Rachael's head snapped up. She glared at the old man. "Who did you say was civilized?" She asked sweetly.
"Hafelina." There was more love than reprimand in the single endearment.
Little cat. She knew it now. Knew what he called her. The long-forgotten language was one she distantly remembered from her childhood and it was beginning to come back to her.
Elijah sat up very straight, a frown on his face. He shook his head but remained silent as the older man came into the room. There was a dignity about him that demanded respect.
"Don't reprimand her for speaking her mind or defending you, Rio," the elder said. "She is a woman of courage and integrity. I am no longer a member of the council, but I am bound by our laws. I'll do my best to change what was decreed, but I face punishment for my actions. I wish that I'd taken action some time ago instead of waiting until a personal crisis happened. I'll send word of Drake's condition immediately. Don't get up, I'll shift on the verandah. My pack is out there." He smiled at Rachael. "I am blessed I had such an opportunity to meet you and exchange ideas." His gaze went to Elijah. "Your sister has taught an old man it is never too late to right a wrong. You know the right path."
Elijah gripped the arms of the chair hard, nails digging deep. "There is no redemption for what I've done."
Delgrotto smiled. "Even the sacred high council can be wrong. Who can measure the worth of a man but his own sense of honor?"
Elijah looked away from the warmth in those old eyes. "If I can't forgive myself, how would I ever accept forgiveness from others?"
"No council can turn away the request of asylum, of sanctuary. It matters little where you were born. There are few true shifters left in this world. We can't afford to lose any of them." The elder moved into the shadows of the verandah, shedding his clothes and packing them carefully in the traditional leather bag he strapped around his neck before shifting.
There was a long silence. Rachael sighed. "I really wanted to detest that man."
"He's a good man," Rio said. "He's right to believe in the laws that govern our people. We can't be judged by human standards and we can't take our problems to the police. We have to protect and patrol our own ranks."
"I see what's going on here," Elijah said. "Only a man who has found his mate refers to her as sestrilla or hafelina. You can't have Rachael. You can't possibly protect her from Armando. I didn't keep her alive this entire time to let her die out here in this jungle."
There was a whip to his voice and Rachael winced visibly. Ignoring Elijah, she took a bowl of the vegetable soup and a cup of coffee to Rio. "Eat all of it, you need it," she encouraged. "And don't give me any guff over your precious elder. He isn't a bad man, he's just not as wise as a woman."
Elijah groaned. "Don't get her started with the women being superior to men argument, we'll get nowhere with this. Rachael, you can't stay. I can tell you feel something for this man, but you can't stay."
"I'm in love with him, Elijah." Rachael said it quietly, staring into her brother's eyes as she handed him a bowl of soup.
"Damn it, Rachael."
Rachael huffed out her breath in exasperation. "Why is it men always say that to me? I seem to bring out swearing in the male species."
She curled up across from Elijah, settling on the arm of Rio's chair, her arms curving around his neck. She had to touch him, her fingers smoothing his shaggy hair. She wanted to inspect his body and make certain there were no scratches to get infected in the humidity of the forest. She had to be content with teasing the nape of his neck with her fingers.
Rio exchanged a long look of understanding with Elijah. "I understand completely, she tends to make me swear too." He followed the admission with a yelp when she tugged at his hair. "I'm Rio, by the way, Rio Santana."
"You'll have to come back where I can protect you too, then. I have soldiers. My home is a fortress. I can keep you both safe. I live near the Glades so you'll be able to run free when the need strikes." Elijah stared at Rio hard, his gaze piercing and focused, a mixture of promised retaliation and challenge.
"You may be able to protect Rachael there, but I can do just as good a job or better here," Rio replied mildly. He leaned his head back into the strong massage of her fingers. "Before you get all bent out of shape, has it occurred to you that you need to do something different? Something unexpected? Your uncle knows you. He raised you. He knows how your mind works. But he doesn't know how my mind works. He doesn't even know about me."
Rachael nuzzled the top of Rio's head with her chin. Her breasts brushed the side of his face, soft and warm and inviting when he was bone weary. "You need to sleep, Rio. I can feel how tired you are."
"Armando will not come to this place."
"Sure he will. If the stakes are high enough. If he thinks he has a chance to win the game for good. It isn't all that hard to find someone to bribe to leak vital information. He has to have someone in his pay, someone who can supply him with information. It could even be some of the bandits. They'd want to collect from both sides."
Rio drank the remainder of the soup and put the bowl on a small end table. His hand found Rachael's. At once he brought her fingers to his mouth. All the time he watched Elijah.
Elijah regarded him through half-closed eyes. "You're thinking to feed him information on Rachael. Something that will bring him here to make certain the job is done right. He'd want to know it's finished. He'd want to know she was dead and he'd want me to know it."
Rio nodded. "There are bandits up and down the river. Some are fairly decent men, just trying to make a living. There are one or two tribes who would be willing to give us aid here and there. This is my realm, not his. He's infiltrated South America; I doubt he's had time here."
"Duncan knew the layout of the house," Rachael said. "Someone told him."
"Not necessarily. Delgrotto knew nothing of Duncan. As an elder, all information of importance is brought before the council. A member of our species unknown to us would be considered of great importance. I doubt if Duncan had any contact with anyone from my people. He was a shifter and he knew shifters populated this area. He listened to Tomas and his men, gathered information on my team and guessed we were shifters. As a leopard, he could easily find the scents and track us, where as a man, he would find it impossible. Most importantly, Duncan didn't have time to get this information to Armando. He was captured by bandits and then he came nosing around here, looking for Rachael. He found me instead."
Elijah rubbed his jaw. "So your idea is to bring Armando here."
"Rachael isn't going back. She's my woman. You know the legends, and you can call them myths if you like, but I know she's supposed to be with me and the only way you're going to take her from me is over my dead body."
Elijah shrugged his broad shoulders. "It wouldn't be the first time."
Rachael knocked a heavy book to the floor. It hit with a thud and brought an abrupt silence. "If you both keep it up," she hissed between bared teeth, "I'm dumping the rest of the soup over your heads. Get some brain cells working here, you two. I love you both. Posturing and threatening each other isn't winning any points with me. In fact, it's downright irritating." Rachael snatched her hand back from Rio and caught up the empty soup bowl. "Elijah, you want coffee or not?"
"Are you going to dump it in my lap?"
"I'm not sure yet."
"Then I think I'll pass until you get over your little..." he broke off abruptly as Rio frantically signaled him to silence.
Rachael turned to glare at her brother. "I know you weren't going to accuse me of being moody--or temperamental. You deserve an entire pot of coffee in your lap. You should have talked to me. I'm a grown woman, not a child to be protected. I know exactly what Armando's capable of and I knew you had no choice but to try to get rid of him if either of us was going to have a chance at a normal life." She swung around to include Rio in her displeasure. "If you ever get a thick-headed notion to go all silent and macho on me, please just get over it fast.
I'm likely to smack you with another stick if you do."
Elijah's eyebrow shot up. "She smacked you with a stick?"
"Gave me a scar," Rio said proudly and swept back his black hair to reveal the jagged white line. "Right on the temple too. She nearly took my head off."
"She knows what she's doing," Elijah confirmed. "And she hits like a man, but she can't cook very well."
"I'm a good cook," Rachael said, outraged. "I'm a very good cook. I can't help it if you don't like anything other than rice and beans. And no spices."
"There's such a thing as too much spice," Elijah said.
Rio grinned wickedly at Rachael. "Oh, I don't know, Elijah, you might be missing out. Live a little."
Rachael groaned and rinsed the dishes, but she was smiling again. The man had a sinful mouth and he had a way of putting fantasies in her head at the most inopportune times.
Rio leaned back in his chair. "The elder had a good idea. If you went to the village and asked for asylum, they'd have to give it to you. You'd be placed under the protection of our lair. It just gives us more people to count on our side."
"What exactly do you do aside from piss off the local bandits?" Elijah asked.
Rio's grin widened. "You've been talking to Tomas and his men, haven't you? Basically that's exactly what I do. That's my job."
"You do that to everyone without much effort," Rachael pointed out.
Franz leapt down from the mantel and scooted under Rio's feet, peering out at Elijah curiously. Rio stretched his legs further to accommodate the small leopard. "I lay up on a knoll, or in a tree, or wherever I can find and guard my team as they go in to bring out kidnap victims, or pay ransom. I do whatever it takes to keep them safe. Once they're out, I lay a false trail and lead the bandits away from the team and into the forest."
"I've heard the bandits have bolt-holes."
"There are mazes of tunnels in the cane fields, just about every field. You don't want to drop into one of them and try to pursue, not if you value your life. We've had to go in a couple of times when the bandits used the tunnels to hide their prisoners. We blew up the tunnels in order to discourage them from using them for that purpose. It's too dangerous to us, although we'll go in if we have to."
"So we don't want Armando to fall in with the bandits and get the idea of using the tunnels."
"If your uncle finds out she's playing house in the forest with some local yokel, don't you think he'd come with guns blazing? Especially if the information was given out to you, instead of him, for the million-dollar reward. We have to locate Armando's mole and let him overhear Rachael's been found. He'll immediately contact your uncle and Armando will come very quickly to get here before you."
"He'll send his killer after her."
Rio shrugged. "Of course he will. He'll want to confirm her presence and he'll want me out of the way. They'll expect an easy kill."
"He'll hunt you, Rio. Leopards make frightening enemies. They never turn aside and they're as cunning as hell. I ought to know."
Rio grinned at Elijah, but it was a particularly lethal smirk. "I'm very aware of what a leopard can do."
Rachael curled up in Rio's lap. Fitting herself to his body seemed perfectly natural. The night had taken on a surreal feel, a dreamlike quality. She couldn't believe Elijah was sprawled in a chair only feet away from Rio, looking relaxed and at home. How had she ever doubted him? His eyes didn't look ice-cold and merciless, although she knew they could. Right now he looked like her big brother, just lying around the house talking. She had forgotten that image of him. Elijah at rest. Elijah relaxed. Elijah with a faint smile on his face.
She buried her face against Rio's chest, confident he wouldn't say a word when he felt her hot tears against his skin. He would understand the enormity of the gift she'd been given this one night. Rio wrapped his arms around her tightly, holding her close to him, protectively, just as she knew he would. He nuzzled the top of her head with his chin, one hand tunneling in her thick mass of hair, just holding her close.
"This is my territory, Elijah. My realm. Those who enter it are subject to the laws of my people and my laws. Man or beast, it matters little. Armando may be a big deal in South America and in Florida, but he's no one here."
Elijah nodded his head. "I've been slowly cashing out our assets and putting the money where Armando can't touch it. He doesn't know, of course. But I'm hoping to get Rachael and me free of our estate and go back to my homeland. Unfortunately, there are problems."
"You could come here, Elijah," Rachael offered. Her voice was muffled against Rio's chest and he couldn't see her face. "The elders would accept you, Delgrotto already said as much. No one knows you here. You could have a new start."
"I don't even know how anymore, Rachael." Elijah looked at his sister through long lashes. His eyes were flat and cold. "If I can't talk to you, my own sister, how do you think I could ever learn to live with others again? Thank you for the offer, but if we manage to remove the threat of Armando, the last thing I intend to do is taint your life."
Rachael stirred as if to protest, but Rio's arm tightened in warning. "Let's just take one thing at a time. Armando is first. Let's find his mole and put out the word."
"He'll know I'm here."
"All to the good. He'll want to kill Rachael right under your nose. You've already established a research camp as your cover so you look as though you're trying to appear legitimate to him while you search for her. Just search in the wrong areas so he'll be convinced you're combing the region for Rachael."
"So I'm the dope miles away when he tries to hit Rachael. I don't think so. If that man sets foot in this country, I'm not leaving Rachael's side."
Rachael sighed heavily. "Do you see where I get words like 'imbecile' and 'idiot' in my vocabulary? Elijah, just this once, please, for me, listen to what Rio has to say."
"What do you know of this man, Rachael? You're betting your life on him."
"I know that. And if you're insisting on staying, maybe both of our lives, and that ought to tell you all you need to know. I left home rather than put you in a position of having to..." She trailed off. Only Rio knew she jammed her fist in her mouth to choke back the words before they could be said.
Elijah sat up straight. "I never wanted you dead. Never, Rachael. It was always the two of us. Hell, without you, what did I have to fight for? Why would I bother? I would have disappeared into the jungle and he would never have tracked me. But I didn't think you could."
"Because I couldn't shift?" She turned her head to look at her brother. "I didn't even know we were capable of shifting. How did you know?"
"It just happened. When I was young, a little boy. Mom told me not to say anything. We always spoke of it in whispers."
Rio brought up his hand to the nape of Rachael's neck in a slow massage. "Of course. She was still trying to hide it from her new husband. He didn't know until later. And then the elders of your mother's lair found out an outsider knew. It had to have happened that way."
"Something went wrong. Mom and Dad were very nervous until we reached Florida. They were nervous for a couple of years. Mom wouldn't allow me to shift and said I wasn't to tell anyone." Elijah sighed. "They were trying to protect us from our own kind. They should have been looking toward Armando."
"He knew, though." Rio said. "He used to take you places and let you run."
"If I had just told Mom right away--but I didn't. Just once, if I had said something to her, they might still be alive." Elijah fell silent, listening to the soothing rain. "And then when I did tell her, I should have kept my mouth shut. Armando already had made his plans and he killed them."
"Their deaths had nothing to do with what you didn't or did tell our parents, Elijah," Rachael denied. "You can't take on the responsibility. You did everything you could to keep us alive."
"I didn't kill Armando, Rachael."
"Killing him might set the two of you free, Elijah," Rio said, "but it won't bring anyone back, and it w
on't make you feel any better."
"I'll settle for making certain Rachael is safe. Even if we could find a way to put him in jail, he'd send someone after her and he'd never stop until she was dead. It doesn't matter if I went against the laws of our people and got a conviction, he'd find a way to kill her. I know him. Armando is vindictive and he hates me. In his mind, I betrayed him. He offered to make me his son. I was the heir to his empire and I went along with it for years. I had to make him believe it."
Elijah looked into Rio's eyes with the focused stare of his kind. "You probably can't understand that kind of twisted hatred, but he wants to kill Rachael more than he wants anything else. I chose her over him. That's the way he looks at it. She held some kind of power over me, otherwise, I would have become his son."
"But you made your move too soon and you couldn't get him. Why?" Rio returned the focused stare, every bit as unblinking and merciless.
"He came to me one night and told me it was time to clean house. He wanted Rachael dead. He said he knew I couldn't do it, so he wasn't asking me to kill her, he didn't need a sign of loyalty. He told me he was going to do it himself, that he wouldn't take the chance that any of the men would dishonor her first." Elijah drummed his fingers on the arm of the chair. "That's exactly how he put it to me. He was casually talking about killing my sister, but not to worry, none of the men would be allowed to rape her first."
"So you had to make your move."
"I had my men in place. I had a loyal following. I got Rachael to a safe house and made my move. Unfortunately, he was still too strong. He knows the way to defeat me is to get to her. She's everything I care about. You know that, don't you, Rachael? I swear I don't know what I said to you when I pulled you out of that car, but Tony was taking you to Armando, and you would have been sent back to me in pieces."
"It's all right," she said softly. "Elijah, I'm sorry I ever doubted you. Whatever was said is forgotten. Please forgive me for the terrible things I was thinking."
"Who could blame you, Rachael? We've lived with betrayal for so long it's become a way of life for the both of us." Elijah shifted in his chair. "So tell me what you want me to do, Rio. Let's see if we can manage to hash out a plan to remove the threat to Rachael."
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