The Coyote's Bride

by Holley Trent

  “What do you think she’s up to?” Lance asked Lily.

  “I dunno, but whenever she’s coy like that, I get a little nervous. I try to watch Tito’s cues and see if he’s getting nervous, too. If he’s not, I chill out.” Lily steered the cart toward the leggings as she had been before the interruption.

  “What if Tito’s wigging out?”

  “If Tito’s losing his cool, I nope myself out of the gaggle, whistle like I don’t know shit about shit, and lock myself into my house until all the paranormal dust settles.”

  “And yet here you are, dancing in the dust storm.”

  “Because I don’t have a choice. I’m not going to cry about it.” She grabbed a pair of light gray leggings, a brown pair, two pairs of black ones that had weird geometric cutouts on the sides, and a sparkly pair that had prancing unicorns.

  “Where are you going to wear those?”

  “Wherever I want.”

  Probably a good answer, so he kept his mouth shut and, instead, opened his wallet.

  *

  An hour later, Lola materialized inside the trailer, looking oddly stunned for a moment. Then she eyed Lily smearing numbing gel on Martha’s gums, and murmured, “I’ll be down at the lake.”

  She left the way of mere mortals—using the door.

  Five minutes later, they found her perched on a rock, staring out at the calm water, hands laid primly atop her lap. Usually, Lola was partial to white blouses and billowy skirts, but on that particular day, she’d donned all black like the Jaguars. Whether that had been intentional or not, Lance couldn’t guess. Her long braids practically disappeared in the rich tone, making her look as though her hair was connected to her dress.

  She cut her gaze sideways to Lily, who held Martha, and then looked out at the lake again. “I’ll be brief. There are some who can track me if given enough time to meditate.”

  “And I take it you don’t want to be discovered right now,” Lance said.

  She looked at her watch. “I ask that you keep the contents of this conversation between us for now.”

  “Why?”

  “I will preface this by saying that it is difficult for me to sit here in front of that child who knows nothing of her fate and how doomed she is. I do not know if you can understand the guilt that follows not being able to do more, and thinking that perhaps doing nothing would have been better.”

  “What do you mean, she’s doomed?” Lily asked frantically, holding the child at arm’s length for inspection and shaking her head hard. “What do you know? I didn’t think you were that kind of psychic.”

  Lola waved a dismissive hand in Lily’s direction. “I do not know the future, but I know that child’s constitution. The same as all of them. The fact they have survived for this many centuries… Well. Perhaps I underestimated them.”

  “What’s wrong with them?” Lance asked.

  “I want you to understand that by me telling you this, you will know more about my Jaguars than they know about themselves. They were not supposed to survive this long. There was not supposed to be a second generation.”

  “Tell us,” Lily said. “Estela said there was a ship.”

  Lola nodded curtly. “There was a ship full of human cargo. I was journeying down the coast at the time, seeking isolation from my kind and others. I saw the explosion. The fire. I saw the struggling bodies, still shackled, unable to swim. I…” Her lips flattened into a grim line and fingers fluttered across the end of one of her braids. “I was not supposed to interfere. We never are in matters that do not personally affect us.”

  “But you did.”

  Still staring ahead, Lola grunted and settled her hand back onto her lap. “I pulled some to shore. Young women. By the time I got them there, they were already more dead than not. I respect Death. Where human lives are concerned, I do not prevent Death from doing her work.” Looking at her watch, she added in a whisper, “Tito could confirm that for you.”

  There was probably a story there, and Lance didn’t want to know it. He had enough of his own angst to digest. The cause of most of it was standing six feet away from Lola cuddling a baby that wasn’t hers.

  She would have been in her second trimester—maybe pregnant enough that she couldn’t hide her state from her cousins and her father. Far enough along that people would have expected him to step up, to confess, to take responsibility.

  And he would have.

  He’d tried to, in his own clumsy way. He’d done what he thought was decent, but it wasn’t just that. The animal part of him must have thought the accident was an opportunity. There was no way in hell he would have hooked a woman like Lily otherwise, and he knew it.

  “If I’d been willing to break my code,” Lola said, “I may have been able to do more for them, but—” Lola read her watch and vanished without another word.

  “What the hell is she doing?” Lance asked.

  Lily gave her head a frustrated shake and settled Martha into the crook of her other arm. “You’re asking me, of all people, to make sense of Lola Perez?”

  “She hangs out at the ranch.”

  “She eats at the ranch and brings her granddaughter over to ride the horseys. Lola’s not there to have sleepovers and to dish on all the latest gossip.”

  “Lemme hold the baby. Your wobbling stance says she’s getting heavy.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “I’ve been within smelling distance of her all day. She’s used to me now. I don’t think she’s going to start shrieking.”

  “Well, she’s…keeping my body temp up. Yeah. She’s like a portable space heater.”

  He gave her a few seconds to recant that weak-ass excuse, but she didn’t. “Lily.”

  “As I was saying,” Lola continued. She’d reappeared on the rock without so much as a pop!, zap!, or flash of light like the angels they knew always did. “When I pulled them to the beach, I only gave them enough fire…” She tapped her chest over her heart. “For them to get back to their home. Several Mesoamerican peoples believe that you are from wherever your people are buried. I suppose I believe the same. I assumed they’d have less than two years. Long enough to find a way and make the journey. Before I left them for good, I showed them the new world they’d been brought to. Taught them how to find our foods. Gave the ability to protect themselves as jaguars since their human bodies were so frail. I could not strengthen the human parts of them. Those were too far gone. I could only give them an alternative form that they could draw on as they saw fit.”

  “But they didn’t go home,” Lance guessed.

  “It would seem that they did not.”

  “And obviously, they survived for longer than you’d expected,” Lily said. “Why is that?”

  “There was someone else,” Lola said acidly, “and I believe he is to blame.”

  “Is he…your brother?” Lily asked gently.

  The shake of Lola’s head was almost too subtle to see. “No. He appeared to me as a stranger—a disruptor—and there on that beach, we could not agree on anything. He would have considered the whole of the ship and all of the lives on it acceptable losses—”

  “But because some survived because of you, he decided to make new plans?” Lance asked.

  “Yes. We argued. He thought since they were already there, that they should be given a chance. I told him I could do no more. I believe that they are still here because he added his magic to mine, and far more than he’d said he would. He is not like me and so they have no balance.”

  “They’re unstable?”

  “I would bet on it.”

  “What does that mean?” Lily asked. “What happens to them?”

  Lola splayed her fingers atop her lap and stared down at them, perhaps at the rings she’d chosen for the day. Chunky statement pieces with stones probably older than the rock she was sitting on. “Your young Coyotes approach,” she said. “At the park gate.”

  Shit.

  That meant Lance needed to go fetch them and direct R
egina to parking. He’d hoped they’d be able to head back to Maria in the morning, but if Estela and company didn’t return to fetch Martha and the dog, they wouldn’t have a choice but to stay…or root them out, wherever they were.

  But that didn’t seem right. He didn’t like the idea of hunting down those women to thrust a baby at them when the baby was perfectly content for the moment where she was. The opportunistic coyote inside him even thought, “Hey. Just take her. Lily would be a great mom, remember? I bet she’d be happy. Let’s make her happy,” but fortunately Lance’s head was screwed on a little tighter than most dogs’. He knew what would happen if he and Lily bounced with that kid. Those Jaguars were going to track her to the ends of the earth if they had to and raise hell everywhere they went until they found her.

  If by morning, they weren’t back, he and Lily would have to find them. Period.

  “I have not been following their group closely over these past five hundred years. I am not connected to them in the same way I am to my Cougars because the magic in them is polluted. I can make some guesses, however,” Lola said. “They probably live to around thirty. Thirty-five at the outside. I imagine that is all they have in them because you can’t create a race out of the barely living.”

  “What happens at thirty?” Lance asked. Estela had to be near that if she wasn’t beyond it.

  Lola gave her fingers a brisk snap. “My guess is that they vanish. Perhaps they turn into nightmares like so many lost souls do. Avenging spirits. The fire in them is the sort that feeds on desperation and revenge. That is what I gave them.”

  “You’re hiding from them, aren’t you?” A brazen question, but Lance didn’t care. If he was going to wade into muck of Lola’s making, he wanted to be armed with the full truth arsenal. He couldn’t make good decisions for his safety or Lily’s if he didn’t have the whole truth.

  “Yes and no,” Lola said. “I am not running from them, though I would prefer that they did not find me. I am a relic. There is nothing more I can do for them. There is no one who can save them but themselves.”

  “How?” Lily asked.

  “By doing something they are unlikely to do. In that regard, they have too much of my fire. They may not think the lives they would have if they took that medicine would be as good as they have been accustomed to.”

  “What’s the medicine?”

  Lola turned slightly toward Lily. Not quite looking at her, but seeming to tune into her. “The same you are currently seeking an antidote for, I believe.”

  Nearly all of the blood drained from Lily’s face before Lance caught on to what Lola was talking about.

  She was talking about him and Lily—about their connection…or what passed for one. She’d guessed that they were trying to break it.

  How?

  “Wait,” he said, “nobody knows about that. How do you know about it?”

  One little corner of her mouth kicked up—the closest thing to a smile he’d ever seen on the staid creature. “I do not make trouble. You know this of me. If a thing doesn’t concern my son and his family, I mind my business. I will say only that your scent is in her. Did you intend to do that? I know little of Coyotes.”

  “That’ll go away.”

  Lily moved into his line of vision, eyes blazing with some dark fury he probably deserved.

  Lance’s phone buzzed in his back pocket.

  He grimaced. It was Regina looking for guidance.

  He sent her an “I’ll be there in a sec” text and looked up to find Lily still glowering at him.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked her.

  “Does the scent usually go away, Lance? For the others?”

  “How the hell should I know? I didn’t stick around. I didn’t want them.” He turned to Lola to give her a piece of his mind for stirring up shit between him and Lily, but Lola’s expression became profoundly less serene.

  Genuinely fearing for his life, Lance took a preemptive step away from her.

  Taking a deep breath, Lola looked at her watch. “Leave the Jaguars to drift. I do not believe they will linger unless they have good reason to. They should be transient by nature.”

  “Because their lives are too short,” Lily said. “I see why they wouldn’t want to look for mates. Who needs that kind of trouble, huh? That would probably shorten their lives even more.”

  “Lily,” Lance scolded.

  Lola vanished.

  Lily kicked up sand, heading toward the road up to the campsites.

  “Lily,” he called after her. “Slow down.”

  “For what?”

  “Just let me talk to you, will you? She was obviously trying to divert from the real problem.”

  “So what if she was?”

  “I don’t see how anything she said about me should matter to you.”

  That made her stop and slowly turn. Through clenched teeth, she asked, “But does it matter to you?”

  “You agreed we should get a divorce.”

  “No, I accepted that we would. Just like with the wedding, the divorce was your suggestion. I agreed to the first. I’m only complying with the second. I don’t want to be with anyone who doesn’t want me.”

  “Gods, woman, I never said I didn’t want you. There’s just no fuckin’ way we can make this work. You’re kidding yourself if you think otherwise.” He was shouting and it seemed that before, there’d been no one on the beach, no one caring, no one paying attention, and suddenly there were dozens in the distance, all looking their way.

  Lily’s mouth hung open. Her eyes narrowed into angry slits. Red crept up her cheeks. She closed her mouth and had shaped her lips to say something, but he didn’t want to hear it. He didn’t need any new blows to his ego.

  He took off at a sprint and called back, “I’m going to get Regina. I’ll see you up there.”

  She didn’t respond.

  That was probably for the best.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  “¿Quiénes son ellos?” Blanca asked Lily later that evening as Lily tried to coax French Fry out from under the kitchen table in the trailer. The damned dog didn’t want to budge.

  Knowing what she now knew, it was taking every ounce of self-control Lily possessed not to pepper the woman with questions, starting with, “What the hell was up with Nayeli?” and “Are you going to die soon?”

  She had to be circumspect. Blanca was cheeky and fun and would have fit right in with the messy personalities in Maria who Lily loved so much, but Lola had said the Jaguars were unstable and unpredictable. Lily wasn’t going to push her luck just yet.

  “Who is that?” Lily asked her. “You mean with Lance outside by the road?”

  French Fry kept moving just out of her reach. He’d gotten too comfortable in the trailer and refused to be shooed. Lily really didn’t care one way or another if he was there, as long as she could get some sleep. The day had just been too…extra. She was tired and weak and wanted more than anything to just crawl up into the loft, put her head under a pillow, and snarl into the mattress until sleep took her.

  “Sí. ¿Quiénes son?”

  Lily backed out from under the table. If Blanca wanted the dog, she could get him herself.

  Blanca wasn’t even paying attention to him anymore. She was looking out the window at Lance, Regina, and the boys, who were in the midst of an animated conversation. Lily hadn’t met them yet. She didn’t see why she needed to. After all, she wasn’t in their pack. Lance’s business was his own. She was going to go back to Maria, try to exorcise his funky smell out of her, and mind her business.

  “The lady is the grandmother to one of the boys,” Lily told Blanca. “The boys are Coyotes. Lance came here to fetch them for his pack. Remember when I told you about that a couple of days ago? We were hoping to head home tomorrow.”

  “Ah.” Blanca grunted and tipped Martha’s bottle back a bit for her. The baby was half asleep and had a lazy suckle, but any chance of her sleeping through the night ultimately hinged on how satiated she
was. Her little tank needed to be topped off.

  Why do I even know that?

  At the memory of Lola’s dire prognostication about the Jaguars, Lily’s heart plummeted into her belly. Unless things changed, Martha was doomed to less than half a life. She had to do all her living in that little sliver of time, and Lily wondered if the women were so accustomed to their state that they’d come to believe that was all they needed.

  She couldn’t ask. Couldn’t tip her hand and let them know what she knew.

  There was one thing she could ask, though.

  She cleared her throat and tossed a bit of kibble just beside the table, hoping French Fry would take the bait.

  He didn’t.

  “So…” she said lightly. “Do you date at all? ¿Tienes novio?”

  Please say yes.

  Blanca snorted, and said emphatically, “No.”

  “Why not? You’re pretty and funny and really talented. You haven’t thought about settling down with someone?”

  “Marry?”

  “Yes. Or, you know. Domestic arrangement. Whatever floats your boat.”

  “No. What good for?”

  “Yeah. What good are they, huh?” Lily turned to hide her grimace. Perhaps it was possible Blanca didn’t know. Maybe none of the women knew. She threw out a bit of bait: “Sometimes shifters have to take mates for balancing. To trade off traits that are too dominant.”

  Lance could certainly stand to leach a few, in Lily’s opinion.

  Shoulda left him to suffocate in the van.

  “No-o-o,” Blanca drawled. “We don’t do that.”

  “Why not?”

  “No time.” She turned slowly to Lily and waggled her dark eyebrows. “Can’t make the crafts if we’re on our backs, huh? Be nonstop.” She pursed her lips and did a little shimmy. “Soy irresistible, eh? All the hombres say, ‘Ay, Blanca. Despacito, Blanca. Is too much.’” She snorted but her little smile quickly fell off. She looked sad, and Lily didn’t know what to say that wouldn’t sound corny or patronizing.

  Changing the subject seemed to be the gentle approach.

  “Hey, did you sell a lot at the fair today? Enough to make Estela happy?”

  “Ah, sí. Much more comfy van.” Blanca pantomimed knocking her head against something. “No boxes fall and squish.”