Drake studied Elie Jeanmard, standing passively as he watched the leopards fight. Scent told Drake the man had been Drake’s first challenger the night before and the third man pursuing him on the Mercier property. He watched the severe beating with a grim face, but made no move to stop it. This was Amos Jeanmard’s son and if Drake was right and Jeanmard was the leader of the Louisiana lair, Elie didn’t want any part of leadership. It was understandable. Elie had seen his father do his duty to the lair, but he’d been unhappy, and most likely his mother had been as well. Still, when he realized Armande and Robert were hunting Drake and Saria, he hadn’t looked the other way, he sent for Saria’s brothers.

“Uh oh,” Saria whispered softly. “Maybe you’d better get behind me, instead of the other way around.” She made a move to sidle around him, to protect him.

Drake caught her arm in a steel grip, holding her in place. His body partially blocked hers from the battlefield. One by one her brothers shifted their gazes from Remy and the torn and bloody leopards to Drake. He could feel the tension stretching out like a thin wire, until even the black leopard noticed and slowly turned his head. Red eyes fixed on Drake. The black leopard went low to the ground in the freeze-frame stalk of his kind.

“You won’t find me easy prey like those two,” Drake said, calmly peeling off his shirt. He flexed his shoulders to loosen his muscles as he kicked off his shoes. “Wouldn’t be a fair fight, Boudreaux. You’re tired and I’m still fresh. I could kick your ass anyway, but if you insist on making a fool of yourself in front of those two dirt bags, I’ll oblige.”

He kept his voice low, amused, a little taunting and it carried to the black leopard. The animal snarled, ears flat, teeth showing in a grimace. The killing rage was still on him and this time he had a target—a stranger—one who had dared to claim his sister. He knew he shouldn’t throw the challenge back in Saria’s brother’s teeth, but damn it all, he was tired of this lair’s out-of-control, strike-first-and-ask-questions-later policies. Someone needed to teach them a lesson.

He was still hanging on to his intellect enough to know his own leopard was driving him a bit, enraged over the attack on Saria, but he’d had it. He wanted to give in to his leopard’s savage nature. His hands dropped to his jeans, slipping the buttons open quickly.

“What are you doin’?” Saria demanded, putting a restraining hand on his wrist. “Are you insane? That’s my brother.”

It was too late for Saria to stop anything. Her other brothers were flinging shirts off and stepping out of shoes. This wasn’t going to be a one-on-one fight with Remy. Saria was their sister and as far as each of them was concerned, she’d been stolen—kidnapped—forced to accept a man they didn’t know as a mate. They could smell his scent all over her and it maddened them. Remy continued forward in that slow stalk preceding an all-out attack.

The shotgun blast filled the air. Simultaneously, an automatic weapon sprayed bullets just a few feet from Saria’s brothers, throwing dirt and twigs into the air. More bullets were fired in front of the black leopard. Elie swung around, his rifle at his shoulder, but there was no target. Everyone froze.

“Stand down. The next one who moves is dead.”

Drake recognized Joshua Tregre’s voice. He sounded deadly and no one, least of all Drake, was foolish enough to move.

“Drake, move back into cover,” Joshua instructed. “Everyone else just stay right where you are and don’t make the mistake of thinking we won’t kill you. You don’t mean a damn thing to any of us. Fucking bastards, turning on your own kind.” He spat the words in disgust.

Two of Saria’s brothers flinched, faces darkening. One glanced at the gun he’d put on the ground near his shirt.

“Don’t,” Drake warned. “You’ll be dead your first step. They don’t miss.”

The black leopard contorted, fur rippling, joints and bones cracking as the man emerged from the beast. Saria gasped and pushed her face into the back of Drake’s shirt to prevent herself from seeing her oldest brother naked.

Remy was covered in blood and rake marks, but he straightened without wincing, his glacier-blue eyes sweeping the surrounding trees. “Don’ move. Any of you,” h commanded his brothers. He glanced at Drake. “I take it your boys have joined us.”

It was a measure of Remy’s strength that he’d fought back his leopard’s killing rage and sounded matter-of-fact, casual even. He also was drawing attention to himself. It wouldn’t work. Drake’s team members were too well-trained. Each had a target, or in this case, a couple of them. Remy’s brothers had been caught grouped too close together.

Drake gave him a curt nod. “I run a couple of teams in the rain forest.” It was a shrewd guess, but Remy was no home-grown boy. He’d been around. A leopard sought out the wilds. If Remy had traveled, he would have run across a lair, and at least a few of the men who worked hostage and rescue.

“Mahieu, throw me my jeans before Saria has a stroke.”

Saria’s brother was as big as Drake, with the same heavy muscles, but his hair was very dark and he wore it long and shaggy and loose. His eyes were a striking cobalt blue. His face was tough, strong, the lines carved deep. A scar on the side of his neck indicated a knife had nearly ended his life at some point.

“And hurry,” Saria added. “I do not want to see Remy in all his glory. I’ll be scarred for life.” Her voice trembled a little, but Saria wouldn’t crumble, even under the tense situation.