“Leading a pod is different from being a casino pit boss.”
“I’m not saying I know everything there is to know about being a sovereign bull, but I know people. I know how to read them. I can tell when they’re lying and when they’re telling the truth. It’s a gift. If you need help finding the person who set the traps, I don’t mind helping.” She shrugged.
“For how long?”
Jacques locked eyes with her, daring her to turn away.
Angel held his gaze defiantly before looking away with a smirk.
“You sure do get intense when you’re stressed, Cajun.”
Jacques placed a hand on her inner calf closet to his thigh. Angel jumped at the contact. Lord but she was warm. Her heat radiated from the material of her jeans.
Jacques stood and dragged his hand up her leg. The closer he got to the apex of her jeans, the more pronounced Angel’s breathing became. She squirmed a bit as she placed her hands on the table, gripping the edge. She was so sensitive and responsive to his touch that he couldn’t tell who was being seduced. He thought it was her, but it seemed the tables were turning. He was just as turned on as he could tell she was— another by-product of being mated.
“You don’t play fair, Jacques.” Angel was staring up at him now that he was fully standing. Her cheeks were spotted red, giving her a flushed look.
“This isn’t a game,
cher
.”
At that moment her thighs snapped shut, trapping his fingers less than an inch from her core.
“I know it’s not. I just don’t want the pressure of feeling like the bad guy for wanting to go back home.”
“
If
you decided to return to Vegas after Bayou, I won’t stop you. You’re my mate, but first and foremost, you’re a woman who had a life before I found you. I understand that. I won’t mate with you against your will, and I don’t want you to feel obligated to stay. Is that clear,
cher
?”
Angel nodded her understanding.
Jacques squeezed her inner thigh. After a brief pause, her thighs relaxed, allowing him to continue his ascent to paradise. He lowered his head a bit, bringing them closer together.
“I’m not going to make it easy for you to leave me,
cher
.”
His lips were now only inches from hers, and his hand had finally reached its goal.
“I didn’t think you would.”
Jacques’s lips connected with hers with an intensity that clearly shocked them both. Her lips gave way immediately, allowing his tongue to enter the warm recesses of her mouth. She tasted sweet and spicy at the same time. She tangled her fingers in his hair, pulling him even closer. Jacques pressed the pad of his palm insistently against her clit before moving in circles. Angel tore her lips from his. Their breathing was ragged in the spacious confines of the office. She rotated her hips and groaned as he rotated in the opposite direction. He kissed her luscious lips, which darkened to a deep pink under the onslaught of their kisses. God she was gorgeous. At this angle he could see a smattering of freckles on her nose. She was such a contradiction, so exotic and all his. He kissed her once more before traveling down her neck.
“Ohhhh yes,” she purred, one of her legs between his. Her hand wandered to the bulge prominently featured in his pants. She gripped and stroked him through his jeans and he growled. He wanted to be inside of her. Had to be inside of her. It was torture, plain and simple. He decided to give them what they both wanted.
Jacques stopped kissing her. Untangling her fingers, he pulled them in front of him to stay their sensual exploration. He noticed the skin had partially changed on the backs of her hands. Angel was going into a shift and probably hadn’t even noticed.
“What?” Angel asked breathlessly as she searched his face with that probing stare he’d come to expect.
He was also having trouble catching his breath. His gator was ready to stake its claim, but Jacques didn’t want their first time to be on a riverboat under construction. She deserved better than that. He also needed to find a way for her to control her beast. The only way for them to solidly mate was in shifter form. Any mating done as a shifter would be binding. His beast didn’t mind forcing his hand, but Jacques didn’t want her like that. She would have to make a conscious decision to mate with him.
“Not here,
cher
. They’re too many prying eyes. Everyone on this boat’s a shifter. I don’t have to remind you how good our hearing is.”
A spark of understanding lit up her face, and she looked away bashfully.
“Lord, you must think I’m…”
“Sexy…passionate…” He grasped her chin and made her look at him.
“I was thinking hard up.” She chuckled.
“
Cher
, I guarantee, between the two of us, you’re not the one hard up.”
He guided her hand to his swollen crotch. Her eyes grew round and then squinted in mirth.
“I guess you’re right.” Angel stroked him. He answered with an involuntary hiss of pleasure.
“Careful there,
cher
.” Jacques mouth was dry as his hips moved of their own volition.
“A gator can only be pushed so far.”
“Really, and then what happens?”
Jacques was about to tell her but Chloe walked in chatting on her phone. Angel attempted to move away from him, but he caught her by the waist and gave her a short yet firm kiss. Chloe picked up some papers off the conference table in the middle of the room. She looked at them both, shook her head, and winked at them before leaving.
When she was gone, Angel hit him playfully on the shoulder.
“You did that on purpose,” she said sulkily.
“I don’t sneak around with my mate,
ever.
It’s best that you know that right now.”
“I’m not asking you to sneak around. I just like…discretion, that’s all.”
The color was back in her cheeks.
Jacques kissed her once more before turning her away from him and nudging her from behind his desk.
“Go and tell the crew to finish what they’re doing and knock off for the next two weeks. We’ll pay them for the entire time.”
Angel playfully saluted him with two fingers. “Aye, aye captain!” she teased before exiting the room. He watched the sway of her hips and the way her jeans creased under each butt cheek as she moved. He had to have her. Tonight, in his home, in his bed, he’d finally make love to her, and he wouldn’t stop until she begged him to.
“Ummm, okay let me try it,
ahn-doo-wee
. Spelled A-N-D-O-U-I-L-L-E.”
Angel cautiously pronounced the word for the spicy sausage used in many Cajun and Creole recipes. It sounded funny to her ears, but the taste was delicious. Jacques spoon fed her the last bit of gumbo as they sat on the tan leather couch in his living room. Their legs and feet were propped up on the matching footrest, allowing them to semi-recline.
After everyone left the
Bayou Moon
, Jacques took them back home to pack. A few hours later, they were on their way to his home.
“Good job, I’ll make you into a Cajun in no time.”
“Something tells me I’ll get as big as a house if I allow you to
make
me into a
Cajun
. Thanks but no thanks. My hips and thighs couldn’t take it.”
“Toothpicks are for hors d'oeuvres, do I look like the type of guy who likes tiny meals? Oh, nooo,
cher
. I like all of your curves just the way they are.”
As if to prove it, Jacques leaned in and gave her a long, lingering kiss that had her clinging to his wide shoulders. The skin on her lower back, which had already been tingling, began to tighten and she groaned.
No, no, no!!! Not now,
she pleaded as her beast threatened to show. She’d been fine in New Orleans, but once outside the city, a switch flipped and all she wanted to do was get into the water, hunt, eat, mate, and sleep. Not necessarily in that order, either. Her gator, or did she call it a cow…nope, she hated being called a cow. Her gator was literally itching to get out, and she wasn’t sure how much longer she could last.
“Come on, let’s go have some fun.”
Jacques kissed her firmly once more before moving the footrest and getting to his feet. He offered his hand to her. The contact was reassuring and her gator quieted. She had to admit, the thought of “having fun” with Jacques had been on her mind most of the day, especially since their little make out session in his office. Despite her name, Angel was no innocent. She was more than attracted to Jacques. Mate or no mate, he was a smart, handsome, financially stable man. That kind of combo could entice a nun.
She thought she could keep things less personal, more businesslike. After all, she’d be going back to Vegas in two months. The last thing she needed was to get emotionally involved. Yet here she was, day-by-day, being reeled in. All she wanted was one taste of him and then she’d be satisfied. It was pure textbook psychology. Why did people keep gambling at her casino despite the odds and the fact that they sometimes lost staggering sums at the turn of a dime? They did it because people inherently wanted what they couldn’t or didn’t have. That euphoria that was just beyond their reach. The machine always chimed for the person seated next to them. Surely they’d be next. For some it was the win, for some, the money. For her, it was sex with one of the hottest men she’d laid eyes on. His rugged good looks, wide shoulders, and intense stare were arousing, and she wanted to sample what it’d be like to have all of that male intensity focused on her, over her, in her. She’d tried to put him out of her reach, but her libido kept closing the distance. She was through trying. She’d decided if he was her mate, then she might as well take advantage of the title, if only for a little while.
Jacques led her through his home, which was remarkably well decorated for a bachelor. From the outside it looked like a huge cabin with multiple levels. They’d driven nearly three miles into the woods before the home had even come into view. The front was spacious and well landscaped; she could see walking trails and a pond on one side and behind it was a huge lake. If the outside was impressive, the inside was gorgeous. Wood-beamed high ceilings were the focal point of the living room, which had large, high windowpanes like a cathedral. Jacques led her out onto the huge balcony, which spanned the entire length of the backside of the house.
There was plenty of room to sit and watch the sun rise and set. It even had a fire pit in the center and a Jacuzzi big enough to seat ten people. Comfortable seating was scattered all around, yet he passed all of it by and went down two flights of stairs before turning and going to a door beneath the house.
“I thought we were going to your room.”
Jacques looked confused for a moment before smirking. He pulled her forward into his arms and kissed her. Angel’s arms circled his neck and she returned the kiss with abandon. She barely noticed Jacques backing her through the doorway. The sound of rushing water had her pulling away.
She looked in surprised delight at the huge underground aquarium in front of her. It was like a cave but one made by man. There was a large rectangular pool with lights underneath so she could see the bottom. Lily pads floated around the edges and in different spots within the pool, giving it a natural feel. It was like being outside, but it was clearly surrounded on all four sides by wooden log-like walls and a wooden floor. It reminded her of a massive sauna.
“Welcome to the grotto,
cher
.”
One moment Angel was standing and looking at the place in awe, the next she was on the floor looking up at Jacques. She felt dizzy, almost like she’d gotten in the backseat of a car that was pulling off fast.
Fuck!
She’d shifted without warning again. She decided to sit back and let the thing take her where it wanted to go, much like being in a submarine.
“Oh, no you don’t. It’s time you learned to control your animal,” Jacques spoke while squatting next to her.
She could feel her gator rebel by snapping at him and hissing. Jacques smoothly placed his hands over her upper and lower jaw and looked directly into her eyes as her gator tried to break the hold. Try as she might, her jaw was locked shut and she was forced to look at him. His eyes changed as his gator peered back at her.
“The only way to control your gator is to be one with it. Don’t let it run the show. Right now I can feel you’re disconnected from it. I want you to meld with it, and then I want you to change back.”
Without the ability to speak, Angel spoke in her mind.
“Exactly how do I meld with it?”
“Feel what your gator feels; open up your mind and senses. Focus on how the floor feels beneath your claws, how your tail feels, or how long your jaw is. You’ll know when you’ve done it. It’ll feel as if I’m holding your mouth and not the gator. Go on, try it.”
“Okay, here goes…”
Angel started concentrating on the floor first. After a few minutes, she could feel her gator’s paw on the cool tiles and then her belly. She seemed to mentally and physically spread out and relax.
“Good girl, that’s it. Now, you should be one with your gator. I want you to move your tail.”
“Men! You guys always want to see a female’s rear end. Somethings never change,”
Angel joked.
“Get used to it,
cher
. Whether I’m in human or gator form, I’m an ass man.”
“Hummff!”
Angel focused on moving her tail and felt the massive muscles constrict and move from side to side. It felt good. She giggled and kept going, moving her body with each sideways motion. Jacques released her mouth and let her wiggle around.
“Hey! This is fun, come on, let’s go! I want to go swimming.”
Jacques stood and started taking his clothes off. Angel calmed down and stared in appreciation as he stripped to his skin. His body was magnificent. Chest solidly muscled without being bulky. There was the beautiful tribal tattoo of a gator coming over his shoulder that made him look sexy as hell. A light crop of hair trailed down his abs to his crotch, where his cock protruded proudly from a thatch of dusky hair. Angel’s mouth went dry.