Primal Song (3 page)

The last whine of the guitar faded away and the singer shouted hoarsely into the microphone, “You’ve been uh…amazing! Thank you for having us. Good night!”

Hundreds of feet stamped the ground while hands clapped in time with the words, “Encore! Encore! Encore!” Daisy prayed Saber would end it now. She wasn’t sure she could take much more of listening to
him
singing.

But then the sweet notes of an acoustic guitar sounded and the crowd quieted until only the dim murmurs from the watchers way in the back could be heard. Daisy’s ears pricked with intrigue. Light flickered as the crowd of teenagers and young adults flipped open their phones until they resembled a galaxy of stars.

It was a slower song, but no less dangerous to Daisy’s peace of mind. The lion crooned his way through the words, causing her skin to pebble as his rough voice swept through her. Again, she sensed his gaze on her, but she refused to turn around. Not this time. His words left her imagining what it’d be like to have him whisper in her ear all the things he wanted to do to her. Her body throbbed with want, her bear once again perking up with excitement.

This was ridiculous.

She let out a silent groan. Her gaze sought out anyone free to take her place next to the stage. She had to get the fuck away before she did something stupid like throw herself at the rock star singing behind her. She made eye contact with Willis Franco and she gave her head a jerk.

Once he reached her side, she asked him to fill in for her until the end of the show. With his customary easygoing smile, the black bear shot her a wink. Without looking at the stage, Daisy pushed her way through the mesmerized crowd and tried not to feel as if she’d left something very important behind.

Her parents stood at the back of the crowd, their faces glowing with love as they swayed to the song. Daisy shook her head. They should have looked ridiculous together. Her bobcat shifter father and her black bear mother. Her mom was several inches taller than her dad, but neither of them seemed to care. They adored each other unconditionally.

That’s what Daisy wanted, what she craved more than anything else, but had yet to find. She knew she’d never discover it with the lion on stage, no matter how hot he made her feel. Sexual attraction was not love or affection. It was sex, which was all he’d be able to give her.

Claudette looked over, as though she sensed her daughter’s pain. Daisy shot her mom a rueful smile, rubbed her temples as if she had a headache, and sauntered away from the fairgrounds. She ached all right, but it wasn’t in her head.

*

Hours later, after the fairgrounds were dark and the crowd left, Ram sat back on the tour bus with a bottle of scotch. Luckily there had been no media in attendance. As much as Ram enjoyed being a popular musician, he hated being followed around by the press. The others didn’t seem to give a shit. They were out carousing with some of the legal beauties who’d stopped by the autograph table. Ram had had his share of admirers who’d hinted they would enjoy taking care of his every desire, but he’d sent them on their way.

A week ago, Ram would’ve picked two or three of the females and had himself a fine time. This evening though, he couldn’t strum up an ounce of interest. Nick had mouthed something about “mating frenzy” to the other band members who’d then stared at Ram as if he’d grown another fucking head.

He groaned and tossed back a bolt of liquor. There was no such thing as a mating frenzy. There was chemistry that led to fucking and chemistry that led to mating. Neither applied in this case because the one female he wanted to be buried inside had walked away before he learned her name.

It didn’t matter though, right? He wasn’t sticking around here. The tour was over, it was time to go home, and home was in LA where the rest of the civilized world resided. As he steadily worked his way through the full fifth of scotch, Ram thought about his place. The big house with its perfectly decorated rooms didn’t feel like home. Maybe he’d been a complete ass to let that interior decorator have free rein, but she’d been great in bed and he’d liked the house.

Of course, back then he’d spent more time on the road than at the mansion and even when he did go home, he always had people coming and going. He’d had so many parties at that house, movie stars, rock stars and the people who followed them everywhere had filled it to the seams, making it less lonely. These days, he was tired of the party atmosphere, tired of people falling over themselves when he entered a room.

Ram shifted on the bench at his ungrateful thoughts. If it weren’t for the humans and shifters who bought every Saber album, came to see their shows and shared their love of the music with others, he wouldn’t have a big, fancy house to hate. He wouldn’t be able to tour all over the country doing what he loved the most. But was it too much to ask for a little break from it all?

Apparently so, considering the amount of press Saber attracted wherever they went. Hell, the bastards staked out his house, tried to sneak pictures of him through the windows and went through his trash.

Despite the strangeness of performing a show without all the usual hoopla, he’d enjoyed playing at the festival tonight. There’d been no disc jockeys trying to get an exclusive, no reporters asking about Ram’s latest lover or the solo career he didn’t want.

Of course, that wouldn’t last. The kids had taken pictures with their phones. They’d all be on Facebook or Twitter tonight talking about the surprise concert in their hometown and next thing Ram knew, the press would descend like a horde of locusts. He’d thought about staying here for a little while, maybe taking some time off, but knowing the media would find him made it an impossible dream. At least at home he had the protection of his property line to keep them out. Here, there’d be nothing.

Even as he pondered the lack of warmth waiting for him in LA, his lion prowled in the recesses of his mind. It wanted to go out to look for that female. Ram’s cock hardened at the thought of getting close to her, but he forced himself not to think about her. She was a cop for fuck’s sake. She’d slap him in handcuffs and cart him off to jail for stalking her. The reminder should have made his libido quiet down, except all he could think about was cuffing
her
to a bed and tasting every inch of her long-limbed body.

He bypassed his glass and grabbed the bottle, hoping to obliterate the images in his brain with alcohol. The lion fought him with every swallow. His claws sprang out and his fangs lengthened, making it damn hard to close his mouth without cutting himself.

Fuck!
He slammed the bottle back on the table, cock throbbing harder than ever. Ram had never had trouble controlling his beast—he mastered his animal at a very young age—but now it was as if all the willpower in the world couldn’t keep the lion in its cage. Heat swept through his body that had nothing to do with alcohol and everything to do with the need to pin that female bear beneath him. He shook his head savagely and drained the last of the scotch.

His lion still stalked through his mind, tail twitching with the need to go on the hunt. Ram leapt from his seat and tore through the minibar they kept on the bus, desperate to drown out his animal’s needs. But he never got another bottle.

Against his will, he was outside the bus, head tilted back to scent the humid, Louisiana night air. There were a variety of odors to sort through, but when he finally caught the faint trace of musk, bear and woman, he shifted and followed his nose.

He cut across a thick marsh, ignoring the swish of alligators on the banks and the curious eyes that watched him from the trees and brush. His only concern was finding that female and taking her. Ram couldn’t fight the animal’s instincts anymore, not with the heat incinerating him from the inside out.

*

Daisy rolled over and punched her pillow again. She’d been wrestling with her bed for two hours to no avail. Her body burned and ached for a male she couldn’t have.

She didn’t understand it. Yes, he was gorgeous. Yes, he was built like a brick shithouse and made her feel almost petite in comparison, but he was a celebrity, a rock star who probably had females waiting for him in every town across the country. Sure, he’d seemed attracted to her, but as she knew from very personal experience, cats were complete…well, alley cats.

Frustrated with the direction of her thoughts, Daisy sat up and glared across her shadowy room. She didn’t have time to fantasize about rock stars. Pulling her knees up to her chest, she wrapped her arms around them. She had a lot to accomplish before her goals were met.

Red House was waiting for her. The house her maternal ancestors built had passed out of the family a hundred years before and no one other than Daisy seemed bothered by that. Saving money on a cop’s salary wasn’t easy, but she did without so she could finally reclaim what the Lebeau women had lost. She could raise a family there surrounded by their heritage.

She sighed. Kids.

She knew she wanted them. One or two would be fine. But she couldn’t have kids without a male. Daisy wasn’t scared of being a single parent. In fact, she’d prefer it. Unfortunately, her mother would strangle her. Her mom was as devout a Catholic as could be found outside a convent. If Daisy showed up pregnant with no mate waiting in the background, St. Patrick Church would probably catch fire from the number of candles her mama would light.

No, she had to have a mate before she started having children. That led to another problem. Who was she going to take to mate? She’d grown up in Maison Rouge and except for the eight months she spent with Kitty in New York, she’d never left. She knew every male in a fifty-mile radius and none of them impressed her as being good daddy material for the next generation of Picous. That left her with the option of going farther afield, like to New Orleans or Lafayette, or making do with one of the good ole boys she’d grown up with.

The thought was so depressing she pressed her face into her knees until it hurt. It wasn’t as though she lacked for dates. Some of her high school boyfriends still asked her out and she’d dated a few of them despite knowing there was no spark of real interest. She wanted love and respect and affection. The kind of relationship her mama and daddy had. But that was starting to look like wishful thinking.

She liked some of the guys, but there was no passion. Could she live without that? Sure she could. She just had to ignore the little voice in her head that said mating was forever and you don’t want to fuck it up by picking a mate whose only saving grace was that you didn’t want to kill them on sight.

Something banged on the front porch of the house, rousing her from her self-pity. It wasn’t a stealthy sound, but more like someone was trying to figure out how to get inside and didn’t care if anyone heard them.

Daisy pulled her service pistol out of the belt she’d left coiled on her nightstand. Some women kept lotions and sleeping masks or even books on their nightstands. Daisy left her gun and enough ammo to start a small war.

She climbed out of bed and toyed with the idea of getting dressed before she went to check on the noise, but another scraping sound prodded her into moving. She did throw a robe over her naked body and loosely tied it, not wanting to wave her girl parts at a potential burglar. Slipping through her house on silent feet, she wondered if one of the strangers in town had decided to try their luck at burglarizing a few houses. It was rare, but it did happen.

Adrenaline and a tinge of fear washed through her as she made her way in the direction of the sound. Those were definitely scraping, scratching sounds, as if someone was using a lock pick to open the door. Heart pounding in her chest, she eased to the window beside the front door and peeked out. And blinked.

There was a lion on her porch. A huge friggin’ beast with a thick, dark mane and the kind of fangs that belonged on the Discovery Channel. He had one paw on her front door and she watched in stunned disbelief as he tried picking her lock with one carefully extended claw.

The only lion shifter she was aware of in the area was the musician, but it made no sense for him to be here. What was he planning to do? Break in her house and sing at her? She bit back a snort. She wasn’t afraid of any big cat. Being a bear had its benefits, mainly that she outweighed most males in her animal form, but her bear wasn’t even fazed by this unexpected visit. In fact, it wanted to come out right now, not to attack, but to play. It thought the idea of a lion trying to break into their territory a great way to end the evening. Daisy sniffed deeply, drawing the scent of cat through the door and knew it was the musician. Beneath that wild, musky cat scent was a hint of the same male she’d been trying not to think about since she left the fairgrounds.

Shit.
What was he doing here? She breathed deep again, trying to figure out his frame of mind. Was he pissed that she left the performance? She almost snorted at the thought. That would take listener satisfaction a little too far. But he smelled hot and agitated. Her head swam as something else filtered through her senses, making her body feel sluggish again.

Her lower body throbbed with want, her nipples tightened into near-painful points. She was getting turned-on. Seriously turned-on because she could feel dampness on her thighs as her moisture seeped from her channel.

He growled. The low, deep rumble sent a bolt of excitement straight to her clit and she gasped.

She reached for the door, not sure if she planned to tell him to get away, or invite him in. She wanted more than she ever had before, but he wasn’t what she needed, right? Only an idiot would open the door to a male who would use her and leave her. Apparently her horniness dropped her IQ by several points because she undid the lock and turned the knob.

But she’d waited too long and the lion had gotten tired of trying to pick the lock. The instant Daisy swung open the door, two paws landed on her chest, taking her to the floor.

The gun bounced out of her hand, sliding across the tile where it bumped up against the leg of a table. Five hundred pounds of big cat was a lot and it took a few minutes for Daisy to get her wind back. She wanted to curse when she did. If he was a serial stalker or something, she’d just lost her weapon and given him the dominant position. She was a fucking genius.