Cross Breed

by Lora Leigh

  “As voluntary as any other mating?” she asked in disbelief. “I slept with him willingly. I didn’t suspect he was my mate before he touched me. What more can I say?”

  That he knew?

  That the lying bastard had known they were mates and rather than warning her had let her step into her own destruction?

  Her mother was watching her too closely, too compassionately.

  “Do you know who he is?” she asked long moments later. “Cassie, do you know who your mate is?”

  She wasn’t going to cry. She wouldn’t let her lips tremble, her tears fall. She wouldn’t give in to the betrayal she felt, no matter how much she wanted to.

  “I know who others believe him to be,” she finally stated, using the line Jonas had given her. “Just as I know he’s not what others believe. He’s my mate.”

  She had to stare into her mother’s eyes and say those words. She had to lie to her mother. It wasn’t the first time she’d done so, but it was the biggest lie she’d ever told her and Cassie hated it.

  Thank God it wasn’t her father questioning her. He could smell a lie. She didn’t know if she had enough self-control to lie to him and keep that scent from emanating from her. Even at the best of times that ability was iffy.

  “Very well.” Her mother nodded. “I’ll let your father know. But you know he’ll want to see you soon, don’t you? Both you and your mate.”

  Her chin lifted. “He has a name.”

  She stared back at her mother defiantly, and she couldn’t even say why, because she hated the deceptive bastard.

  Compassion softened her mother’s face. “He’ll want to talk to you and Dog soon, then,” she said gently, nearly breaking Cassie’s determined façade. “You know, Cassie, your father and I would do whatever it took to ensure your happiness. You have only to ask.”

  And what could they do?

  Kill her mate? Breeds had only one mate. Endure this arousal, unquenched, for the rest of her life? The way it was building now, she couldn’t imagine such a thing. She’d never survive it.

  As much as she hated the Coyote, she was stuck with him for the time being. Possibly for life.

  No falling in love. No happily ever after. No mate that she at least knew one good thing about. No, her mate was a Coyote. A Council Coyote at that.

  “I went into this willingly,” she finally whispered, hoping, praying, her mother believed her. “Please, don’t let Daddy think otherwise, Mom. He’s not what others think he is.”

  He had helped her every time she needed that help. He had saved Kenzi, and in doing so, saved Cassie’s sanity.

  “Have you seen Kenzi yet?” she asked her mother, hoping to change the subject as they left the shower room.

  “She’s refusing to see us.” The strain in her mother’s voice could be heard now. “I left your father to talk to Rhyzan. There seems to be a problem between him and Kenzi.”

  Rhyzan Brannigan was the Coyote Jonas had picked as his deputy director of the Federal Bureau of Breed Affairs. An exceptionally striking, cold Breed.

  “He could be a problem,” Cassie admitted. “Rhyzan doesn’t care much for me for some reason. It could affect how he’s treated Kenzi.”

  She had no idea why Rhyzan was antagonistic toward her, but from the moment they’d met, she’d felt it, despite his later attempts to seduce her.

  “You never told me that.” Once again, a statement with a question behind it. Her mother was incredibly good at that.

  Once again, she shrugged negligently. “I’m a big girl, Mom. I’ve learned to do my job without allowing other’s distaste for my presence bother me.”

  She was a Cross Breed. She’d heard the distinction far too often. She was neither Coyote nor Wolf to other Breeds. For the most part. Strangely enough, it was the felines who were more accepting of her. But they’d known her since childhood.

  The majority of the Wolves and Coyotes she knew regarded her with suspicion; some, like Rhyzan, just hid it better.

  “I’ll discuss this with your dad, then. Jonas will need to revise his decision to keep Rhyzan in charge of Kenzi’s debriefing. I won’t have her bullied. Not after all she’s been through.” The sorrow in her mother’s voice was deep, the scent of it strong.

  Kenzi was her child. Cassie’s full sister despite the fact that Kenzi had been created without the Wolf DNA.

  “I’ll see her soon as well,” Cassie promised, though she sensed the fact that Kenzi wouldn’t welcome her.

  She could feel it inside, deep, where that gift she had once possessed had retreated to.

  “I’m here for you as well, Cassie,” her mother promised as they entered the elevator and Cassie pressed the button that would take her to the residence level of the Bureau’s offices.

  “I know, Mom.” She stared straight ahead, refusing to give in to the need to spill the hurt, the pain, into her mother’s loving arms.

  If she spilled that much, the rest would come rolling free. She wouldn’t be able to hide everything she’d kept from her parents for so very long.

  Everything she’d kept hidden even from herself.

  •CHAPTER 4•

  He was waiting for her when she stepped into her suite on the upper floor of the Western Bureau of Breed Affairs. The dun-colored buttoned shirt and matching pants were paired with work-scarred boots and a wide leather belt. The sand-colored fall of hair around his face was both rakish and almost boyish. But there was nothing boyish about the look in his gunmetal gray eyes.

  He wasn’t armed—at least she couldn’t see or scent any weapons on him. They had a distinctive smell, one that reminded her of death.

  Sprawled back in her recliner, remote in hand as he scanned the channels on the HD screen. On the table beside him sat several empty beer bottles and one half full and a half-eaten ham, roast beef and cheese sandwich.

  He flipped off the screen and in a move that bespoke pure male confidence tilted his head and grinned back at her mockingly.

  “Well, mate, did they get all their samples from you? At least until after we have sex again?” A dark blond brow arched with curious sarcasm.

  She hated him. She was sure of it.

  Bastard.

  She made certain her smile was cold. “Examinations are all finished and hopefully a hormonal treatment that will counteract the mating will be here soon.”

  Of course, nothing could counteract the mating; it could only help ease it, nothing more. But even an easing would do, because she was damned if she could clear her head enough to think past the Mating Heat.

  He flipped the recliner back to a sitting position, his booted feet meeting the carpet as she watched him warily. And he laughed at her.

  “Nothing counteracts the mating, mate,” he assured her, the laughter still lingering in his voice.

  His expression was frankly insulting.

  Now she knew why Ashley, the Coyote female she worked with, swore she was shooting her mate at first sight.

  Before he had a chance to exchange any bodily fluids with her.

  “I can only hope this will be the exception.” She had a feeling it was anything but.

  Arousal was burning through her, creating a fine film of perspiration along her forehead, and her hands were getting ready to shake.

  She just wanted to touch him.

  Taste him.

  “So . . . ,” he drawled, rising slowly to his feet. “They tell you who I am?”

  Cocky bastard. Did he think she couldn’t figure that one out on her own?

  “Are you a Breed?” she snapped.

  His brow arched. Was that surprise she saw in his face?

  “Why, mate, I do believe I am.” He was laughing at her again.

  Propping her hand on her hip, she restrained the need to snarl back at him in fury. “Do I smell as though I give a fuc
k what your name is right now? Yes, I know what your goddamned name is, and I’ll be damned if I’ll scream out ‘Dog’ while I’m coming. So please be kind enough to choose another.”

  Choose another name?

  She was worried about the name she called out when she orgasmed, when the scent of her Heat was like a drug hitting his system?

  He didn’t even have time to tell her what he thought about that demanding little statement before she turned with a little twitch of her nose and a toss of her head and stalked through her bedroom door.

  Had anyone ever delivered such a stinging rebuke only to sweep away before he could deliver a comeback?

  He didn’t think so. And he didn’t like it. He couldn’t remember a time anyone had left him speechless. And the knowledge that his fledgling mate had done so didn’t sit well with him.

  He grinned, raw, primal lust rising hard and fast, releasing the hunger he’d been holding back.

  He’d warned her the night he slipped into her hospital room so long ago to never dare him. And though she might have been unconscious when he bent over her, she’d damned sure come awake once he’d whispered the words.

  She might not say the words, but every look, every word out of that smart mouth of hers, was a blatant challenge, and it was time to meet that challenge in a way she couldn’t refute.

  Dog slipped silently into the bathroom minutes later, naked, anticipating a confrontation with his mate, when he was brought to a hard, sudden stop.

  The scent of feminine arousal was heavy in the small room. Tempting. If ambrosia had a scent, then it was the smell of his mate’s need for him. But mixed with it, and vying for supremacy, was the scent of her pain and her fear.

  Never had he scented her fear.

  Trepidation on occasion, anger, confusion a few times, but he’d never smelled fear.

  Moving silently to the entrance of the shower, he expected to see her tears, a ravaged expression. Instead, she stood beneath an icy spray, her forehead and hands resting against the tile wall, her profile composed and eerily calm.

  There wasn’t a hint of the turmoil he could sense pouring from her, mixing with her arousal but doing nothing to dim it.

  Standing so still and silent, the soaked silk of her hair flowing down her delicate back, she made him more aware of his own strength and larger build in a way he’d never been before. But it was the mix of chaotic emotions that held him, that had his chest clenching, had him pausing before he reached for the shower’s controls and pushed the temperature from icy to something far warmer and more inviting.

  He waited for the fall of water to warm as he watched his little mate. As she stood like a statue, silent and so very still, he could sense the battle inside her, feel it tearing at her. And only a fool wouldn’t be aware of whom she feared so deeply that she was standing there fighting to control herself.

  She feared him. Feared him with the same depth that she wanted him.

  And there wasn’t a damned thing he could do to fix it. He didn’t dare give voice to his own secrets, because once they touched the air around him, they’d be secrets no longer, and he couldn’t protect her if that happened.

  “So, tell me, mate,” he said instead. “What name would you prefer I carry?”

  Cassie swung around, so shocked that she hadn’t heard him, hadn’t smelled him enter the room, that she could only blink back at the Breed standing in the shower’s open doorway.

  “Is there something else you’d prefer to call me?” There was nothing mocking, cruel or censorious in his tone. He spoke as though merely curious as to her answer.

  She could only shake her head, uncertain now.

  For a second, he lowered his head and stared at the floor as she slowly became aware of the fact that the water flowing around her had become much warmer, steamy, in fact. And within the warmth she could swear the hunger emanating from him was sinking inside her and increasing her own.

  When he lifted his head, those steel gray eyes met her own gaze, and though she couldn’t sense any particular emotion from him, rather than lashing at her, his lust seemed to surround her, almost comforting instead.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked him instead. “All these years we’ve messaged, why didn’t you tell me you were my mate? You knew. I know you did.”

  He gave a quick, firm nod. “I knew. I’ve known since I first saw you and caught your scent flowing toward me. And I think I showed remarkable restraint in waiting to claim you.”

  He chose that moment to move into the roomy shower, taking up space, surrounding her with his scent, with his hunger, as his larger body blocked the shower spray.

  But he still hadn’t answered her question, and she would have demanded the answer again if the need for him wasn’t swamping her.

  She fought to breathe, to hold back all the needs and sensations, the hunger beating at her, pushing past control, confusion and fear and reaching out to him.

  Oh God, she ached for him. Needed his touch as she’d never needed anything before him.

  So much power filled his hard body, more than was normal for most Breed males. Broad shoulders, hard biceps, golden flesh stretched across his chest and down his lean, muscular abs. Strength honed by training and necessity, each inch of his body built for endurance and in prime, peak condition.

  Between his thighs, his engorged cock stood out from his body, the mushroom-shaped crest and heavily veined shaft throbbing in arousal. She’d heard Wolf and Coyote Breed males were exceptionally endowed, but until Dog, she hadn’t seen proof of it. That hard flesh was thick, powerful and imposing, like the Breed possessing it.

  Water sluiced down his body, the steam infusing with the scent of his lust and of the male facing her. Heated, redolent of the desert itself, a whisper of safety, a hint of a storm. Enduring. Alive.

  She licked her lips at the remembered taste of him filling her, taking her.

  She’d deal with his name later. For now, this need for him was clawing at her, destroying her.

  “What do you want, mate?” His fingers slid into the sodden length of her hair as he gripped his shaft with the other hand. “Or shall I help you decide?”

  It didn’t take much pressure to push her to her knees.

  She remembered how he’d pressed his cock to her lips in that hotel room, the taste of him, and suddenly, she was beyond desperate for more. She was dying for him.

  Her lips parted as the broad crest pressed against them, her tongue catching the essence of the mating hormone seeping from the glands beneath it as her mouth closed over the wide crest.

  Silk over steel. The dark, plum-shaped crest pulsed, the slight taste of the pre-seminal fluid infusing her senses.

  A helpless moan welled from her throat as she sucked him in eagerly. Her lips closing over his hard flesh, drawing on it and giving herself up to the Heat flaming through her body.

  “That’s it, mate. Suck me.” Her mouth tightened at the explicit growl, her hand lifting, covering his where he gripped his hard flesh.

  Thick, throbbing, his cock head filled her mouth as she worked it over, thrusting in shallow strokes past her lips as he stared down at her, his expression savage with lust.

  She couldn’t hold back her moans as his hand moved from beneath hers, allowing her to stroke the thick stalk as she milked the sensitive head with her mouth. His fingers tightened in her hair, tugged at it as another flex of the broad crest gave her another heady taste of the hormone-rich pre-seminal ejaculation.

  Her body sensitized further at the taste, her mouth becoming greedier.

  “Cassie . . . ah hell . . . your sweet mouth . . .” The inherent growl in his voice only made her want more, the sound of his pleasure as she took him goading her further.

  She worked her tongue over the thick crest, hungry for more of him. His taste, his need for her, the hunger for him rising eve
r higher. She ached for him, his ragged groans, the explicit words fueled by his need.

  “Fuck! Yes . . .” The sound was a snarl of pleasure as she managed to take him deeper. “That’s it, baby . . . so damned good.”

  The roughening sound of his voice, the brutal need filling it, edged her own need to a critical level.

  She took the engorged crest as deep as possible as another pulse of his pre-cum coated the back of her mouth, easing it. She worked her tongue against the sensitive underside, her own moans impossible to hold back.

  Each shallow stroke took him nearly to her throat now. Thrusting in and pulling back, each impalement controlled even as she rapidly lost her ability to restrain herself.

  The sound of their heavy breathing mingled with the shower and that of her mouth on his cock, greedily taking each thrust as his movements increased. His hands tightened in her hair, his breathing rapidly becoming more ragged.

  “Ah hell, Cassie.” His groan was a rumbled sound of pleasure.

  She sucked at the head of his cock, tightened the draw of her mouth, increasing the movements of her tongue against the sensitive underside of the iron-hard flesh.

  “Take it, damn you . . . Take my dick, baby . . . all of it . . .”

  The first eruption of silky, hormone-rich semen hit the back of her throat, followed by another.

  Sensual greed took over. The taste of his release had her sucking him with abandon, desperate for each taste as she swallowed his release and felt the need raging through her increase.

  Hard hands pulled at her hair as he forced her head back and drew her quickly to her feet. In the next instant he pushed her around until her back was to him, placed his hand under her knee and pushed her foot to the shower seat built along the wall. And before she could draw a breath his erection was parting the folds of her desire-slick inner lips.

  A pulse of heat as the pre-cum hit the entrance; a second later nerve endings became so sensitive, so desperate for touch, she could barely breathe through it.

  His head bent to hers, his lips caressing the shell of her ear. “Your pussy’s wet, Cassie. So hot and wet and sweet.” As he held her steady, his hips shifted, his cock pushing inside her. “So fucking tight.”