Savage Nature (22 page)

“You’re such a miracle, Saria,” he murmured, his mouth wandering over her face. He kissed her eyes, her nose, the corners of her mouth and that sweet, stubborn chin.

“I’m just me, Drake,” she sounded bemused.

He smiled down at her. “And that, honey, is the miracle.” He trailed kisses down her throat, his teeth nibbling along her neck, down to her breasts as he bunched her shirt in one fist. His mouth closed over one breast, suckling strong right through the thin lace of her bra. She cried out and arched against him, pressing more deeply into him. His hand came up to roughly massage the soft mound.

A bird called loudly, answered by another one. Drake’s leopard leapt and was answered by Saria’s female. Drake actually felt the rush of fur sliding under her skin, the scorching heat, and he inhaled the wild, exotic scent. His tongue lapped gently at her nipple once more before reluctantly lifting his head.

“Damn it, honey. We’re out of time.”

She let out a little gasp of shock, as if she was coming back from a great distance. He dragged down her shirt, and steadied her, as he lifted his head, scenting the air. “They’re coming at us as men, rather than leopards. That’s not good, Saria. Get back to the boat.”

She looked around her for the rifle. She’d set it against the trunk of a tree without realizing it. She shook her head. “Seriously, Drake, I don’ know what I’m doin’ when you’re kissin’ me.”

Drake put his arm around her and drew her beneath his shoulder, holding her close for a moment. “I should have known they’d come after us as fast as they could. They don’t want the other members of their lair to know what they’re up to. Will Charisse tell on her brother?”

“You saw her. No way. He covers for her all the time.”

He nodded. “I’m armed, honey. I’ll stay here. You take the boat and head . . .”

She shook her head. “It’s not goin’ to happen, so stop right there. We’re not splittin’ up, although I appreciate the gesture. No sense in arguin’ with me, Drake. I won’t change my mind.”

He took her at her word. “They’re going to use bullets. We need a place to defend. I’m not willing to risk the open water with me in the boat with you.”

“Neither am I.” She sent him a rueful smile as she immediately signaled him to follow her. She moved with confidence through the tangled vegetation. “I’m guessin’ they’re goin’ to shoot you on sight and hope I’m not in the way, unless they don’ want a witness.”

He’d thought of that. He also was a little worried about what three leopard-driven, lust-filled, out-of-control men would do to Saria if they caught her alone. He was certain Armande had attacked her once. Where the hell was the leadership?

“I might have to kill them.” He said it straight, with no apologies. “They’re hunting us and I can’t take any chances with your life.”

“I’m well aware of the position they’re puttin’ us in.” She shot him an emotion-laden look over her shoulder. She kept moving, winding her way through the heavier reeds and tangles of brush. “Don’ step there, not even on the edge. The crust is thin here and you’ll fall through.”

He didn’t bother attempting to hide their tracks. These men had grown up in the swamp and were hunters. They were also leopards with all the instincts and advantages of their cats. He stepped exactly in Saria’s footsteps as she made her way through a narrow strip of land that was barely thick enough to support them. The reeds began to thin and brush took its place. Rather than cypress trees with the knobby-kneed root systems, evergreen and pine appeared, the grove growing thicker as they went deeper into it.

“You’ve been here—a lot. I thought no one came here.”

She sent him a small grin, not breaking stride. “It was the one place no one thought to look for me. I’ve been comin’ here since I was a child. It’s my private refuge. No one else comes here, so I found a place around the other side to pull my boat onto shore and hide it.”

“You’re taking us through every pitfall you know of, aren’t you?” The terrain had gone wet and soft again. He skirted around the areas she did. His leopard shifted inside him, stepping far from the spots that looked as if they might be quicksand. The Spanish-moss-covered cypress trees were back, growing in the thin soil. Around them palmettos, irises and marsh grass vied for space with tangled vines.

Turtles rested on logs and one sat on the bank. Birds were everywhere. Saria didn’t worry about disturbing them. The buzz of insects was constant, becoming a kind of music in his ears. He found he was becoming accustomed to the sounds of the swamp. He knew the rain forest in the way she did her environment and he followed her without question.

She suddenly tugged at his arm to avoid stepping near a tree concealing a water moccasin.

“Should have seen that,” he admitted.

“You were looking at my butt,” she accused.

“So true.” And damn it all, it was true. He figured he had a little time off while he followed her. “The view is spectacular.”

She shook her head with a little snicker and picked up speed, rushing through a cypress grove that gave way to reeds. He stopped in his tracks. As far as he could see were blue heron and snowy-white egrets. They walked gracefully in the shallow water, dipping beaks into the waters, fishing.

“I’ve never seen anything like that.”

She looked pleased. “I knew you’d think it was cool. You should see them when they take to the air.”

“Have you photographed this?”

“Yes. But the money shot is as they’re actually risin’ to fly, with their wings outstretched, barely skimmin’ the water.”

“You’re really very good, aren’t you?”

“Yep. And I’m goin’ to make a name for myself with
National Geographic
. I want my own book someday.” She began walking rapidly again.

“How would you feel about photographing the rain forests of the world?”

The ground went solid again and the cypress trees gave way to another tangled grove. Saria ducked her head to go underneath a low-hanging branch. Something spit splinters at them both and the sound of a shot reverberated through the swamp. The air groaned under the sudden migration of birds as they rose in fright. An alligator slid into the water with an ominous plop. Drake took Saria down, his body covering hers.

They lay very still for a moment, hearts racing, Drake swearing silently.

“They shouldn’t have been able to follow so fast,” she whispered.

“They’re using both animal and human form, which is against every law we have.” His voice was grim. “Slide out from under me, Saria. Reach for your leopard. She’ll rise to the surface to protect you. Don’t be afraid of her. Her senses will be sharper than yours.”

“What are you goin’ to do?” she asked. For the first time he could hear fear in her voice and it tore at his heart. Damn them all, they were going to die today for this.

“You don’ want her hurt, come out by yourself,” Armande challenged.

Saria caught his arm. “Don’ even think about it. They know I would never stay silent if they killed you.”

“They’ll get their chance at me. You start crawling forward and when you get to that heavier brush, break to your right. There’s plenty of the cover unless they get crazy and spray the area with bullets. Give me a minute before you decide to shoot anyone. I’m going to shift and go after them.”

“They’ll kill you, Drake, and you know it. That’s what they want. They can explain the killing of a leopard, but not a human being. They’re goading you into shifting.”

His leopard roared with fury, determined to remove the threat to his mate, uncaring about human life. The three men had dared to fire a weapon near Saria—they deservyouath. He felt the familiar ache in his bones, the convulsing of muscles.

“No.” Saria turned under him, onto her back, throwing both arms around him, holding on tightly, as if she could somehow hold off the fur slithering beneath his skin and the teeth filling his mouth. His shirt ripped with the ropes of muscles banding over his body. She refused to let go, even when hot breath blasted her throat. She closed her eyes, refusing to look at his face changing, but she never once let go.

There was a moment when he wasn’t certain he could stop his leopard. Stiletto-sharp claws burst through his fingers and it was all he could do to bury them into the soft earth on either side of her head while he breathed his leopard into submission.

Her hands framed his face. There were tears swimming in her eyes when she opened them. He knew she was staring into eyes pure leopard.

“Please, Drake,” she whispered. “Don’ do what they want. Stay with me. We can fight them off.”

He had no choice. Not if she was going to cry. The real knife to a man’s heart was his woman’s tears. He bent his head and kissed them away gently. “Let’s go then. Crawl out of here, stay low and don’t move brush.”

They were both soaked from the wet ground and she shivered a little, still holding him tightly.

Behind them was an explosion of sound, a wild roaring growl and the sound of a man’s high-pitched scream of terror.

9

SARIA went still, lying beneath Drake in inches of water and mud, looking up at him with terrified eyes. The noises emanating from the groves of trees around them were horrifying. It sounded as if a thousand leopards were fighting over prey. The birds took to the air again, the sounds of their cries mingling with the ferocious growls and snarls rising in volume. Branches cracked and the brush trembled as heavy bodies slammed into them.

Drake rolled off Saria and reached to help her up. She took a better grip on her rifle, dropping behind him as he took the lead, working his way back toward the sounds of the battle. He opened his shirt in preparation for the change. Soaked and covered in mud, they ran through the brush, batting at spider webs as they wound their way along a narrow trail, avoiding sink holes and quicksand until they came to the grove of evergreen trees.

Five men, all heavily armed, surrounded two golden leopards and a huge black one. Drake drew his weapon, but Saria pushed the gun down.

“Don’ shoot. That’s Elie Jeanmard and four of my brothers,” she whispered, her voice trembling a little. “The black leopard is my oldest brother, Remy. I saw him once like that.”

Drake rocked back on his heels. He had expected to have to take on her brothers, but not all together.

Clothing was strewn around the ground, ripped and shredded. From the scent, Drake knew the two golden leopards had to be Armande and Robert. They had shed their clothes quickly, to keep from being attacked in human form by the ferocious black leopard. Remy had burst out of the trees and rushed them, giving them little time to shift before he hit Armande, driving him backward ">

Fur rained down and blood splashed across the reeds. As fast as the two golden leopards rose, out of sheer desperation for survival, the black leopard relentlessly knocked them down again, his movements fast, twisting in midair, using his flexible, accordionlike spine, and savagely raking the sides and bellies of both cats.

The two leopards had no chance to coordinate their defense against him. Remy attacked them with such ferocity that Drake suspected the bloodlust of his leopard was out of control. If he wasn’t careful, he was going to kill them both. The injuries both golden leopards had already sustained would take a long time to heal—and Remy was far from finished.

A black leopard was rare in the wild and even rarer among shifters. In shifters, as a general rule, they were bigger and stronger and in this case, faster. Remy moved with lightning speed, punishing the other two leopards, refusing to accept any sign of submission, forcing them to have to rise to protect themselves even when it was clear they wanted to call a halt to the punishment.

More than once each leopard signaled its submission to the enraged male, but he was having none of it, walking away, prowling back and forth, kicking leaves and dirt toward the two fallen leopards with a furious swipe of his paw and then leaping on them again and again, raking and clawing mercilessly.

No one made a move to help the two hapless leopards. Drake knew it was more than punishment. Remy Boudreaux was furious. Drake understood, even if no one else did. Personally, he would have killed both the bastards. They dared to shoot a gun at Saria Boudreaux. Remy and his brothers had been in pursuit and they heard the shot Armande fired toward Drake and Saria.

Saria’s oldest brother was a hell of a fighter, one of the best he’d seen, and for a man to be that experienced, he had to have traveled as a shifter outside the Louisiana bayou. Drake wouldn’t have been surprised to learn Remy had served on his own teams in the rain forest. Remy Boudreaux should be the leader of the lair, not Amos Jeanmard, Drake decided. He struck the right note of terror into the hearts of those watching. It was impossible to tell if he would stop before it was too late, but the others didn’t seem terribly concerned.

Drake studied Elie Jeanmard, standing passively as he watched the leopards fight. Scent told Drake the man had been Drake’s first challenger the night before and the third man pursuing him on the Mercier property. He watched the severe beating with a grim face, but made no move to stop it. This was Amos Jeanmard’s son and if Drake was right and Jeanmard was the leader of the Louisiana lair, Elie didn’t want any part of leadership. It was understandable. Elie had seen his father do his duty to the lair, but he’d been unhappy, and most likely his mother had been as well. Still, when he realized Armande and Robert were hunting Drake and Saria, he hadn’t looked the other way, he sent for Saria’s brothers.