One Down: Bayou Heat (Pantera Security League Book 1) Read online

  “Did you poach it?”

  “Does it matter?”

  “Hell no,” she admitted on a laugh. “I’m starving.”

  He laughed with her as she reached to take the bread. She quickly assembled two sandwiches, piling them high with roast beef. Not that he was going to complain. He was a carnivore. The more meat the better.

  Taking the sandwich that she offered him, Cerviel absently consumed it in four large bites. Then, leaning against the wall of the cave, he studied his companion in the warm, soft light of the lantern with unconcealed fascination.

  She was so exquisite. From her wide, hazel eyes to the long, thick red hair that bracketed her lovely face with such smooth skin and pure lines. But it wasn’t her physical beauty that attracted his attention, and made him—in Raphael’s words—act like a mate where she was concerned. It was the unbroken strength he could see in her eyes, and the courageous spirit visible in the aura that flickered around her.

  She was a warrior.

  She was a survivor.

  Fuck… He scrubbed a hand over his face. He could only hope that the Pantera’s need to know the truth didn’t do irreparable harm to his tenuous yet ever-growing bond with her.

  Polishing off the last of her sandwich with more restraint than he’d displayed, Hallie glanced up to discover his unwavering gaze.

  “What?” She put her fingers to her mouth, then her nose. “Do I have something on my face?”

  Unable to resist temptation, Cerviel reached out to lightly stroke a finger over her cheek. Damn. Her skin was as silky smooth as it looked. And now that she had some food in her belly, a hint of color was replacing her unnatural pallor.

  Her hand dropped from her face, and her lips parted in an unconscious invitation, but with a heroic effort, he managed to resist temptation.

  “Your face is perfect,” he assured her, pulling his fingers from her cheek. She doesn’t belong to you, Cerviel. No female ever can. She is yours to protect.

  For now.

  For tonight.

  She continued to study him. “What’s wrong? Is your arm still hurting you?”

  He didn’t know if it was a good or bad thing that she seemed to be able to read his moods. Usually it took people years to see beneath his glib façade. If at all.

  “My arm’s already healed,” he told her with a slight, and possibly cocky, grin. “The beauty of Pantera blood.”

  She arched a brow. “So what is it?”

  “If you’re willing, I’d like to see if I can retrieve your earlier memories,” he said.

  She stiffened, her eyes widening with alarm. “Why?” she breathed.

  Cerviel grimaced. He hated to press her when it was obvious she was unnerved by the thought of resurrecting her old memories. Unfortunately, he knew if he didn’t convince her to let him coax her past the block in her mind, Raphael might just insist that one of the Healers be given the opportunity to try when they returned to the Wildlands.

  And the thought of anyone else being so intimately connected to her…

  His inner puma snarled with a savage protest.

  Nope. That wasn’t going to happen. Unleashing Raphael’s feral temper sounded pretty shitty, but Cerviel would share whatever information—strike that, whatever pertinent information —he gleaned from the extraction.

  He cleared the growl from his voice. His mind—no, his cat was starting to take over his reason. Dangerous for a member of The Six. They survived on rules, following orders, never going rogue no matter how desperately they wished to. He needed to get his act together and face reality. This female didn’t belong to him. He was there to find and retrieve only. Then he walked the hell away.

  Back into the shadows where all ghosts live.

  But, memory extraction… It could help. Not only her, but the mission.

  He glanced up at her. “I think your past, and what happened in it, what brought you to this point, might be important,” he said in cautious tones.

  Her exquisite face clouded with uneasiness, and maybe even a touch of distrust. “Is that why you came for me?” she demanded. “Because of something in my past?”

  Cerviel hesitated. His first instinct was to comfort her with a lie. Only the knowledge she would be far more pissed at learning he hadn’t been honest with her forced the truth past his lips.

  “We didn’t know you existed until we intercepted a message from our enemies that listed the name of this ranch.”

  She stared at him warily. “Still, you believe I have information you need?”

  He couldn’t help himself. Desperate to comfort her, desperate to quell any sign that she didn’t believe his heart was pure where her safety and security was concerned, he reached for her again, this time cupping her cheek with his palm. “It’s possible. But trust me, Hallie, it wouldn’t have mattered if you had information or not.” His eyes never left hers for a moment. “Nothing could’ve stopped me from rescuing you.”

  Or protecting you…

  Caring for you.

  Wanting you.

  Not even a direct order from my leader.

  6BCHAPTER 5

  Hallie had never been this physically close to a male before and not felt fear, hatred and a desperate need to kill.

  But Cerviel wasn’t just any male.

  The dark-eyed, dark-haired puma shifter made her feel something else altogether. Something she hadn’t felt in…forever, it seemed. A new and amazing sensation.

  Safety.

  And when he spoke about her past, her memories…she believed he was speaking the truth. Her shoulders fell as she gazed at him. That wasn’t just wishful thinking, was it? Or a reaction to being rescued? She truly wanted to believe that there were people out there who cared if she was alive or dead. More than cared. Even if they were complete strangers.

  But that didn’t make it any less unnerving to think about having her memories forced back to the surface.

  After all, she had to be repressing them for a reason. Her gut tightened painfully. What if they were too traumatic for her to deal with? What if she lost it in front of him? Broke down in tears that never ceased?

  “I don’t know about this,” she whispered, her tone husky.

  They were so close, maybe five or six inches apart as they gazed into each other’s eyes. Cerviel slipped a finger beneath her chin and tilted her face up so he could study her wary expression.

  “Tell me what’s bothering you, kitten,” he urged.

  Warmth spread through her at the word, the…endearment, and all her fears and self-doubt eased. “I’m afraid.”

  “Of me?” Something that might have been disappointment flared through his eyes. “I swear on my life I won’t harm you.”

  “Oh no.” She gave a sharp shake of her head. “I’m not afraid of you.”

  The tension lifted from his beautiful face. “Then what?”

  She bit her bottom lip, wishing for one brief second that it was his teeth there, not her own. “I’m just worried… What if…”

  He allowed his thumb to brush the line of her jaw as her words trailed away.

  “What if?” he prompted softly.

  “What if there’s something terrible in my past?”

  She watched as Cerviel’s brows furrowed, his thumb continuing to stroke a tender caress up and down her jaw.

  “Ma chère, you’ve already endured terrible. You’ve been through hell and it’s only made you stronger,” he said, his eyes so intense on her own, she had to remind herself to breathe. “Like finely tempered steel.”

  She laughed softly. Right now she didn’t feel like finely tempered anything. She felt raw and fragile. As if she might shatter into a million pieces, never to recover. She felt like she never wanted him more than three feet away from her at any given time.

  “I don’t mean something that was done to me.” She struggled to explain her reluctance. “Like you said, I’ve been through hell. But I can deal with that. I’ve made my peace with that.” She felt her eyes pri
ck with tears, and hated herself for them. For the weakness that five years in captivity inflicted on a person.

  Or to a Pantera?

  “Hallie…” he began with gentleness.

  She shook her head. “What if I’ve done something to someone else? Something unforgivable.”

  He stilled, perhaps sensing there was more to her words than some vague, unexplainable fear. “Why would you think that?”

  She licked her dry lips, glancing toward the opening of the cave. Logically she knew there wasn’t a guard hovering just out of sight, but the awareness of being constantly watched was too ingrained to be easily dismissed.

  At last satisfied that they were alone, she returned her attention to the man seated next to her on the hard ground.

  “I overheard Donaldson talking to his boss on the phone,” she said.

  It was as if a switch had been flipped, and Cerviel turned from tender beast to a fierce male on the edge. “What was his boss’s name?”

  She paused, allowing the conversation to rewind in her head. It’d occurred shortly after she’d awakened at the ranch. “I think it was Benton,” she said, only to wrinkle her nose. “Or maybe Benson. Something like that.”

  Cerviel’s breath hissed through his teeth, as if he recognized the name. “Can you tell me what Donaldson said?”

  “Does this Benson person have to do with why you came to get me?”

  “Please, Hallie.”

  The almost desperate tone in his voice had her pressing on. Granted, she wasn’t abandoning her query, just backing off it for a moment. “He said that he was keeping me safe, and promised that nothing bad would ever happen to me.” Her lip curled with utter disgust. Safe. Yeah, right. One day she was going to return to the ranch, and keep Donaldson ‘safe.’ “That piece of shit liar.”

  “Agreed.” Fire crackled in Cerviel’s eyes and he looked murderous. “Anything else?”

  “He said that he understood I was special,” she said on a bitter snarl. “And that I was vital to the success of his boss’s plans. He assured Benson that he would do whatever necessary to keep me alive.”

  Cerviel’s eyes, dark and foreboding, were pinned to hers as his fingers were softly caressing her jaw, making her breathing uneven. He was clearly absorbing her words, silently running them through his clever mind. Hallie was beginning to realize that this man was the sort who didn’t impulsively leap to conclusions, or rashly strike out. Even with a beast inside him, he was a thinker. He was a man who considered a problem, or enemy, very carefully, and then chose the most effective means of destruction.

  Not that she didn’t assume he couldn’t be provoked into savage violence. A puma dwelled inside him, after all.

  But she knew his cold logic was far more dangerous than fangs and claws.

  “Answer my question now,” she said, trying to keep herself focused as he touched her.

  He paused for only a moment before nodding. “Benson is an enemy of the Pantera. One of our most vicious adversaries.” As his fingers traced the pulse at her neck, his gaze roamed over her face, landing gently on her mouth. “We intercepted a message on his private cellphone. It was about you and your location.”

  “What about it?” she asked, her skin humming with awareness and heat. “To get me? Rescue me?”

  He said nothing. And his intense but secret expression warned her she would get no more from him. Not that she would stop trying. She was owed the truth.

  “Why does that conversation make you fear your past?” he asked, his eyes finding hers once again. “Between Benson and Donaldson?”

  “Because it’s obvious that I have some connection to these assholes. I was selected for some particular reason. Maybe it has to do with something I did when I was young.” Her stomach rolled, killing the safe, almost sensual feeling she’d been having since they’d shared their stolen meal. “Or something to do with my family. A part of me senses that my life is easier not remembering.”

  He slowly nodded. “I get that.”

  She released a shaky sigh. “Yeah, right.”

  “I’m serious, kitten.” He allowed his hand to slide from her throat. Hallie immediately missed the warmth of his touch. Where physical contact had always been a nightmare, something to fear and fight against and recoil from, with Cerviel, it was almost medicinal, helping to ease the anxious ball of dread in the pit of her stomach. While awakening something she no longer thought existed inside her. Attraction.

  “I’ve spent a lot of years wishing that I could erase the memories of my past,” he continued thoughtfully.

  Her lips parted in surprise. “Why?”

  “My sister died.”

  She sucked in a breath at his blunt confession. “I’m so sorry,” she breathed, reaching out for his hand. It was big and warm and strong. Like him. “Was it an accident?”

  “No.” His eyes grew distant, his features hardening.

  With pain? Anger? Guilt? Probably a toxic combination of all three.

  “It was close to the time of our festival,” he said. “It’s always marked by the bloom of the Dyesse lily.”

  Hallie furrowed her brow. “I’ve never heard of that flower.”

  “It grows only in the Wildlands,” he said, his voice thick with emotion. “One day I hope you’ll see it. My sister wanted me to go with her to try and find the first bloom, but I told her no. I was too busy training with my friends to be bothered with an annoying little sister. I was such an ass.”

  She squeezed his fingers, feeling his pain, and he squeezed back. “You don’t have to say any more, Cerviel.”

  He slowly shook his head, his unfocused eyes revealing that he was still lost in the past. “I don’t mind telling you,” he insisted. “It’s so much easier trying to keep my memories of her locked away, good and bad, you know? But that’s not fair to her. She deserves to be remembered.”

  Hallie had this intense need to not only comfort him, but to get as close to him as possible. Crawl into his lap and wrap her arms around him and bury her face in his neck. But she didn’t dare. Firstly, because she didn’t want him to continue to see her as that victim in the cage. She wanted him to see her strong and capable. And also because maybe…maybe he had someone. Maybe there was a lucky female waiting for him back in the Wildlands, and she had no right…

  Just the idea of it made her belly clench painfully. And there was something else too…something that lived beneath her ribs that disliked the notion of Cerviel and another female even more than she did.

  Was it possible that she had more than just Pantera blood? Was it possible that a real and true and fierce cat hummed beneath her breasts?

  “Talk to me,” Hallie said with gentle sincerity. “I’d love to know about her.”

  He glanced up, his eyes betraying a soul-deep vulnerability. “Yeah?”

  She nodded.

  He took a moment, as if gathering his thoughts. “Her name was Evie,” he started, his expression melting with a fond affection. The sort of affection that Hallie deeply envied. Had anyone ever thought about her with such love? She gave a small shake of her head, forcing herself to concentrate on Cerviel’s low words. “She was a pesky, crazy, fun, incredibly charming thing who was always tumbling into trouble.” He laughed, but it was a melancholy sound. “There was no dare she wouldn’t take, and no lengths she wouldn’t go to, to make people smile. She was like a ray of sunshine whenever she appeared.”

  “She sounds amazing,” Hallie breathed.

  His eyes connected with hers. “She was.”

  Long seconds passed. “What happened?” she at last prompted.

  “Our homeland is deep in the bayous of Louisiana and heavily protected by magic,” he said, his eyes darkening with emotion. “Or at least we all assumed it was protected. What we didn’t know at the time was that a jealous goddess had been secretly destroying the layers of protection we’d taken for granted forever.” He released a harsh sigh. “Evie was at the edge of the Wildlands when she was shot by poac
hers. She should have been able to heal, but the bullets tore straight through her heart and she bled to death before I found her.”

  Horror flooded through Hallie. Not only for the young girl whose life was ended way too early, but for the family left behind to mourn her loss.

  She glanced up. Into the face of the male before her. He was all sharp angles, and misery swimming in the dark depths of his eyes. He blamed himself. Still. And she could see that the guilt of failing his sister had clearly shaped his life, defining him in a way he probably didn’t even realize.

  “Oh, Cerviel.” She impulsively leaned forward to place a kiss on the hard line of his jaw. “It wasn’t your fault.”

  When she pulled back, his eyes met hers. “It doesn’t matter if it was or wasn’t,” he said, the threads of sadness in his voice tugging at her heart. “It feels like it’s my fault. Every minute of every day.”

  “I’m sure your parents helped you—”

  “They believed it, too.”

  Shock flew through her. “No…”

  “It’s all right. It’s done. It’s why I left, accepted our leader’s call and became…this.”

  “This? What is this?”

  He shook his head, and she thought she’d lost him. That maybe he was going to shut down, shut off and tell her he couldn’t tell her anything. But when he found her gaze again, his eyes betrayed not only a deep pain, but a desperate need to connect. If just for a moment.

  “I’m essentially a ghost, Hallie. To everyone, my parents included. I don’t exist.”

  Her brows knit together. “What do you mean?”

  “To everyone, except a select few, I’m dead.” His jaw hardened. “That’s all I can tell you. Frankly, it’s more than I should be telling you.”

  She gaped at him. He wasn’t serious. Why would he seek out something like that? A position like that? Even as she thought the question, she knew the answer. His sister was dead. It was only fitting that he was too, in the only way that worked.

  Her heart squeezed with pain. It was universal, the language of loss.

  “Trust me,” he said as the air inside the cave grew suddenly colder. “It’s better this way. Better for them.”