Badlands: The Lion’s Den(3)

At that, Finn let out a harsh laugh. Jose always knew exactly what to say to him. If he’d shown the least sign of pity or worry over Finn’s flashes of PTSD, it would have been like pouring salt in a wound, but when he gave Finn crap just like any of the other bouncers, it just made Finn laugh.

“Better than being a butt-sniffing canine,” he said as his pulse rate slowed.

“Actually, I’m more of a boob man, myself,” Jose said, taking no offense. That was true. Jose’s main girl, Krystle, was no slouch in the boob department.

Finn felt a different tension in him now; a strong pull to find the feline shifter again.

He hurried back inside, heading for the end of the bar where his little feline had been sitting. His feline? Where had that thought come from? he scolded himself as he shoved his way none too gently through the crowd. Several patrons flashed scowls at him, but none of them dared speak up. There was his size, and he had a certain reputation.

He got to the spot where she’d been sitting. A surprisingly strong slash of disappointment burned through him as he saw that her seat was empty and she was nowhere in sight.





Chapter Two




He glanced around the room with a scowl. He was taller than most of the people there, but the room was getting more and more crowded, and he couldn’t see her. Could she have gone out the back exit?

He leaned against one of the columns and decided just to let it go. She was distracting. He didn’t need distractions. He had enough to worry about, like holding together the fractured pieces of his sanity, getting through the night without being ripped awake by screaming nightmares, and keeping the bears on their side of town before an all-out war over territory took place.

But even as those dark thoughts raced through his head, he found himself walking across the room again, elbowing through the crowd, scenting the air, searching for her.

He found her standing by the velvet ropes that separated the bar from the BDSM play area. She was standing there, nervously clutching her oversized canvas purse like it was a life preserver and watching with a mingled look of interest and trepidation.

She was staring at a woman who was bent over the spanking bench. The woman’s legs were spread, and her hands secured with leather cuffs in front of her. Red, raised welts slashed across the ivory globes of her buttocks. The woman was being spanked with a riding crop, and from the sound of her throaty moans, she was close to orgasm.

“Newcomer to the scene?” Finn said. The woman jumped, let out a startled squeak, and spilled part of her drink on her chest. His eyes involuntarily flicked to the liquid wetting her shirt and making it cling to her ample breasts, and he felt blood rushing to his groin.

“You shouldn’t sneak up on people like that,” she chided him as she grabbed a napkin and dabbed at her chest.

He shrugged. “Sorry. Catlike reflexes and all,” he said, delivering the line with a roguish smile. The smile always guaranteed that he got a smile in return, along with a giggle and a fluttering of eyelashes.

Except for her. She just looked up at him with a frown on her face.

He cleared his throat, not quite sure what to do with a woman who didn’t melt under the heat of his gaze. After she’d stood there staring at him for several seconds, he finally decided the straightforward approach was the only one that would work on her. He stuck his hand out, and she took it and gave it a brief shake, after a moment’s hesitation. Her hand was warm and soft, and her touch sent a delicious thrill racing through him.

“I’m Finn. And you are?”

“I’m looking for Krystle,” she said. “Is she working tonight?”

She was a friend of Krystle’s? Aside from the fact that they were both lynxes, that seemed unlikely. Krystle was outgoing, foul-mouthed, and pretty damned kinky. This girl looked like a misplaced Sunday school teacher. She was wearing a big, blousy denim shirt that obscured her lush, curvy body, a calf-length denim skirt, sneakers, and no makeup.

“Where do you know her from?” he asked skeptically.

“We’re…old friends. It’s complicated.”

Interesting. The woman had avoided giving him her name and didn’t want to reveal her connection to Krystle. Either way, he wouldn’t have told her anything about Krystle or where she was. Trust was a rare commodity in the Badlands, earned only through time and familiarity.

“She’s away right now,” Finn said. Krystle sometimes worked as a Badlands guide, working with a team of security contractors who accompanied clients through the Badlands for various purposes, usually illegal. It was lucrative and incredibly dangerous. Finn did it too, on occasion.

At the disappointment in her gaze, he added, “She should be back by the weekend.” That was true. Krystle also worked security at the club, and she particularly liked weekends. That was when they had the most fights.