Lion's Dangerous(Kings of the Jungle #1)(73)

Eyes flashing gold in the dark, the lion stalked her. Brick abraded the backs of her arms and pulled at her hair as she edged along the wall, sure of one thing: that was not Jude.

Neither was the big cat that prowled into view at the other end of the alley, cutting off that avenue of escape.

Maybe these were good things, though. Jude wouldn't destroy her, but these lions would. They would protect their territory and Jude.

Before she could decide which beast to charge, Jude tore around the corner at a run, gripping a duffel bag in one hand and in the other … a First Aid kit?



       
         
       
        

She stared at him, uncomprehending as he slowed and then dropped into a crouch at her feet. He started unpacking the bags. A blanket, bottled water, a couple smallish coils of rope came out of the duffel.

"No. You weren't supposed to come after me," she choked out around a sense of mounting horror as he cracked open the First Aid kit and arranged bandages like he was setting up some kind of field hospital.

His eyes met hers, barely human. "I will always come for you, Lily."

She just … stared at him. The big lions crowded closer, but they were nothing, kittens, compared to the fierce creature pacing in Jude's eyes, burning brighter than that big moon overhead.

"I can't go back," she whispered. "It's … whatever I am, it wants to be in the Jungle. It's stronger there."

"I know. That's why we're going to do this here."

Lily closed her eyes. This was exactly what she had wanted to avoid. Jude shouldn't have to be the one to destroy her. "Let Ares do it. Or Cavin. Please."

He let out this snarling, roaring sound that made the hairs on her arms stand up. Fear rolled through her, taking out her knees. As she started to slide down the wall, Jude grabbed her waist and hauled her to him, then pushed her face down on the blanket.

He yanked her shirt from her waistband and shoved it up to her shoulder blades. An agonized sound tore from his throat. Lily squeezed her eyes shut and buried her face in her crooked arm, willing herself to pass out or for him to suddenly turn into a coward or anything to end this.

Neither of those things happened. With one hand braced between her shoulders, pinning her, Jude clawed at her skirt until it fell away in shreds, leaving her exposed to three lions and the night.

"Forgive me, sweetheart," he said. "This is going to hurt."

Oh, hell, he wasn't lying. She felt a wicked sharp point at the base of her spine, felt her flesh give, and fire. Everything became fire.



With Cavin and Ares pacing in the back of Jude's mind, he managed to hold the lion's raw emotion at bay. Cavin was right-wild instinct wouldn't save Lily. She needed a steady hand, and the human ability to lock away base emotion.

Thank fuck Lily lost consciousness, because her body was a roadmap of blackened veins. He started with the original puncture sites and treated them like snake bites. There was still poison there, so bitter and black, he could barely stand to hold it in his mouth long enough to draw it from her and spit it on the ground.

When her blood started to sweeten again, he started on the rest of her, opening flesh with his claws only to lick the wounds closed again, pushing his antiseptic enzymes into her blood stream. Cavin and Ares looked on grimly, silently standing guard through the long process. By the time Jude finished, Lily's clothes were shreds of blood-soaked nothing, and she was as washed out white as the moon. He wrapped her limp form in the blanket, stood, and, flanked by his pride, carried her back to the Jungle. 

Inside the club, energy was subdued. Not even lust-drunk animals missed the scents of fear and panic in their midst, and Jude hadn't even attempted to hide any of that while tearing from the roof to Cavin's office, and then through the club on Lily's trail.

Ignoring wary, questioning faces, he left Ares and Cavin to deal with distribution of information and carried Lily up to one of the private rooms.

She didn't stir when he rolled her onto the bed, face down, because it would have been the fucking height of cruelty to put her on her shredded back. As it was, she whimpered in her sleep, and there wasn't a damn thing he could do about her pain.

No, there was one thing. Shifters healed their wounds with relative ease, but humans were locked into the workings of their slower metabolisms.

Leaning over her, he carefully moved her hair off her neck and traced a line from her ear to her shoulder. She was so out of it, the muscle didn't even twitch at his touch. Transformation from human to shifter wasn't violent, but it wasn't peaceful as rose petals, either. If he did it now-bit her now, while the Mating Moon was still high and she was still deep into her body's pain defense response, she wouldn't feel the change until it was over, and then her new metabolism would kick in and take over.