Leopard's Wrath (Leopard People 11)

“I want Evangeline happy. So far, the babies haven’t shown signs of distress. Evangeline wants children, and the last thing she’ll do is risk losing them. She’ll stop when she feels she has to or if the doctor tells her she needs to. You don’t understand the importance of that bakery to her, Timur.”

“If it ever gets to be too much and you can see she’s risking her life to keep going, what then, Fyodor?” Timur demanded. “Because that’s a very real possibility.”

“Then I’d burn it to the ground without her knowledge. Promise her a new one and take my time getting it done. I can delay the hell out of any building project. I do it all the time. In the meantime, though, Timur, if she needs this bakery to fulfill something in her, I’m giving it to her.”

Mitya admired Fyodor. He did. He loved the man, but he didn’t agree with him. Timur didn’t either. Mitya would have burned the bakery down a long time ago if he thought it could get his woman killed. That was part of the problem. Ania was an intelligent woman. She read people. That was part of her gift. She read him, and she knew he was dangerous. Her leopard knew. He was ruthless when he felt it was necessary. Each time she was determined to commit to him, something happened, and she came up against his personality. That hadn’t helped his cause one bit.

He wasn’t looking forward to facing her after his decree that Sevastyan do whatever it took to get her in the safe room. Sevastyan was every bit as ruthless as Mitya. Although he appeared a little more charming, he was a man who would do whatever it took to get the job done. He thought like Mitya. Stop it before it had a chance to happen. He would burn down the bakery as well.16ANIA glared at Mitya from the bed where Sevastyan had secured her. She was lying on her back, her hands in cuffs—and they weren’t the soft play ones either. They hurt her wrists. If she was honest, they probably wouldn’t hurt if she hadn’t gone crazy and fought. She knew better. She couldn’t break out of steel, but she’d tried.

It hadn’t helped that Sevastyan had watched her with that dispassionate look on his face, the one that infuriated her, his arms folded across his chest. He hadn’t said anything at all, just stared at her with that unnerving, unblinking way he had.

She’d kicked him several times before he’d gotten the cuffs on her. She’d scored two great shots to his gut, driving the ball of her foot deep, eliciting a very satisfying grunt from him. Then she’d scored another great shot to his thigh. She was positive she’d given him dead leg, but he was Sevastyan and he hadn’t given her the satisfaction of letting her know if she had or hadn’t.

He’d waited until she kicked again, caught her ankle in the vise from hell and snapped a cuff on her and then secured that to the bed. He hadn’t even smirked, just given her that blank stare. She’d been cautious then. She only had one weapon left. She wasn’t going to give him her other leg, not if she could help it.

He’d walked around the bed, cuffs dangling from his hands, and she’d eyed him warily. Where had he gotten all those handcuffs anyway? Were they already in the safe room, and if so, did they belong to Mitya? She doubted it. He would have padded cuffs, not ones that dug into skin and left bruises.

Sevastyan had moved with sudden blurring speed, catching her ankle, snapping the cuff around it with practiced ease and then securing the other end to the bedpost, almost all in one movement. He’d looked her over carefully and then turned and left her alone, sauntering out the door as if he hadn’t had a care in the world.

He didn’t know it, but she believed in revenge. She’d had plenty of time to give it a lot of thought, just how she would make his life miserable. But then time passed, and she got angry with Mitya. After all, this was his fault. He gave orders in that low voice, smoldering with rage but as cold as ice, and he expected everyone to obey him. Clearly, Sevastyan was unhappy with the orders, the same as she was. No, this was Mitya’s fault.

She glared at him when he stepped into the room and then she noticed the bloody towel he had wrapped around his bicep and shoulder. “What happened?”

Mitya glanced down at his shoulder as if just noticing it. He shrugged. He was wearing only a pair of light blue denim jeans. They rode low on his hips and he was barefoot. He looked amazing, but then he always did.