Total pages in book: 172
Estimated words: 155984 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 780(@200wpm)___ 624(@250wpm)___ 520(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 155984 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 780(@200wpm)___ 624(@250wpm)___ 520(@300wpm)
Sevastyan shifted back to his fully human form and pressed kisses to the bites. Blood trickled down her shoulder blade in a steady stream. He had expected a little blood, but not quite that much. His cat had licked at the bites and that should have helped to clot the blood, but it hadn’t. He frowned.
“I don’t want you to move. Matherson is going to come to the door, or the window, and be very dramatic. Remember, he can’t get in. He can threaten and posture, but he’s like the Big Bad Wolf in the children’s fairy tale. He can huff and puff for all he’s worth. I’ll get a first-aid kit and see to that bite. Your female accepted my male.”
He caught her arms and turned her around to face him. Flambé kept her head down so he tipped her chin up. “Are you crying?” His heart stuttered unexpectedly at the dampness the pads of his fingers encountered when he touched her face. “Did Shturm hurt you? Surely he was careful.” If he wasn’t, Sevastyan was going to have a few choice words to say to his leopard.
“It just felt so permanent between them. Intimate. Everything is happening so fast. I always hoped if I ever got into a permanent relationship it would be about love. Not protection.” Her lashes swept down to veil her expression. “I just thought I might have that someday.” There was vulnerability in the red-gold tips of her lashes as well as in her tone.
Sevastyan leaned forward and brushed kisses over her lips and then sipped away the tears on her face. “It would be impossible to have the kind of relationship we’re going to have and not be in love. I intend to love you with everything I am. What you do is up to you. I’m sorry I didn’t have the chance to give you a proper courtship. You deserve one and we’ll take every minute we can to get to know each other.”
She blinked up at him, confusion swimming through the liquid in her eyes. “You’re . . . unexpected.”
He hoped he would always be unexpected to her. “Stay right here, baby. I’ve got a first-aid kit behind the bar. We stash them in all the rooms. Evangeline, my cousin Fyodor’s wife, is the one who insisted we do that, and it has really come in handy.”
“You have a lot of cousins.”
That was true. He did. Sevastyan was halfway across the room but keeping an eye on Matherson. He had deliberately showed the man he was leopard and that he had claimed Flambé. He hoped that was enough to take the pressure off her and the idiot would go home and annoy someone else. Clearly, that wasn’t the case. Franco Matherson was furious that his prize had been stolen out from under him.
“Evangeline has the bakery in San Antonio a few blocks from the huge building Jake Banniconni owns downtown. Her bakery is called The Sweet Shoppe,” Flambé said. Her voice shook as she informed him she knew of Evangeline’s bakery.
Sevastyan made his way back to her and turned her around but put her hands on the windowsill to steady her. He wanted to take a look at the lump on her head as well. “Look at the floor, not at him.”
Matherson had come straight to the window and was staring in, his eyes glowing with his cat’s menacing presence. Sevastyan ignored him, once more pushing up Flambé’s shirt in order to expose the leopard’s bite. It was still bleeding. When he wiped the blood away, he could see that Shturm really had been careful to keep his bite shallow, just enough for holding to call to the female. That was shocking to Sevastyan.
Shturm was fierce, a rough, brutal leopard, honed from the many beatings Sevastyan’s father and uncles had given him when the cat had tried to protect the boy. They’d let their larger adult cats loose on the young, immature leopard, tearing him nearly to pieces at times, until Sevastyan had forced a shifting in order to protect him, willing to let the leopards kill him rather than see Shturm suffer any further. Theirs had been an ugly childhood with little room for gentleness. He was thankful his leopard had shown that trait to Flambé.
Sevastyan applied pressure to the puncture wounds until he was certain the bleeding had slowed to trickles. He smeared on the antibiotic cream, placed Band-Aids over the two puncture wounds before pulling down her top and turning her almost in one motion so she wouldn’t see that Matherson was right at the window, the threat of death in his eyes. He pulled Flambé into his arms, tight against his chest.
“We’ll find our way through this. I’m excited to see what you’re going to do with the landscaping. I’ve been looking forward to hearing your ideas and seeing them drawn out since I made the call asking you to meet with me.” He brushed a kiss on top of her head, his gaze meeting Franco’s without hesitation.