by Lora Leigh
He’d let that go for now. He’d deal with the two at the door and any others he sensed himself. Just as he’d been prepared to deal with the attack that morning. Mutt and Mongrel were on the trail of the third Wolf Breed who’d attacked her. The one Jonas was unaware of. The third, he’d have in custody soon and Dog would make certain the other two knew what awaited them.
He’d know who it was soon, and the bastard wouldn’t live much longer. No Breed, no matter who he was, deserved to live after such a strike. Had they struck at Dog, he might have left them living, if he was in a good mood, but they’d struck his mate instead.
“It’s been like that since I was a child, Dog.” There was the weariness, the hurt. “I wasn’t always as discreet as I could have been in things I knew. The felines for the most part were never bothered by it. Some were wary at times, but not distrustful. Coyotes take everything in stride.” The irony in her tone couldn’t be missed. “But Wolf Breeds, I think, react instinctively to the mixed scents of the DNA I possess as well as rumors concerning abilities I really don’t possess. And they know the threat I represent to the lives they’re building if I’m ever captured by the Council.” She looked at him solemnly. “Felines, Father’s Wolf Breeds, and Jonas personally would go to war if that happened. There wouldn’t be a Breed alive who wouldn’t be pulled into it.”
She was making excuses for them? He couldn’t believe what the hell he was hearing. But she was right. There wasn’t a Feline Breed he knew of who had met her and didn’t like her; many adored her. Coyotes were wary of her ability to argue Breed Law but, other than that, found her playfulness and charm enchanting.
He’d never heard that the Wolf Breeds felt any differently, but come to think of it, they rarely heard of any Wolf Breeds but her father’s say anything kind about her either. And it had been a Wolf Breed who’d attacked her.
He’d been certain he was losing his mind as he watched her go to her knees, her eyes wide, dazed from the blows to her body. A haze of red had obliterated everything but the knowledge that she’d been attacked, hurt. And here she sat excusing them. Not just her attacker, but every Breed who dared show disrespect to her by allowing the scent of it free.
“Cassie, what right do they have to resent your genetics or your abilities? None of the other Coyote females experience this . . .”
It was the tiniest flinch of her expression that stopped him.
Evidently, the Coyote females were experiencing it. Ashley was tolerating it? The Coyote female even he would hesitate to meet in a dark alley, and Wolf Breeds were actually showing their disdain for her? They obviously had a suicidal wish.
“It’s not all Wolf Breeds.” Swinging her legs over the bed, she gripped the side of the mattress as she stared up at him. “Until the two at the door, I was never certain where it was coming from. Maybe it was just those two.”
Bullshit.
She frowned up at him when he didn’t say anything. “Don’t glare at me like that. And sit down or something. I’m straining my neck.”
He wondered if he could get away with paddling her ass.
He knew the scent of her wariness combined with her Heat was about to make him crazy. From the moment he laid her on the bed, her arousal had been growing. And he’d been trying to ignore it. She’d been attacked, she had to be hurting, she didn’t need to deal with his lust on top of it.
“Why did you leave the suite this morning?” And that was the uppermost question.
“I had things to do, Dog. I normally don’t lie around in my suite all day. And I won’t play the prisoner and begin doing it now.” Steel will and determination filled her voice.
She began to rise from the bed after making that little declaration, as though the conversation were finished.
“Sit back down.” He kept his tone polite, nice even.
He watched those odd blue eyes lighten just a hint and her expression tighten stubbornly.
“Excuse me?” Her tone, for all its pleasantness, held a note he rarely heard in a female’s voice. That undercurrent that only alphas could actually pull off. Son of a bitch, he’d suspected it, but that moment of strength he sensed was surprising.
No damned wonder so many Wolves were having problems with her and Coyotes weren’t. Coyotes loved the challenge an alpha female presented; Wolf Breeds tended to view it more suspiciously unless it was an acquired trait the mate of an alpha had developed.
“You heard me.” He stared down at her, trying to fit together the pieces of the puzzle he knew about his intriguing little halfling. “What things did you have to do at daylight this morning that required leaving the building? Especially alone.”
Her eyes narrowed on him. “Where were you, come to think of it? You were gone when I awoke.”
She was deflecting. Now, this was interesting.
“Things to do,” he murmured, barely controlling a grin. “Places to go. People to see.”
“Council things?” The wave of anger that shot from her might have intimidated a lesser Coyote.
“Things that didn’t cause an attack against you,” he pointed out rather than answering her. “Unlike yours. Now, would you care to answer me?”
The scent that hit him when he finished speaking was so intriguing his cock hardened to iron and the glands beneath his tongue began throbbing with the need to kiss her. It caused such a punch of lust to hit his balls that it nearly stole his breath. Because that scent was one of such challenge, such daring, that the instincts he harbored in the darkest part of him nearly slipped free.
“Yes, your things did cause that attack.” Rising to her feet, she faced him. Without her heels, shoulders straight, she stared up at him with narrow-eyed fury. “I was called a Council whore before that fist connected with my head. And I was out there because I was looking for a cab to take me to where I had stashed a secure mobile phone, because mine were wiped. Phones, tablet and laptop. I couldn’t contact anyone and I had no access to any floor except this one, and there were guards to keep me from accessing the other hallways. I could use the elevator to go to the lobby. Period. Because of you.” Delicate, graceful, a finger poked at his chest with imperious feminine anger. “And because of your Council things, I was unable to even contact the enforcers my father sent to see to my protection, let alone the ones Jonas assigned me.”
Once he began killing, he might just start with Jonas. There were few who could give the order to have her so restrained. Very few. And Jonas was at the top of that particular chain.
Straightening from his slouched position against the dresser, he looked at that little finger pointing at him before lifting his gaze to her eyes.
The Heat was building in her, but it was far slower than his, indicating her body was attempting to heal rather than mate. She hadn’t been lying earlier when she said she was hungry, and beneath it all, he could sense the impotent fury that came from her belief that her mate was the enemy.
And that damnable pride he possessed wouldn’t let him tell her the truth.
“Why don’t you get out of those torn clothes and dress in something you can relax in. I’ll order some food,” he suggested.
Her eyes narrowed. “Your phone works?”
He couldn’t help but grin. “I don’t use a Bureau phone, sweetheart. And I use my own encryption. I have a spare I picked up for you this morning, though, to ensure the Bureau couldn’t track any calls I made to you.”
“I don’t want one of your Council toys,” she snarled back at him, striding past and heading for her closet. “I’ll get my own.”
“You’re going to get fucked before you get fed if you don’t watch all the little dares you’re throwing out,” he snapped, unable not to respond to the constant challenge. “Now, by God, do as I ask, just this once.”
Before she could make another smart-ass reply, he turned and stalked from the room. But instead of making the call f
As the first glared up at him, coughing, Dog pulled a cigar free of his shirt and lit it with lazy amusement.
“You know what that was for. Let it happen again, and you’re dead.” Turning, he reentered the room and found himself facing his mate’s furious glare.
He closed the door and pulled his phone free of his belt and shot her a lazy grin. “I think steaks are called for. That work for you?”
•CHAPTER 7•
Dressed in gray cotton lounging pants and a matching camisole, Cassie sat back in her chair, the remains of dinner almost nonexistent. The steak, loaded potatoes, salad and yeast rolls had seemed far too much for her to finish when Dog unloaded the bags that were delivered.
Now replete, all she had to do was fight back the distracting arousal beginning to build inside her for just a while longer. She could feel a sense of imperative warning awakening as well. That warning had begun before the attack, though. It had begun the night her sister, Kenzi’s, fear and panic had reached out to her.
It wouldn’t be easy for her sister; she’d lost the foster parents who had sacrificed so much to protect her, only to ultimately lose their lives. And now she was having to finally face the parents she’d been kept from.
The threads of knowledge were dangling in her mind; she could feel them, sense them. They were all connected somehow; she just wasn’t certain how, because that sense of impending warning still brewed inside her senses.
Though she and her father never spoke of it, as Cassie had matured, her underlying paternal scent had begun emerging. It was faint because of the Coyote genetics she possessed, too faint for most Breeds to detect, but it was still there. Somehow, the Council had acquired Dash Sinclair’s genetics and the scientist who performed the in-vitro procedure had created not just Cassie, but Kenzi as well.
“Here.” Dog moved to her side, laying a phone and tablet on the table as he took her plate. “Both are encrypted and secured. I’ve programmed my number into the phone, and both devices are equipped with a nano-ghost. They’re safe.”
Her brows lifted. Nano-ghosts were even harder to build and program than nano-nits. Their encryption and ability to access the Internet through the wireless connections around them without leaving a trail made them highly valuable.
“How did you manage a nano-ghost?” Turning her head, she stared up at him suspiciously.
“Because I’m good like that.” He grinned, flashing those canines he seemed so damned proud of.
Charm practically oozed out of him along with the arrogance and ever-present confidence. Unfortunately, that bad-boy charm only turned her on more. It had aroused her before he’d ever touched her. Six years of calls, messages, favors and ridiculous demands, and each time, she’d become more captivated by him. She’d always known he was part of the Council. She’d suspected he was a Coyote. And she’d still so rashly made that final bargain with him.
“I’m not certain how I feel about that,” she admitted. “You’re too damned good at the wrong things, Dog.”
Rising from her chair, she wondered what that said about her, that she was so willing to break Bureau rules by accepting such a device. Not that she would be caught doing so. Detecting nano-nits was hard enough. Nano-ghosts were impossible to detect unless the programmer knew exactly what she or he was looking for.
“I try.” His expression was both sensual and knowing. “But you have a little bad inside you as well, halfling. Admit it.”
A little bad? Sometimes she felt in danger of being possessed by instincts she had no idea how to handle. Jonas had once said he sensed the battle between the Wolf and the Coyote she was created from and he wondered which would win in the end.
She had walked away from the discussion, terrified that he had seen that inside her. That battle between the good and the bad.
“I can’t exactly deny it.” She lifted her shoulders negligently. “Those genetics aren’t exactly hidden. Any Breed can smell them.”
Dog was watching her too closely now, staring at her as though she were a puzzle he needed to put together.
“You think the Coyote genetics are responsible for the hellion you keep hidden?” A grunt of laughter followed the question. “I don’t think so.”
“There’s no hellion hiding, Dog.” Picking up the phone and tablet, she moved for her room. Both needed to go in the pack she kept ready in case she had to leave quickly. “Though sometimes being nice takes work.”
Sometimes, she wanted to tear into those who allowed their hatred of her to mark their scent, who allowed their distaste to touch her. Sensing it and actually smelling it were two different things. Allowing another Breed to scent those feelings was considered the ultimate insult.
“And you think Wolf Breeds or felines are naturally nice?” He laughed at the idea. “Baby, you are so determined to deny the little Coyote crouched and ready to defend itself that you amaze everyone who really knows you. Breeds aren’t nice. Doesn’t matter their designation. Just as humans aren’t really nice. They just hide it from each other better.”
Crouched and ready to defend itself? No, the Coyote was crouched and straining to attack at all times. It was the impulse to slip up behind the guards outside her room and prove she was just as deadly as they. It was the need to snarl in fury at the enforcers who had worked beneath her when they questioned her every order, every decision. It was a lifetime of resisting the desire to run from the protection her parents put around her, to strike against her enemies with deceptive stealth.
How many times had she been forced to run and hide at Sanctuary with her brother while her parents faced danger? Her father had trained her to fight, he’d trained her to be deadly, but when she’d had to use that training, he’d stared at her with such disappointment, she’d cringed inside.
She agreed with Dog, though. Breeds weren’t always nice. Not when dealing with the enemy or the prejudice that poured from humans. But they weren’t cruel either. They took each situation as it came and dealt with it. They didn’t bemoan their lives or whimper over the blood they had to shed, but neither did they want to shed that blood.
The need to shed blood was becoming harder and harder for her to dismiss, though.
“Cassie, aren’t you tired of playing the perfect little Breed princess?” he asked as she passed him. “Haven’t you gotten sick of being a good girl all the time? You’re not human. You can’t keep pretending you are.”
He had no idea what he was talking about.
Flashing him a furious look, she passed him and strode into her bedroom to the closet. There, she stored the phone and tablet. Before she reclosed it, the hilt of her knife caught her eye, as did the small, old-fashioned handgun. There were a dozen clips for the gun, loaded with deadly bullets, at the bottom of the bag. The knife was sheathed in a holster made to fit her thigh.
She kept them hidden because carrying them felt too natural, and more than once, the need to use them had been overwhelming.
The good versus the bad.
Her fingers glanced over the leather hilt before she forced herself to pull back and secure the flap once again.
She was aware of Dog moving in behind her, watching her, daring her.
Yeah, that was another failing she shared with him. Passing up the challenges and dares so mockingly thrown out to her by the Wolf Breeds who regarded her with such suspicion and distaste. So many times the need to meet those challenges had been like a fever that refused to abate.
She could feel it now, the Coyote pacing, straining at her control, demanding release. As she’d matured, the Coyote and Wolf genetics had fought to outpace each other. Dr. Armani still studied the phenomenon and had drawn Sobolova into it when she’d joined the Breeds’ medical and scientific community.
“You were eighteen,” Dog stated, moving farther into the room. “I was in that fucking atrium waiting for Jonas when you walked in, that virgin’s gown flowing around you. It wasn’t the Wolf Breed you were called in the media that stepped in that room. You were wild and restrained. Like an enraged Coyote, caged. And I wanted nothing more than to mark you that night.”
She’d wanted nothing more than to carry his mark that night, she realized. The restlessness that plagued her had been one of those periods when her Coyote genetics had reigned.
“I was caged,” she told him coolly. “I’m still caged.”
Rising to her feet, she closed the closet door, pushed back the needs tearing at her.
Dog chuckled behind her again. “What an intriguing scent,” he murmured, the amused drawl causing her to stiffen. “Are you pissed off, little halfling? Does it offend you that I don’t allow you to hide? To pretend you don’t possess all those nasty Coyote genetics?”
She turned to him, her gaze raking over him derisively. “Stop trying to start a fight, Dog. Go attack the Wolf guards again if you can’t control your need to be nasty.”
“My need to be nasty?” His expression turned calculating. “You think I’m trying to be nasty, mate?”
“You’re trying to be cruel and I don’t like it,” she stated, refusing to meet the dare in his eyes.
If she gave in, just once, then it would all be over. She’d never rein those impulses in again. She’d never regain control of herself or the creature all too willing to attack.
Dog scratched his cheek, regarding her quizzically as she went to move past him.
Before she could clear his side, he reached out to grab her, to restrain her. She felt him getting ready to move, felt his need to control her.
Before he could touch her, she jumped clear of him, twisting away in a perfect flip as he moved to counter her.
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