Saria’s answering smile was serene. “I know that, I just wanted to make certain you knew it as well. Have fun tonight, although,” she added mischievously, “whenever my big brother wanted to talk to me about somethin’, I was usually in trouble.”

Laughing, Bijou hurried to the car with a wave of her hand. Saria and her brothers definitely enjoyed teasing one another and they already had begun to include her in the warmth of their circle. She had come home looking for her white knight and she’d found him. Remy was everything she remembered and more.

She would never forget his face, the way he yanked her out of the hotel room and shook the living daylights out of her. He’d cared. He’d been alarmed. That had been the moment she realized much more would have gone on in that room than her simply overdosing. She saw it in his eyes. In the expression on his face. He’d been horrified and he’d been angry. She would never forget his eyes as long as she lived.

Everything about Remy was beautiful to her, even his famous temper. He would always be a cop, but he would be her cop and she knew she could live with that. She had a home and a family and Remy had given both to her. There was no way to describe to someone else how much she loved him. The intensity of her emotions when she was around him sometimes overwhelmed her.

She drove carefully in Saria’s car. She loved fast cars and often went to racetracks and drove. She’d never mentioned that little secret to Remy, or the fact that she owned more than one high performance car. He’d never asked her much about her life and he was in for a few surprises. She did like to live simply, but that didn’t mean she didn’t like nice things—or really fast cars.

Laughing at the thought of his pained expression when she told him, she pulled up to the police station. At night it looked different. Somber. Even haunted. During the day people were in and out, but at night there was only a single valiant light over the door and the place appeared to be deserted.

As she walked up the stairs to the station door, she glanced around her. Night had closed in completely and fog had drifted in. Lights from street and stores appeared dull yellow halos, unable to penetrate the gathering fog. She shivered and rubbed her arms. That other inside of her was restless and she could tell the female leopard’s mood was affecting her as well. She told herself she was too imaginative and the fog and deserted streets were making her edgy.