Ryland (11 page)

“I don’t care.” He cupped the back of
her head and pulled her to his mouth. He nibbled on her lower lip then suckled it
into his mouth. She turned more to shove him away, but her fingers and hands
had a will of their own and curled around his neck and held him. When he tilted
her head and then his she waited for him, wanted him to kiss her. Then his
mouth took hers.

There was no gentle build up once he
covered her mouth with his, but a conquering. He speared his tongue into her
mouth and stroked hers. One of them moaned and it took her seconds to realize
it had been her. When he shifted her around so that she was turned to face him
she moaned again. His hands were everywhere, gentle and warm. When he lifted
his head she was panting as hard as he was, her body on fire, burning for his. He
laid his head against her forehead and held her. “Alistair is coming for us.
He’s whistling so that we’ll be warned that he’s near.” He kissed her quickly
on her mouth before he lifted his head. “He didn’t want to walk in on something
that would scar him and he’d need therapy, he said.”

She realized when he started to button
her blouse back up that he’d had her nearly undressed. Slapping his hands away,
she quickly put herself together just as he stood up. The barn door opened a
second later.

“Mom wants to know if you could come in
now. She said everything is ready.” He wouldn’t look at them, and that
embarrassed her more. “Shall I tell her you’re coming or that you’ll be along
soon?”

She looked at him, shocked at what he’d
said. She stomped toward him when Ryland laughed. She wasn’t sure if it was at
her or his brother’s joke. When she was ready to step into the house, she
turned to them both. “Nothing happened. Nothing at all. We were looking at the
kittens is all.” Alistair nodded. “You can think whatever you want, but nothing
happened.”

“Sure.” Alistair started in and stopped
before she could follow. “If nothing happened then why is your blouse buttoned
all walperjawed.”

Ryland laughed harder. She was going to
kill them both. Turning around, she fixed her shirt. She was two holes off and
it took her two tries before she got it right. She glared at Ryland when he
tried to help her again.

“This is your fault.” He nodded. “I mean
it. If you hadn’t tried to undress me and have you…you should just stop trying
to get me naked.”

He pressed her against the wall and took
her mouth again. When he lifted her leg up and put it over his hip, she felt
his cock rock into her. He lifted his head and licked along her throat to her
shoulder. She grabbed onto his hair and tilted her head to give him more.

“I want you naked right now. I want to
bury myself in you and never come out.” He rolled into her again; her body felt
heavy and needy. “Christ, what I wouldn’t give right now to have you in my
room, beneath me, riding me. I want you now, Bronwyn.”

He turned her away from the door when it
opened. She had no idea who had come out, but Ryland growled. It sent a shiver
up her body that made her ache. He looked at her when the door closed again.

“We have to go inside.” She nodded. “I
don’t want to. I would rather take you back out to the barn and make love to
you. All night. Probably into tomorrow too. But they want us inside.”

“We can’t…we shouldn’t do this.”

He shook his head.

“They’re going to come for me. I don’t
want you hurt.”

“If you leave me, Bronwyn, it’s going to
hurt me more than anything they can do to me.” He took her hand and they went
inside. Dinner was served as soon as they sat down. Christ, she was in big
trouble here.

Chapter 9

Eli Cunningham looked over the lab
findings from the day before then tossed them on the desk. It wasn’t working. None
of it was. And not only that, it was costing more money than he had coming in
right now. Making a synthetic drug was not as easy as he’d thought it would be.
He glanced at the file he’d been avoiding since he’d had his encounter with Bronwyn.
If only the bitch would cooperate he’d have his money.

He thought about the tigers there. He’d
been told that all of them had been run off. And that those who hadn’t been run
off or killed were now a part of another ambush, Crawford’s ambush.

But she’d had them. And she protected
them as well. One had nearly taken his leg off and probably would have if he
hadn’t gotten the door opened when he had. Christ, that fucker was huge. He
leaned back in his chair and wondered what to do about them and her when
Crawford walked in.

“That little bitch you said was hot for
me is dead.”

Eli looked at him, trying to remember
when he’d ever said that to any man before, much less him.

“I think she was just trying to make
that boyfriend of hers jealous. He’s not anymore.”

“You killed them both.” Crawford nodded
even though it hadn’t been a question. “Did you happen to get rid of the bodies
this time, or did you leave them to be found by some nosey landlord?”

“Nah, I had them put out at the airport
in their car. Somebody will think they were killed there. I even remembered to
wipe shit down this time.”

 Eli looked out the window and counted
to ten. How this man had gotten to where he was without someone killing him was
mind boggling. And the fact that he had about fifty cats in his ambush was even
more astounding. The man was nothing but a bully and not even a smart one, at
that. Eli turned back to him. “When was the last time you made a sweep for cats
in this area?” He waited while Crawford pulled out his little notebook. Eli had
often wondered if he was actually writing in it or simply drawing pictures
because he couldn’t read. He waited so long he was ready to rip it out of his
hand and read it himself.

“Nearly three months ago. Didn’t find
much more than a passerby. He’s not passing no more. At least passing alive.”

Eli started to ask what the hell that
meant, but didn’t bother. “I had a run in with an ambush of them a week ago. If
you had a cell phone worth shit, I could have told you then.” Crawford sat up
straighter in his chair as Eli continued. “About half a dozen of them. Big
fuckers too. And you’ll never guess who had control over them.”

Crawford looked confused. Eli wanted to
hit him. He started to tell him it was a rhetorical question, but didn’t want
to have to explain that too. Having a brute force was great, but not when the
leader was no smarter than the paper he wrote his assignments down on.

“It was Bronwyn Lawrence. She was protecting
them so I would imagine that she can tell you where they are when you find her.
You are still looking for her, aren’t you?” He nodded. “Well, what’s the
progress?”

“Progress? Oh, you mean what have I been
able to figure out. Why don’t you just say that? Any hoo, she isn’t in that
building no more. It’s gone. Somebody went and bulldozed it right to the
ground. I went there twice and it’s still gone. And that girl friend of hers,
she’s gone too. I wish you had have given her to me when her mate come up dead.
But that man we left in charge there, he said there were laws or some shit.”

“Yes, there are laws that he has to
follow. It was leave him there in charge or leave you. And you had things to do
for me.” Eli could hear his IQ lower every minute he spent with this fool. “And
I told you to leave her alone. She’s our only link to Bronwyn. Once we… You
said she was gone too? When did this happen?”

Crawford shrugged. “Don’t know. About a
week ago, I guess. Her place is all there like she was coming back, but she
hasn’t yet. And that guy I had on her, that Otter? He’s gone too. I’ve been
looking for him since last week too. You think they being gone together means
something?”

Eli laid his head on his desk. A week. She’d
been gone a week, which meant that either she was gone in the wind with Bronwyn
or she was with the other cat. It was highly unlikely that she had gone to
another cat. Her mate from before had been brutal and nasty. He doubted the
woman had even been near a man much less slept with one since.

“You okay there, Eli?” He looked up to
see Crawford leaning toward him. “I thought maybe you were upset about Otter. I
am. He was a good kid.”

Laughing at the absurdity of it all, Eli
sat up. He picked up his phone and found his calculator on it. He did some
quick math before putting it down again and looked at Crawford.

“You can only spend twenty-five minutes
with me a day from now on. And, after you leave, I will need to spend twice
that to get even half the brain cells I lost trying to understand you. You’re
detrimental to my wellbeing.” He lifted his hand, already anticipating that
he’d have to explain most of the words he’d just used. “Twenty-five minutes. And
I’m setting the timer when you come in. Do you have anything else to tell me?”

“I don’t think… You want me to go and
check to see if that building is gone still? I could go right there now.”

“No. I’m pretty sure that once a
building is gone, it’s pretty much going to stay that way. But thanks. I want
you to find Sindy Wilson. And not to hurt her, just find her and bring her to
me. Understand?”

“Yeah. Find Sindy Wilson and bring her
to you. I can’t hurt her either. I’m betting the others can’t hurt her either,
right?” Eli said that was correct. “I’ll go by her place and see if she’s come
back. If not, then I’ll go to her work place. I have me a friend in there that
can tell me what I want.”

A friend in the hospital. Eli had
visions of his friend being a brain surgeon or something like that. He nodded
and, after writing down the instructions in his book, Crawford left.

He was going to have to figure out a
better way to run the cats. They were afraid of Crawford; everyone was when he
was a cat and pissed, but he was beyond stupid and going to get them killed. How
he’d not managed to do that so far was insane. Eli opened the folder with Bronwyn’s
name on it.

Christ, she was a beauty. Long red hair
and eyes that were both scary and hypnotizing at the same time. And her power? He’d
never created a more powerful being. And the fact that she could control it was
what he wanted. What he needed.

He could make millions from her. Selling
her to the military, any military that had the funds he wanted, would do that.
Then he’d have the funding that he needed to make him more of a long-term cash
flow. Drugs that could do three to four times the damage for half the cost. But
he’d charge ten times what he would get for the real stuff.

But he needed her first. And she wasn’t
doing what he’d wanted her to. Not now and not when he’d had her the first
time. Smiling, he flipped to the back of the folder to see the pictures he’d
taken of her the last time.

Eli was a sadist. He knew that and so
did anyone who was caught in his bedroom or the play room with him for more
than five minutes. The only way he could get off was from
inflicting physical and psychological pain to his victims,
and he loved it. And when he’d had to discipline Bronwyn, he’d come every day
just watching the whip strike her back. Christ, she’d been so good for him.
Then she’d gotten away.

Eli tossed the file down. She’d
been unconscious when he’d left for the day. Her most recent beating was on a
thumb drive to use at home and her file, the one he had now to go over, was in
his brief case. He was just about to shoot his load when his alarm had gone off,
telling him that he was needed at the lab. But by the time he’d gotten there it
was gone. And so was she.

It had taken him nearly a
month to figure out that she hadn’t been in the place when it went up. The fire
marshal had said it was a gas leak and had been filling the building nearly all
day. Not likely since there had been about a dozen cats in the building all
during that time frame and they would have smelled it first. It had been her. She’d
gotten loose and had blown his building and all his work to hell and back. Just
another thing to hold over her head when he found her. And he would too. It was
just a matter of time.

He picked up his cell when
it rang and he cringed. His ex-wife. He had better things to do than to listen
to her complain about one of his brats again. He set the cell down again and
let her tell her woes to the voicemail. He sent her more money in one month
than a small country could use in two years. He closed his eyes and thought
about Bronwyn when he heard the beep that he had new mail. He ignored it. Later,
he told himself. When hell froze over, he’d get back to her. Grinning, he went
to find some lunch, then he might go and see if that building was still gone.

~~~

“Do you know what this is?” Keith
handed Ryland a picture as he explained where he’d found it. “When we were
being shot up by those guys while trying to save Bronwyn one of the men I was
chasing dropped it. I’ve been working on a recognition program, but it doesn’t
seem to get it.”

Ryland even tried to turn it
sideways and then upside down and he didn’t know what it was either. It was
sort of blurry, but that wasn’t it. It seemed to be of a person, but it was
hard to tell. He leaned over to Bronwyn and handed it to her. He realized she
knew the moment she stood up.