Page 13 of Destined Predator
“What you want, a prize or something? And good morning to you, too.” Casey stilled, his nostrils flaring in a sniff. He snaked out a hand and yanked at Rhett’s jacket, to see the shirt he was wearing underneath was stained with blood. “Ain’t yours,” he breathed, relief flooding him.
“You said you weren’t wild animals. Your family, shifters. That—”
“Rhett.” Casey tilted his head back, shaking a loose lock of hair from his eye, and looked down at Rhett. It was an innate alpha move, one that had other shifters and most humans lowering their gazes. Not Rhett, though. “What the hell’s going on?”
“Apart from me being the one to find Greg Manning last night, you mean?”
“Find—?” Casey did not like the way this was going. No—the way Rhett, the driving force behind it, wassteeringit.
“I found him, after he’d been attacked.” Rhett wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “I took him to the hospital.”
His voice cracked halfway through, like the memory of it scraped his throat raw. Casey’s frustration cooled, the alpha in him catching the pain under the anger. Whatever Rhett had seen last night wasn’t something a man walked away from clean.
“What?”
“Tore up.” Rhett nodded. “Shredded. Bitten, clawed…mauled by a wild animal after he’d left Bard’s.”
“Shit.” Casey cussed on occasion, and this was one such. He searched Rhett’s face, trying to sift through all the emotions playing across it.
“He’s got lacerations, blood loss, bite marks…one side of his torso’s a real mess.” Rhett was spitting the words out like bullets, and they found their mark.
“‘Wild animals,’” Casey repeated. Rhett had said the words twice in the space of a minute, his meaning clear.
“He was attacked by some kind of predator. The doctors supposed a wolf. Greg doesn’t know. He thought he hit something, so he got out of his car to see, then followed whatever it was, in case it was hurt. But it was just luring him away from the road so it could fucking set on him!” He sounded animal-like himself, roaring out the last words.
“And you think…” Instead of words, Casey jerked his thumb at his chest. “Why me? Why not old lady Elgiers’ chihuahua, if we’re going with unlikely suspects?”
The look Rhett gave him wasn’t quite disbelief anymore. It was hurt. Casey hated that more than the accusation.Hell,maybe because it meant Rhett’s opinion mattered way too damn much already.
“What?” burst from Rhett, his turn to disbelieve what he was hearing.
“Yeah, why the hell not? Always thought that critter was a Chupacabra.” Casey was warming to his theme, but it seemed he was enraging Rhett, if his narrowed eyes, pressed-together lips and dilated nostrils were any sign. Oh, and his clenched, ready fists.
“Hey,” Casey shot out, half-warning, half-reprove, and raised his hands, keeping them open, palms out, not so much to defuse as to have his hands ready, one higher and farther forward, and the other closer to his body and lower. Rhett was big but didn’t look slow—and did look ready to explode. Yep—Casey rarely read situations like this wrong, and in the next second, Rhett had swung his right fist for Casey’s head.
Casey locked his left hand behind his own neck, using his elbow to block Rhett’s punch, and at the same time, brought his other arm up so that elbow blocked his face from the left fist Rhett let fly on the heels of his right. Casey’s next move, not even a millisecond later, was to pull his hand from his nape and grab Rhett’s right arm. He used it to drag Rhett flush to him, trapping his arm captive between Casey’s and the side of Casey’s body. He made sure to hold it high above the elbow, immobilizing it and preventing Rhett yanking it free.
He tucked his head behind Rhett’s neck, in case the rancher had any thoughts about trying to headbutt him or bring up his left fist to punch Casey’s head. Rhett was strong and powerfuland, Casey had no doubt, could knock him senseless, probably with one blow…if he were given an opening. If anyone came upon them right then, they’d have thought the pair of them were embracing, Casey with his face lodged in the curve of Rhett’s neck in some sort of loving nuzzle. He could smell everything from that close—the salt on Rhett’s skin, the hint of leather and sweat, the wild beat of a heart that didn’t know whether to rage or surrender. It was supposed to be a restraint hold, but it felt like claiming.
With his face there, he couldn’t see, but it was easy enough to drive his free hand up Rhett’s chest to his throat. He didn’t squeeze Rhett’s windpipe, just wrapped his fingers around it in a loose hold that would be child’s play to tighten.
“Calm down,” he ordered, but Rhett didn’t, struggling instead. With a “Fine. Have it your way.” Casey hooked his leg around Rhett’s and jerked him to the ground, still holding his arm. He leaned in, fist raised to show Rhett he could punch him out if he chose to. He didn’t choose to. He dropped his hands and straightened up, leaving Rhett alone on his back.
“Self-defense?” Rhett scorned, sitting up. “That all you got? Thought you were the big bad…coywolf.”
Casey was actually amused. “You do realize I just dropped you to the floor? And like Mike Tyson said, ‘Everyone has a plan until they get hit in the mouth’.”
“A plan,” Rhett repeated, as if thinking, then, almost before Casey realized he’d moved, he’d hauled off and, still sitting, socked Casey in the gut.
He jumped to his feet while Casey was doubled over. He’d been right—the rancher packed a hell of a wallop. Casey was strong too, powerful enough to recover quickly, and speedy, so he could dodge Rhett’s attempt to shove him over onto his back. Meeting no resistance clearly unbalanced Rhett, as Casey hadintended, and he was barely able to jump to avoid the sweeping low-calf roundhouse kick Casey aimed at him.
Rhett flailing his arms and stumbling on landing gave Casey the opportunity to get behind him, where he wasted no time pinning Rhett’s arms. Standing to one side, out of range in case Rhett used the back of his head as a battering ram, Casey pressed close to Rhett’s body. The rancher was in good physical shape—he was barely panting and hadn’t even broken a sweat. What had fine tremors rippling his skin and his breath sticking in his throat was something else, and Casey, never the most patient of men, wanted to find out if the reason was the one he suspected.
“You might as well submit to me,” Casey drawled.
The flinch Rhett gave at that traveled through Casey. “Concede,” Casey amended. Fine, so it was a little too soon to talk about Rhett giving in to him sexually, although the vibes the rancher was giving off ranged frominterestedtoyearning.
Out of Rhett’s sight as he was, Casey smiled. He was getting the feel of the defenses Rhett put up…and seeing how best to knock them down.Kinda like the wall I was demolishing just now.How aptthatwas had his smile inching farther up his face.
