by Anne Marsh
“This is where I make my living. I know these waters—there’s nowhere safer for me.”
She loved the bayou, and from what she’d seen he did, too. No way would she trade this wide-open space for the four walls of the bayou towns and the efficiency apartments she’d rented over the years. Eventually, she’d given up and moved onto her boat permanently. It wasn’t like she needed all that much stuff.
There was enough light now to see Landry’s expression. He eyed her, his gaze moving over her face and down, like he was memorizing what he saw. His lips firmed—getting ready to issue orders again—and before she could stop herself she was remembering what it had felt like to touch those lips. To taste him. The man was a sensual feast, and once hadn’t been enough. She had a suspicion she’d never get enough of this man, and that was trouble right there. Because she suspected Landry Breaux would always have somewhere else to go. He wasn’t the settling-down type, not him.
And yet she wanted to bring him back to her boat, let him into the life she had out here on the water. Keep him close by her side when anyone with eyes in their head knew he was the kind of man who ranged free and far. She didn’t doubt he’d enjoyed himself with her, but he wasn’t going to love her, and he damned certain wasn’t going to stay.
Not for long.
“You head on back,” she suggested, getting dressed beneath the sleeping bag’s cover. Silly to feel shy now, but she was done. He didn’t get a show with dinner, not tonight.
There was no compromise in Landry. “No.”
Bending swiftly towards her, he snaked an arm beneath her and effortlessly hoisted her into the air as he stood.
“Landry,” she protested, pushing against his chest. He simply tightened his grip, bending and scooping up the rest of her stuff with his other hand. The raw power of him was unexpected. She’d known he was strong, had seen it earlier in the day as he and Dre pulled the oysters from the lease hour after hour.
“I wan’ you back on that boat.” He didn’t look down at her, just started back up along the bayou bank, stepping confidently. The darkness didn’t bother him in the least. And he moved silently, like a graceful predator, sidestepping branches and other pitfalls.
Hell.
He acted possessive.
And defensive. Like he truly believed there was something or someone out there ready and waiting to hurt her.
She wriggled and tried again. “You want to talk about this?”
“Nope.” Watchful and predatory, his gaze moved from side to side, quartering the shadows and scanning both banks, but the thumb stroking her collarbone was almost tender. “Don’ fight me on this one, sha. I can’t let you win.”
She’d spent a lifetime avoiding conflict—while fighting for the right to stand on her own two feet. His alpha-male crap should have had her running for the hills, but instead the rough-tender tone in his voice was a lure she didn’t want to resist. She could stand her ground tomorrow. Right now, she wanted more of the satisfied, sensual glow he’d wrapped her in. Now, she could sleep.
“At least put me down,” she countered. “Let me walk.”
She didn’t need to be carted back to the boat like a recalcitrant child—or a lover.
He never took his eyes off their surroundings, but a smile flickered at the corner of his mouth. “I like carryin’ you.”
As soon as he got her onto the Bayou Sweetie, he set her on her feet and dropped a hard kiss on her lips.
A quick fast glance around the deck turned up Riley, still snug in her sleeping bag, but no sign of Dre.
“I’m goin’ to go take a little look-see. You be ready to get out of here,” Landry warned. “Be ready to go when I say.”
Before she could protest, he’d slipped over the side of the Bayou Sweetie and disappeared into the dark.
###
“Let me go and live another day, wolf boy.”
Dre ignored the offer and palmed his hunting knife, keeping his eyes on the dealmaker currently kneeling in the bayou mud. Close contact with the dirt hadn’t done the vamp’s threads any favors. Still, despite the dirt and worse on the pinstripe fabric, the male looked too damned confident for someone with one blade in his shoulder and another headed for his throat. He certainly didn’t look like he belonged out here in the bayou.
Condescending prick also hadn’t processed the memo about the new change in management. Wolf boy didn’t heel anymore. If the vamps came after the Pack, the Pack fought back—and fought to kill. Dre was no boy, either.
He’d scented this vamp traveling along the bank, casing the Bayou Sweetie earlier. As soon as Riley had been truly out for the count, Dre had made his move. Since there was currently only one vamp closing in on the boat, Dre had figured on evening the odds.
The vamp wore what looked like a fur jacket made from wolf pelts over his eight-hundred-dollar suit. Multicolored and blood-streaked, the furs still smelled of wolf. Skin hunter. The vamp had tracked down his shapeshifter prey and skinned them alive, taking the pelts to protect his sorry ass from combusting when hit by daylight. That act alone was a death sentence, the way Dre saw it.
The vamp shifted uneasily, the truth of his dilemma sinking in, and Dre stepped closer. He sensed Landry moving through the shadows at his back, so Mary Jane would be back onboard as well. Good. He preferred knowing where both girls were. Leaving them alone was a calculated gamble, but this vamp was the only one in the area, and he was not a threat now.
“Not an option tonight,” Dre drawled. “You don’ get to live much more than another five minutes.” The kneeler’s eyes widened, and Dre knew what the other man saw. Six foot four inches of hard-ass, cold-eyed, straight-up killer. A hunter with prey in his sight. Sucked for him.
“You don’t want to be killing me,” the vamp suggested.
Dre laughed. “Hell yeah, I do.”
The vamp tried again. “I’ve got intel you need.”
Not likely, but Dre’s wolf sure liked the sight of his blade biting into that pale neck. He was the predator. Now the vamp was merely prey.
“Here’s how I see things,” Dre said, leaning in. “This fur look you’ve got goin’ on pisses me off. I like seein’ wolf skin on the proper bodies. You’ve got no business killin’ my kind jus’ so yours can walk in the sun. You take the hand nature dealt you, oui?”
The vamp spat out a curse Dre hadn’t heard since the Middle Ages. Maybe he was getting through.
“We on the same page now?” he asked.
Somewhere far off, something splashed and a gator roared.
Time to wrap this up and roll out.
Usually Dre knifed his prey before they could start running their mouths and working their claws. Tonight, for whatever reason, he hadn’t given a fuck. He’d tracked this sorry bastard here and then he’d pinned the man when he should have gone for his throat.
That had been a mistake. A mistake he was fixing now.
He bared his teeth. “Time’s up, motherfucker. Time to die.”
###
The pirogue’s paddle cut through the black water almost soundlessly. It wasn’t too late—barely gone two o’clock—but the bayou was preternaturally dark. With the clouds planted firmly over the full moon, no starlight lit up the waters. Every twist and turn of the waterway had to be negotiated in the pitch-black. Mary Jane sank into the welcome stillness.
Landry was good at giving orders.
She’d give him that.
She’d almost kept her ass dutifully onboard the Bayou Sweetie. Almost, because that was her boat. Her life. And she did things her way.
That was why she’d always preferred working alone. No matter who she signed on, bottom line was those hired hands were an unwelcome intrusion on the bayou’s peace and quiet. They talked. Made noise and reminded her she wasn’t alone out here, not really. As the day had worn on, she’d watched Dre and Landry, waiting for them to tip their hand. No way the Breaux brothers were simply deckhands on an oyster boat. She didn’t buy that story—but sh
e didn’t know what they really wanted. Even though she now had plenty of memories to draw on, memories of hot, talented male hands tracing the line of her spine. Dipping wickedly lower.
So, okay, she knew plenty well what Landry liked.
Harvesting oysters wasn’t going to be easy when all she could think about was getting her hands on Dre and pulling a repeat of what she’d done to Landry. She had a feeling she’d be dreaming about how it would feel to spend an entire night learning Dre’s big body. Or Landry’s. No. Two men holding her, two sets of hands and lips and cocks? That kind of fantasy needed to remain a fantasy.
She dipped the paddle into the water.
Dre and Landry were up to no good, and she aimed to find out what. The closer she got to the bank, the more her intuition hollered at her that there were dark things happening in the bayou tonight.
Something flickered in the corner of her eye.
Someone cursed, a harsh, foul-mouthed sound she recognized instinctively.
She needed to keep moving.
She needed to keep right on paddling and head back to the boat and Riley. Better yet, take the boat downriver, unload her catch and pick out a spot at the closest bar. Knock back a couple and celebrate another decent take.
Unfortunately, she’d never been good at doing what she should, and abandoning the Breauxs, even if they’d brought their troubles on themselves, didn’t sit well. She didn’t do leaving and she stuck by her crew.
So she dug her paddle into the water, and the pirogue glided to a slow halt, turning into the shadows spilling out of the trees lining the banks of the bayou. It was just another Louisiana night, nothing unusual about the dark slice of space between the two cypresses. Laying her fishing knife on the bench beside her, she pulled soundlessly closer.
The plan was stellar until she got a good look at the two men facing off on the marshy ground. One kneeler and one loomer whose body radiated menace. Her body hit the Stop button, debating whether or not this was just a little hardcore sex or some other, inexplicable male behavior.
The larger man was Dre, his big body reminding her too much of how she’d had his brother wrapped around her earlier like the best kind of blanket. He moved, a sharp flick of his wrist and a whisper of steel. The kneeler groaned, and a dark stain spread over his white T-shirt because Dre’s hunting knife was in his throat. This wasn’t sex. Her detour was a ringside seat on a murder or an assault gone south. Either or both, Mary Jane didn’t need a label for what she saw. She dug the paddle in hard and deep, looking for speed.
The sound of water splashing had both heads swiveling towards her. Mistake.
The kneeling man took full advantage of the distraction, exploding to his feet and leaping towards the mouth of the inlet. He must have struck Dre, because her Cajun fell backwards. She backpedaled herself, paddling furiously. With two desperate strokes, the pirogue shot out of the inlet. Footsteps pounded along the bank. A man called her name.
She wasn’t looking back. Wasn’t wasn’t wasn’t.
She looked.
Landry ran along on the bank, his work boots eating up the ground. The water was too narrow here to put enough distance between them. Hell. She was in a world of trouble.
“Mary Jane,” he gritted out. “You wan’ to be stoppin’ now, sha.”
Like hell.
She paddled furiously, but when she glanced over her shoulder, he was still there, gaining ground. No man should be that fast.
Something, someone, shot out of the shadows, landing on the pirogue’s prow. The boat rocked wildly, the knife flew overboard, and she screamed, bringing her paddle up. Six-plus feet of malice eyed her coldly. The creature’s white skin was straight from the grave, something left to rot deep in the bayou. Lips peeled back from sharp canines in a hiss.
Landry’s “Hell, no” echoed in her ears as she sucked in air.
The stranger crouched in front of her, bringing her hand to his lips. His shirtfront was dark and wet where he was bleeding out. “You see what that wolf did?”
“Don’t hurt me,” she whispered, because all she could do was appeal to the better nature she wasn’t sure this being possessed.
She debated rolling overboard, but the night was dark and the roaring gators were plenty of warning that the bayou wasn’t feeling so friendly now. Even this far inland, sharks were a possibility, too. So go in the water and she could be right out of the frying pan and into the fire. Not good.
“He hurt me.” The creature—because he sure as hell wasn’t a man—turned his pale arm, examining the crimson streaks of blood snaking down his skin. “Now it’s your turn.”
Before she could do more than whimper, a large wolf shot out of the darkness, slamming into the stranger. The beast had to be two hundred pounds, an inky grey-black that blended with the shadows. Golden eyes glowed as its lips pulled back from its teeth in a snarl. She’d seen eyes like that earlier tonight. No. What she was thinking was an impossibility. Wolf and monster hit the bayou, water splashing up around them as they fought.
She pulled for the boat, hollering for Riley to fire up the motor.
Only one thought banged around in her head as she tried to figure out where she was and how to get somewhere else. Fast. Escape.
Run, run, run.
There was a low-level buzzing in her head, and her skin itched. Every inch of her was desperately, suddenly alive. She could smell Dre coming, the scent of him an intoxicating blend of something wild and mint and man. His reasons for following her didn’t matter.
She could die.
Exactly like the stranger.
Strangers had no place in the bayou, and certainly not a man dressed like that. Almost she questioned whether he was human or not, which put her smack in the middle of crazy territory. They’d be holding her spot at the nuthouse if she wasn’t careful.
A baying howl rose behind her. The unearthly sound could have been dogs, but this was her bayou, and she recognized that cry on a primal level. The wolf that had taken down the stranger had her trail, and he wanted her to know it. His inhuman voice was a deep, implacable rasp. I’m coming for you.
The hunter was coming. Run. She couldn’t shake her memories of how Dre had looked. He’d had his back to her, but his shoulders were all pure, masculine power. Strong and ruthless. He’d turned, unloading his weapons, pivoting his powerful, jean-covered legs. This wasn’t a fair contest at all, and she had absolutely no chance. The too-fast beat, trip-hammer flutter of her heartbeat counted down the time she had left.
Danger.
Run.
The Bayou Sweetie loomed up out of the dark, almost close enough to touch. Maybe she’d make it.
A shadow detached itself, leaping from the bank and landing on the pirogue’s bow with a bone-jarring thud. The small craft rocked wildly as her unwanted boarder straightened from his crouch, and she dropped the paddle, fighting to keep her balance and not go over.
“Start the engine,” she screamed, praying Riley heard her.
One big, booted foot moved purposefully towards her. That was a take-no-prisoners, shit-kicking boot. Attached to a powerful pair of legs in jeans. The buzz in her head built, and she shook her head, trying to clear the cobwebs.
“Dre?” She eyed him uncertainly. Because there was something wrong with his face. Almost lupine, his face shifted, melting back into familiar lines. She opened her mouth. Closed it. Deep in the bayou, there was old magic. She’d always known that, accepted that truth. She simply hadn’t expected to have that magic standing on her boat deck.
No way would she stay near the bank. Not tonight. She prayed for the clouds to part, for the moon to light them up, because she needed to see, and no hundred watt was enough. Not for this.
“Going somewhere?” The masculine drawl snaked through her as the foot’s owner came closer still, stepping into the pool of light from the boat’s spotlight. So close. So far. She’d touched his brother’s skin earlier tonight, learned him, wanted more. Now, this male she’d fanta
sized about screamed hunter, from the hair buzzed ruthlessly short and the eyes that never stopped moving, quartering every inch of the bayou cataloging potential threats.
Dre Breaux was trouble.
Or in trouble. She’d witnessed him kill a man with ruthless efficiency. She opened her mouth. Closed it.
“Some free advice, sha. When you see a man down and bleedin’ on the ground, that’s your cue to run like hell in the other direction. You don’ stop. You sure as hell don’ pop your pretty little head in like you’re about to ask if you can help.”
He took another step towards her, and her hands got clammy, her body sending an urgent SOS to her brain. This man was too big, too strong. If he wanted to hurt her, she’d hurt. Nothing in her life, she thought, a strange detachment kicking in, had prepared her to face death when death was wearing steel toes and sporting a whole lot of nasty attitude.
There was nothing nice in his smile now. “We need to be havin’ ourselves a discussion. Later. Right now, you get back on the Bayou Sweetie and you take the boat right out on the river. Put some space between us and the bayou, and take cover below deck.”
The dark opening of the Bayou Sweetie’s hatch was barely visible from where she bobbed in the pirogue. Nope. No way in hell she’d go there.
Scraps of memories she couldn’t get rid of drifted through her head. Six years old and below deck in the dark because she’d pissed her daddy off once again, or more often than not because her daddy was drinking up a storm above deck and her company was superfluous. Hours spent crouched in the dark, counting off the minutes and the slap of the water against the boat’s sides.
Her tongue swiped nervously over her lower lip. “You killed a man.”
There was a flash of something in his eyes that had those big hands clenching and releasing on his thighs. “That was no man,” he drawled. “Get on the boat and go below deck.”
He stepped towards her, his eyes never dropping from her face, and she broke and ran. There was a handgun in the locker onboard. All she had to do was get there.