by E A Price
Huh, looked like she wasn’t the only one having trouble resisting the unholy dreamboats that were the kidnapping jaguars. Apparently, the woman wasn’t quite as mousy as Hester first thought.
“Can I look yet?” added Mary. Her face was moving around, but Tomas’ hand stayed clamped over her eyes.
“We’re going back to Mary’s room, just, please, try and keep it down. Mary needs her rest.”
“Yes, that’s what we’ll be doing – resting,” sighed Mary.
Tomas gave them an irritated look before leading Mary back and firmly slamming the door.
“Touchy, isn’t he?” giggled Hester. “But I guess the problem is that he isn’t getting touched at all right now.”
“I think he’s pissed about me being naked.” Antonio folded his hands beneath his head and lay back, stretching his glorious body out for her perusal. “Didn’t like his little mate getting an eyeful of this.”
Hester scrambled off him, and though her cheetah was panting like a lovesick cub, she just scowled at him. Actually, she wasn’t keen for Mary to get an eyeful either. The woman had her own mate – she didn’t need to be looking at Antonio. Tomas was right to cover her eyes; though, Antonio hadn’t covered hers. Tomas was nearly naked, and Antonio didn’t even bat an eyelid. Humph. That actually put both her and her cheetah out a little. She wasn’t exactly about to go out and flash her ding dongs at other men to intentionally make him jealous, but shouldn’t he feel just a smidge of possessiveness?
“Don’t know why he would be worried. He surely already knows how lucky Mary is to have him. Did you see his muscles – ay chi wow wow.”
Antonio swiveled shrewd, golden eyes in her direction. “Hessie, baby, you want me to be a jealous rampaging beast, I will be. But I already know I don’t have anything to be jealous about.”
Her cheetah snorted as she folded her arms. Obnoxious tit. He was right, too.
“What makes you so damn sure?”
Antonio propped himself up on his side, and Hester fixed her gaze on his head. Below that was something bobbing and getting bigger, and she was trying to pretend it wasn’t there at that moment.
“Your breathing,” he answered simply.
“My breathing?” Not what she was expecting.
“Yeah, haven’t you noticed? When you’re talking to me, you start breathing faster, and your heart starts beating quicker. I excite you,” he said with a horrific amount of smugness.
“Puh-lease!”
“It’s true. Flirting with me gets you going and when you kissed me earlier…”
Outrage boiled over. “When I kissed you?!”
“Trying to sleep in here!” shouted Tomas from Mary’s room.
“Yes, we are,” agreed Mary, more faintly and with a certain amount of resignation.
“When I kissed you?!” Hester repeated in a whisper as her cheetah howled at his audacity.
“Yep, when you kissed me, I thought your heart was going to beat out of your chest.”
Hester huffed; she didn’t like to admit he was right. Set a bad precedent for any future discussions.
“But when you were talking to the prime, or when you were looking at Tomas and heck, even when you were running as your cheetah, your heartbeat was fine, you were relaxed. It only seems to be out of control around me.”
“It’s because I’m annoyed at you,” she stammered.
“Nah, you were annoyed at Tomas when he interrupted us…”
“We weren’t doing anything!” Hester hissed.
“Well, your hand was certainly doing something, but let’s not split hairs. You were annoyed at Tomas, but you were still calm and you certainly weren’t lusting after him.”
Hester let out some sounds of disgust. He was being totally insufferable, and the most insufferable part of it all was that he was right. She generally was calm when it came to confrontations – she had to be when fighting in court. She may be shouting and haranguing on the outside, but inside, she was steady as a rock. Yeah, he was right about her not even looking at Tomas as any kind of object of lust. He was a good-looking young man, but the idea of feeling any lust toward him was completely lost on her – but when she looked at Antonio… gah! Drool, melting, and lots of cheetah swooning – the whole works. When dealing with Antonio, inside, she was as steady as jelly.
“You have no idea what you’re talking about,” she said primly, trying as elegantly as possible to get to her feet.
His only answer was a grin. Yes, she was lying, and he knew it – business as usual for the two of them.
“Why are you outside my door?”
His happy demeanor faded, and his expression turned grim. Antonio stood to face her. “Guarding your door. No one is getting past me. Spoke to Roberto - he found the leap mate who left the chocolates on the stoop.”
Her cheetah perked up in interest, flexing her claws. “Who?”
Antonio shook his head. “Hilda – she’s in her late sixties, human and lives close by here. When they were taking in the mail, they found the box for you, and she offered to deliver it. It was just there in our mailbag when it was dropped off earlier.”
Hester deflated a little. So much for hoping it was Valentina. “Maybe there are fingerprints on it.”
“Roberto already took it down to the local cops.”
“He took it down himself?”
Antonio smirked. “Yep, got the chief out of bed for it. He’s super pissed about what happened, but I think he also enjoyed getting to see the chief in his jammies.” His amusement dimmed. “Got a bad feeling they won’t find any prints but yours, Laurel’s and Hilda’s.”
“Have you heard…”
“Laurel’s fine. She can come home tomorrow.”
Hester breathed out and muttered her thanks to any deity who happened to be listening. Antonio placed a hand on her shoulder, and instinctively she pressed into his touch.
“This isn’t your fault.”
“I know,” she growled, “I just want to find who did it and kick their ass to the North Pole!” Her cheetah roared in agreement.
“That’s my girl.”
Hester rolled her eyes. “Don’t you have a floor to be getting back to?”
Antonio gave her a leer. “You know, I’d be happy to guard your room from the inside – if you like.”
“Pretty sure you can manage just as well from the outside.”
“Well, if you’re content to leave me on this cold, hard floor…” He gave her such a kittenish look – think Puss in Boots’ big eyes look – that she almost wet herself as she burst into peals of laughter.
“Seriously! Please go to sleep!” howled Tomas through the wall.
“Okay!” called Antonio.
Hester took the opportunity to slip back into her room and shut the door. “Good night,” she called through the wood.
There was a pause, and then a chuckle from Antonio. “Good night.”
The cocoa was completely forgotten as she returned to her bed and willed her telltale heart to slow down. She felt better knowing Laurel was okay, though still pissed that the assface moron who did this was still wandering free. Not for long, not when her cheetah got her claws into them. Still, it was kind of nice knowing that Antonio was looking out for her, that he was outside, protecting her, separated only by a tiny bit of wood…
Hester groaned and got up, her cheetah grumbling. After a few minutes of grunting and sweating, she had managed to push the chest of drawers in front of the door. It wasn’t that she was worried he would come into the room, more like that she would wake up in the night and in a moment of weakness drag him in. Well, she was only human… mostly!
Twenty-Three
The leap party was a very cheerful affair. There were mountains of food – potato salad was definitely not in short supply, half a dozen barbecues going, each of which was surrounded by several men, enthralled by the fire and meat. Games and competitions had been set up for the kids, and everyone seemed to be in a good mood. Well, al
most everyone.
Her cheetah growled. Marta didn’t exactly look thrilled by the barbecue or her fellow leap mates. She was sitting away from everyone with a haughty look on her face. She sneered when she caught Hester’s eye.
Hester was trying to watch everyone covertly, getting a feel for which of the jaguar leap members – if any – had tried to poison her. It wasn’t easy to concentrate; the good mood was infectious, the sun was bright and warm, and Hester was a little tired from her nearly sleepless night. Well, how could she sleep knowing that Antonio was right on the other side of her door? She wasn’t made of stone! Knowing he was so close was far too big of a temptation. She was amazed she made it through the night without dragging him into her room and begging him to take her to heaven. Perhaps it had been too long since her last boyfriend, but then, none of her boyfriends had ever got her quite so hot as Antonio.
Hester spotted Valentina. Her beast bared her fangs. The young jaguar looked relaxed and happy as she moved between her leap mates, saying hello. She certainly wasn’t acting like a devious poisoning harpy, and she probably wasn’t. Hester just really wished she could be. Grrr.
Valentina caught sight of Hester, and her cheeks turned pink before she hurried away out of sight. The eyes of many young male jaguars followed her progress. Well, it beat the sneer her mother sent her.
Daniel was also sitting apart from the rest of the leap and appeared to be drinking himself into a stupor. Roberto and Antonio were currently deep in conversation, though Antonio constantly glanced in her direction to make sure she was still there, or possibly just still alive.
All the other kidnapped females were there with their respective kidnappers. Mary and Tomas were sitting together and smiling shyly at one another. Hester had strained to listen, but she couldn’t hear anything from Mary’s room all night other than a few snores.
Sadie and Lorenzo were talking, or perhaps arguing, or perhaps talking – Hester couldn’t tell, but the two of them were standing very close to one another and whatever their topic, it seemed important and intense.
Hester perked up as Diego led a wan-looking Laurel over to her table.
“Hey, how are you?” asked Hester leaning over and taking her hand.
Diego growled at her in warning and Hester gave him a growl in return.
“I’m okay,” she said with a small smile, “my stomach hurts a little from the stomach pump, but I’m fine.”
Hester tried to talk to her, but it wasn’t easy with Diego constantly fussing over her. He was trying to get her to eat, trying to put sunscreen on her, trying to get her to move and sit somewhere out of the sun. She batted away his concerns with infinite patience. Seriously, if it were Hester, she would have already snarled at him by the time he was trying to put sunscreen on her eyelids.
Laurel picked at her food. “I’m never eating chocolate again.”
Hester frowned. “Oh, you can’t let one poisoned box of chocolates put you off. Don’t say anything you’ll regret later.”
Laurel rolled her eyes at her and laughed.
“Gah!” Hester and her cheetah let out a sound of surprise as something small, warm and sniffly bounced up onto her lap.
“Looks like you’ve got company,” smiled Laurel.
A young jaguar shifter stared up at her from her lap. He couldn’t have been more than two years old, but his golden eyes already told her he was a shifter.
“Shoo!” tried Hester, completely unaccustomed to dealing with cubs.
His nose appeared to be running, and her dress was designer. She tried to push him off her gently – she didn’t really want to hurt him – but he had to be part barnacle or something because he wasn’t going anywhere.
Laurel completely failed to hide her titters of laughter, and even Diego who was preoccupied with fretting over Laurel, couldn’t help but let out a few snickers.
The little jaguar let out a few garbled words and reached forward to give her a hug.
“Oh, ah, um, okay!” mumbled Hester.
“Looks like you’ve found a new boyfriend,” teased Laurel.
“What?!” snapped Antonio towering over the table, his eyes blazing.
“I’m being attacked!” whispered Hester as the cub settled his head in the nook of her shoulder and he stroked her hair.
“That’s little Marco,” said Antonio, disapproval lacing his voice.
Reluctantly, Hester settled her arms around Marco, fearing he may fall off her. He was so warm and smelled so fresh and fit so well on her lap. Okay, he was adorable; she’d give him that. He was all big gold eyes, chocolate brown hair, and chubby cheeks. Yeah, maybe she could see why so many women wanted one of these. Her cheetah let out a small almost longing mewl.
“Aren’t they cute together?” said Laurel.
Any thought she had that this was some kind of tactic employed by Antonio to encourage her to stay in the leap was dismissed the moment she saw his face. He was struggling not to be irritated by the cub. He didn’t like it that the cub was on her lap, and didn’t like Laurel’s taunts that he was her boyfriend. He was actually jealous of a baby! Her cheetah howled in mirth.
Antonio forced a laugh out and reached down to disengage Marco’s grip on her. The cub let out a yowl of discontent as Antonio carried him back over to his mother.
“He’s precious,” said Hester as Antonio returned, partly because she believed it and partly to needle Antonio.
“Humph.” He tucked into a burger and kept a wary eye on the cub who now appeared to be having a tug of war with one of his brothers.
Laurel said she needed to go to the bathroom, and in spite of her many objections, Diego would not let her go alone.
“What did Roberto say?” Hester asked when they were alone.
“You shouldn’t worry about that.”
“Spare me and tell me.”
Antonio sighed. “There were three sets of prints on the box of chocolates.”
“Which would account for me, Laurel and Hilda but no one else.” Hester deflated a little; it was perhaps asking a bit too much for her would-be poisoner just to leave evidence pointing in their direction.
“The chief wants to take fingerprints from you to rule you out.”
“Whether it’s worth it,” she muttered.
“Oh god, he’s coming back,” grumbled Antonio.
Hester looked round to see Marco making his way back to her, arms outstretched. His mother was laughing as Marco reached Hester like a heat seeking missile.
“What can I say, I’m irresistible.”
Antonio scowled. “How open would you be to me climbing up on your lap?”
“Only one way to find out,” she growled flexing her claws.
Too late, Marco clambered onto her lap and started hugging her again. Antonio gave the cub a sour look and Hester blew Antonio a kiss.
“Practice maybe for when we have our own kids,” he taunted in return.
Hester narrowed her eyes, and Antonio chuckled.
Before she could throw a scalding retort at him, Maria joined them, beaming at the sight of Marco curled on Hester’s lap.
“Enjoying the barbecue?” she asked.
“Sure,” replied Antonio. “Now what’s this about you dating a bear shifter called Roman?”
Maria almost choked on her lemonade.
*
The next morning, Hester was still in a good mood, and when Maria asked if she wanted to walk down to collect the mail with her, she automatically said yes. Didn’t question why Maria was asking, or complain that it was too early. She got dressed – after her enormous breakfast – gave Antonio, who wasn’t invited, a smug smile and set off with Maria. She guessed Maria was trying to ease her into leap life by having her do the more mundane everyday jobs. But she wasn’t going to argue that it wasn’t worth it because she would be going home soon, she just got on with it. Plus, she liked spending time with Maria. She reminded her of her mother – if her mother weren’t uptight or act like a crazy stalker from
time to time. Though, admittedly, she didn’t know Maria that well – maybe she was a little nuts, too.
The barbecue had been kind of nice. Not something her coalition ever did. No, they had fancy dinners at the country club. They were filled with finger food, gossip, and stick-up-their-butts cheetahs. Their get-togethers weren’t fun like the leap barbecue had been. The barbecue went on into the night, with a huge bonfire and music. It was a real party that no one wanted to end. Indeed, the older members continued the party well into the early hours. Everyone always wanted the coalition parties to end early – usually the cops insisted on it. The leap was more like a family than anything else.
“Walk a little slower,” puffed Hester, having trouble keeping up with the sprightly human. “The chorizo omelet and the cinnamon bun you made me for breakfast were delicious, but I am kind of full and starting to feel like a beach ball. I don’t suppose you can make breakfasts that delicious in diet-sized portions?”
Maria slowed her pace. “You have nothing to worry about – you could do with a little meat on your bones.”
Her cheetah preened – she would. When shifted she was lithe and lovely, in her human form, eh, not quite so lithe.
Hester snorted. “Bah, I’m all meat. You’re just trying to make me too fat to run away from your son.”
Maria guffawed before sobering and slanting an annoyed look Hester’s way. “Speaking of my son, I can’t believe you told Antonio about Roman.”
“What is there to tell? You said there was nothing going on.”
“Well… there isn’t.”
“All I really told him is that the guy has a crush on you – which is true.”
“I… ah…” Maria flushed, wanting to deny it but also wanting it to be true.
“But if you wanted something to happen with him…”
“I don’t… at least, I don’t think I do.”
“No one said you have to be lonely,” said Hester, her tone as gentle as if she were trying to soothe a skittish deer.
“I’m not lonely, I just… I don’t want to replace my mate.”
“Don’t. Don’t ever try to replace him. Roman wouldn’t thank you for it, and it wouldn’t make you happy. My mother has spent years trying to replace my dad, trying to mold her new husbands to be like him and it always ends badly. But, you can have something new with Roman.”
