Bayou Heat (10 page)

Erin had said she filled more than one tape with Belisaire. Had she transcribed them
first while the meeting was still fresh in her mind? He had to get his hands on that
last tape. Find out just what Erin might have overheard, and, God help them both,
recorded.

“Teague?” Her voice was rough with sleep.

He stilled. And went rock hard. Damn, his mind had gone into his shorts and his instincts
had gone to hell. In any other situation, he’d be a dead man right now. A dead man
with a hard on.

“
Mais yeah, chèr
,” he answered quietly, stifling a disgusted sigh. “It’s me.”

There was a pause on the other side of the door, then, “You just hanging out in there,
or do I need to call paramedics?”

He fought to keep his smile out of his voice. “No blood. But you’re welcome to check
for yourself.”

“I’ll take your word for it. You going to be in there long?”

He held his breath. Caught red-handed and he still couldn’t get his mind in gear.

“Because if you are, perhaps it would help you to know that the rest of the tapes
are locked up in the lab safe on campus.”

That did it. He kicked the mat away and opened the door. “And why would that interest
me?”

He hadn’t expected the stomach clutch on seeing her again. But she was all soft, too
soft, for the take-charge woman he knew her to be. And her hair, that angel hair which
should have been way too short to be this sexy, was all tousled and finger raked.
She was wrapped in a sheet. He gripped the edge of the door to keep from reaching
for her.

“Because Sheriff Bodette mentioned you seem to have an interest in what’s going on
down near Bayou Bruneaux.”

“Of course I do, I live there. Care to tell me why you and Frank Bodette were chatting
at all?” he asked.

He wanted to wring her slender white neck. He also had an overwhelming desire to run
his tongue up that same soft spot. Make her gasp again, the way she had in the woods.
Make her stop worrying about overheard conversations and think only about him and
what he wanted to do to her … with her.

As strategic tactics went, seduction was far from overrated.

Which was precisely why he couldn’t do it. Not with her. Not that way. He didn’t bother
to ask himself why.

“It’s not what you think,” she said, the certainty in her tone wearing away the last
traces of sleep from her voice.

“You have no idea what I think,
ange
.”

She took an unconscious step backward.

“He was on my interview list. I wanted to ask him about his interaction with the voodoun
culture, determine what types of activity they monitor and why. What he’d actually
seen, if anything, of their rituals. I set up an appointment earlier this afternoon.
He was very friendly and helpful. You’d be surprised what local law enforcement can
contribute to these kinds of studies. Sometimes they have access to knowledge no one
else does.”

Suspicion tightened the back of Teague’s scalp. “How coincidental.”

To his surprise, she looked away. Guilt.
Ah, chèr
, he thought,
what have you gone and done
.

She looked back at him. “Okay, so I carefully—very carefully—felt him out on what
other activities he monitored down there.” She stood straighter, assuming a casually
defensive posture. “I’m sorry, but that conversation I heard last night still bothers
me. I guess I just can’t shove it all aside and pretend it never happened.”

“Did you tell him about it?”

“No.”

He tried not to sigh out loud in relief. “Then why do you think I care about your
tapes?”

“Just something the sheriff said. Since I was taping our conversation, he knew how
I worked. He was talking about the various things he keeps an eye on down there and
I joked about my recorder possibly coming in handy sometime. I guess I wasn’t as offhand
as I thought, because he gave me this look.”

“Erin—”

“It’s okay. I covered it. I’d already pretty much come to the conclusion that you
were right and what I’d heard wasn’t strong enough to risk Belisaire’s trust.”

“Well now, that’s a comfort.”

She made a face. “Don’t be snide. I’m not an ingenue in these things. I’ve dealt with
complex tribal politics that would confound you. And in those countries, one wrong
step and you could be dinner.”

“Don’t make the mistake of thinking it’s any different here,
ange
.”

“I’m not,” she said evenly. “Bodette said that if I ever did think I saw or overheard
anything unusual or suspect, that I run it by you if he couldn’t be reached. Said
you’d know if it was cause for concern or not.”

Teague bit down hard on a string of curses. Damn Frank Bodette and damn Teague’s own
superiors for letting the sheriff know about Teague’s role down here. He’d told his
boss that letting local law in on this was a mistake. Frank was the only one who knew
why Teague had really returned to Bruneaux. And that was one too many.

“Not surprising,
chèr
.” He fought to sound calm,
dismissive. “Local law doesn’t have time to patrol everywhere. Frank knows I keep
an eye on things down there, that I’m aware of what goes on with Belisaire and her
followers, and that the Eight Ball is a natural place for information to get passed
around.”

“Are you saying you’re an informant for him or something?”

“Hardly,” he said, not hiding his derision at the idea. “But that doesn’t stop him
from pumping me every chance he gets. The more he can get from me and other locals,
the less he has to dig up himself. Probably thought you’d make a nice link. You tell
me things, I tell you. Then he has two sources to pump. He’s just doing his job, Erin.”

“Which is exactly what I thought at the time.”

“At the time?” Teague pushed away from the doorframe and stepped closer to Erin. His
back blocked the light, casting her in shadow before him. She didn’t back away.

He noticed her grip tighten on the sheet. Just like that he had to struggle to remember
what they were talking about. He wanted that sheet gone. Now. And to hell with underworld
midnight plots and outwitting an idiot sheriff and keeping a too-smart-for-her-own-good
ethnobotanist from getting her pretty derriere in a deadly sling.

He wanted badly to forget all of that and just take her. Have her. Share his need
for her. Make her need him in return.

Dangerous. When had she become so dangerous?

“I thought the same thing. Until I got back to my office and found your note.”

He grabbed her shoulders before he realized he’d moved. “What note?”

“The one you left in the desk drawer on top of the notes I’d already transcribed.”

“And what makes you think it was from me?” Teague asked. “You said you lock up your
notes and tapes.”

She stared pointedly at the open French doors, then back at his face. “So?” Before
he could answer, she added, “And I only locked them in the safe after I found the
note.”

“And just what did I supposedly warn you about?”

“Not to discuss what I do in the bayou with local law enforcement.”

“And why would I warn you about that?”

She glanced away for a second.

“Erin?”

She tightened her jaw. “I don’t know. Maybe you have reasons of your own not to want
the police all over the place. Because of Belisaire … though I have to say from our
brief visit she doesn’t strike me as someone who needs looking after. And it was you
who was so determined to keep me from calling them.”

“The only thing I was determined to do,
chèr
, was keep you from ruining your setup with Belisaire by reporting information that
would lead nowhere anyway.”

Erin’s expression softened. “I know this sounds ungrateful. I appreciate what you
did in bringing me to Belisaire. But if this note wasn’t from you, then who?”

“Who else knows you interviewed Bodette?”

“No one. Not that that means anything. News travels fast. I can think of two other
people who wouldn’t like me talking to the law.” Then just as quickly she shrugged
that off. “No. No way did those two men know I was there. And I honestly don’t see
them coming on campus to warn me.”

“You are right about that,
ange
. Followers of Belisaire, if indeed they were, have a number of other very convincing
options at their fingertips to scare you away.”

He saw her shiver and draw the sheet tighter.

He stepped closer. “That’s right,
chèr
. Don’t ever underestimate Belisaire’s reach.”

“I don’t.”

He studied her face. “Did you record the conversation last night, Erin?”

Her eyes flared briefly with renewed suspicion, then it was gone as she let out a
sigh. “Is that why you’re here? Protecting Belisaire’s people?”

“Like you said, Belisaire rarely needs protecting.”

“Then why are you here?”

Teague lightly traced a finger across the soft rise of skin just above the sheet.
He was more gratified than he should have been by her soft gasp.

“I told you I’d taste you again. Perhaps I just got hungry,
chèr
.” It was the truth. The instant he felt her skin, alive and warm, under his, he knew
the job was an excuse to touch her. Not the other way around.

She broke away from his light caress, moving deeper into the shadows. “And maybe I
don’t appreciate being a convenient midnight snack when your other plans aren’t working.”

“Trust me,
mon ange
, there is nothing remotely convenient about you.”

“Yeah well, so what else is new in the life of Erin McClure.”

There was no self-pity in her tone, just acceptance.

“I know all about being an inconvenience,
chèr
.” He reached out and ran the side of his thumb along her cheek. “I learned a long
time ago not to fight it. To use it.”

He felt more than heard her light shuddering breath and closed the distance between
them. He pressed his fingertips into her hair and tilted her head back. “I suspect
you figured that out long ago too.” He lowered his mouth. “Let’s be inconvenient together,
Erin McClure. I really do need to taste you again,
chèr
.”

She opened eyelids that had drifted half shut at his touch and held his gaze.
“Mais yeah
, Teague.” Then on a soft exhalation,
“Mais yeah
.”

A groan escaped his throat as his mouth closed over hers. The sensation of being welcomed
home stole through him. Too provocative, too much what he needed but didn’t want.
And yet he couldn’t turn away
from the danger. She was too perfect, made just for him.

He pulled her into his arms, wrapping her in his body. Yet, when she let go of the
sheet to hold him instead, he felt as if he were the one being sheltered, cradled.

Another groan escaped his throat, long, low and guttural. He buried his face in her
neck, breathing hard.

“Erin.” The word was both plea and demand.

She was kissing his neck, pressing her teeth gently against the vein that pulsed wildly
under her mouth. He felt her lips travel to the neckline of his T-shirt, then breathed
in sharply when her hands found the warm skin at his waist as she pulled his shirt
from his jeans.

“Teague, your skin, you’re so hot,
chèr
.”

She pushed his shirt over his chest, then lowered her face to the soft hair that swirled
between his pectorals. The kiss she pressed there made him shudder. The light trace
of her tongue as she moved it up to his neck threatened his control.

He tilted his head back. She took the movement as an invitation. Had it been? He was
no longer certain. Nor did he care.

He held her waist in a tight grip, as she ran her tongue up along his throat, then
gently closed her teeth around his chin. Her hands were all over him. Tracing his
arms, shoulders, down his back, around his waist, slowly up his chest, molding the
muscles there.

He’d allowed himself to be touched, but never seduced. Not like this. This was a conscious
act of surrender,
and yet he had no choice in the matter. Not with her.

As she claimed his mouth again, and he let himself get lost in hers, he discovered
a need he’d thought dead and buried.

The need to be loved, cherished. To be needed. In this way. In all ways.

It terrified him.

But the forbidden thrall of it enticed him more. Darkness was all he’d known where
love was concerned. Love and need had always led to pain and suffering … so he had
long ago turned away from them both.

“Teague.” His name was a raw whisper of need.

His response was hardly more than a moan. His body felt heavy, languid, a sponge soaking
up sensation after heady sensation. He was unable—unwilling—to move, to chance breaking
this spell she’d cast over him, more terrified he’d never again feel this way, than
of the emotions she was dredging up in him.

“I need you.”

His knees actually buckled. His arms came around her in a fierce hug.

She didn’t seem to mind, her arms held him just as tightly.

“Please.”

He shuddered. “Don’t ever beg me, Erin. I’m not—I can’t be—” He swore under his breath.

She tilted her head back, forcing him to loosen his hold and look at her.

“I know. But you can be what I need right now,” she said quietly. “Is that enough
for you?”

He groaned, then kissed her. Long and hard.

No! Never enough
, his mind railed. He raised his head. “Yes.”

Erin looked into his black eyes and began to shake. She’d thought she understood what
she was asking. But now everything had changed. She was sure of nothing.

Because the last thing she expected to see in his voodoo eyes was vulnerability.

And yet, it was also the one thing she couldn’t ignore.

Connected. That’s how she felt in this moment, as they stared at each other. The impact
of that rocked her, should have frightened her.

Instead it gave her strength.