Leopard's Run (Leopard People 10)

Timur swung around, frowning. “They take breaks and walk around outside?” His gut began to churn when he saw the truth on Gorya’s face. “Damn that woman. I’m going to talk to Fyodor. At least he’s taking his security more seriously. You should have told me immediately.”

Gorya nodded. “I just found out today and was waiting for the right moment. I knew this new woman was a big worry.”

“Having Evangeline’s guards leave her alone with Ashe when we don’t know a damned thing about her is more worrisome.”

Gorya again nodded his agreement. “You’re right.”

Timur glanced at his watch. “How far out is Jeremiah? Did he give you a time?”

Gorya consulted his phone and began texting. While his cousin asked the more pertinent questions of the kid, Timur made good use of his phone, texting two of the shifter guards, Kyanite Boston and Rodion Galerkin. Rodion had followed Timur and Gorya from the lair after Fyodor had killed all the males. They all knew their uncles would retaliate. Rodion and Kyanite had helped burn the bodies before they’d left and then come to the United States in the hopes of disappearing. Like Timur and Gorya, there was very little they knew how to do, other than to kill.

Timur trusted both men implicitly—well, as much as he trusted anyone who wasn’t part of his family. He pretty much considered both men in that category. He wanted them closer to home. They traveled with the team covering Fyodor, but he needed shifters covering Evangeline as well. The two men he’d had on her weren’t from his home lairs.

He and the other shifters known to him had been born in the Primorye region of southeast Russia. There, the Amur leopard still had a valiant foothold, but was close to extinction. There was a reason for that. The lairs were made up of the Amur leopards, and instead of finding the women who could complete them, they made certain they didn’t in order to show their loyalty to the bratya .

“Nothing like killing a mother in front of her sons to make men out of them, right, Gorya?” Timur whispered bitterly. He would never get over that nightmare. It would never stop moving through his mind, day or night. He didn’t know how many times he’d replayed that gruesome scene in his head. His father’s cruel smile as he’d killed her, making her suffer as much as possible, all the while telling Timur and Gorya they would enjoy this if they let themselves. He had tried to call their leopards out to feast on her blood.

Gorya leapt out of his chair and punched at the wall. Sheetrock and paint cracked beneath the powerful blow. “Stop. You have to stop thinking about it.”

“You tell me how I’m supposed to do that,” Timur said.

Before Gorya could answer, the heavy oak door swung open and Jeremiah hurried in. He had the collar of his coat pulled up as high as possible against the cold. A wind blew in with him, cooling the overheated room. Timur didn’t want the door to close. The taste of his mother’s blood was clinging to his mouth and staining his chest. The scent was in his nose and the horrendous sound of her screams in his ears.

He turned so neither man could see his face. Jeremiah shut the door hard enough that it was jarring. He bit down on his tongue, refusing to give in to the temptation to yell at the kid. Gorya was right. He didn’t want to be anything like his father, and his father would never have waited to hear what he had to say.

“I followed him all the way into the city, Timur. It wasn’t easy either. He spent a lot of time backtracking. I thought he might have made me at one point, but I was wrong.”

Timur watched Jeremiah remove his coat and, with a small shiver, stomp over to the fireplace. He held out his hands to the warmth. He remained silent. Waiting. There wasn’t going to be a lecture on safety, or any asking of questions such as “Are you certain he wasn’t on to you?” He was going to be reasonable …

“You sure you weren’t followed back here?” Gorya demanded. “Did you check?”

“Of course, I checked,” Jeremiah defended, a note of belligerence creeping into his voice.

Timur sighed and gave a slight headshake toward Gorya, indicating to his cousin to back off. First, he’d given Timur a lecture about jumping the gun and sounding like his father, and then he’d done it himself.

“Give me whatever info you managed to collect on this man,” Timur intervened.

Jeremiah gave Gorya another glare and then hurried with his report, the words stumbling over one another as he attempted to talk fast. “His name is Apostol Delov.”

Timur’s heart sank. His breath caught in his throat.