Beau LaRue had met only one other man as dangerous as this in his lifetime. By coincidence it had also been at night in the bayou. Power and danger clung to Gregori like a second skin. His unusual pale eyes were mesmerizing, his voice hypnotic. Beau smiled. He had spent most of his life in these waters, had encountered everything from alligators to smugglers. Life was always good in the bayou, unpredictable and exhilarating.
“You picked an interesting night for your tour,” he said happily. The actual storm had passed, but the mood of the water was dangerous tonight. On the banks around them, the alligators, usually so calm and quiet, sunning them selves in the light of day, were bellowing in challenge or sliding silently into the waters to hunt prey.
Gregori’s white teeth flashed in answer. He was part of the night, the creatures known to him, the restless, untamed land matching his hungry soul. Beau watched him, observing the utter stillness marking the dangerous predator, the merciless eyes moving constantly, missing nothing. The powerful, well-muscled body was deceptively relaxed but ready for anything. The face, harshly sensual, beautifully cruel, was etched with hardship and knowledge, risk and peril. Gregori stayed in the shadows, but the silver menace of his gaze glowed with a strange iridescent light in the dark of the night Beau took the opportunity to study Savannah. She was everything up close that she had been on the stage, even more. Ethereal, mysterious, sexy. The very stuff of men’s fantasies. Her face was flawless, lit up with joy, her eyes clear, like beautiful blue star sapphires. Her laughter was musical and infectious. She was small and innocent beside the predator in his boat. She would touch Gregori’s arm, point to something on the embankment, her body brushing his lightly, and each time it happened, those pale eyes would warm to molten mercury and caress her face intimately, hungrily.
Beau began to answer her questions, explaining all about his youth, his father trapping for food and fur, how he and his brother collected moss from the trees for his mother and sisters to dry and stuff in their mattresses. He found himself telling her all kinds of childhood memories, things he didn’t know he’d even remembered. She hung on his every word, making him feel as though he was the only man on the planet—until Gregori stirred, a mere suggestion of rippling muscle but enough to remind Beau that she was well protected.
He took them to all his favorite spots, to the most beautiful, exotic places he knew. Gregori asked questions then, about herbs and natural healing arts on the bayou.
Beau found the voice impossible to resist, like velvet, a black-magic power he could listen to forever.
“I heard a few men in a restaurant talking about a bayou legend,” Savannah said suddenly. She leaned on the side of the boat, presenting him with an intriguing view of her tight jeans. They clung lovingly to every curve.
Gregori moved, a flowing of his body, gliding silently, and his large frame was blanketing Savannah’s, blocking out the captain’s enticing view. Gregori leaned into her, his arms coming down on either side of the railing to imprison her against him. You are doing it again.His words brushed softly in her mind even as his warm breath teased the tendrils of hair at her neck.
Savannah leaned back into him, fitting her bottom into the cradle of his hips. She was happy, free of the oppressive weight of the hunt, of death and violence. There were only the two of them.
Three,he reminded her, his teeth scraping her sensitive pulse. He could feel the answering surge of her blood, the molten lava spreading in his.
My mother thinks my father is a cave man. I’m beginning to think you could give him a run for his money.
Disrespectful little thing.
“Which legend? There are so many,” Beau said.
“About an old alligator that lies in wait to eat hunting dogs and little children,” Savannah said.
Gregori tugged at her long braid so that she tilted her head back. His mouth brushed the line of her throat. I could be a hungry alligator,he offered softly.
“The old man,” Beau said. “Everybody loves that story. It’s been handed down for a hundred years or more, and the critter grows with each telling.” He paused for a moment, maneuvering his craft along a snag in the canal. Cypress trees bent low, looking like macabre stick figures dressed in long strands of hanging moss. Occasionally splashes could be heard as a snake plopped into the water.
“It’s said that old man alligator has lived forever. He’s huge now, growing fat with his kills and more wily and cunning than anything else in the bayou. He claims his territory, and the other gators give him wide berth. They say he kills any alligator stupid enough to wander into his territory, young or old alike, male or female. Trappers have disappeared in that area from time to time and old man alligator gets the blame.”
Beau allowed the boat to stop, so that they bobbed gently in the water. “It’s funny you should ask about that particular tale. The man who gave me the tickets for your concert was very interested in that alligator. We used to come out here at night together, gathering herbs and bark, and we poked around looking for the monster. We never did find it, though.”
“Who gave you tickets to Savannah’s show?” Gregori asked softly, already knowing the answer.
“A man named Selvaggio, Julian Selvaggio. His family has been in New Orleans almost from the first founding. I met him years ago. We’re good friends”—he grinned engagingly—”despite the fact that he’s Italian.”
Gregori’s eyebrows shot up. Julian was born and raised in the Carpathian Mountains. He was no more Italian than Gregori was French. Julian had spent considerable time in Italy, just as Gregori had in France, but both were Carpathian through and through.
“I know Julian,” Gregori volunteered, his white teeth gleaming in the darkness. Water lapped at the boat, making a peculiar slapping sound. The rocking was more soothing and peaceful than disturbing.
Beau looked smug. “I thought you might You both have a connection to Savannah, you both ask the same questions about natural medicine, and you both look as intimidating as hell.”
“I am nicer than he is,” Gregori said, straight-faced.
Savannah’s head brushed his chest Her laughter was sweet music in the stifling heat of the swamp. “So you never found the alligator. Is it true he eats large dogs?”
“Well, the fact is, a great number of hounds have been lost in the bayou along a particular trail. It’s in the old man’s supposed territory. A couple of hunters say they saw him lying in wait to bushwhack the dogs. They couldn’t nail him, though. No one can. He’s been around so long, he knows all the ways of the bayou. One small warning and he’s gone.” The captain rubbed his forehead as if it was pounding.
“You are talking as if you believe he is real,” Gregori pointed out gently. “Yet you say you and Julian did not find him. Julian is a hunter without equal. If there was such a creature, he would find it.” He was reading the captain’s mind, baiting him. Beside him, Savannah stirred as if to contradict his statement, but Gregori silenced her with an upraised palm.
“Julian knew he was there. He felt him.”
“But you saw him.” Gregori pushed the man a little harder, suddenly interested in this beast that could survive when so many others had not.
Beau glanced around the canal, uncomfortable in the dark of night. He was superstitious, and he had seen things, unexplainable things, and he didn’t like to speak of them without light of the sun. “Maybe. Maybe I have seen the old man,” he admitted, his voice low. “But out here, if you admit such a thing, the newcomers think you’re loco.”
“Tell us about it,” Gregori urged, his voice velvet, mesmerizing, impossible to resist.