Leopard's Prey (16 page)

She bit down on her lower lip, her blue eyes rising to meet his. The impact hit him hard, like a punch to the gut. The tip of her tongue came out and she licked at her lips as if the thought was intriguing. “I want to, Remy. I dreamt of pleasin’ you that way, maybe a million times, but I honestly don’t know how. I’m a fast learner,” she added. “I read books just in case you wanted me. I didn’t want to disappoint you.”

“You could never disappoint me, Bijou. The key to being good at this is to enjoy it. If you do, and I know you want me like that and that you enjoy having me in your mouth, lovin’ me that way, anything you do will be perfect.”

“Would you help me learn? If you talk me through it and have patience…” She trailed off.

The hopeful note in her voice tugged at his heart. She was squirming again. The Han Vol Dan was so close and her leopard was definitely a very sexual passionate animal, just as his was. She wouldn’t give Bijou any relief, her heat driving her to mate.

He put a little pressure on her shoulders, silently commanding her to kneel. “I’m a very good teacher,” he told her hoarsely.

He was not going to last long, his passion rising to meet hers. He would have to be inside of her soon. The thrall was on both of them, not just Bijou, and he couldn’t stop himself from taking her again and again, no matter the cost to either of them.

Who could resist the sight of Bijou, her long hair falling around her soft skin, on her knees looking up at him with dark desire in her incredible eyes? He needed her mouth wrapped around his cock. He was already dripping in anticipation.

Her breasts rose and fell, her nipples harder than ever. She wanted this every bit as much as he did, and that had him nearly falling to his own knees. He nudged her knees a little farther apart with his foot, enjoying the reality of her rather than an image. Her body was open to his, needy like his, and she licked her lips again as if she couldn’t wait to taste him.

Already he could scent her call, that wild lavender honey wafting up from between her thighs to tease his senses and drive him insane with need all over again. She was leopard, she would take to every passionate, erotic lesson he gave her. He let her look her fill and then he caught her hair in his fist and urged her chin up. “Explore with your tongue. Get to know me. Every part of me. I belong to you, so take your time and enjoy yourself.”

He wasn’t altogether certain he could give her that time, but he found he needed this from her. Her hands touched him tentatively at first, stroking little caresses that made him want to growl. Then she touched with more confidence, testing his weight, his girth, holding his balls and rolling them gently. He threw back his head at the first stroke of her tongue. Featherlight. Velvet soft. He wasn’t going to survive this night.

He used the back of his hand to gently caress the sides of her face, encouraging her as she built up her courage. It was all he could do not to force himself to thrust his cock into her mouth. Fire burned over him when her tongue stroked and licked and then she sucked at his heavy sac. This wasn’t going to work, not when she was so sensuous and obviously into pleasing his every whim. He would never last.

“Blue, I need your mouth around me. Suck on me hard.” Now his voice was nearly gone, just a hard command that was more growl than voice.

Bijou licked up the shaft, swirled her tongue around the ridge and down under the head of his cock. His breath hissed out of him as she licked over the head and then pushed down, taking it into the heat of her mouth. The suction was tight and her tongue teased over his hard flesh. He forgot all about teaching her anything. There was no way he could allow her to explore much longer, not if he planned on being inside of her.

Her scent beckoned him, a wild call he couldn’t ignore, not even for the ecstasy of her mouth moving over him with such care. She was squirming, her hips undulating in desperation, yet she still did her best to please him.

He tugged at her hair, waiting until she looked up at him. Her eyes were nearly pure cat, glowing at him like two glittering jewels in the night.

“I need to be inside you,
chere
. Right now. There’s all the time in the world for you to pleasure me like this, but right now, I need something else.” He drew her up and pointed to the bed. “Kneel down there.”

Bijou did as he commanded without question. He knew exhaustion didn’t matter. Inhibitions didn’t count. She had no more choice than he did. All he could do was make their joining the most pleasurable and passionate he could.

In the end, as dawn crept in, and she finally fell into a fitful sleep, he had no real idea of how many times he had taken her, only that each time she had screamed in pleasure, her body riding his as he took them both to paradise again and again.

Remy looked down at Bijou sprawled across the bed, her skin marred with his fingermarks, and the teeth of his leopard. He’d marked her – claimed her in the manner of his people, a primitive ritual, but it served its purpose of warning off other males, and making certain the emerging female leopard accepted the male. Bijou Breaux was formally now and forever… his.

7

“You really pissed off someone,” Gage said, hands on his hips, as he surveyed the damage to his brother’s apartment.

Remy noted with an inner smile that his younger brother had positioned himself protectively just a little in front of Remy. He knew without a doubt, if there was trouble, he could shove his brother out of the way, but it would slow him down by a second or two. On the other hand, it was a good feeling to know his brother had those protective instincts – for him.

“I guess I did,” Remy admitted with some satisfaction. He looked around the small apartment he rented in New Orleans. His home would always be the bayou, but it wasn’t always convenient to make his way that distance every night, so he kept a place closer to the police station.

“He really tore up your apartment,” Gage said. “I don’ think there’s anythin’ left.”

“I don’ keep anythin’ of value here,” Remy replied and took a long, slow look around the sitting room of his apartment.

Everything was smashed. His end tables, his lamps. The television set that had been on the wall was shattered, leaving a huge hole in the Sheetrock. The couch and recliner cushions were slashed and the stuffing torn out.

“I’d say he was in a rage,” Gage said. He glanced at his brother. “What did you do?”

Remy shrugged. “I kissed a girl.”

“I hope she was worth it,” Gage said, and stepped back, closer to his brother in order to peer into the bedroom.

Remy knew the exact moment Gage inhaled and caught his scent. His head swung around, eyes wide with shock.

“What the hell have you done, Remy?” he asked, swinging around to fully face his brother. “You have Bijou’s scent all over you. There’s no mistakin’…” He trailed off, suddenly catching that other much more elusive scent shadowing Bijou’s. He inhaled sharply. “She’s…”

Remy nodded. “Leopard.
Mine
.” He made that very clear. “This bastard has been stalkin’ her. He’s not going to get away with it.”

Gage held up his hand, shaking his head. “Wait a minute. I need a moment here. You
claimed
Bijou Breaux? The multimillionaire, born with a silver spoon in her mouth, daughter of a
legend
? Are you out of your mind?”

“I’ve been asked that more than once, and watch your mouth.” Remy shrugged lightly, but his hands closed into fists, the ache in his knuckles telling him his leopard was close.

“Get real, Remy. She’s slummin’, comin’ back to New Orleans. You think she’s a hometown girl? She’s never been one of us. She’s elegant and stylish and she’s restless as hell. She’s used to livin’ a lifestyle on red carpets with jet-setters and private jets. We don’ belong there and never have. She’s come here on a whim, putting her club together and her cutesy little apartment.” Gage laid a hand on his brother’s arm. “She’s goin’ to rip your heart apart. She’ll never stay.”

“Watch what you say, Gage. She’s my mate. No one’s goin’ to take her away from me. And I’m not goin’ to let anyone, including my brother, make her life miserable. She’ll stay. She belongs with me whether she knows it or not.” His voice was resolute. Implacable. Bijou might try to run, but she wouldn’t get far.

He feared his rising anger at his brother was because Gage was voicing his own concerns. Bijou didn’t belong in the homes on the bayou – and he did. She didn’t belong in a fucked-up leopard’s lair – she was made for far greater things. Money meant little to him, it was nothing more than another tool to get through life, and the amount she had was nearly unimaginable. It wasn’t her money, it was Bijou herself. She was elegant, a lady, just as Gage had said. Her passion came from her leopard driving her. What happened if her leopard didn’t emerge?

“A week ago you didn’t even know she was in town, Remy. Now you’re actin’ like an idiot, drawin’ some crazed fan out so you can be a hero.”

Remy smiled, but his eyes had gone cat. He knew because he was seeing distorted heat images. “You don’ have to like her, Gage, but you do have to be respectful. I’ll defend her with everything I am. She’s my choice. And just for your information, I would have been an idiot and drawn out any stalker if a woman had come to me for help. Bijou didn’t ask. I insisted.”

Gage opened his mouth and closed it abruptly, shaking his head. “You may have bitten off more than you can chew with this one, brother. But I’ll back your play. You want Bijou Breaux, then I’m all for it.”

Remy inhaled sharply. The stalker had left his scent everywhere throughout Remy’s apartment. He had cleaned up the scenes forensically, but he couldn’t fail to leave behind his scent. Unlike the crime scene the serial killer had left behind, there was no blood and fear to contaminate the nose of a leopard.

“Have you come across this scent before?” he asked Gage.

Gage took another sniff. “No. But I’ll know him if I run into him.”

“Have all the boys come in and smell him. I want them all lookin’. The moment someone scents him, have them call me.” Remy sounded like he was giving orders – and he was. He was head of his household and his brothers would do as he said. When Drake wasn’t in residence, the rest of the lair relied on him as well. He wanted all of them out searching for Bijou’s stalker.

The man’s anger toward Bijou was escalating, but his rage toward Remy was all consuming. Remy stepped closer to the long wall in his sitting room – the wall the stalker had nearly destroyed. There was a picture ripped from the tabloid of Remy kissing Bijou and another frame where he’d lifted his head and looked directly at the camera. His body was slightly in front of Bijou’s blocking her face from the shot, but there was no denying it was her.

His face had been scribbled over with a black marker – permanent, he was certain. A knife had stabbed at the region of Bijou’s stomach and then jabbed at his body repeatedly, over and over, each tear in the photograph larger and deeper into the wall then the last. Forensics had already told him there were no prints on the knife and the knife itself was most likely untraceable, but it mattered little. The stalker had fallen into Remy’s trap, and it was only a matter of time before one of the shifters got his scent.

“I’ll get them on it,” Gage said, “but watch your back.”

Remy moved through the small apartment toward the back where the bedroom was. “He was very methodical here.” He glanced at Gage over his shoulder. “He was searching for something.”

Gage crowded closer, his eyebrow raised. There wasn’t a single thing in the bedroom untouched – or unbroken. “Searching for what?”

“Evidence that Bijou has been here.”

Gage opened and closed his mouth again. “Damn, bro. This isn’t a good situation.”

“He didn’t find anythin’,” Remy stated. “I’m not about to set her up as a target of that kind of anger. I took enough of a chance kissing her publicly. I was fairly certain he’d come after me, and I knew if he came here, he would be satisfied that Bijou has never been here.”

“You took a big risk, Remy,” Gage pointed out. “Look at the rage this stalker exhibits. He almost acts as if he owns her. She’s in real danger and kissin’ her probably added to that.”

“It was a calculated risk,” Remy admitted. “And necessary to draw him out.” He gestured toward the bed. “I think he was makin’ a statement.”

There was nothing left of the bed. Even the frame was in splinters. The mattress was slashed, ripped and stabbed repeatedly, the guts all over the room. Remy was thankful his good mattress was in his home in the bayou. On the wall, like the wall of the sitting room, a giant eye was painted in dripping red paint, the meaning clear. He was being watched. Bijou was being watched.

“Yeah, I get it,” he murmured under his breath. “Tell everyone to be careful, Gage. If they scent this man, I don’ want anyone approachin’ him. Just have them ID him to me.”

Gage nodded. “I’ll get everyone in here.”

“I have to get back to the Inn. Saria had to leave because her leopard was goin’ crazy with Bijou there.”

“Did Bijou’s leopard actually emerge?” Gage asked, his tone cautious.

“No.” Remy’s abrupt answer didn’t invite discussion.

Gage ignored him. “Her mother? Bodrie?”

“Not Bodrie,” Remy said firmly. “He didn’t have any leopard in him.”

“You certain about that?” Gage replied. “His sexual excesses were legendary. That’s a by-product of a leopard without a mate.”

Remy shook his head. “I would have known. My leopard would have known. I was around him a few times.” There was distaste in his voice. He couldn’t help it. Taking an eight-year-old child into a room filled with naked men and women and endless drugs sickened him, and every time he thought of how he’d chosen the easy way out – palming her off on Pauline and taking off – he wanted to kick himself all over again. “Bodrie was no leopard,” he repeated.

“You can’t know that for certain. It isn’t as if we haven’t had our own mess here in the lair with half leopards and crazed leopards doin’ things they shouldn’t. Look at Bannaconni’s family. And right here, Tregre’s family. Not all leopards are worth anything,” Gage reminded.