Dion shook his head, stepping closer to her and lowering his voice another octave. “Not with this man. If he wants a guide, I’ll do it for you. You have no idea what you’re dealin’ with.”

“So tell me,” she challenged. “He didn’t roll over and play scared when you and your brother tried double-teaming him?” Fury burned through her. “If you know somethin’ about this man, tell me now.”

“I’ve been around men like him, Saria. You haven’t. He’s too still. He didn’t even blink when we came up on him, and believe me, cher, normal men fear us.”

She believed him. Robert and Dion were built strong and could fight fiercely. Others left them alone, knowing if you fought one, you’d be fighting the other.

She shrugged one shoulder. “Then I guess I’ll be safe out in the swamp with him.”

Drake could hear the whispered conversation rather easily, as did his leopard. His cat was already far too close to the surface and once again he found himself struggling to keep the animal under control. Saria was surrounded by leopards, and if he hadn’t known it before, he sure as hell knew it now: he didn’t want any male, in any form near her.

The Lanoux twins, as well as the man in the shadows, whoever he’d been—and Drake couldn’t tell until he managed to get over there and nose around—were certainly leopard. The older gentleman—Amos Jeanmard, she’d called him—who was watching them from the path with interest, was a leopard as well. He had stumbled into a real shifter lair where not one but several families grouped together to form a loose coalition. He hadn’t known one existed outside of the rain forest.

He inhaled the scent of males in their prime, furious that another male had entered their realm. An outsider, possibly a rogue. He had no fear of them—both he and his leopard had been fighting since he was a child—but he hadn’t shifted in a long while. The surgeon had been adamant that he take it slow and allow his leg to fully heal before he tried shifting again. That mattered little to his cat.

His animal raged, throwing himself at Drake, but Drake had been an alpha for many years, running teams of male leopards in the rain forest, where their primitive natures often edged out the civility of their human side. It took strength, patience and discipline to control them—all of which he had in abundance. More than anything, he had to get Saria away from the males. If he read her correctly—and he was very good at reading people—she was as independent as they came.