Charisse drew herself up abruptly, her childlike expression going cool. “I don’t have to stay here and listen to these accusations. I think the next time you talk to me, I’ll have a lawyer present.” She started to rise.

His low growl of pure menace rumbled through the cabin, stopping her. “Sit down,” he snapped, his eyes going pure gold. “You’re leopard, Charisse. You belong to a lair. I am the leader of that lair and as such, I am the only judge and jury and executioner that you or your family will ever have. There is a death sentence hanging over your head and as much as it would pain Saria, I will destroy your entire family for the preservation and good of the lair.”

He raised his voice. “Look at me, not Saria. She can’t save you. You need to convince me you have nothing to do with this mess, and right now, honey, it isn’t looking all that good for you.”

Charisse’s hand went defensively to her throat. There was no getting around the ring of truth in Drake’s voice. He heard Saria make a small, protesting sound, but he didn’t look at her. She was going to be his wife. She needed to see the reality of what their life was like. Amos Jeanmard should have been cleaning up his lair years earlier. Regardless, it was all there in this dying lair, the depravity, the sickness and the greed for power and money. If he had to kill this woman, he would do so and without hesitation.

“It’s not what you think. Yes. I experiment all the time with scents and the by-product of this very new scent I was workin’ on turned out to have an unusual, very unique aspect to it.”

Her voice changed completely again, Drake noted, suddenly animated, her eyes bright with eagerness. For the first time he felt he was looking at the real Charisse Mercier.

“I’d never seen anything like it. Not only was there no scent, but it consumed every other scent around it. Can you imagine the uses? I haven’t perfected it yet, but I think it will be amazin’. Think of all the people with allergies to scents and that’s just one use. I’ve been experimentin’ with ingestin’ it. That seems to yield the best results, but I have to study side effects.”

“Charisse.” Drake needed to bring her back to the reality of what was going on. Her brain had flipped a switch to pure scientist and she was no longer talking to him, rather talking aloud to herself to find a solution for some problem she’d obviously encountered. “Who else knows about this scent-masking product you’ve discovered?”

She frowned at him. “No one. What I’m doin’ in the lab stays there until I have it ready to be tested and I register it.”