Gorya wandered over to the counter, pretending he wanted a coffee, but clearly what he really wanted to do was flirt. Timur stepped closer to her. At once his leopard settled, curling up contentedly and leaving him the hell alone. Even so, he could feel the leopard snarling, head up alertly. He might be content to be close to the woman he dubbed the leopard whisperer, but his cat didn’t like her near his cousin.
“Baby, who is this woman you’ve hired? You know this is dangerous, not only to us, but to what we do,” Fyodor whispered to Evangeline. “You said nothing about this woman to me, or to Timur. He’s responsible for our lives. Can you imagine how he would feel if he failed in his job and you were killed? Or I was? Evangeline, you know better than this.”
Timur nearly fell down he was so shocked. It was all he could do to keep his mouth from dropping open. Fyodor had never once indicated to him that he knew his personal security was a nightmare for Timur, especially since the attempt on his life as well as Evangeline’s. His brother never reprimanded Evangeline, let alone in public.
He glanced up and met Ashe’s eyes. The impact was just like a bullet through his heart. That intense. That visceral. She’d heard, and Fyodor and Evangeline were clear across the room, huddled together in a little corner while Ashe was behind the counter. Her hearing was more than excellent. She looked away first, ducking her head and concentrating on making Gorya’s drink.
“I’m sorry, Fyodor,” Evangeline whispered. “I really, really need the help, and none of the men you had working for me worked out. They drop things. They ruin the machines. Do you have any idea how much those cost?”
“Baby.” There was a sigh in Fyodor’s voice. “We can afford a new coffee machine. We can’t afford a new you.”
“She isn’t a threat to me. Or to you. Please, honey, just let this one go.”
Something in Evangeline’s voice alerted him. Timur moved closer to the counter. Evangeline knew Ashe. There was some connection between them. He watched as Ashe handed Gorya his coffee and took his money. Her hands appeared steady enough, but they were trembling. Just slightly, but they were trembling all the same.
Timur didn’t like puzzles, especially when it came to Fyodor’s safety. Gorya signaled to him. His cousin had been raised as a sibling with him, and they had continued to be close as adults, although if he kept flirting with Ashe, that closeness might end. Timur was a little shocked that the thought went through his head.
He joined Gorya at the table his cousin chose. It was always the same one. It was small, a table for two, and it was positioned so that Gorya had his back protected and yet could see the front door and the sidewalks through the window, and still keep the counter in sight. Rather than take the chair opposite him that would put his back to the wall, Timur toed one around and sat straddling it, facing the door as well.
“She’s scared,” Gorya mouthed around his coffee cup. “My leopard went quiet, just the way it does when Evangeline is close.”
“Maybe it’s Evangeline,” Timur pointed out, but he knew it wasn’t. He knew it was Ashe. His leopard was practically purring.
“She has to be leopard.”
Timur had to agree with that, and if they were both suspicious, that meant she was close to the emerging—a time when the female leopard’s cycle and the woman’s cycle synchronized together. “Where’s she from?”
Gorya shrugged. “I asked, but she didn’t answer. She didn’t answer any of my questions.”
The bakery was beginning to fill up. Fyodor slipped behind the counter to the back room he used as his office. Gorya went with him. They took turns, one up front, one in the back. Two more patrolled the alley behind the bakery, and two were on the front walkway. One was on the roof above the shop and another was across the street on the roof.
Timur watched Evangeline and Ashe work together. They were fast and efficient. They moved in sync as if they’d been doing so for years. They laughed occasionally, and when they did, Ashe’s laughter seemed to move through his body, teasing every one of his senses. Again, that was so unusual that he didn’t trust it.
His cat hated everyone. The leopard had been raised in violence, just as he’d been. His father had lived to control the world around him. He’d done so through fear. He’d liked everyone to be afraid of him. He’d needed that. Timur and Gorya, a few years younger than Fyodor, had been afraid. They hadn’t dared befriend anyone because their father would have been very likely to force them to kill that person. It wouldn’t have mattered if it had been a child, a woman or a man responsible for providing for his family, Timur’s father would have laughed when he forced them to kill.