Bayon/Jean-Baptiste (Bayou Heat) by Alexandra Ivy, Laura Wright Page A

.”
    Undeterred, Raphael continued as though he hadn’t heard anything at all. “Just don’t know how it started. Or when. Few weeks ago? A month?” His eyes locked with Jean-Baptiste. “Considering how many tats and holes you have in that body of yours I’d say you’ve been trying to push down the fact that you have no control over your cat for some time now.”
    The words sank so deep Jean-Baptiste didn’t have time to suppress his animal’s reaction. With a terrifying growl, he grabbed the male’s shoulders and rushed him like a linebacker. “Who the fuck told you?” he snarled, saliva forming in his mouth as Raphael’s back hit the trunk of the cypress.
    “Perks of being a Suit,” Raphael said through gritted teeth, his green eyes flashing gold fire. “I have connections outside the Wildlands. That piercing there,” he jerked his chin forward, “through your eyebrow—the one coated in malachite—well, it was done by the brother of one of my spies’ girlfriends.”
    Baptiste’s eyebrow twitched. So did his lower lip—the one with the twin silver rings through it. He’d been betrayed. By a foolish, foolish soon-to-be dead human male. He forced a dark laugh. The sound was hollow. “Proves nothing.”
    “I don’t think so,” Raphael said. “Malachite is inside every tattoo and piercing you have.”
    He was going to cut the tongue out of that human before he killed him. “I like the mineral, that’s all,” he said. “It helps me to heal faster.”
    Raphael sniffed, his expression glib. “I’m sure it does. But it’s also the very mineral that’s purported to ground a cat inside the body. The elders use it as punishment to cage a wild puma.” Raphael’s gaze narrowed. “And I hear the Nurturer shrinks also use it on patients who can’t control their mind or their feline.”
    Dead, fetid air sat inside Jean-Baptiste’s lungs as he gripped the male’s shoulders. Every inch of his skin had gone tight around the muscles and bones, and his canines and claws were starting to emerge. The desperate need to kill this male, end his questioning, his accusations, his impossible truth, was almost unbearable. So he did the only thing he could do.
    He released Raphael and walked away.
    “Any other time and I’d be all about helping your ass,” Raphael called at his back. “But today my one and only concern is my mate.”
    Stopping at the window, Jean-Baptiste stared through the glass at that mate. Ashe . She was completely still, lying in the bed, and she looked as pale as a frog’s belly.
    “Go to that voodoun you visit,” Raphael called to him. “The one who recommended the malachite and every tattoo that’s on your body, and bring her here.”
    Fucking loose-tongued human better enjoy his last few days of breathing . Baptiste didn’t turn around. “Impossible.”
    “Make it possible.”
    “She won’t come. She’s terrified of the magic of the Wildlands.”
    “You’ll make her come. Because if you don’t, the Pantera—starting with the elders—will know your secret.”
    “Blackmail,” Baptiste uttered coldly. He glanced over his shoulder at the Suit. “You’ve fallen pretty damn far down the well, Raphael.”
    The male’s eyes blazed gold fire. “I’d fall on a fucking blade for my Ashe and our cub.”
    Jean-Baptiste stared at him, let the words and their weight sink in as the sun sank into the calm waters of the bayou beyond. The air around them crackled with tension and heat. They couldn’t remain here, speaking like this for much longer. Soon the Pantera would be out, their cats playing after sharing meals with their families or Factions.
    “Why do you need the voodoun?” Jean-Baptiste asked. “You have the human doctor. Or was the attack more serious than Bayon let on?”
    If it was possible, Raphael’s skin pulled even tighter over his bones, and his eyes grew dark with fear and rage. “Ashe was injected with something. She’s not conscious, and she’s