by Thorne, Elle
She didn’t have to.
Jax, as bold in spirit as she was vibrant in looks, took her mate’s mother’s hand. “Isabel, won’t you—”
“No, I will not.” The typically mild-mannered woman’s voice held a steel edge. “It is over.”
“But Giovanni—”
“I wish you wouldn’t use his name in my presence.”
Rafe gave Jax a look.
She shot him one back. “I don’t give up easily.”
“Neither did I, once upon a time.” Isabel Tiero stared toward the horizon.
“So, it’s officially over?” Sophie leaned closer to her mother.
“Not officially over. There hasn’t been any legal proceedings.” Isabel let out a long, ragged breath. “Yet.” She shook her head. “I haven’t seen your father in a long time.”
“You still love him,” Jax said.
Rafe gave a slight head shake, but the half-smile on his face said it all—he adored his mate’s boldness of spirit.
“God, I do.” Isabel bit on her lower lip, worrying it with white teeth.
Anya felt a gaze on her. She found Bryson watching her, his expression intense, his eyes hooded, emotions hidden. In spite of that, a heat traveled throughout her.
Was this how she’d be when it came to him? Like Isabel Tiero was—still in love with a man she couldn’t have?
* * *
Bryson crept out of Pepper’s room. His little girl was in a deep slumber. It hadn’t taken long for her to fall asleep. After lunch, they’d had another paddleboat race, and, this time, everyone had been in a boat.
There were no more deep conversations, and he’d enjoyed the company of Isabel’s friends and family until they’d parted ways as dusk settled in. They’d agreed to get together again before the visitors left Monaco for Rome and then America.
Bryson felt a sadness that their new friends would be leaving. This was the closest he’d come to family and friendship while he was here.
What’s keeping me in Monaco, anyway? Why don’t I move?
True, the country no longer had the charm it once held for him, long ago, when he was younger and enjoyed life differently. Those were the pre-Pepper days. Now everything was about his daughter.
Almost everything, he reminded himself, his mind on the curvy beauty who was sleeping a few doors down.
There was still much on his mind when it came to protecting Pepper. Maybe the answers lay with the Order of Elementals. In Denver.
He passed by Anya’s room, stopping right outside her door. Standing still, he used his shifter hearing to try to pick up any signs she was still awake. He listened for her breathing, expecting it to have the regular rhythm of sleep.
It didn’t. Clearly, she was awake.
He wanted to go in more than anything. He wanted to talk to her.
His leopard snarled a not-so-gentle reminder.
Maybe more than just talk to her.
Her door opened.
With night clothes on, Anya stood before him, holding the knob. “Were you going to knock?” Her voice was low, and her hair gleamed dark-red flames in the dim lighting of the hallway.
“You knew I was here?”
“Just as you knew I wasn’t asleep.” A smile curved on the lips he wanted to kiss.
She turned and walked toward her bed. All she had on was a pair of shorts and a tank top, yet they drew him toward her as if they were an elegant, sexy nightgown. The cotton hugged her curves and showcased her figure.
“What’s on your mind?” She turned to face him.
Her braless, stiff-peaked silhouette put something else on his mind. He saw her tigress’s gold flicker in her eyes, acknowledging the lust that broiled beneath.
“I’m going out of town tomorrow. A day trip.” It would be the farthest he’d gone since he’d hired Anya. No, that wasn’t true. It would be the farthest he’d gone since Bianca vanished.
“Pepper and I are staying here, right?” She moved toward the bed, sat with her back against the headboard.
The question gave him pause. He didn’t have to; he could take them with him. He’d feel better knowing they were in the same city. “You could join me. Take Pepper around Paris. Have you been before?”
“For work, sure.”
“This time, you could enjoy it.”
“What about safety while you’re at meetings? I couldn’t guarantee it. There would be many more variables.”
“No one needs to know you’re going. Let them assume Pepper’s staying here.”
“I think it would be safer here, where, at least, we have the security measures set in place.”
“I’m the boss, right?”
She glared at him, and a low growling sound came from deep within her.
“Tell your tigress not to worry.” He placed a hand on her knee.
“Tell her yourself.” She slid off the bed and watched him with those entrancing emerald-green eyes as she shifted into her white tigress form.
She approached him and butted his thigh with her head, then did it again. He shifted into his leopard and stood next to the stunning creature with her gleaming fur as he pushed for a sync.
She opened her mind to him.
Minx. Why did you shift?
Because you would have sidetracked the conversation, and I wanted to talk to you.
Sidetracked it how?
She swatted at him with a paw. As if you don’t know. Then she stretched and dug her claws into the carpeting.
Shift back. I want you.
Make me. Inside his head, her voice was playful. She gave him another swat.
He ducked then leaped, pouncing on her, taking her neck between his jaws.
Now what will you do, temptress?
She struggled to free herself from his grasp but only ended up further and further beneath him, more solidly encased in his grip.
A tiny creaking gave away her shift, and he released his grip on her immediately, because it would be lethal to her as a human.
Before she’d completely finished her shift, he shifted as well, finding himself on top of her as she lay belly-down on the carpet.
* * *
Hot shudders washed over Anya. Her nerve endings were tuned into his presence, into the weight of him on her back. They’d both shifted into their human forms, and his body covered hers as if he’d been fashioned for her. His erection pressed against her ass, tucked between her cheeks, demanding, hot and pulsing, even with the fabric of their clothes between them. She bit back the moan that threatened.
God, he’s going to think I’m an insatiable hussy.
She knew he wouldn’t. She knew he’d love every part of her…but still, this new version of herself, heated and melting for him, was new to her.
Her shifter hearing picked up the tiny sound of his claw extending. The cool air on her back spoke of what he’d done.
He’d sliced through fabric, baring her ass to his hands and eyes.
It’s a good thing he can afford to buy clothing, at the rate this man goes through mine.
She moaned in a low whisper, her need to have him inside her, to have him claim her fierce. His lips sank into her neck, making her think of the couple bond. She wanted him. She wanted him to bond her.
What the fuck? Where’d that come from?
She refused to let logic conquer passion, though she wanted him to claim her.
His knees pressed her legs apart. Large hands pushed the fabric farther off her as he spread his fingers between her nether lips. He ran them up and down her cleft slowly, with a tortuous rhythm that made her muscles clench for him. Over and over he teased her with a promise of more until he finally sank his fingers deep within. She reared back, her ass rising to meet his hand as he pumped his fingers into her, over and over, like a jackhammer, crashing through defenses, pummeling resistance she no longer had.
Her back arched. She dug fingers into the rug, pushing upward to meet his thrusts. She panted with each plunge. When he stilled, a groan sl
ipped from her mouth.
“What do you want?” His voice was a raspy groan against her ear.
“God, Bryson,” her tormented whisper was ripped from her throat. “I want you.”
“You want me to what?”
She swallowed. “To fuck me.”
She felt him move above her. She braced for his fingers to return, and raised her ass farther upward.
What she wasn’t expecting…
What ripped a gasp from her throat…
What filled her and stretched her…
His cock, harder than she’d felt before, bigger than she’d felt before, plunged into her with a fierceness. Stretching her to a painful degree that was matched by the pleasure it delivered.
With that drive, he was buried in her, their pulses one, their heartbeats completely synchronized.
She returned thrust for thrust, pushing upward to meet his every delivery, writhing and wriggling, a roar building within her chest that she knew belonged to her tigress.
“Let it go,” he growled close to her ear. “Give her to me.”
A howl was torn from her lungs as she threw her head back. Except her howl was soundless; it was all in her mind, her tigress releasing her emotions within Anya.
“You can hear that?” Shivers ran up her spine.
“My leopard can.” His words were panted out with each breath. “Let her out again. He needs her.”
Anya didn’t need another invitation. She let her tigress free within her, relishing the passion of the roar her tigress released, feeling his leopard’s response in Bryson as her body clenched tighter around him and an orgasm coursed over her in waves.
“Fuck.” Bryson released the word as his body began to pulse a release deep within her, striking her spasming muscles. “You’re mine.”
His words were spoken so low that nothing but shifter hearing could have heard them.
Her tigress heard.
And within Anya, something awoke she’d never been sure would ever come to life.
Chapter Twelve
Anya had convinced Bryson they’d be safer at the villa in Monaco rather than traipsing around Paris in unfamiliar territories. He left for Paris early that morning while Pepper still slept. Anya had watched him place a tender kiss on her temple.
“Take care of my baby.” He placed his lips on Anya’s.
“With my life,” she assured him, meaning it, fully. She breathed him in, his leopard’s scent, his man’s scent. “Come back safely.”
Her words made her realize something. She’d fallen. She’d fallen so hard she now acted like she belonged in his life and he in hers.
I can’t do that. I can’t have a relationship.
Her tigress bellowed an argument in Anya’s mind.
I can’t.
Anya didn’t have to explain shit to her tigress. She wouldn’t understand anyway.
Her tigress snarled.
Those you love get ripped out of your life. Don’t you get it? They disappoint and leave.
Every. Single. Time.
She needed to call Cas and ask him how long the assignment was supposed to last. She couldn’t ask Bryson when she could leave. He’d get bent out of shape. She could only imagine the way his nostrils would flare and his jaw tighten.
Truthfully, I don’t want to go.
This wasn’t what she wanted for the rest of her life—being a child’s playmate—but Anya also couldn’t imagine leaving Bryson and Pepper behind.
A burning in the bridge of her nose told her it was too late for her to leave without hurting anyone—at the very least herself.
Clapping drew her attention away from the tears she didn’t want to shed, signaling Pepper was awake.
She squeezed her eyes tightly, driving the tears away and forced a smile to her face when she heard running footsteps heading toward her.
It was business as usual for her and Pepper.
Pepper was the bundle of energy she always was, and, without ballet classes to look forward to, Anya knew she’d be hard to contain.
I predict a day roaming around the property and the lake.
It was too bad Pepper had no siblings or friends in the area. Of course, how would a little shifter elemental hybrid make friends amongst others—especially when her father seemed hell-bent on keeping her elemental a secret.
Understandably so. It was clear that having others know about Marleis posed a danger to Pepper.
Then again, more would find out if he planned to take her to see the Order.
“I wish Signora Isabel and her family and friends could come over again.”
“I’m sure if you ask your daddy, he’d invite them.”
“No, I mean today. Right now.”
“Well, he’s not here right now.”
“Why does he have to travel to work?”
I don’t even know what he does for work. “I don’t know.”
Maybe that was another question for Cas. Though was it, really? Since she planned to leave, it really wasn’t her business.
Then again, if they’d wanted me to know, someone would have told me.
“Can we go out on the lake?” Pepper’s eyes shone bright with anticipation.
Hell no, not after the display of that tower of water that could take out the villa and both of us with it.
She couldn’t very well refuse on those grounds, what would she say?
I’m afraid your elemental will kill me with one display of her power? Maybe even kill you, too?
No, she could hardly say that.
“Please?” A quick blue hue flushed through Pepper’s eyes. “Marleis says she’ll behave.”
Anya nodded. “We’ll see.”
“Will you take me Christmas shopping this afternoon? I haven’t bought anything for Daddy yet.”
“I’m sure Santa has him covered.”
Pepper giggled, grabbed Anya’s hand, and headed toward the back of the property. “There’s no Santa, silly.”
Anya cut her a glance. “No Santa?”
“Oh, come on.” It was Marleis’s voice. “You do not expect her to believe in something like Santa Claus, considering the things this little soul has experienced?”
“Marleis, if you’ve been in her body for a long time, could you not have stayed quiet until she’d had a childhood? She’s never had a chance to be a kid.”
“Listen, shifter. I did not take that away from her. Bianca’s elemental did that.”
Anya frowned. “How so?”
Why did Bryson not mention this?
“No one else knows, but Pepper saw what happened to her mother. She saw the elemental kill the shifter. If Bianca hadn’t had an elemental in her, she’d have been dead. You do know that shifters can’t live if their shifter animal is killed.”
“I do know that—though I don’t know how.”
“Most shifters don’t. Elementals know about that. And another type of being. One that stays hidden from shifters.”
What the hell is she talking about?
“Care to share, this type of being?”
“Vampires.”
“Vampires,” Anya scoffed.
Pepper’s shoulders moved up in a shrug that was very Old World European and looked very out of place on this innocent child. “Think what you will,” Marleis said.
“Get back to Bianca and Pepper.”
“Pepper saw her mother’s shifter animal lose the battle with her elemental.” The little girl’s green eyes turned a solid blue, a dark indigo that seemed filled with sadness. “I couldn’t make Pepper vanish in her mind. I couldn’t block her out, and I was powerless to stop Bianca from falling victim to that creature.” She spat the final word out.
“You’re not friendly with her elemental?”
“There are clans of elementals, just as shifters have clans. We are not all friends. Sometimes, we are at cross-purposes.”
“Marleis. The leopard that exists in Pepper, do you mean to harm it—her?”
“I would nev
er.”
“Then why did Bianca’s?”
Marleis shook her head. “Pepper’s ready to come back. Can you behave normally around her?”
“Wait. One more thing. How do you keep her at bay, how does—?”
“Anya! Are we going on the boats?” Pepper was back.
Anya thought of the water tower the other day. “Why don’t you show me the woods behind the lake?”
That seems far enough to keep the water from being a danger.
She took Pepper’s hand and led her past the deceptively calm lake. Anya would remember the water’s reaction for long time. It would take a lot for her to trust a body of water near Marleis.
“Sure! Can we collect pine cones?”
Anya glanced at the tall trees. They reminded her of Bear Canyon Valley—a place that had been on her mind way too much of late.
I should visit Mae. And Doc, she reminded herself, since Mae and Doc were mates now.
* * *
An hour later, if not more, they’d finished hunting for pine cones and other treasures nature seemed eager to part with, leaving Pepper with a full bag of mementos of the day.
Pepper was dragging her feet through the pine needle-covered forest floor, her braids a disheveled mess, her face dirt-streaked. And she was a happy little girl. Until…
“I’m hungry.” She yawned. “And tired. Will you carry me?”
“Sure.”
Anya bent to pick her up.
The sound she heard wasn’t easily recognizable. A whistle, as if something zipped by her ear.
A bug?
Didn’t seem so, but, busy with Anya, she didn’t question it.
Thwack!
The sound came from a nearby tree. She glanced up from Pepper’s face. A tranq dart was stuck in the tree’s trunk.
What the hell?
Anya whirled around toward the direction it came from.
Four figures walked out from behind trees, all in shadows cast by the trees that blocked the sun. Two large men, shifters from the way they walked. And two humans, one male one female.
“You missed,” the female said, her voice a low hiss that Anya’s shifter hearing picked up.
Anya pushed Pepper behind her.
