called trust, Sevastyan.” He answered his cousin absently, his mind already working the problem that he’d created by insisting he carry out his promise to her father. The man deserved to die with honor. He’d made certain there’d been as little pain as possible to the leopard when he’d delivered the killing bite. He wasn’t sorry he’d done what he believed to be right. He was upset that he hadn’t prepared Ania better for the outcome.
“Mitya.” Sevastyan stood in front of him. “For once in your life, listen to what I have to say. Trust is something that is gained over time. Not because you take her to bed. She’s been living with a dark secret for a long time. She’s angry and hurt and scared. This thing has now escalated way out of control.”
Mitya shoved both hands through his hair again, making it wild and as out of control as he felt. He had his own blood on him. He had her blood on him. He had the blood of Antosha’s leopard on him as well as Dymka’s. He was a mess, and yet he couldn’t move.
“What I did was right.”
Sevastyan threw his hands into the air in surrender. “Yes, Mitya, what you did was the right thing. Absolutely. It was honorable. Sometimes, you can’t do the right thing. For her, maybe it would have been better to turn that particular job over to me.”
Mitya shook his head. “My father never chose the right way one single time. Not one, Sevastyan. I’m not ever going to be like him. We’ll choose honor every time.”
“At what cost? She’s not going to accept you.”
“That’s impossible. We’re a bonded pair. Dymka says Jewel is close. Just a little confused right now.”
“What are you going to do when Jewel begins to emerge and your woman refuses you? What then, Mitya?”
“It won’t happen.”
“It’s going to happen. You weren’t looking at her face, I was. She’s going to go the moment she thinks she can.”
Mitya was done talking about it because the fact was, Ania was his mate. He knew she wanted him, she had just stepped off their path for a moment, and rightfully so. It all made perfect sense to him. Sevastyan could say they weren’t compatible all he wanted, but he knew better. She just needed a little more time with him. Jewel had to have patience. A mating leopard would drive them beyond anything Ania could conceive. There was no way he was letting her out of his sight when she was so close to emerging.
“I’ve called for Drake to come. He and Joshua and a couple of others will be flying out immediately. The memorial service has to be planned as well. The number one problem, aside from my beautiful Ania, is what happened tonight at her home. She should have been protected at all times.” He couldn’t imagine what would have happened had he not been there.
His eyes met his cousin’s, and Sevastyan saw something there that made him wince. Mitya was a product of his father’s twisted, maniacal upbringing. The man had wanted to bring the killer out in his son’s leopard, teach him to rage and hate, to be cruel, so he would pass those traits on to his human counterpart. Lazar had managed to do that from the time Mitya was very young.
Mitya’s leopard was a straight-up killer, and what did that make the man? It was there in his eyes. He couldn’t altogether blame Ania for being leery of him. Or Jewel his leopard. Jewel even more than Ania had to be confused. She could read Dymka every time she rose, and she clearly read him correctly—and she feared him as much as she was enamored with him. At the moment that was what was driving Ania to leave him.
“Ania’s father should have been protected in his own home. He might have been able to last a few more days, or weeks, long enough to see me put a ring on his daughter’s finger, but instead, he had enemies come into his room and smash his things after bashing him with the butt of a gun. Tell me how that happened, Sevastyan.”
“Drake sent us the man from Borneo. Amory Binder worked for him there, worked for his crew rescuing kidnap victims or delivering ransom. I liked the kid. In fact, I worried a little about him. I called for a check when I realized we’d been infiltrated, and he was the only one not to