Drive Me Wild (20 page)

“Great, you’re a frickin’ comedian,” Anisia said, still refusing to move out of Tess’s path. “Notice how hard I’m not laughing. I’m twenty-seven years old. I’ve been sexually active since I was eighteen. In that time, I’ve had relationships with four different Felines and never taken a single precaution. I mean, why would I bother? My mom started trying to get pregnant when she was twenty-four and didn’t have me till she was almost forty. It just doesn’t happen for us without a damned long concerted effort. Until you showed up.”

“Look, I know you must be—”

“Shut up. I’m telling you, you’re the only thing that’s changed here. Before you, there was nothing in this world safer than sex with a spotted Feline. Now? One lousy week of
you
and suddenly I’m about to be a frickin’ mommy! Do you have any idea what that means?”

“I’m not—”

“Shut up. I had plans, you know. I have a good job with an ad agency in Midtown. I’ve been busting my ass for them for nearly four years, and I’m finally—
finally—
on the fast track to the promotion I deserved two years ago. I have plans, damn it, and they don’t involve taking six weeks of maternity leave while some young, white, male asshole from Yale swoops in on an internship and steals
my
accounts!”

“What do you think—”

“I said,
shut. Up.
Don’t go telling me that I should just get rid of it. That’s bullshit. This is a
baby.
It’s
my baby,
not to mention one of the first spotted Felines conceived this year. This is the future of my goddamned race we’re talking about, and I am damned well going to keep it and raise it and love it like a mother ought to do. But you need to understand that this was Not. In. My.
Plan!
”

Anisia punctuated each statement with an increase in volume until Tess found herself stepping backward simply to preserve her ability to hear.

“Lady, you have got to get a grip on yourself.” Tess retreated an extra step for good measure and eyed the other woman warily. “I sympathize with what you’re telling me, really I do, but I think you need to stop for a minute and take a good look at the situation.”

“Oh, I’ve looked plenty—”

Tess snapped and gave a pretty respectable growl of her own. “No, now it’s your turn to shut up. I’m sorry if you think you’re stuck with an unplanned pregnancy and all the consequences that go along with it, you but need to stop blaming it on me and maybe think about the fact that anyone who has unprotected sex with a fertile member of the opposite sex should maybe think about the repercussions, no matter how unlikely they might be.”

“I told—”

“Zip it! You also apparently have a lot to learn about your own culture, sweet cheeks, because the legend
I
heard says that a spotted Feline has to remain faithful to his human mate for a year and a day before everyone can get on with the baby making. Since none of you Others appears to be able to work out the technical aspects of a
calendar,
allow me to point out that far from three-hundred-sixty-odd days so far, it has been exactly
nine.
Now, why don’t you go share that with your little friends and pass on the message that I said you can all start leaving me the hell alone?
Capice?
”

Sucking in a deep breath, Tess released it with a strangled groan and set off for her apartment as fast as her injured leg would carry her.

For the first block and a half, she paid more attention to listening for anyone approaching behind her than she did to the route home, which she knew like the back of her hand. She honestly wasn’t sure whether the irritated and irritating Ms. Cuma would actually take her at her word and go back to wherever she’d come from, and she really didn’t think she could take any more surprises tonight.

Come to think of it, she didn’t think she could take much more of anything tonight.

By the time she turned the corner onto her own block, Tess felt ready to curl up in a little ball and whimper like an abandoned kitten. Her thigh ached so badly she knew the bruise she would find there must go all the way to the bone, and her back and shoulder felt like someone had beaten them with a lead pipe. Appropriately enough. All she wanted was a hot bath, a cold compress, and an entire bottle of extra-strength Advil. Not necessarily in that order.

Hell, she’d take them in any order she could get them.

Her left hand fumbled in her pocket for her key ring, a task made doubly awkward by the facts that she kept her keys in her right pocket and that her right shoulder screamed like a banshee every time she so much as jostled that arm. After three painful attempts, she finally managed to pinch the fob between two fingers and palm the keys. She was trying to fit the key to the outer door lock when a large, masculine hand covered hers and squeezed.

This time, Tess didn’t scream. She whimpered.

“What is the matter,
gatita
?”

Rafe’s voice held only mild concern as he stepped up behind her, taking away the keys and opening the door himself. He ushered her into the building and the bright lights of the lobby area. When he caught a glimpse of her face, he cursed like a stevedore.

“What in the name of God happened to you?” he demanded in a roar loud enough to wake every occupant of the building.

The building across the street, that is.

Tess flinched. She’d had enough of being yelled at for the evening, thank you very much. Ignoring her irate lover, she limped over to the elevator and pressed the button with her left hand.

“Tessa,” Rafe snarled, reaching out with the intent of turning her to face him. He didn’t abandon the plan when she cried out, but he did hiss something in Spanish that she decided it was just as well she couldn’t translate.

“Tessa,” he repeated, his voice hard and deep and menacing. “Don’t ignore me. Tell me what happened to you.
Now.
”

Tess shot him a glare and stepped out of the elevator as soon as it stopped on her floor. He followed so close behind her that she thought they might have stepped into her apartment at the exact same time, laws of physics be damned.

“I got mugged,” she said resentfully, her left hand fumbling with the buttons on her coat. “Some guy came up behind me as I was walking home from the subway and took a couple of swings at me. I got a flash that something was about to happen right before it did, so I managed to duck the worst of the initial blow, otherwise I’d have been knocked unconscious.”

Or worse.

Rafe looked grimmer than any reaper could hope for. He brushed her hands away and eased her coat off himself, his sharp eyes noting the way she winced whenever she had to shift her right arm or shoulder. He didn’t stop with the coat, though, just shifted his hands to the buttons on her shirt and began flicking those open as well. Fatigue began to settle on Tess, taking away her ability to protest. She simply stood there and let him undress her in the middle of her living room.

“What did he look like?”

Tess shook her head. “I didn’t get a good look. He came up behind me, like I said, and he was wearing a jacket with a hood pulled all the way up. Plus, it looked like he had a bandanna wrapped around his face, like some kind of gangster. That’s probably what he was, some gang member looking for money or street cred or something. He only got in two hits before someone saw and scared him off.”

Rafe dropped her blouse on the floor and unsnapped her bra, easing it down her arms before tossing it aside. Gently he turned her to the side so he could assess the damage to her back and shoulder. He said nothing, but Tess could feel the rage billowing off him like clouds of steam. He hadn’t been this angry when he caught her tailing him. Not even close.

He trailed his fingertips over her shoulder in a feather-light caress. It still made her hiss in discomfort.

“You said two hits.” His voice sounded strangely flat, but it didn’t take a genius to realize that he’d grasped the reins of his temper in an iron grip. “Where else did he strike you?”

Tess ventured a quick glance at his face and knew that now was not the time to assert her independence.

“On my leg,” she admitted. “My left thigh.”

He said nothing, simply sank down to kneel at her feet and reached for the fastening of her jeans. He had them open and sliding down her hips in the space of a few heartbeats, taking her panties with them. He grasped each ankle in turn and helped her step out of the pooled fabric. Them he lifted his eyes to her left thigh and surveyed the damage.

Unlike the blow to her back, this time Tess could see the marks left by her attacker. A thick, black bruise ringed by an angry red halo had already begun to form against her pale skin. About two inches wide and eight inches long, the contusion angled down from her hip and across the front of her leg, pointing vaguely toward the opposite knee. It looked nasty and painful and Tess knew it would hurt even more over the next few hours.

Rafe’s fingertips traced the discoloration as lightly as a breath, and Tess could see the muscles in the side of his jaw jumping as he struggled to maintain his composure. Somehow, knowing that he felt such anger on her behalf made her own anger at her unknown assailant lessen. He had taken the burden on himself.

Tess lifted her left hand to brush over his silky dark hair. “I know it looks terrible, and I can’t say it doesn’t hurt like a sonuvabitch, but it’s not serious, Rafe. Nothing is broken, and the bruising will fade in a couple of weeks. I’ll be fine.”

He said nothing for a long moment, just stared at her injury and soothed it with barely there caresses. Tess watched his golden eyes glow intently with emotion and wanted suddenly to wrap her arms around him, to be the one to offer
him
comfort.

“I should have been there,” he finally rumbled, his voice hoarse and thick with gravel. “I should have been there to protect you. No one should be allowed to harm you,
gatita.
I would kill any man who tried.”

She opened her mouth to respond, a thoughtless platitude or a flippant remark ever on the tip of her tongue, but something stopped her. Maybe it was the fierce tenderness that turned his gaze into molten gold, or maybe it was the fist of something powerful and frightening that tightened around her own heart. Either way, Tess found herself at a loss for words.

She gazed down into those beautiful old-gold eyes and suffered another clench of that fist. It was getting harder and harder to pretend that what she felt every time she looked at him wasn’t deep, irrevocable love.

Just the thought made her tremble, and Rafe interpreted the movement as cold or shock or pain, because he stood and swept her carefully into his arms, cradling her against him warmth like a precious treasure.

“You’re safe now,” he murmured. “No one will ever harm you again,
gatita.
I will not allow it. I will take care of you. I will keep you safe. I promise.”

It would be so easy to let herself believe that those intensely spoken words of possession and protection meant Rafe loved her, Tess realized. If she allowed herself, she could move forward happily believing that this ultimate tomcat loved her enough to put aside all other women and be hers alone for the rest of their lives.

God, how she would love to believe that was true.

The way her heart jumped at the thought told Tess how far she had already fallen. She’d be lucky if she ever saw the surface again. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t maintain her dignity. She didn’t have to act like an idiot just because she’d fallen head over heels in love with a man who redefined the notion that “men just aren’t monogamous animals.” She could at least try to maintain a semblance of dignity. And she could begin by putting her foot down when the feel of his arms around her began to make her knees go as weak as water.

“Rafe, I said I’d be fine, and I meant it,” she said, pushing at his shoulders in an attempt to separate them by at least the width of a sheet of paper. “All I need is a hot bath and some of my arnica-and-comfrey liniment. That will help with both the pain and the bruising and will even get some of the swelling down. I keep a jar of it in the bathroom. Just let me go get it and get the bath running, and I’ll be fine. You’ll see.”

He shook his head and thwarted her attempts to get him to release her. Instead, he adjusted his grip and scooped her up in his arms like a swooning damsel in distress.

“I will run your bath,” he informed her, carrying her toward the bathroom, his face set in an expression of stalwart determination. “And I will apply your salve. I might not have been there to protect you earlier,
gatita,
but at least I can be here to care for you now.”

“Rafe, really. That’s not necessary. I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself.”

“I never said otherwise, though I would like to point out that the wound on your back would require the flexibility of a contortionist for you to be able to tend it on your own. I know you can take care of yourself, but tonight I would very much like if you would allow
me
to take care of you.”

Tess saw the sincerity and tenderness in his eyes and felt her heart melt a little more. How was she supposed to resist this man?

Why would she want to?

“Well,” she said, her strength waning, “I suppose you could help me with the salve, at least. I mean, if you really want to.”

“I want to,” he confirmed, setting her down on the fluffy rug beside the bath and squeezing her arms gently. “Believe me when I tell you,
gatita,
that caring for you will be entirely my pleasure.”

Eighteen

Rafe’s pleasure apparently also involved licking every square inch of her body with that rough sandpaper-velvet tongue.

Not that he mentioned that until later. Much later. First he let her soak in the tub for what seemed like forever, the gently steaming water loosening her abused muscles and soothing the sting of the deep, violent bruises. When she felt nearly as relaxed as warm molasses, he picked up a washcloth and a bar of her lemon balm soap and began to wash her with all the gentle patience of a mama cat caring for her kittens. Finally, after he’d rinsed her clean, he bundled her up in a nest of warm towels and carried her into the shadowy recesses of her bedroom.