When a Liger Mates (A Lion's Pride #10) - Eve Langlais

Chapter One

Thick fingers adorned in chunky rings stroked the fur of the giant feline leashed by his side. Guillaume Champignon had certain hobbies. Collecting large and rare wild animals—and training them to obey him—was one of them.

“Are we on track for the hunt?” Guillaume asked of the woman standing in front of his desk, her hair cut blunt and streaked with gray.

Tracey held up a tablet and slid her finger across it, the light from the screen illuminating her face. “Everything is a go for tonight’s entertainment.”

“We have enough prey?” His fingers stilled on the large cat’s head. It had gone stiff. It made no sound, and yet he could have sworn the liger vibrated. It had better not be growling without permission. His kennel master had assured him the beast was quite tame.

“We have more than plenty, with two to spare.”

“Good.” Nothing worse than when a client finished the hunt unsatisfied because they didn’t bag anything.

“I don’t pay to leave empty handed,” one of Guillaume’s most generous guests had once exclaimed. Those paying for the privilege expected a trophy.

They also weren’t picky about what they shot. The accident on the last hunt had cost him a chunk of his profits to cover it up.

Somehow, a woman had wandered onto the secured property. Went gallivanting through the woods on a night the hunters were set loose. It was an easy mistake to make. The hunters all wore bright fluorescents, whereas the intruder appeared to be trespassing naked as the day she was born.

The bullet went through her stomach, and while she was alive when his wardens got to her, it was a deadly wound. A nearby river took care of the remains.

Which left only the client who shot her. Rewinding through the footage that tracked the hunter and prey, they could see who’d been in that sector just before the kill.

Bernard, a low-end client, claimed innocence. He tried to convince them he’d shot a lioness, except their tracking data showed no one near him. It cost Bernard a large sum to keep his mistake secret. And even after he paid, Guillaume had him taken out as an example to anyone else that thought to jeopardize his operation.

An oddity about the whole mess was they did come across a discarded tracking bracelet in the woods—for a lioness as a matter of fact, a feline who’d disappeared without a trace.

“I hear we have a few lionesses this time,” Guillaume mused aloud. Quite a few, considering they mostly managed to capture bears and wolves.

“Three, all brought in last night.”

“Did another illegal zoo get raided?” Animals for the hunt weren’t easy to come by. Either they poached them illegally or purchased them from a collector thinning their herd.

“Private owner. Claimed he was remodeling and needed to get rid of them.” Tracey dropped her arm with the tablet practically attached at the end down to her side.

“His loss, our gain.” A distant sound caught his attention. Guillaume strained to listen. “Did you hear something?”

Tracey turned to look over her shoulder. “Is that gunfire?”

Removing his fingers from the tense hairs on his cat, Guillaume stood. He braced his hands on his desk, opening the line to his secretary. “Cirine, what’s going on?”

Usually the height of efficiency, his secretary didn’t reply.

The popping sounds stopped abruptly, only to be replaced with a roar.

A second blood-chilling snarl followed.

Then a third.

What the ever-loving fuck was going on?

Grawr.

Was that a freaking wolf? In his lodge?

It sounded as if his menagerie had gotten loose. Unlikely, and yet he leaned over to open the drawer of his desk. Reached for—

Nothing. He gaped at the empty space. No gun.

There was a sudden staccato of gunfire, then a muffled yell, followed by a roar, then nothing.

Eyes wide enough to pop, Tracey hugged her tablet and backed toward the wall farthest from the door. She appeared fixated by it.

The urge was understandable. Guillaume stared, too. Held his breath at the silence beyond it.

What was going on?

A shift of fur and muscle drew his attention to the forgotten feline by his side. A massive beast. Part lion, part tiger. A liger as they called these kinds of hybrids. And already so tame.

It was sent to him as a gift only a day ago. He’d been amazed at how well it obeyed commands, even as he scorned how meek the creature was.

It didn’t appear subservient at the moment. It sat on its haunches, and Guillaume would have sworn it smiled.

It definitely winked.

Guillaume found it hard to control the tremble