Leopard's Run (Leopard People 10)

“She was disappointed I was a girl?” That hurt. She’d known it, but it still hurt. Hearing him confirm it was almost devastating.

He lifted her off the counter and held her until she got her legs to work. She stepped away as quickly as possible. She could be naked in front of him and that didn’t bother her. She could have wild sex with him, and she wasn’t embarrassed. But she didn’t want to feel this kind of vulnerability. To keep him from seeing her expression, she went to the cupboard where her dishes were stored.

“I don’t think it was disappointment, Ashe,” he said as he lifted the lid on the wok. “I think your mother loved you very much. She wanted your father to teach you how to survive. They held themselves away from society or anywhere that might put your life in danger. She also wanted her sister safe, yet she didn’t try to go rescue her. She didn’t ask your father to rescue her. She stayed here with you to make certain you survived, and no one could get to you. That’s love. I know love when I see someone like you. Your parents gave you that.”

Ashe was silent, turning over and over what he’d said. She tried to remember her mother picking her up. Had she? It had always been her father’s voice she’d heard telling her to push herself harder. That she needed to learn to swim faster. To run farther. To shoot with expert precision. He used to yell at her that there was no reason to waste a bullet. It had to hit precisely where she aimed it.

Her mother had been there with them. Her father never went anywhere without her mother close to him. What had her mother been doing while father and daughter trained? Ashe set the table as she thought about it. Yes, she’d been there, wringing her hands and occasionally objecting that her father was being too harsh with her. He hadn’t stopped or listened to her. In fact, now that she replayed those scenes in her head, she saw her father send her mother a quick, quelling scowl.

“She catered to him. She did everything he told her to do,” she mused aloud.

“Probably. She was a terrified child when he saved her life. They came to a foreign land. It was his money they lived on. She might have loved him, but she didn’t feel equal with him. How could she? She adored him. Doted on him. Wanted to please him.”

Her mother had been like that with her father to the point that Ashe had felt pushed aside. She hated feeling as if she was being a huge baby when she’d had a really good childhood and Timur’s childhood had been pure hell. She poured water into tall glasses and then sank down into her favorite chair at the small table where the built-in alcove was. The little breakfast nook was round, the small circular outcropping coming out of the kitchen, creating a space that was intimate. She liked it but had added heavy drapes. She liked looking outside during the day, but in the evening, she felt vulnerable with the lights on.

“I love this house,” she murmured as he put the bowls of rice and stir-fry on the table.

“I do too,” he said. “I’ve asked Evangeline if she’d sell it to me a couple of times. She’s thinking about it.”

She glared at him. “Don’t you dare buy my house out from under me.”

“You can’t have it both ways, malen’kiy smirch . You’re either running or you’re staying.”

She shrugged and helped herself to the rice. “You’re always saying you’re going to catch up with me, so either way, I need my house.” She scooped a healthy portion of the stir-fry onto the rice. It smelled wonderful. He’d cooked the night before. If that food was anything to go by, he was an awesome chef, and she didn’t plan to waste her opportunity to eat something good.

She felt his eyes on her, but she refused to look up. Truthfully, she had no idea what she was going to do with Timur. “I’m not like my mother, you know. Even if I did stay, I wouldn’t dote on you. Or adore you.” She couldn’t help sneaking a peek at him to see how he took that declaration.

“Yes, you would. You’d also argue with me about anything and everything. That will more than balance out your adoration of me.”

She gave an inelegant snort of derision. “You wish.”

“I don’t wish for the crap you’re going to give me,” he denied, pushing the basket of bread toward her. “But the rest of it, yeah, I’m looking forward to it.”

“This is too fast. Don’t ask me to make decisions when I know I’ve got the ones who murdered my parents on my trail. I would have brought them straight to Fyodor in the hopes that he would have gotten rid of them for me.”