by Kat Simons
“Then what do you want with him?”
“To offer him a job. You have a unique talent, Jonathon. I wish to discuss employing you.”
“Why the hell would you want to offer me a job?” Jon spat.
He was holding all three dog leashes, and the animals sat quietly and still in a half circle in front of him. Cary didn’t need to be able to talk with the dogs to see that all three were vibrating with unease. Buck released a low sound, half whine, half growl, then fell silent again.
“So you can use that talent of yours to our mutual benefit,” Holland said, answering Jon’s question. “I pay very well for skills such as yours.”
Cary shifted positions to further block Jon from view and bring Holland’s gaze back to her. “Mr. Holland. I’ve heard quite a bit about you. Or should I say, I haven’t heard nearly enough?”
That slight smile again. “I’m a very private man.”
“Aren’t we all?” she said. “But I do have one question for you.”
He spread his hands in a gesture indicating she should ask.
“What are you?”
“I’m a businessman.”
“No.” She leaned in a little closer. “I mean, what are you?”
“You’re an interesting woman, Ms. Redmond.”
“Gee, thanks. Are you avoiding my question?”
“I find you quite fascinating.”
“I’m flattered.” She hated when bad guys avoided questions by changing the subject. It was rude. Just tell her it was none of her damned business and leave it at that. Don’t try these interrogation tactics.
She conveniently chose to ignore the fact that she did the same thing herself sometimes. Maybe more than sometimes.
“Like that.” Holland mirrored her gesture and leaned a little closer. “You’re taunting me. You have no idea what I might do, what true danger I pose, but you taunt me with sarcasm. And believe me, I know sarcasm when I hear it. I’m British.”
“So you like my sarcasm? Good. I’ve got lots of it.”
“You show no fear.” He shook his head, his gaze steady. “And then there’s your job. A bodyguard. Such an interesting job—”
“If you finish that sentence with ‘for a woman,’” she said, “I will be required by law to hurt you.”
He laughed. “I was going to say for someone with no discernable training. You don’t even own a gun. You don’t practice firing a gun at any range, ever. You’ve never been in the military, the FBI, the secret service, the police. You’ve minimal martial arts training that only started after you took up as a ‘bodyguard’—and honestly, a class every other month can’t qualify as real training.”
She winced at that. Lucy kept telling her the same thing.
“You’ve taken no classes in tactics at university,” Holland continued. “You’ve never even taken a theatre course to learn stage combat. And up to six years ago, you were no one special.”
“Hey,” she said. “I resent that. I’ve been special since the day I was born.” She was more than a little disconcerted by his knowledge of her background, but she hated for the bad guys to see her sweat. And this was one mother of a bad guy. The hair on her arms rose the nearer she got to him.
“Yes,” Holland said, “well I imagine your mother told you that. They all do, you know, but it’s rarely true. Then there’s the fact that you don’t age—”
“Now, that’s not true. I age.” Just slowly.
“You are thirty-two years old. But you don’t look a day over twenty. Significantly younger than you are.”
“Good genes,” Cary said with a shrug. “My mother always looked young for her age too. And I do age. Ask my doctor. Or doctors.” She muttered the last.
“Ah yes,” Holland said, his gaze narrowing. “Your medical history. That was interesting reading. Strange bruising, cracked bones, dislocated joints.”
“Guess I’m not so good at my job after all, without all that military training.”
“And yet you withstood the full force of a dragon shifter’s fire.” He paused, leaning even closer. “So I ask, Ms. Redmond, what exactly are you?”
“Cool under fire. Get it? Dragon shifter fire.” She waggled her eyebrows and grinned.
“Fascinating. Such bravado.”
Her grin dropped. “Don’t condescend to me, Holland.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it. I do find you very interesting, Ms. Redmond. It would be a shame to kill you.”
“Yes, it would. I suggest you don’t try.”
He smiled.
Deacon growled and stepped closer to Cary’s side. “It would be better for you if you didn’t try,” he said.
Holland’s gaze shifted to Deacon. “The leopard. He belongs to you, Ms. Redmond?”
“Why do people ask me that?” she said. “He belongs to himself. But he likes me.”
“I’ve no doubt,” Holland said. “And I can understand why. Well, I wouldn’t like to anger a leopard. Especially this particular one.” He tilted his head in a mocking bow.
“No,” Deacon said, “you wouldn’t.”
“What does that mean?” Cary asked, glancing between the two men. “‘This particular one’?”
“She doesn’t know?” Holland raised a brow at Deacon. “That will be an interesting conversation. Oh to be a fly on the wall.”
“Is there a point to all this word play, Holland?” Cary said, trying hard not to snarl. She didn’t like that Holland knew something about Deacon that she didn’t. She really didn’t like that Deacon had a secret big enough to give Holland that gleam in his pale eyes. But that was a conversation for later.
“Enjoyment, perhaps?” Holland said. Despite Deacon’s looming menace, Holland leaned even closer and put his face an inch from hers. His breath smelled like peppermint. “I’ve never met anyone quite like you, Ms. Redmond.”
“I’m unique,” she agreed.
“Yes. You are. And I have a taste for unique things. I’d very much like to get to know you better. Understand more of that uniqueness.”
“You better not be hinting at what I think you’re hinting at, Holland. You’re too old for me.”
“So is he.” Holland nodded at Deacon.
Cary slanted a glance at the man beside her. “No, he’s not.” She looked back at Holland. “But we like to pretend he is.” And she winked.
Holland threw his head back and laughed, straightening away from her as he did. She swallowed her relief and slowly straightened as well. They still had to get away from this…whatever he was.
“I’ll look forward to further conversations with you, Ms. Redmond,” Holland said, still smiling. “I’d like to continue our discussion as to what you are.” He looked between her and Deacon, then to Jon. “And you, Jonathon. Think about my offer. I pay very well. Ask anybody.”
Without another word, and with absolutely no sign of discomfort, Oliver Holland walked around her small group and headed to the opposite side of the park, his thugs in tow.
Cary let out a breath that ruffled the small hairs teasing around her forehead, escapees from her ponytail. Though she held steady for Jon’s sake, her knees felt rubbery. “That was interesting.”
“What kind of job do you think he wants me to do?” Jonathon asked.
“Nothing you’d be able to do and still look your mother in the eyes afterward,” Cary snapped, harsher than she intended.
“I was just asking. Geez. What’s your problem?”
“I get antsy when strange men accost me in the park and know that much about me,” she said. Then sighed. “Well, we knew he had resources.” She watched the place where Holland had disappeared into the trees with his five thugs. “But I thought my background was a little harder to get at than that.”
She turned to Deacon. “He knew about you. That can’t be good.” She still wanted to ask what Holland had meant by “this particular leopard,” but that part would have to wait until they were safe in her house.
Deacon was also staring after
Holland. “It’s not unexpected, given he’s a demon.”
“He’s a what?” she said, her voice rising before she could control it. “How come I couldn’t tell? I should’ve been able to tell. I can usually spot a freed demon.”
“He’s old,” Deacon said. “He’s very strong. And he’s very smart. He’s been untethered for centuries, if my nose is any judge.”
“Great,” she said with a groan. “I hate dealing with demons. There are so many different kinds. I still get them all mixed up, and I’ve been studying this stuff for years.” She put her hands against her head and squeezed to relieve the building pressure. “Too much to learn and never enough time to learn it all,” she muttered to herself. “Where’s a good demon hunter when you need one?”
“How’d you know he’s a demon?” Jon asked Deacon.
The kid wasn’t nearly as disturbed by the news as she would have thought.
Deacon tapped his nose. “His scent.”
“What about it said demon?” Jon asked.
“You’d have to be a shifter to understand. There are a lot of layers to scent.”
“The dogs try to explain it to me.”
“They can’t, can they?” Deacon asked.
“No,” Jon reluctantly agreed. “But that’s cause they don’t have the words. You do.”
“They don’t do me any good when it comes to explaining how my body and brain sift through a single scent to analyze it’s every component.”
“Fine, don’t tell me.”
Cary rolled her eyes at Jon’s sullen tone. Of all the things for him to get upset about at this moment… “Come on,” she said, “let’s get back to the house.”
On the way to the car, though, that feeling of being watched swept a shiver over her shoulders. She looked around the park, trying to pinpoint the source without alerting Deacon or Jon. For a long moment, she stood at the open car door, scanning the park, hunting the tree shadows, studying the people scattered across the open grass to see if anyone was paying any attention to her.
Then the sensation vanished. Whoever had been watching was just…gone.
Damn.
This was really starting to creep her out.
18
Deacon left Jon in the living room watching a movie and joined Cary out on the back porch. She sat on the steps leading down to her grass covered backyard, idly tossing a ball to Fred while Pickles and Buck reclined on the porch next to her. He scooted Buck out of the way—moving Pickles when she was settled was nearly impossible—and sat next to Cary.
The evening had turned chilly but was fortunately still dry. Cary wore a padded flannel shirt over her sweater and jeans. She looked warm enough, but he still had an urge to tuck her under his arm to keep her from the cold.
“You want to talk about it?” he asked. When Fred came bounding back with the ball, he shoved it into Deacon’s lap. Deacon took a turn at throwing. There wasn’t much light in the yard, but Fred still managed to find the ball and come scampering back at high speed.
“I was just wondering where the hell Jaxer is,” Cary said after a moment. “I haven’t even gotten a message from him in more than a week. Not since you delivered his last one to the school. I knew he wouldn’t want to come around while Jon’s here, but…”
“But?” Deacon tossed the ball again without looking at her.
“But I was expecting to hear something by now.”
“We’ll find out more about Holland.”
“It’s not just that.” She puffed out a breath. “I need him.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “He’s my mentor. And I don’t know what to do next.”
The very slight quaver in her voice nearly broke him. “Cary…”
“After six years, I still feel like I have so much to learn. I don’t know how to deal with a demon like Holland. Strategy isn’t my strong suit. I’ve always had Jaxer for that.”
She tilted her head to look at Deacon, and he met her gaze, ignoring Fred when the dog tried to shove the ball into his lap again. When Fred got no response, he flopped down on the lower step at Deacon’s feet.
“Holland is powerful,” Cary said, “wealthy, and has been freed from any demon bonds for a long time, according to your nose. In all those centuries, he’s also managed to avoid the demon hunters.” She raised her hands in a shrug. “I can stand between him and Jon from now until the end of days and keep Jon safe. But I can’t do anything about him. I can’t make him go away. I… I don’t know how.”
“It’s not your job to make Holland go away,” Deacon said. “It’s your job to protect Jon.”
“But if the demon just keeps coming and coming, what do I do then? You saw how interested that kid was in Holland’s job offer. Even if Jon does see through the deception and continues to let me protect him, will I have to keep him here for weeks? Months? Years? As long as I’m around, he won’t be hurt, but what if Holland is the persistent type? There’s going to come a time when we relax, when we get lazy. When Jon goes somewhere without me.” She looked out over the yard again. “Maybe I have someone else I have to protect. Maybe he just goes out on his own one day, and I don’t stop him.”
“We won’t let that happen,” Deacon tried to assure her. He had no idea how they could prevent it, but he couldn’t stand to see her so frustrated. “We’ll figure something out. Holland will give up and leave Jon alone, or we’ll find a way to make him go away.” He reached out and cupped her cheek. “We’ll figure this out.”
“That’s just it,” she said. “Jaxer would know what to do. He always does. He’s not limited to a purely defensive power, like I am. He would know what to do. And I want to know why the hell he isn’t here to do it.”
“Cary…”
She shook her head and stood up. “I want a beer. You want one?”
He nodded and watched her disappear into the kitchen, fisting and relaxing his hands to keep from breaking something. A low growl rose in his throat and he choked it down so he wouldn’t scare the dogs. He wanted desperately to help her, to make her see everything would be okay. But his jealousy, an emotion he just couldn’t seem to control, kept short circuiting his more tender desires. Damn it, he wanted her to turn to him when she needed help. Not Jaxer. And because she was looking to Jaxer, his leopard roared in protest.
He let out a deep breath, pulled in another, and let it out again. His animal half pressed at his skull, making his skin crawl with the leopard’s need to get out, to protect his mate. He forced his jaw muscles to relax, counted his breaths to slow them, willed his beast to quiet. None of it worked. His mate was hurting. Every instinct in him screamed to make things right for her.
His control, already tenuous, continued to slip, slowly melting away. There were moments, like that afternoon when they’d faced Holland, when he could barely reason beyond his emotions. He’d wanted to tear the demon to pieces for threatening Cary, and he’d been close to attacking when he shouldn’t have, when the situation would have been made worse by a public fight in the middle of the day. He hadn’t struggled with his nature like this in years.
He was too dangerous like this.
He had to be more controlled even than other leopards. He was first born to parents who were in turn the first born of first born parents. Birth order and the birth order of one’s parents made a difference for leopard shifters. Not just socially. It affected their skills, powers, and the strength of their animal side. He was the result of first borns of first borns tracing back generations. His animal was incredibly powerful even at the best of times, which meant his control had to be absolute.
Meeting his mate had thrown all his discipline into chaos. All those years of self-control laid waste. His leopard could hardly stand to be away from her now. The animal was getting closer and closer to the surface. If Deacon wasn’t careful, his animal would subsume his human self.
A disaster not just for him but for all the leopards on this coast.
He needed to convince Cary she was his mate. He needed time
alone with her, time to…court her. Time to seduce her. Time to prove to her they had a future together. But he wouldn’t be able to until Cary no longer needed to protect Jonathon. To finish this business with Holland, she needed Jaxer.
Deacon launched up from the decking, startling Fred and Buck into standing. Pickles raised her head but didn’t bother getting up to watch him stalk into the house. Cary was standing at the sink, an unopened bottle of beer on the counter next to her as she stared at the tiled wall.
He stepped up behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist. Touching her helped quiet his angry leopard, and fortunately for him, she didn’t seem to mind being touched. He kissed the top of her head when she leaned into him then pressed his cheek against hers.
“I’m going to take off now,” he said. “I’ve got something I need to do. You want donuts again for breakfast?”
She turned in his arms. “You’re going so early? What do you need to do on a Saturday night?”
“I know someone who might know more about Holland. But he can only meet me tonight.”
“Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”
“I didn’t think about it.” He dropped his mouth to hers because he needed to kiss her more than he needed to breathe.
At first, her lips remained unmoving beneath his. Then she relaxed, opening her mouth to deepen the kiss. God, he loved the way she tasted, the way her scent filled his head, driving him slowly crazy and completing his world at the same time. He wanted nothing more than to carry her off to the bedroom and explore every inch of her.
But he couldn’t. Not yet.
He ended the kiss reluctantly and stepped back. “I have to go. I’ll be back early. Think of something you might like to do tomorrow. Anything you want.”
He left before she could question him more. Picking up his coat and keys, he waved goodnight to Jon and left.
He had a faery to find.
Deacon found Jaxer sitting on a hill deep in Forest Park watching the stars. The faery was dressed in a dark silk shirt and pants, the color making his pale skin glow in the weak moonlight.
