by Fel Fern
“For years, the Leopold Pard always had an alliance with another medium-sized pard in Dark City up north. Gerald and five of his best enforcers went to neutral territory to sign their annual peace treaty, but someone, an unknown third party, interfered.” Cas closed her eyes, the pain on her features clearly visible.
“We don’t know who interfered, but someone sealed all the exits of the roadside bar where Gerald, our cats, and the entire Dark City Pard were holding a meeting. Then the bar was set on fire. No one survived.”
A chill ran down Lars’s spine at those words. “Whoever the culprit was knew shifters were in there.”
Cas nodded, her expression looked weary.
“They reinforced all the doors so even shifters couldn’t break them down easily. We’ve examined the scene and the evidence a hundred times, and came out with no answers. We can’t go around in circles or mourn the past, so all we can do is live and continue our lives.”
Lars brought her hand to his lips. They were ice-cold, so he placed a gentle kiss on each of her knuckles. The slight smile on her lips was enough to warm him up. The grief he felt on her last night was merely a taste, but an ocean of it lay buried inside of her.
“Lars,” Cas finally said, looking directly into his eyes. “I understand if you want to walk away after hearing all that, but I want you to know you weren’t meant to be a quick or temporary replacement. What Des said was true. It’s hard to find the right and proper king, and he doesn’t share me lightly.”
“Baby, if you belonged to me, I won’t want to share you, either.”
Cas and Des were all kinds of trouble, and he wasn’t sure a lone leopard used to solitude could tackle shifter politics. Cas had been upfront and honest with him, though, and that made it a whole lot harder to refuse. Even a blind man could see the leopard queen was a damn treasure, and so was her consort.
“So,” Cas finally spoke tentatively. “Should I pack you some lunch before you leave the city, or would you like to meet the other cats with me?”
“Lunch sounds good.” Lars watched disappointment and pain quickly pass her features, but he continued, “I’m a large man. I’ll need something to tide me over while we go see your cats.”
The smile on her face that day was so bright, looking at it almost hurt.
Chapter Seven
Cas wasn’t certain why she’d been more nervous than Lars. The black leopard looked calm, dressed in his leather jacket and the clothes he’d worn the night before. Lars wisely mentioned that if the other cats smelled he was wearing Gerald’s old clothes, it might offend them, and she agreed.
They took his bike and Cas could understand why he loved riding the sleek black-and-silver machine. Feeling the purr of the powerful machine between her legs and Lars pressed behind her was exhilarating.
She found she liked Lars’s easy manner. He seemed comfortable letting her do the talking during the ride, but he didn’t shy away when she asked him questions. He was surprisingly careful rider, and when the stoplight was red, he’d occasionally run his hand across her back, shoulder or arm.
Cas rather liked his little touches. It was an encouraging gesture that he was becoming possessive of her, and would willingly protect her if trouble came.
Last night cemented that fact. She knew Des would ask her to reconsider and think the situation through, but Lars backed her up immediately. Not that she couldn’t protect herself, but Lars’s personality told her he’d make a good leader.
Besides, if Lars did have a somewhat reckless personality like she did, at least Des was there to balance them. Cas knew on some level that she shouldn’t keep her hopes up, and Lars could still change his mind, but she needed something solid to cling to.
“Are we nearing the place, babe?” Lars asked, interrupting her thoughts.
“Yes, the garage is just a block down.”
It seemed he sensed her apprehension, because he parked the bike by the curb so she could mentally prepare herself. Cas got off the machine and handed him back the spare helmet.
They walked in silence for a few moments until Cas stood outside the garage’s entrance. She tried sensing the emotions of the other cats inside using pard bonds.
Noah and his mate Mason would back her up, she knew. The other cats wouldn’t hold out long either, and she could probably sway them, but Trig would’ve been a problem. She recently caught word the enforcer was spreading rumors about Des, and that her consort was too weak to keep the pard intact. While she believed in Des’s abilities, Trig was still nearly two hundred pounds of feline muscle.
“Hey, Cas?”
She blinked up at Lars, who touched her arm.
“Sorry, was just a little distracted. I shouldn’t be this worried, should I?”
Lars gently brushed the edges of his knuckles against her cheek, and the simple contact made the leopard queen inside of her lazily stir from its sleep.
“You’re doing fine, babe. Just breathe. Don’t worry about how your cats are going to react to me, let me worry about that.”
She nodded and led him inside. This early in the week, there were only two cars undergoing repairs in the hangers.
“Hey, Cas. Right on time. I’m damn hungry.”
A slender, dark-haired and olive-skinned man covered in oil stains stopped working on the hood of a car to greet her.
“Mason, is Noah in?” she asked.
“Yeah, in the office. He managed to get one of the teenage wolf pups to temporarily man the phones and help with some of the paperwork.”
“How are they doing?”
“They’re battered, but surprisingly not bad. Noah and I could house them until you and Des know what to do with them.”
“Thanks,” Cas said, meaning it.
She liked that about Noah and Mason. They didn’t ask questions until she was ready to give them.
He grabbed the paper bag she offered, and then gave the large biker beside her a wide berth. “You’re the cat who was with our queen when she saved those wolf pups?”
“This is the cursed black leopard everyone’s harping about?” The taunt came from another mechanic who emerged beneath the belly of a second car.
Trig Summers only came up a few inches short of Lars. His shoulders were slightly broader and he probably had a few more pounds on Lars, but not much. Cas had never liked the redhead. Gerald never really trusted him with serious pard business, either. Trig’s methods were crude and violent. He acted carelessly and thoughtlessly, even if that meant hurting a fellow pard member.
He also seemed far too intent on displacing Des. Noah told her last night it wasn’t long before he’d challenge Des to an official one-on-one match. According to pard laws, Des had to concede his position as her consort and surrender his power as her second if he lost.
Having someone as unreliable as Trig beside her would only further splinter the pard, and just imagining the rough redhead touching her made her shudder. Trig wouldn’t have Lars’s brains, thoughtfulness or unexpected kindness.
“Lars Marsden, cursed black leopard at your service,” Lars said beside Cas’s shoulder.
“You’re nothing to me,” Trig growled. “You’re just a filthy outsider.”
Cas felt the enforcer flare his metaphysical beast. Trig pushed his way past Mason until he was only inches away from Lars’s face.
“Cas, you seriously can’t let this stranger fuck you,” Trig sneered. “If you’re in heat, you just need to ask me. I’ll fuck you raw and show you what a real leopard is like.”
Meeting his eyes, Cas told him coldly, “It’s too bad I already fucked him, then.”
Trig’s eyes narrowed. He let out a threatening roar of rage, and his words barely sounded human. “You snide little bitch.”
Lars’s hand automatically wound possessively around her waist, as if he could sense her apprehension.
The gesture was enough to spark the attraction between their leopard king and queen. His touch felt like electricity. Once it passed through t
he haughty leopard queen lounging inside her, it passed to the other cats bound to her.
Mason let out a surprised sound. Cas could feel the other cats working in the garage stop what they were doing. They were drawn to her and Lars like a magnet.
“If I hear you disrespect her again, I’ll fucking kill you,” Lars said, his voice dangerously low.
There was no mistaking the authority in his voice. Leopard kings weren’t made. They were born to their power. It was one position a greedy, opportunistic and rank-climbing leopard like Trigg couldn’t take.
“The pard will tear you apart, outsider,” Trig fired back, although he looked a little shaken by the bold show of power.
“Will they? I can feel them through your queen, and they seem to be eager to get rid of you. They seem to like me well enough.”
Trig recoiled and took a hesitant step back.
“Lars, I see you’ve taken good care of our queen,” remarked a voice.
Noah had come out of his office to investigate the commotion. He patted Lars’s shoulder. Cas knew that was Noah’s way of saying he approved, and his approval made the metaphysical pard bonds in the air shimmer and undulate with power. Cas closed her eyes, breathing in the smell of change. It felt like a comforting and warm breeze entered the quiet and empty space Gerald and the other enforcers’ deaths had once occupied.
“Do I make myself clear, cat?” Lars asked Trigg, his eyes merciless and cold.
“Crystal,” Trig spat.
“Fuck this.” Trig unzipped his work overalls and began to shift. In minutes, a large spotted cat ran out the garage.
“Are you going to let him go?” Noah asked Lars.
Lars shook his head. “I didn’t come here to fight. I came here to meet some of the cats.”
Noah nodded in approval and began introducing him to the other cats. Cas expected the distrustful and uncertain faces, but through the pard bonds, they tasted her certainty and confidence. There was also curiosity in some of them, making her optimistic.
Bringing Lars to the garage was the right decision, because they felt and knew his power was real. Underneath the curiosity and suspicion, Cas also sensed something she didn’t expect to find.
Hope.
* * * *
“So, how do I score, babe?” Lars asked Cas.
He still had her small frame pressed against him, and he rather liked feeling her small warmth beside him. She finished texting Des and gave him one of her dimpled smiles.
Fuck. He was beginning to adore those dimples. Leaning down, he licked at them and kissed the one on her left, then her right, making her laugh.
“A ten,” Cas said, recovering from her giggles.
“Is ten a good or bad thing?” He watched her run her small fingers across his chest.
“A good thing,” she decided.
“Where to next?” he asked.
“Hold on a second, I forget to tell Des about Trig.” She began to text again, but Lars snatched her phone away and nuzzled her neck.
“Text him later, babe.” He tucked the phone into his pocket, but she didn’t argue.
“I need to check with Lil. She’s our resident doctor, and she took a day off to look after Sam. From what Rain told me, her brother took one hell of a beating.”
“Sure, babe. Just tell me where to go.”
After the introductions in the garage were made, he hung around the air-conditioned office, watching her talk to Rain, one of the wolf cubs they’d rescued the night before. She was pretending, or really sorting out some paperwork, Lars wasn’t really sure, but Cas somehow managed to get the teen to open up to her within a few minutes.
Cas was good with kids, he decided. In fact, he could see she was good with everyone. Her cats weren’t just open with her. Lars could sense their respect for her ran deep. The words her told her earlier that morning rose to the surface of his mind.
“Cas, if you’re mine to claim, fuck and protect, I’m going to have you every opportunity I can.”
Hells bells. Cas was one fine woman. He could really imagine sharing her with Des. The thought of settling down once repulsed him, but if settling down meant being able to come home at the end of the day to people who cared for, respected and wanted him, Lars didn’t think was so bad.
He started wanting, and he wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing. Lars even began to dream of little cubs running around the apartment. The boy would have Des’s eyes and his messy hair, and the adorable girl would have Cas’s red curls and huge dark eyes.
Fuck. What was happening to him? Was it only yesterday that he was thinking of just passing through the city and moving on to the next? His old life seemed so empty and directionless.
The small hand on his arm tightened. “Lars, something doesn’t feel right.”
Lars halted. Cas was right. Inside him, his leopard snarled in warning. The air felt changed. Heavy, almost. He began to stretch out his metaphysical senses when he spotted the flash of metal from the corner of his eyes.
He ducked just in time behind a car, dragging Cas with him. The bullet ricocheted against the brick wall of the building beside them, creating sparks. Lars scanned the quiet side street with narrowed eyes, spotting one hulking figure taking cover behind the car opposite the street.
More shots were fired. Unfortunate humans caught in the wildfire screamed. In a matter of minutes, the local authority would arrive. Lars hoped they would arrive fast enough.
Realization hit him. The second series of shots came from another direction.
“There’s a second shooter.”
Cas looked pale beside him, but he squeezed her hand in reassurance. Lars didn’t feel very confident. If there were two different shooters, then they were surrounded and good as dead.
“Come out in the open where we can see your faces, little kitties,” a gruff voice shouted from across the street.
“How the hell do we know you won’t gun us down, asshole?” Lars called back.
“You don’t. Either you come out, or we shoot that car you’re hiding behind full of holes.”
Lars bit his lip, and glanced at Cas, meeting her dark eyes. She was frightened, but he could see she didn’t let fear get in the way of logical thinking.
“If we don’t do as they say, more people will get hurt.”
“I know, sweetheart.” Lars kissed her cheek. “I guess there’s no other choice.”
They slowly emerged from their hiding place, holding their hands up in surrender. Lars expected their unknown assailants to honor their agreements. They wanted them alive, he knew. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t bother with negotiations.
They came face-to-face with their assailants. One of the shooters was Razor. The werewolf grinned menacingly at them. He had a mini Uzi in his hands. Lars expected the second shooter to be the same werewolf goon with Razor last night, but it wasn’t.
Cas let out a breath beside him. She almost collapsed, but Lars caught her. He ignored the cold barrel pressed threateningly to the side of his head. The same cold knowledge came to him.
Trig was the insider who’d sold out and betrayed the Leopold Pard’s former king. He knew he didn’t like the man the moment their eyes crossed, or the way he kept leering at Cas.
Lars glared at Trig, but the leopard only swung the barrel of his sawed-off shotgun, catching him good in the head.
“Lars,” Cas cried out with obvious alarm.
Lars swayed on his feet, and tried ignoring the pain. He stared Trig down.
“You betrayed your king, your queen, and your pard.”
For his little act of defiance, the edge of the barrel caught the side of his mouth. This time, the impact made him lose his balance.
Trig brutally kicked at his ribs, shouting, “What the fuck do you know, you useless son-of-a-bitch?”
“Fuck, Trig. Calm the hell down. We can’t kill him yet,” Razor reminded the enforcer.
It took awhile for Trig to calm down. He glowered down at Lars, his hate-fil
led eyes filled with barely surpassed rage.
“If you didn’t come into town, none of this would’ve happened. You fucking destroyed months of careful planning, bastard.”
Lars had been hurt worse before, but he pretended to weaken with each blow Trig gave. What hurt worse was hearing Cas plead for his life.
“Shut up, bitch.” Razor slammed the butt of his gun into her face.
The black leopard inside Lars rose to the surface, and he let out a snarl of challenge. He could feel his skin rippling with the change, and it took all of him to calm the beast down. Shifting now wouldn’t help them, and while shifters had fast regenerative abilities, he wasn’t sure he could completely recover from a bullet straight to his skull.
“Careful there, big bastard.” Trig leaned down and pressed the barrel to his head again.
Lars gritted his teeth, trying not to react when Razor roughly dragged Cas to him. She pulled away when he sniffed at her neck, but he only hit her again with his gun.
“A real man doesn’t need to hit a woman to prove his point,” Lars pointed out. His cracked ribs protested when Trig hit him again.
“Let’s see just what kind of man you are, Lars Marsden, when you see Razor and me rip your little bitch apart. We’re going to ram into all her holes until she’s begging us to stop.”
Trigg leaned in closer to whisper to his ear. “After we’ve used her up, Razor’s going to give her to the rest of his wolves. When she’s nice and broken, she’s going to make one fine, obedient queen.”
Lars was sickened by his words, but he remained dutifully beaten on the ground.
“You can do what you want with me, Trigg. Lars isn’t involved in all this. Please, let him go.”
Oh Gods, Cas. No.
“Hush, my little queen, you don’t need to waste your breath pleading for someone else. You’re going to plead and beg us to spare your life soon enough,” Razor crooned, forcing his lips on her.
He laughed, backhanding her when she spat at him. “You’re a feisty little cunt, aren’t you?”
A sound caught itself in his throat. Calm and quiet anger coursed through his veins. These bastards would pay. Lars changed his mind about simply killing them. He was going to make them hurt.
