Leopard 04 - Wild Fire

the scars and weathered lines, the fierce burnt gold of his eyes, the sensual mouth that would drive any woman crazy—all showed a man with absolute resolve. But his eyes had gone different. Softer. Almost hesitant. She couldn’t help but be intrigued.
    “Yes, she played,” Conner admitted, his tone dropping even lower. There was a soft note that was all leopard mixed in with his human voice.
    Isabeau watched him swallow, his gaze moving over the broad leaves surrounding them, hiding them from the rest of the rain forest.
    “She loved the violin.”
    “Did you play the violin?” She couldn’t stop herself from learning whatever she could about the real man, not the role he played.

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    “Not the way she could play.” He had a faraway look in his eyes when he turned his head back toward her. There was a small smile on his face as if he was remembering. “She used to sit out here with me while the rain came down and she’d play for hours. Sometimes the animals would gather so she had a huge audience. I’d look out and the trees would be covered with monkeys and birds and even a sloth or two. She was gentle and beautiful and it showed in her music.”
    “She taught you herself? Or did she send you for lessons? And where would you even find schools and music teachers? You couldn’t have lived here for long.”
    “We stayed to ourselves. When we left our village . . .”
    Isabeau caught a note of pain in his voice. The boy was remembering some childhood trauma, not the man.
    “We kept to ourselves for several years. My mother didn’t want to see anyone. She was very strict about schooling and she was smart. If you look in the wooden boxes beneath the benches, you’ll find they’re filled completely with books. She was a good teacher.” A slight grin touched his mouth. A little mischievous. “She didn’t have the best student to work with.”
    “You’re extremely intelligent,” she said.
    He shrugged. “Intelligence had nothing to do with being a wild boy out in the middle of the rain forest thinking I was king of the jungle. She had her hands full.”
    Isabeau could imagine him, a curly-haired towheaded boy with golden eyes, leaping from tree branch to tree branch with his mother chasing after him. “I can imagine.”
    “I snuck out a lot at night. Of course, I didn’t realize then that, being an adult leopard, she could hear and smell better than me and knew the moment I moved. I learned a few years later that she trailed after me, making certain nothing happened to me, but at the time, I felt very brave and manly.” He laughed at the memory. “I was also feeling pretty cool that I’d managed to put it over on her that I was out every night playing in the forest.”
    “It must have built your confidence though. As much time as I’ve spent in the rain forest, I stay in camp at night.”
    “I was a kid, Isabeau. I hadn’t learned all the dangers in the forest. Mom would tell me and I’d just shrug my shoulders and think it could never happen to me. I was invincible.”
    “Most kids think they are. I know I did. I liked to climb on the roof of our house at night. Any place high.
    My father would get so upset once he found out. I forget how old I was when I first started. I think he said around three.”
    He flashed a companionable grin at her. “That was the leopard in you. They like to go up all the time. The higher the better.”
    “And I took tons of naps. I was always sleepy in the day.”
    He nodded. “And up all night. Mom actually made me do lessons at night when I was a teen. She said I’d do my best work then.”
    “And you played music at night?”
    “I couldn’t sleep sometimes—most of the time. And she was . . . sad. We’d sit listening to the rain and then we’d come out here with our instruments. She’d have the violin and I’d have a guitar and we’d play together. Most of the time the animals would come. A few times I glimpsed leopards, but they never came close and she pretended not to notice them, so I followed her lead.”
    “I wish I could have met her.”
    He blinked and his expression settled into the familiar mask. “She would have loved you. She always wanted a daughter.”
    “You said she was killed by Suma? Why? Why would he kill a female leopard?”
    His jaw hardened. “Suma killed her in the village. She tried to defend Adan’s family.”
    Her breath caught in her