Leopard's Run

by Christine Feehan

“You know that’s not a good idea. If they’re guilty, it won’t matter to Evangeline. She wants family. If you’re the one telling her every member of her family betrayed her, she isn’t going to like you very much.” Timur wasn’t about to let Fyodor ruin his relationship with Evangeline. He didn’t want his bond with her broken, but what choice was there? They had to know if her brothers were involved in the conspiracy against them.

  Fyodor stood up slowly. “Thank you, Timur.”

  Timur didn’t acknowledge the expression of gratitude from his brother, but it meant something to him. He left the room to the others to clean and get rid of the bodies. He needed a break. Some time with his woman, even if he just watched her sleep. He took a shower and let the warm water pound his sore muscles and then he went to her with more blood on his hands.

  He stood over the bed just looking down at her sprawled out, arms wide, legs out, like a pinwheel, or a star, no covers, the thick braid unable to cage that wealth of hair.

  “What are you looking at, handsome?”

  She didn’t move. Didn’t open her eyes, but she knew he was there and she sounded a little amused.

  “I’m looking at what’s mine.”

  “You sure about that?”

  “Absolutely sure.” He poured confidence into his voice.

  “Then why am I alone?”

  “Letting you sleep, malen’kiy smerch . If I’m with you, I’m in you.”

  Her soft laughter was muffled by the sheets, but the sound moved through him in spite of that. The notes were melodious and tugged at his heart. Deeper. Settled in him. He pulled his shirt from his body and tossed it aside, looking down at the wide expanse of satin skin. The line of her back was beautiful, the curve of her butt, enticing. Her legs, shapely. Just looking at her caused that burn to start.

  A slow burn was something for him to savor. With a leopard’s heat involved, his need of her was brutal. Harsh. This was different. Little flames licked at his skin. His blood turned thick and hot, but moved slowly through his body to settle in his cock so that the ache became familiar and yet new at the same time.

  He kicked his jeans aside and sank down onto the bed beside her. She didn’t move, not even to give him room. He drew a line up her side, from the curve of her hip, over her ribs to the enticing swell of her breast.

  “I missed you.” She made it a confession. “I woke up and didn’t like being without you.”

  He rubbed the cheeks of her bottom. “I don’t want you waking up without me.”

  “Put your hand between my legs. Feel what you do to me.”

  He did as she said. She was hot and slick.

  “That’s me waiting for you. She’s still asleep. No leopard, Timur. Just me.”

  His heart contracted. “Turn over, baby.”

  She didn’t move. “Is it always going to be like this? Me waking up craving you?”

  “I hope so. I want you to always want me. I know it’s going to be that way with me. I think about you every minute I’m away from you. Even when I shouldn’t be.”

  “Was it bad?”

  “I shouldn’t tell you. I should keep you as far from my business as possible.”

  She did turn over, drawing her knees up, but keeping her legs spread wide. Her eyes were on his face, seeing too much. Seeing into him. “No, you shouldn’t keep your business from me. I can feel how heavy a burden it is and I want to make it better. I don’t need or want details. But you can tell me if it was bad. There can’t be harm in that.”

  “Then, yes, it was bad,” he conceded.

  “I can give you a massage. It can be a sensual one,” she offered. “But a massage might help. We can find ways that I can help you.” She wrapped her fingers slowly around his cock, her thumb sliding over the large crown. “I want to do that for you.”

  “I need the taste of you in my mouth, Ashe. I want to taste every inch of you.” He had a bad taste, a coppery one, that wouldn’t disappear, as if he’d somehow gotten blood inside him and it wouldn’t come out. He knew only Ashe with her sweet, giving nature could remove it.

  He framed her face with both hands and rubbed his lips over her forehead. Her breath was warm on his wrists as he kissed her eyelids and then the tip of her nose. He rubbed his nose along hers, savoring the feel of her. The sweetness of her. The way she gave him every single thing he asked for without reservation. His mouth took hers.

  That was her gift. She gave herself to him. All of her. Every inch, not just physically, but mentally and emotionally. She trusted him with her when he didn’t deserve that enormous gift. He kissed her over and over, losing himself in the hot haven of her mouth. Kissing Ashe was a paradise in itself. Hot. Wet. Fiery. Her taste was exquisite. Perfection. He chased after it, needing more. Greedy for more. She gave it to him.

  He kissed his way from her mouth to her throat, using his tongue to take the taste of her skin into his mouth. She was soft and warm and tasted like heaven. He took his time, kissing her along her collarbone, taking the shape of her into his mouth, on his lips, into his mind where he mapped that image, etched it there for eternity into his brain.

  He kissed his way to the curves of her breasts. His tongue slid over them, tracing them so he could commit that feeling to his brain. His teeth scraped gently, as if he could take part of her into his bloodstream and keep her there.

  “Timur.” Just his name, but need was there. Hunger. Her body moved, hips undulating, trying to get him to cover her.

  “Let me,” he whispered. “Let me have this.”

  Her eyes moved over his face. She saw every line etched deep there. She saw whatever it was she needed from him to let her know this was important to him. Not just important—it was as essential as breathing air. She nodded, and pressed her hips to the mattress.

  He rewarded her with another long, slow kiss, so that fire burned through both of them. He let it happen, taking those flames and savoring them. He didn’t allow the need building in both of them to stop his exploration. His claiming. He kissed the tips of her breasts and then spent time learning every curve, slope and peak. He used his mouth. His teeth. His tongue. His hands and fingers. Committing her to memory.

  He registered every ragged pant. Her gasps that sent a rush of heat arrowing to his groin. The moans that sounded like music. The soft little cries that vibrated through his cock. Her hands moved over his shoulders, alternating between massaging his muscles, rubbing his skin and biting down with fingernails. Every touch sent waves of emotion straight to his heart. Sometimes the connection was so strong, he feared his heart couldn’t take the intensity.

  He kissed his way along her ribs on either side, tracing them with his tongue, feeling her hands move to his head, fingers curling into his hair. She held on as if she might lose him, or she needed an anchor. He wanted it to be for both reasons.

  His mouth blazed a trail to her belly button. He spent time there, wondering how he’d ever neglected it. He found the way she jerked under his tongue and teeth intriguing. She was sensitive there, and he slid his hand up the inside of her right thigh to the junction of her legs to feel how hot and slick she was.

  “You’re so ready for me.” He murmured the words against the soft satiny skin of her belly. Deliberately, he rubbed his chin through the tiny curls on her mound. He hadn’t shaved and the shadow on his jaw was bristly.

  “I’m always ready for you, Timur. I seem to be going around in a constant state of arousal.”

  He pulled her thighs farther apart. “Do you?”

  “Yes.”

  The acknowledgment hissed out when his tongue swiped across that slick entrance, gathering the honey that was all his. All for him.

  “The other night, at the dinner table, before my female made her presence known to everyone, I was fantasizing about sliding under the table and having you for dessert. The way you smell, Timur, that amazing scent, all man, drives me crazy.”

  His cock jerked hard at the idea of Ashe sucking him down at a dinner table. His dinne
r table, not someone else’s, but he liked her fantasy. “Tell me more.”

  He didn’t want to talk, but he wanted to hear her. Every word. He wanted to indulge himself. He wanted to feast on her taste. To devour her. This wasn’t for her, to drive her to the very edge, this was for him. All for him. He fastened his mouth around her, his tongue stabbing deep. Her hips bucked, and he locked her down with one arm so he could use his fingers in his pursuit of treating himself.

  “The other day, when we were sitting in chairs in front of the fireplace and I had a blanket over me. I was sitting on your lap, remember?” Her voice was strained.

  How could he forget? He’d been as hard as a rock and they weren’t alone. He made a sound, but he didn’t stop what he was doing. He might never stop.

  “I had my dress on and no panties.”

  He knew that too. He’d been the one insisting no underwear under that long, flowing dress. He’d hoped the air would ease her soreness. That had backfired on him. He’d been so aware of the fact that she wore nothing under that dress that he’d fixated on it and his cock had been hard for what seemed hours.

  Just to punish her for making him ache so much, he pushed two fingers deep and used his thumb to stroke her clit as he lapped at the honey spilling out of her.

  “I couldn’t stand it. You were so hard and your hand was right under my breast. I used my fingers …”

  He lifted his head. His own fingers plunged in and out of her while he stared at her, devouring her with his gaze, making certain she was aware of his displeasure. “You got yourself off?” How had he not known? They hadn’t been alone and he’d been aware of his own discomfort.

  She nodded, her small teeth biting into her lower lip. There was no remorse in her eyes. None at all. Just that mischievous look that drove him insane with lust. “I did. Right there with everyone in the room.”

  “You put your fingers inside you?”

  She nodded again, and this time he could see the answering hunger in her, stark and raw.

  “Do it now. For me.”

  She obeyed him instantly, sliding her fingers down her belly slowly and then letting them curve over her mound until two disappeared. “It feels better when your mouth is there.”

  He yanked her fingers from her and licked them clean. “Next time you decide to get yourself off, I want to know you’re doing it.”

  Kneeling between her thighs, he pressed his cock to her. In his fist, he felt heavy and thick, like a steel rod with no give in it. He watched as he pushed the crown deeper, watched as her body began to slowly swallow his. It was sexy and remarkable. Sensual and sinful. Her lips stretched to accommodate his girth, just as her mouth did when she took him down. He loved her body and the way she strained to accept every inch of him.

  “What does this feel like to you?”

  “Possession. Belonging. Yours. It burns, but in a good way. You’re going too slow though. I need you to …” She tried to force him to take her faster, to impale herself on him.

  “This is mine. For me this time.”

  She stopped moving immediately. “I’m sorry. I did promise you that, and I meant it. Whatever you want. However you need me. I want to give that to you.”

  Already she’d given him so much. The coppery taste was gone and in its place was all Ashe, that sweet spice that was her. He felt her everywhere. He had her in his heart. In his mind, he had her in his body. Now, she surrounded him like a living flame, squeezing him tightly, stroking his cock with those small, strong muscles.

  He didn’t let the feeling overwhelm him or drive him. He took his time, savoring her, registering each separate layer of beauty she gave him. Taking everything in. The love on her face, the adoration in her eyes, the way her breasts swayed with every movement of his body, the ragged little pants that nearly destroyed his ability to keep his body from letting the fire consume them both fast.

  “You’re a fucking miracle, Ashe. What you give to me.”

  Her gaze never left his face, even when her smile turned to a hitch of shock as he surged deep and then held himself still. “Anything, Timur.”

  He believed her. His woman. He took a breath and began to move in her, wanting her to feel his love with every stroke. “I’m not good at relationships, baby. I’m going to fuck things up often, so what I want is patience. I want to give you so much back that in those times, you’ll remember and you’ll have patience with me.”

  If it was possible, her face softened even more and her eyes went watery. “I think I can manage that.”

  He took his time for another few minutes, wanting to feel every grip of her sheath, that silken fist strangling him. And when he couldn’t take it anymore, he got down to business.

  18

  AMBROISE Tregre wasn’t taken downstairs to the rooms below the house. Timur didn’t want him to know anything about those rooms unless it was necessary. The man had an eye for detail and a memory that allowed him to draw anything he saw. Timur didn’t need that room hanging on a wall of a gallery someday. If it became obvious that Ambroise was part of the Tregre conspiracy, he would be taken to that room never to leave.

  It was after midnight when the two brothers arrived back in San Antonio after having driven back to New Orleans. A plane had been sent for them and both, thankfully, had gotten aboard without needing weapons to persuade them.

  Ambroise paced the length of the den. He didn’t look at Timur but looked up and down the walls, along the floorboards and up to the ceiling. “Something is wrong, isn’t it?” he asked abruptly, coming to a halt in the middle of the room. “You’re here talking to me instead of Fyodor because you’re head of security, not because you’re his brother.”

  Timur nodded, studying the kid. He was older than Evangeline, but he looked younger. He was nervous, but not necessarily scared. He clearly wasn’t aware this meeting was life or death for him. Timur didn’t enlighten him. Sometimes, it was easier to get information by not asking a question, but waiting to hear what the other person had to say. He waited in silence.

  Ambroise sighed. “We’re never going to be free of what comes with our name. My grandfather was a vicious murderer. He liked to beat men and women equally, because it made him feel powerful. Unfortunately …” He trailed off and shook his head.

  Timur waited. Hands in pocket. He leaned against the wall, ankles crossed, looking as if he would be at a disadvantage if a fight ensued. Ambroise had a leopard. That meant he would be fast and could easily leap the distance to Timur. Timur wasn’t in the least bit worried. Temnyy was fast and experienced. Ambroise’s leopard wouldn’t stand a chance against him.

  “My father and Uncle Gilbert, over the years, have begun to act like my grandfather did. I could see a change in them right after his death. Maybe it was there all along, and they were just better at hiding it than my grandfather. I left for school. I couldn’t breathe there. I don’t live at home and haven’t for years. When I heard Pere planned to try to persuade Evangeline to let him help with her bakery, I wanted to be here to see what he was proposing. He got into some trouble a while back, and I didn’t want that to touch her.”

  Timur wasn’t going to waste time. “I know about the drugs, and it looks as if he’s back in that business. What I don’t understand is why you drew a map of your sister’s house, so that any enemy she had, including your father, would know the entire layout.”

  Ambroise looked horrified. “Wait. No. I drew it for Christophe. He isn’t an enemy. He couldn’t be there and her house is so cool that I wanted him to see it. No one else …” He trailed off and closed his eyes. “Uncle Gilbert went to the apartment we share in New Orleans. Like I said, we don’t live in the swamp anymore. When Christophe came back from Borneo, he needed a place to stay, so I had him stay with me. The drawings were at our place. Uncle Gilbert came over one morning for something, and I was in the shower. Christophe was already gone.”

  “Would there be an advantage to your father if Evangeline died?”

  Amb
roise frowned. Shook his head. “No. What would there be? She’s married. Everything she has would go to her husband.”

  “Was there ever insurance or papers signed giving her father whatever she had?”

  Ambroise was silent for a few moments. “He has insurance on all of us. I signed a legal document giving him everything if I died before I went to college. I think Christophe did as well, before he left the country. I don’t know about Evangeline. It wasn’t like any of us had anything.”

  Timur would bet his last dollar Evangeline had as well. Beau Tregre had sold out his daughter and her husband because he already knew he couldn’t control her. He’d made his pitch, but it had been more to appease his conscience than because he thought she’d give him an “in” to her bakery. He wanted it to expand his opium business.

  “Thanks, Ambroise,” Timur said. “I need to talk to Christophe. Fyodor and Evangeline are in the sitting room. You can meet them there.”

  Ambroise went to the door, hesitated and then turned back to him. “My brother and I both have had suspicions that our father killed our mother. Once, when Christophe asked, he said she committed suicide. Uncle Gilbert said our grandfather killed her. When I asked Pere , he said she ran off. He told most outsiders she died in childbirth, but she didn’t.” He didn’t wait for an answer and left the room.

  Christophe was waiting in the poolroom. He put the cue he’d been using in the rack and went straight to the large stone fireplace at the opposite end of the room from the table. “Is Evangeline all right?”

  Timur nodded, studying the man’s face. He was fit as only a shifter could be. In his prime, every muscle honed to its greatest strength. He looked like a man, unlike Ambroise. The two brothers couldn’t be any different. There was a delicacy to Evangeline that was also in Ambroise. Timur didn’t see that anywhere in Christophe, but his eyes were like his sister’s. Same shape. Same thick crescent of lashes. He could see the resemblance when he looked for it.

  It was a good tactic, asking questions first. Timur wasn’t going to let him get away with it. If one of the brothers was guilty of helping his father, Christophe seemed much more likely to be that person. Except … Timur thought he was the stronger of the two boys. He wouldn’t bend under pressure. Still, that meant it would be his choice to join with his father.