“What are you talking about?”

He studied her pale face for a long moment. His eyes slowing changed back to dark gold. “It doesn’t matter, Isabeau. We have a truce. Let’s just keep to that.”

She frowned at him, her expression genuinely puzzled. “I don’t understand what you meant. I saw you.”

“You saw your father put a gun to my head. He nearly blew my brains out.”

“You had him trapped. What was he supposed to do?”

“I went in unarmed. I tried to talk him into surrendering, into walking out with me and letting the team take down his boss, but he wouldn’t listen.” He made certain to look her in the eye. She wouldn’t want to believe him, but her cat would know he was telling the truth. The cat was becoming strong enough to emerge, and the closer she got to the surface, the more she would enhance Isabeau’s abilities. She would know if he lied and if he told the truth.

Isabeau refused to be a coward, looking him straight in the eye and forcing herself to remember the terrifying moment when she’d stepped into the room and saw her father falling, blood splattering the wall behind him. There’d been so much blood. At first she hadn’t known what happened. There was no sound, a silencer on the weapon used. She had opened her mouth to scream, and her lover had been on her so fast she couldn’t even see him move, his hand clapping hard over her mouth, taking her to the floor, his eyes cold and hard and so demonic she’d been terrified.

She’d lain under his body, watching the blood turn black and thick around her father, and the man she’d loved with her soul, now a stranger who was clearly working with the man who had shot her father. Funny, she could barely recall the other man, only the gun and her father falling and Conner’s face, carved of stone, grim, without a trace of love or caring. Without a trace of remorse. He’d held her there while others moved in with guns, his hand clamped tight so she could barely take a breath. She’d watched them, grim and silent, weapons crisscrossing their bodies, move through the room, stepping over her father as if he were a piece of garbage and not a man who had laughed and played with her, teaching her to drive, sitting up all night with her when she was ill.

Isabeau swallowed hard and looked away from him. It was totally dark now, but she could see when she should have been blind. She didn’t want to see. Maybe staying blind in the darkness was the best way for self-preservation, because God help her if she came to terms with what Conner had done.

“We’ve got to go,” Conner said.

She nodded, letting her breath out in relief. She couldn’t think about that night. She’d spent too much time delving into her father’s affairs, feeling as if she was betraying him. She’d spent too many sleepless nights, had too many nightmares.

“Put your shoes back on, you can’t walk barefoot.”

She sank down without arguing and pulled her shoes on, watching as he did the same. She knew by the way he tilted his head that he was listening to something. She caught vibrations of sound, like an echo almost, but couldn’t sort it out.

“Are they close?” Instinctively she lowered her voice.

“Someone is coming this way. It isn’t one of ours.”

“How can you tell?”

“They’re too loud. And I can smell their sweat. It isn’t a leopard scent or Adan’s. We’ll be fine. He’s alone and he’s being stalked.”

“Why can’t I smell him?”

“Your cat retreated. Women move closer and closer to their leopard emerging, but she comes and goes quite often at first. No one knows why. Maybe she’s just as nervous as you are. My cat has settled, which means yours has moved away from us.”

She shook her head. “It’s hard to believe. If I hadn’t seen or felt it, I’d think we were both crazy.”

His eyes went soft. Liquid. Sexy. Her breath hissed out. She couldn’t blame her reaction on her cat when her cat was far away. This was woman, pure and simple, so attracted to a man she went damp just looking at him.

“I know this is a lot for you to take in all at once, Isabeau, but it will get easier. And you haven’t run screaming even with all the death you’ve seen today and the revelations about who and what you are.”

There was pride in his voice—respect even. That was his talent. He could make her feel special. More than special, extraordinary. The admiration in his voice stroked like fingers over skin. How did he do that? His voice was so compelling. So real. There was no way to desensitize her skin after he’d touched her with his fingers, or after hearing his voice. It was impossible, at least for her. Her nerves were raw—little electric sparks arced over her breasts and down her stomach.

She wasn’t experienced enough, or sophisticated enough to be casual with him. Everything he did and the way he talked affected her physically and emotionally. He was so far out of her league she didn’t have a prayer of hiding anything from him, so she shrugged her shoulders and made certain her shoes were tied.

“I’m not fragile, Conner. I knew what I was getting into, or at least what it would take to get the children back.”

A blood-curdling scream filled the night. Chills went down her spine and she swiveled toward the sound. The harrowing cry was cut off in mid-note. Isabeau stood shivering, realizing that once again, Conner had inserted his body between her and whatever had made that god-awful, horrible sound. He always protected her, even in the cabin when he thought she might want him dead. Even when her father had been killed. It hadn’t felt like protection then—he’d prevented her from crying out—but his body had shielded hers throughout a terrible shootout.