breathe normally and not give in to the desire to jerk her hands away. The worst of it all was she felt sorry for him. He seemed so alone and she'd hurt him. She didn't want to see that, but she did.
"Do you remember the dinner you had with the Lospostos family? I was so careful. I wanted you to be proud of me. More, I wanted you to look good to them. I chose every dish so carefully and prepared it. It took me hours. Even the bread was made from scratch. Everything was perfect. They loved it. They loved the dessert. And then you forced me to read that poem. You knew I couldn't read. You wanted to make fun of me. Worse, you wanted them to make fun of me."
The memory brought heat to her face. She would never be able to look back on that night without feeling the embarrassment of her lack of education. Rafe had done it on purpose, and no matter what he said now, he could never take the moment back.
"You said I was good in the kitchen, but not good for much else. I heard you. You laughed. They laughed. You implied I had a subpar IQ and couldn't learn anything in school."
She allowed her lashes to lift because she knew he'd see genuine pain there. She didn't want to show it to him. The only person she trusted enough to see her that vulnerable was Eli, but this was for Eli.
Rafe's fingers tightened around her hand. "I had no choice, Catarina. None. They had noticed you. They asked too many questions and they wanted to meet you. I couldn't have them speculating on whether or not you meant something to me. That would have put you in danger."
"You want me to believe you humiliated me in front of your friends because somehow that would keep me out of danger?" Catarina poured incredulity into her voice.
She kept her gaze from shifting toward the kitchen door through sheer willpower. She'd have to check on Eli soon. She couldn't stand not knowing if he was all right or not. There had been something in Rafe's look when he'd directed his men to leave Eli alone. She didn't believe that Eli was entirely safe.
"They aren't friends," he said, leaning toward her, his eyes steady on hers. "They are dangerous people I'm forced to do business with. I have one weakness. Only one. You make me vulnerable. If others know it, especially a crime family as dangerous as the Lospostos, you can be used as a weapon against me. What that means, Catarina, is they may take you and torture you. They may send you back to me in pieces. I wasn't willing to risk you for your pride."
She heard the truth in his voice and she didn't want to. Her heart already bled for him--this man lost to his past--to the parents who abused and corrupted him. There was no redemption, no going back from what he'd done.
She licked her lips, forcing her mind to stay on Rafe and away from Eli. She knew Eli had a plan and she had to trust him, although what he could do hanging from chains with three male leopards who obviously hunted humans with Rafe in the swamp was beyond her comprehension.
"Rafe, I grew up in your home."
"It's your home too, Catarina." His tone, still low, was very firm and decisive.
"I'm quite a lot smarter and more observant than you ever gave me credit for."
"I'm well aware of that, although I've always known you were intelligent. I just underestimated you. I thought if I kept you from school, it would slow you down a little. Instead, you accelerated. That was my mistake and one I won't make again with you."
She didn't know if that was praise or a warning. "The point is, I used your computer for my education, not my own. I hacked you. I know your business. I know what you do."
"I'm very aware of that." Now he did sound proud of her.
That pride made her heart ache all the more. "I know the arms deals. The drug deals. The prostitutes and even contract kills you arranged. I know where your money is. I'm a danger to you and to every business partner you have."
"I've been aware of that for some time, Catarina." He sat back, for the first time letting go of her. "You never once cooperated with law enforcement. You didn't go to them. You refused to give them anything this time, even when you knew I would find out where you were the moment they brought you to a police station. You knew I would come after you. And you knew I'd find you. Still you didn't take their deal. That's not fear, Catarina. That's loyalty. I've never once had anyone loyal to me. Anyone looking out for me. Not unless I paid them. You gave that to me."
It wasn't altogether a lie. There was more truth in his statement than she wanted to believe. He'd killed, and still there was a part of her that protected him and she didn't understand why. She kept thinking she could find a way to save him. He'd grown up in what could only have been a nightmare world, but so had Jake Bannaconni. Jake had found a morality, lines he would never cross; Rafe had turned to killing to ease his own pain.
"What about those people you allow your leopard to hunt in the swamp, Rafe?" she asked quietly.
His eyes flickered, darkened. She saw the threat of his leopard there. The focused, piercing stare of the hunter. "I don't kill those people, Catarina. My leopard does. It's the only
way I can restrain him. Every one of them was an enemy."
"You brought women to our home to sleep with you. You hunted them. How could they be the enemy?"
"You go too far," he hissed. "Do you have any idea how dangerous this conversation is for you?"
"I want to understand the things I didn't as a child. The things about you that scared me. I'm giving you all the reasons I ran from you, Rafe. You were everything to me. My whole life. There was no one else. Only you. You didn't hold me. You didn't reassure me when I needed it. I tried to hold on. I tried to understand. But I knew what you were doing and it frightened me, especially when I felt her. My leopard. I was afraid she would hunt with yours. That she was a killer."
He studied her face. He reached out and touched her hair gently. So gently. His fingers slid through the silky length and then he tucked it behind her ear. She realized he really thought he could persuade her to leave Eli and go back with him. To do that, he had to know he'd have to kill Eli. Eli would never let her go, and if there was one thing Rafe was good at, it was reading other men. He'd know that. Somewhere in Rafe's mind, he believed he could make her see that it was the right thing to do. The thought that Rafe was that far gone saddened her.
"You don't understand about leopards, sweetheart. They need freedom to be who and what they are. They're at the top of the food chain. If I don't let mine run free and hunt the way he was meant to, his mood affects me and I become dangerous. Better a prostitute than some innocent woman."
"Did your leopard hunt my mother?"
"She wasn't your mother. She intended to use you for prostitution. She told me so herself when she came back demanding more money for you."
Her heart stuttered in her chest. She couldn't help herself. She wrapped her arms around her body and rocked herself gently back and forth. "I need a drink of water, Rafe."
"I'll get it for you. This is a lot to take in." He stood, his eyes on her just in case, and walked to the sink.
She waited for him to fill a glass with water before feeling quickly under the table for the weapon taped there. The moment her fingers found it, she dropped her hands to her lap, twisting her fingers together. She knew he would focus on that. He hated that she couldn't keep still when she was nervous or agitated.
Cat's Lair Page 36