Her small tongue came out and she moistened her lips. "When?"
"Right now. You've got your courage up, let's just do it now."
He saw her take a breath, but she stood up. His Catarina. Yeah, she was scared, but she didn't let that stop her.
"Um. Eli. I'm not dressed. I don't even have shoes."
"You don't need shoes or clothes. You're just going to sit in the truck and watch."
"What if I want to touch him? Can I do that?"
She was killing him. "Yes, baby, if you want to touch him, you certainly can." He got the truck keys and came back to her, reaching out his hand. She hesitated, but she took it.
"I'm going to take us out into the middle of the property, Kitten. That way no neighbor might accidentally stop by. It doesn't happen often but I don't take chances. You always have to remember, you can't take chances either, once she's emerged. She's your responsibility. You have to control her and protect her."
He opened the door to the passenger side and when she stepped up, his hand slid over her bottom, shaping her butt, a small gesture of male possessiveness. He didn't do it with the long shirt over her bottom, he slipped his hand under the material to caress bare skin. She recognized the gesture for what it was. The warm slide of his hand sent heat rushing through her body, streaking through her veins like a drug. Once she was in the seat, he leaned in to fasten her seat belt.
"You do know I'm perfectly capable of putting on my seat belt," she said, mostly because his head rubbed against her breasts, sending sparks of electricity straight to her feminine channel.
"Of course I know," Eli said. "But then I'd miss a golden opportunity." His fingers deftly undid two of her buttons and his mouth closed over her breast, mostly because he couldn't resist her, but also to see her reaction.
She gasped and her arms went around his head, cradling him. That was all his Cat, not her leopard. She didn't realize that she should have pushed him away. Been angry as all hell. She shouldn't have been cradling his head to her while his mouth suckled her breast and his tongue pulled at her nipple. He used the edge of his teeth and felt her shiver. Perfect. She was born for him. If he had any doubts, which he didn't, this would have proven his point. She belonged to him.
Reluctantly he lifted his head and brushed a kiss across her mouth before closing her door firmly. She looked a little dazed, a look he'd come to know and would forever want to see on her face. She was beautiful, his Cat, and she didn't have a clue.
Her fingers went to the two buttons he'd slid open when he got behind the wheel. "Leave it, baby. I like to look at you."
Again, she should have told him to go to hell and slapped his face, but instead, her hands dropped to her lap, her fingers twisting together. His shirt on her was open nearly to her belly button. He could see the curve of both breasts and the darker nipple of one.
"Fucking beautiful," he whispered as he started the truck. And it wasn't all about her looks, although she was beautiful. She suited him. She didn't keep her body from him even though she wasn't certain of them together. He hadn't thought it was possible to find a woman who would take him as he was.
He reached over and captured her hand, bringing it to his thigh. He held it there, needing the closeness, wanting her to understand it wasn't just about sex with her. He knew he made it seem like that, but truthfully, everything about her appealed to him and it had from the moment he'd laid eyes on her.
A man could go his entire life waiting to find that perfect someone--most gave up and settled. He wasn't settling. She was the one. He'd known it instinctively, even before he knew she was leopard. Now he was absolutely certain. He was also certain, if he was Rafe Cordeau, he wouldn't give her up. He would be hunting her. Cordeau was coming. Sooner or later he would find her, but she wouldn't be defenseless anymore. Eli planned to teach her leopard how to fight just as he was teaching the woman. And Cordeau would have to go through him and his leopard to get to Catarina.
They drove along a narrow road toward the center of the property. He wanted her to see how beautiful the land was. It was important to him that she liked it. It would be her home and her leopard would want to run free here. Once she relaxed, her gaze was on the window and he was fairly certain she liked what she saw.
"This is good, baby," he said softly, bringing the truck to a halt. He kept possession of her hand, bringing it up to the warmth of his mouth. "I don't want you to be afraid. We'll open the door . . ."
She shook her head. "I want to be outside. With the leopard."
That surprised him. Clearly she was afraid. He studied her face. "Kitten, there's no need to prove anything to me."
She lifted her chin. "You asked me to trust you, Eli. I'm going to stand outside with a leopard, and if it attacks me I'll know you're full of shit."
He couldn't help but smile. "That isn't even logical. A leopard can kill in seconds. You know that. Why would you put yourself in jeopardy like that just to see whether or not I'm telling you the truth?"
She didn't answer him. In fact, her gaze slid away from his. His heart stuttered in his chest and he swore under his breath. She thought she was risking her life, and if he wasn't telling her the truth, it didn't matter to her. She had nowhere to go, and after the sex they'd shared, she knew she wouldn't be sharing that with Cordeau. She'd rather be dead. He hooked his hand around the back of her head and pulled her in close to him.
"I'm telling you the truth, Cat, but your thinking is totally fucked up. You know that, don't you? There's always a way out."
"Not with Rafe there isn't. Let's just do this, Eli, before I vomit all over the seat."
He leaned close and kissed her. She tasted as sweet as ever. She wasn't going to puke but she was scared, he could feel her body tremble. "We'll do this then, baby, and you'll see that it's all going to be all right."
10
ELI let his hands slide away from Catarina and, curiously, he felt the loss. She made him laugh more than anyone he'd ever met. She cooked for him. When he got in her space and put his mouth on her breast, she cradled his head to her. He loved the shy hesitation in her eyes and the way she was so honest about wanting to please him. He detested that he'd ever made her doubt him.
Eli yanked open her door. She already had the seat belt off. She hadn't done up the buttons, leaving them just as he asked. His heart stuttered again. Who had a woman like this one? His hands spanned her waist and he lifted her out of the seat to carry her around to the bed of the truck.
"Take my shirt off, Cat," he instructed. "A leopard has to stash clothes around the property just in case. I have to be naked to shift."
Her eyes jumped to his. She licked her lips, and he groaned.
"Baby. I need the shirt gone. You need to sit on the tailgate and I don't want your ass on that cold, dirty metal."
A hint of a smile stole into her eyes and that made him want to groan all over again. She leaned away from him so she could pull his shirt up and over his head. First one arm was free and then the other. He opened the tailgate and laid the shirt down before depositing her there. She didn't take her eyes off of his face.
"Shifting with a hard-on is much more difficult," he growled at her.
Her hint of a smile widened into the real thing. She swung one bare foot. "I'm sure you're up to the task."
"You could help me out . . ." he suggested, not making it a command, just teasing.
She wiggled her fingers imperiously at him to get on with it. Eli grinned at her and pulled off his boots and socks and then his hands dropped to the drawstring of his sweats. She didn't look away. He stepped in close to her, wedging his hips between her legs, pushing her thighs open with his.
"Actually, Kitten, if you want to see my leopard you can do this for me."
She tilted her head. "Do you think I won't?"
Her hands shook but they went instantly to his drawstring. She loosened it and then opened it, her fingers working deftly in his waistband to push the material off his hips. Eli wanted to th
row his head back and roar like the leopard he was. She was his all right, every damn inch of her. He was beginning to realize that all the time he'd been trying to hold her to him, she was winding herself around his heart. He was more than halfway in love with her--he was already gone.
His hand dropped to her thigh. Her skin was warm and soft, just like he knew it would be. He had the taste of her in his mouth and his body already recognized the feel of her. He ran his palm up her thigh and then around to the inside. He felt her incredible heat radiating, beckoning.
"Are you wet for me?" he murmured.
"Don't get distracted. You're showing me your leopard," she whispered, but her hand curled over his cock.
His body shuddered. "You aren't helping." He couldn't resist seeing for himself. His fingers found her hot core and yes, she was wet for him. Scared of his leopard and still wet for him. Perfect for him. Perfect.
He kissed her hard, plundering her mouth, taking her tongue and taking command. She gave herself to him, her mouth moving under his, following his lead, tentative, but still opening to him. It took a moment for him to get himself under control, to feel the small trembling in her body. When he lifted his head, her gaze shifted from his immediately and dropped to her hands.
"Don't, baby, don't do that." He caught her chin in his hand and tipped her face up. "Don't be embarrassed because you want me. There isn't anything wrong with it."
She nodded, pressing her lips together, but her eyes didn't quite meet his.
"Catarina. You know what I want." His hand went to the nape of her neck, fingers moving gently on her tension-filled muscles.
Eli waited until her eyes were on his. He nodded approvingly. "Thank you, Cat." He kept his voice gentle with an effort. "Now talk to me. What's going on in your head right now?"
"Maybe I don't want to talk about it, Eli."
"I get that." He wasn't used to prying things out of people. He rarely asked twice and very few men argued with him, let alone women. Most recognized the alpha, never understanding a good portion of that was his leopard. She recognized the leopard and she still struggled against his authority. "I do, Kitten. But this is about you coming to terms with our future. If we don't talk, bring things out into the open, how are we ever going to work things out between us?"
"You just keep pushing me, Eli," she said. "I need a little breathing room. This is difficult to come to terms with, all of it."
"You think I don't know that?" Eli raked a hand through his hair. "I'd give you all the time in the world if we had it, Cat, but we don't. She's so close my leopard is getting crazy. We have to be right, you and me, solid. You have to know you can count on me. You'll be scared and you won't know what to do. I'll be the one seeing you through it and I want to make it as easy as possible. So talk to me."
Her eyes shifted again. He waited. He actually counted every one of his heartbeats. He couldn't allow her to win this one. It was too important. She did deserve all the time in the world, but they didn't have it and that was a fact. He remained absolutely silent and still, focusing his eyes on her, his will.
Catarina sighed and lifted her gaze to his once more. "You don't understand. I realized that I can't go back with Rafe, not after everything between us, which essentially means I'm staying with you. But you hurt me. I let you in so deep, and I didn't even know I was doing it. You hurt me far worse than he ever did. I have to get to a place where I can let that go. I don't want to be the type of person who brings up the past and throws it in someone's face, and that means I have to deal with it and forgive you or I can't be with you. More, I have to trust you again. To do that, I'd be giving you everything, stripping myself bare. And if I do that . . ." She trailed off.
He kept his face blank, but it was a body blow. You hurt me worse than he ever did. He wanted to roar with rage. He'd handled everything the wrong way with her. I don't want to be the type of person who brings up the past and throws it in someone's face, and that means I have to deal with it and forgive you. She'd delivered that in her soft little confessional voice as if she was the one who had sinned, not him. Giving you everything. Stripping myself bare.
She was definitely going to kill him if she kept saying things like that in a voice that penetrated through all of his armor and pierced him straight through the heart. He pressed one hand to his chest, hoping he wasn't having a heart attack and it was just penance for betraying her. She had been such a damn innocent and he'd ripped that away from her as well.
"If I trust you again, Eli, you could destroy me. That's what I'd be giving to you. The power to destroy me. That's what you're really asking of me."
There it was. She saw what he was asking--no, demanding--of her. She knew what the ultimate price would be. She was going in with both eyes open, no rose-colored glasses like she'd had in the warehouse. She knew what he was and now, what he was capable of. Still, Catarina was holding out the world to him. That was the one piece she didn't get. What she would be giving to him.
She could bring him to his knees without even trying. He didn't deserve her. He had a hell of a lot of sins on his soul, and she didn't. She was clean and good and damn it all, he was keeping her anyway, even when he knew he shouldn't. That wasn't his leopard talking, that was the man.
"I know that, baby, I know what you'd be handing me. All I can do is tell you I'd cherish that gift." He poured sincerity into his voice. She was leopard enough to hear it.
"I don't want to be like him." She rushed the second confession, the words tumbling out fast. "If I'm like him, I want your leopard to kill me. I do, Eli. I don't want any part of him inside me."
"Cat." He framed her face with both hands. Now his heart broke for her. "You're nothing like him. Neither is your leopard."
"You can't know that. You said there are rogues. What if my leopard is like that? The first time when I was with you, it hurt. Really hurt and I didn't even slow down. And then I wanted more. That isn't normal, and no matter what you tell me, I know it isn't."
He winced. There it was again. Cat blaming herself for something he did. Her first time should have been slow and gentle, not ruled by two leopards coming so close to the surface. He was the one who was supposed to have control. He was the one with a lifetime of experience dealing with his savage, brutal, very alpha leopard. Catarina still had no way of knowing what to expect, let alone learning how to deal with her leopard.
"Kitten, if you don't listen to anything else I have to say to you this afternoon, hear this. You're sweet and kind and good. You're an innocent in all this. That leopard inside you, she's just as confused and afraid as you are. She's being driven by nature just the way you are right now. You'll control her because you have to. You'll feel her needs and you'll take care of her. She'll do the same for you."
Her teeth tugged on her lower lip and he stopped himself from groaning, stopped his body from reacting. She needed care. Gentle handling. While their leopards were settled, he knew it was the only time he'd have to give her those things.
"This all happened to me because of her--my leopard. All of it. My mother handing me over to Rafe. Rafe killing April and the others. You taking a job in the dojo and befriending me. All of it, because of her."
He shook his head. "No, none of that was her fault. That was all Rafe Cordeau and your mother." He wasn't going to soft-soap any of that for her. Her mother was just as guilty as Rafe was. "She sold you to a man who took a chance on what you were. He couldn't know for certain and that's why you had more freedom at first but he began watching you closer as you got older."
"If my leopard hadn't emerged, he would have hunted me in the swamp."
For some reason, Eli couldn't bring himself to believe that. He wasn't certain Cordeau was as devoid of feelings for her as she believed. Cordeau had shown a few protective instincts, not just possessive ones. The DEA had quite a long file on the man, dating back to when she was just a child. She'd gone up a tree, a tall one and she'd taken a nasty fall.
Cordeau had been conduc
ting a business meeting with two of his local distributors and he'd launched himself from his chair, sprinting to break her fall. They had a series of photographs and two of them showed his face very clearly. It hadn't been the face of a man who didn't care, but Eli wasn't going to tell her that. Not now, maybe never, and that made him an even bigger bastard. Strangely, both of the distributors had disappeared about two months later, neither body ever found.
"You don't know that for certain, Cat."
She shrugged. He caught the front of her shirt in his fists and tugged her closer as he leaned down and brushed a comforting kiss across her mouth.
"I'm going to shift. I can go fast or slow. Up close or far away. You tell me how you want it, Cat, and it's yours."
She blinked. He realized she hadn't expected any concessions from him. Her deep cobalt blue eyes searched his face for a long time as if looking for something. It took a few moments and then she took a deep breath. "Up close and fast. Rafe was across the room from me and shifted very slowly. It looked torturous and so scary. I've never been so frightened of anything in my life."
He frowned and stroked his hand down the side of her face, more to soothe her than because he wanted to feel the softness of her skin--and he really wanted to feel how soft she was. "Why up close and fast?"
Her chin went up. "You said how I wanted it was mine to say."
He studied her face another minute. "Just say my name," he reminded her.
Catarina nodded, and Eli shifted. It was not just fast, he shifted with blurring speed. He was so fast she nearly missed it because she blinked. One moment he was a large, intimidating man and the next he was a huge leopard. The head on the male seemed almost as big as she was.
There wasn't time for panicking, she didn't even scream, her breathing catching in her lungs and holding there, trapped. Gold eyes locked on her, smoldering, pupils dilated. So gold they were pure fire. Focused on her. Unblinking. Absolutely intelligent. Eli's eyes. She would know his eyes anywhere.