Inevitable: Shifters Forever Worlds (Only After Dark Book 5) (4 page)

BOOK: Inevitable: Shifters Forever Worlds (Only After Dark Book 5)
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Chapter 8

N
ew Orleans
, Louisiana

L
eandra stared at the swarthy
, dark haired man before her. What was a shifter doing in the red section? His gaze was intense, drawing her in, pulling on her like a whirlpool seduces a piece of driftwood, sucking it in, taking it down, claiming every part of it.

She was lost in his black gaze, dragged further and further into the vortex he was creating within her.

Time slipped away as if it were everything—and nothing. She didn’t notice Lucia approach until she felt her hand on her shoulder. “Leandra. Let us go.”

A roar filled Leandra’s head. She put her hand over her ears, trying to push it away, trying to block it out. All to no avail. That sound was not coming from outside her mind.

Leandra didn’t want to go.

Lucia’s lips were moving, saying something, but the roar drowned it out. The man’s eyes pierced her, straight through to her core. Looking into those dark windows to his soul, with the golden glimmer of his lion rampaging within, she felt as if she were looking into a mirror.

Not the mirrors that she’d always hated.

No, in this mirror she saw truth, integrity, beauty, and the blossoming self-assurance that this creature before her, wanted her.

The gorgeous hunk of man with his muscular build straining at the fabric of his shirt was overwhelmed by her.

Lucia’s hand trailed down to Leandra’s fingers, she took them in a tight grasp and pulled her away, back to the table.

And still, with every step she took, she felt the lion shifter’s scrutiny on her.

Lucia and Leandra sat at their table. During their absence, two glasses of iced tea had been brought to their table, served in frosted glass, dripping with condensation onto the dark table top.

Lucia took a quick sip, then jumped into a conversation. “What was that about? Do you know him? He’s with the Arceneaux.”

Leandra battled the urge to return to the doorway and look for the shifter. “I’ve never seen him before.”

Lucia made a tiny tsk of doubt. “You didn’t seem like strangers.”

“You haven’t answered any of my questions.” Leandra raised a brow. Maybe this could convince Lucia to be more forthcoming with information.

Her aunt frowned. “What do you want to know?”

Really?
Leandra fought the sarcasm back. “Quake, for starters.”

“He’s part of my past.” The words were clipped, propelled through tightened lips and a clenched jaw.

So that’s how it’s going to be. Fine then.

“Alright. Where do you live?”

“Most of the time in Europe.”

“Why?”

Lucia heaved a sigh, opened her mouth to speak, then closed it when a woman that could have been Bethany’s twin appeared with two plates of etouffee.

“Enjoy,” the black clad server said, without a smile.

Lucia nodded, then as soon as the woman had left, “I didn’t grow up here. My father is—was—an Arceneaux. A shifter. He came to claim me, taking me to Europe to be raised by one of his relatives.”

“And that’s where you are now?”

“You’re persistent. You get that from your Mémé.”

“Did you miss her? Growing up away from her?” Leandra couldn’t imagine a life without Mémé.

“Did you miss
your
mother?”

Leandra frowned. “Do you ever answer questions?” she huffed.

Lucia laughed, a sound that carried softly all about the room. It was like hearing a tiny bell.

“I did answer questions.”

“Some. And no. How could I miss
her?
Rochelle didn’t want me in her life to begin with. She wanted a… I am an embarrassment to her.”

“Rochelle has issues.”

“I’ll say,” Leandra scoffed.

“No, it’s more than you think. Food’s getting cold.” Lucia stirred her etouffee.

There was no more conversation that day.

Lucia took Leandra back to the cabin and drove away, down that pebbled road that flooded when the rains were strong enough.

Leandra watched her drive off, then entered the solitude of the cabin, leaving the shawl over the mirror.

Part II
The Courtship

A
Handful
of Years Ago

Chapter 9

O
utside the boundaries
of Black Glade Bayou, Louisiana

T
heo stretched
his muscular lion limbs. He sniffed at the bayou air, hoping to catch her scent.

Her.

Leandra.

The woman who’d been at Quake.

Nothing.

Last week, on one of his weekly runs—a man had to let his lion have its head every so often, he’d caught her scent on the downward breeze.

It was faint, but his lion knew. The lion had roared, shaking the trees in the swampy water, making the water ripple.

Birds had flown, bayou creatures had scurried. He’d thrown his head back and sniffed harder, taking in so much air his lion chest felt like it was going to burst.

It didn’t burst, but his heart was forlorn, because of her.

She’d been in the bayou. Somewhere. Sometime.

Not long ago, and not too far away, else he’d never have been able to catch her delicious scent.

He’d been wanting to find her, hadn’t had a chance to look. Working for Lézare kept him on the road, out of town, and at times out of the country, while his boss added to his empire. They’d finally settled back in New Orleans on a more permanent basis.

After settling in, the first thing on Theo’s mind and his lion’s heart had been relocating the woman whose scent had seared itself into his memory.

He began a lope, keeping a brisk pace and only stopping to sniff the air and see if her scent was stronger and if he might be closer to finding her.

A new scent infiltrated his senses.

Shifter.

White tiger shifter.

Correction: White tigress! A female shifter was in the bayou’s brush.

Theo’s picked up that scent immediately. Thankful that his sense of smell was even better than most shifters.

He froze in his tracks, his senses on high alert. Something made the fur on his back stand straight up. The thick muscles on his lion’s back and chest tightened and flexed with anticipation that there might be conflict. He knew he was still in Lézare’s territory.

Or am I?

Had he pushed himself further out of Lézare’s territory? The area outside the Arceneaux claim was typically populated by non-shifters types. Witches and vampires.

Theo had urged Lézare, at times, to let him push the other types back, to stretch Arceneaux boundaries further and claim more area, but Lézare staunchly refused. Said it wasn’t what his ancestor Étienne had wanted.

Theo didn’t pry. He could tell from the set of Lézare’s jawline that he’d crossed into a topic his boss didn’t want to discuss.

Theo sidestepped in his lion form, standing in the shadows of an old cypress tree.

“You think I don’t know you’re here, lion?” A very definitely female voice came from the brush.

Theo shifted quickly, with the twinge of discomfort he’d worked hard to tune out. Morphing wasn’t painless, but with enough training and willpower, he’d turned it into more of an acute but short-lived pain than a long drawn out excruciating process.

“I could say the same,” Theo countered.

“I’m aware you’re cognizant of my presence.” A woman stepped from the brush.

He knew that face. The woman who’d been with Leandra at Quake that day.

“I know you.”

“And I know you, Theo Ricoletti, security for the Arceneaux Group.”

“Your name?”

“Lucia.” A tiny smile graced her lips, pulling the corners upward.

It struck Theo again that she bore a great resemblance to Leandra. “Your last name?”

“Last names don’t mean that much to me.”

He nodded. He got that. He’d used his mother’s last name. It was his promise to her on her deathbed that he would use Marco’s surname. And he had. Reluctantly so.

“You’re related to Leandra.” Stating the obvious, hoping for an answer. Maybe even Leandra’s last name. that’d be a great start.

Not that he’d do anything with that knowledge. It’s not like he could go out and ask questions about the dark-skinned, exotic beauty. Lézare would find out and that wouldn’t do.

He felt guilty enough about his feelings after Lézare’s warning.

“I am.” Lucia plucked a long blade of straw-like grass and rolled it between her fingers. “She’s my sister’s daughter.”

He caught the note when she said sister—definitely a sour note.

“Leandra’s a witch.” Stating the obvious again. “You’re’ a shifter…”

She nodded. “It’s convoluted.”

“I’ll say, considering how witches and shifters feel about one other.”

“There are exceptions.” She had a wicked gleam in her eye, but thankfully not an evil one.

“I’m sure.” He narrowed his eyes, trying to figure out where she was going with this.

“You are the exception. Leandra is as well. The attraction between you two isn’t possible to hide. It wasn’t that day, and it’s obvious why you’re haunting the bayou, seeking, searching, making your way through the marshes, silently, but ever hopeful.”

A chill crossed over his body. He had no idea that what he felt was so obvious. A thought occurred to him. Lucia said the attraction wasn’t possible to hide. Was it still two-sided? Did Leandra dream of him nightly as he did of her? She preoccupied his dreams consistently. “What makes you think you know what you’re talking about?”

Lucia shook her head. “Sometimes shifters are so blockheaded.” She laughed, as if it was occurring to her that she was a shifter herself. “What you and Leandra have—it is inevitable. It could no sooner be denied or avoided than the sunrise’s glorious path across an azure morning sky.” She flicked the blade of straw and as if it were a miniature spear, it sailed through the air and pierced through the marshy undergrowth. “You’ll go to Quake tomorrow. You’ll sit near the same area you saw us that day.”

He cocked his head. Who was she to give him orders? Then again, it occurred to him… he had to do it. Something in him, in his lion too, something wouldn’t let him stay away.

“Will you tell me why?”

“It is time to set your destiny in motion. Yours and Leandra’s. It was predetermined and seen by others wiser than I am.”

He nodded.

“And lion shifter?”

“Yes, Lucia.”

“It won’t be an easy road you travel with her. But it will be worthy of both of you.”

She vanished into the brush. Theo didn’t follow, he understood the need to slip away unfollowed.

Chapter 10

B
lack Glade Bayou
, Louisiana

L
eandra sighed
. It was the anniversary of Mémé’s death. She’d lost count of the years.

Okay, no she hadn’t. She simply didn’t want to remember how long since she’d seen Mémé.

Leandra had become accustomed to the solitude of the cabin, only venturing out to attend occasional mandatory meetings with the coven. She would grudgingly attend, grudgingly vote when a vote was called for. She spent no time on niceties and no time socializing.

As an interim leader of the coven—there’d been no leader since Mémé’s mother had died—Michelina had attempted to bring Leandra into the coven, to get her to be a part of the group.

Leandra had no interest in it. She’d spent her time honing her witchcraft on her own, studying her grandmother’s notes, practicing well into the midnight hours by candlelight.

Her days were spent searching out and healing injured swamp animals, evenings were dedicated to witchcraft, and her nights were haunted by a dark-haired, dark eyed lion shifter who had made her body feel things she’d never felt before, without even a touch. He’d touched her soul, pulled her into a maelstrom that promised her things she’d never even imagined existed.

Lucia had disappeared from Leandra’s life after that lunch, and only an occasional postcard in the mailbox—no postmark—let Leandra know her aunt was still alive and keeping an eye on her.

Today’s mail yielded yet one more postcard.

“Quake. Noon.”

That was all the postcard read.

Block writing that resembled Lucia’s.

Leandra dropped the card on the kitchen table.

Chapter 11

Q
uake
. New Orleans, Louisiana

T
heo slipped
into the shifter door at Quake. He couldn’t explain it, but there was something about Lucia that he trusted. It seemed completely natural to him that he come to Quake as she’d said.

The hostess let him in and led him to the room he’d sat in before, the day he’d first seen Leandra.

He didn’t occupy the large table in the middle. Instead he chose a chair at the two-seater corner table. He ordered the daily special without even looking at the menu. He couldn’t have cared less what he ordered. He didn’t even plan to eat.

He hadn’t been there ten minutes when her scent drifted toward his nostrils and filled his lungs.

Leandra.

A drumming sound filled his head, bounced off his mind, reverberated throughout his body. It took him a second to process this new phenomenon, it was so new to him.

In truth, he admitted to himself with chagrin, he wouldn’t have been able to place the cause without his lion’s whispered thoughts.

Her heartbeat.

The drumming that filled his body and took over his own pulse was Leandra’s own heartbeat.

The magnificence of this occurrence awed him. Could Leandra feel this? Was it the same for her?

The tempo became stronger and he knew that meant she was approaching.

BOOK: Inevitable: Shifters Forever Worlds (Only After Dark Book 5)
4.55Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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