Grinding for the Coyote

by Serenity Snow

  “How many people were recruited from here to help?” Sam demanded. He might not be able to tell her who they were, but if anyone was going to be able to get closer to them, it would be someone who worked at the club.

  That someone was going to die for fucking with her mate and her pack.

  “Darden recruited some old packmates who left the pack when our old alpha was killed by the current one. He also brought in a couple of dancers from a club where Wolf works.”

  “Names?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Donna, Daffodil, Curtis, Randall, Cargo, and Kerri are all I knew about.”

  “Cargo’s a bodyguard for Sorrento,” Mica muttered. “He’ll never own it.”

  “Of course not,” Mallory murmured. “Finish up with him and hand him over to Jenner.”

  “They’ll kill me,” he exclaimed.

  “Then, you’ll be dead,” Sam said coldly.

  ****

  “Hey, Adalyn.”

  Adalyn jumped guiltily at the sound of Sydney’s voice. She hurriedly closed the book and turned it over, so she couldn’t see the title. “Hi.”

  Sydney smiled as she eyed the book. “Light reading?”

  Adalyn got to her feet. “I was just—I—”

  Sydney waved a hand. “It’s not my study,” she said. “I was just checking up on you. Sam called and you didn’t answer. She was worried.”

  “Oh.”

  “She’s on her way home.”

  “Okay.”

  “What are you reading?” Sydney asked.

  “Oh, uh, just a book.” She waved it before putting it on the couch next to her.

  Sydney nodded. “Did you find what you were looking for in there?”

  She bit down on her bottom lip and looked down at the book briefly. She’d been reading a long time and had found some interesting things.

  “It’s just a book.”

  “How are you holding up? I mean learning that shifters exist has to have been trying.”

  She shrugged. “I think the hardest part is having them come after me,” Adalyn said quietly.

  “Our world has more challenges than the norm, but we aren’t any less capable of love and compassion, Adalyn,” Sydney told her.

  “I know.” She didn’t believe Samarra was incapable of love or compassion. She thought Samarra was afraid of falling in love with her.

  “I have to get ready for work, but I won’t leave until Sam gets here. If you need me just call.”

  “Okay.” Did she think someone would attempt to break in? She’d never noticed Samarra deactivating an alarm.

  Adalyn got to her feet and replaced the book as soon as Sydney was gone and headed to her room. She wanted to keep the book to read later, but she figured Sydney would tell Samarra she’d been in here. Adalyn had just gotten so absorbed in the information she hadn’t been able to put it down.

  She’d found answers to lingering questions about the mark on her. According to the writer, it was believed humans with the mark like her had some shifter genes deep in their family tree, but they’d been submerged over time, and they could no longer shift. However, they did carry the genes that produced shifter children when the other parent was a shifter.

  The strangest part was the mention of mates and their psychic powers. The writer had described her ability to shield and to hide undetected by other shifters to a T. The energy was said to be the coyote’s strength and determination culled into psychic ability giving human usable by the human unable to shift the same prowess just in a different form.

  If the human was well taught, she could shape the energy for defense into balls or other shapes.

  The coya was a female coyote and the term shadow applied to the coyote’s link with the dark nature of the animal. Those who embraced that part of themselves were fierce fighters, difficult to heal, and long-lived.

  In her bedroom, Adalyn set about putting the clothes away and was wondering if she could get another look at the book. There was still so much more she needed to learn about Samarra’s heritage especially since apparently they had some part of it in common.

  “Hi.”

  She smiled. “You saw a doctor,” Adalyn said. She’d changed and she didn’t look pale.

  “Yes.”

  “I’m glad you realized it wasn’t just a scratch,” she teased.

  Sam grunted. “It wasn’t that bad,” she murmured as her gaze slid over Adalyn. “Sorry I was gone so long. I had to take care of some business.”

  Sam looked a little tense and Adalyn wondered what she’d been doing. “Something came up at the club?”

  “Sort of,” Sam replied moving toward her now. “Reading. Did you find what you needed?”

  “Are you mad?” She winced.

  Samarra shook her head as she reached her and caressed her face. “Why would I be?”

  “Maybe there were books you didn’t want me to see,” she answered, swaying toward Sam. She loved the way she smelled and the way her hands felt stroking her skin.

  “I don’t have anything to hide, especially from you,” Sam said.

  Samarra wouldn’t just open up to her about what she was, and Adalyn didn’t blame her. But she needed to know what she was walking into.

  “I was thinking.” She slid her hands up Samarra’s chest, fingers brushing the curves of her breasts before she rested her hands on her shoulders.

  “About what?” Sam asked softly.

  “Us,” she said deciding to take the leap she wouldn’t have dared take two days ago. Her heart pounded hard now, and her stomach clenched with her fear. Sam cocked her head to one side, gaze curious.

  “Oh.” She withdrew her hands and pushed them into the pockets of her pants. “What about us?”

  She swallowed and leaned into Sam despite her withdrawal from her. One of them had to do this and she may as well be the one since she was the one putting her heart on the line.

  “I—” She licked her lips. “I was thinking I’d accept your offer to stay here until I found another place.”

  Sam shrugged. “I’m glad.”

  Okay. She closed her eyes briefly as she gathered her courage. “Does it hurt when you change?” Adalyn asked. That wasn’t what she’d meant to say.

  “A little.”

  “Show me? I want to see you in your animal form.”

  Sam studied her for a long time before stepping away from her and Adalyn sighed thinking she wouldn’t show her. She really needed this but she wouldn’t push. Maybe Sam didn’t want her to see her that way.

  Then she shifted.

  The colors of the shift were deep purple with a hint of pink and then a gray coyote stood before her looking like a German Sheppard. The animal didn’t move but sat down and waited for Adalyn.

  Sam’s fur varied in shades of gray and her underbelly looked white. Her blue eyes were intelligent and bright.

  Adalyn closed the distance and rubbed the animal’s head tentatively. She was beautiful and soft. “You’re so pretty, Samarra.”

  Sam barked and Adalyn jumped. Sam nuzzled her hip.

  “I bet you’d keep a girl warm on a cold night,” she teased and Sam licked her hand. Adalyn laughed.

  Sam changed back. “Did seeing me like that ease your fears?”

  “Actually, I was never afraid of you,” she said. “I feel too much for you for fear.”

  “Adalyn, don’t,” she said in a warning tone.

  “I fell slowly in love with you over the last three months, and I’m only falling deeper now,” she said softly.

  “I’m not a cuddly plush toy,” Sam snapped. “You can’t just stand here and tell me that and expect me to let you go.”

  “I don’t want to go anywhere,” Adalyn said. “And I don’t want to be just the woman you turn to once a month to scratch your itch. I want to be your mate with all the rights and privileges it entails.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Sam held her gaze and Adalyn saw the shock in her eyes before she looked
away wiping a hand over her mouth. Adalyn watched her, her own breathing coming harshly, shoulders rising and falling quickly.

  “Adalyn you shouldn’t say things like that,” Sam told her roughly. “The animal won’t let you go if we claim you.”

  Adalyn laughed. “I just told you I didn’t want to leave.”

  Sam swallowed convulsively. “I—” A rap at the door interrupted her sentence. She cursed. “Syd, you’re supposed to be at work.”

  Sydney peeked inside. “Jen wants to talk to you,” she said quietly. “He’s on the phone.”

  “I’ll be right back,” Sam told Adalyn.

  Adalyn frowned. “She better mean Jenner, the cop,” Adalyn muttered.

  “It is,” Sam told her as she headed out the door.

  Adalyn stood where she was, hoping Samarra was merely surprised by her words despite their conversation earlier today. If Samarra didn’t want to commit to her it would break her heart, and she certainly couldn’t stay with her.

  ****

  “What did he say? Sydney asked.

  “He said the cop is bad news,” she answered. “He’s been suspended pending an investigation. They think he might have killed his partner.”

  She shook her head. “What about the Agent Rusk?” she asked. “My intel says she’s good.”

  “She’s good and dead,” Sam told her grimly. “He thinks the cop killed her. He found her in her motel room an hour ago with three bullets in her. Sang shot her in the back.”

  “He knew what she was,” Sydney mused. “If only we had the file.”

  “We will have it,” Sam answered in a hard tone. “I have Aisha working on it.”

  “What do you mean?” she frowned.

  “Addy sent it to her boss’s email. She told me what it was and I got Aisha to hack it while Addy tried on clothes today.”

  Sydney nodded. “Mal called to tell me about the interrogation. We have to close and then deal with Sorrento.”

  Sam shrugged. “That’s the plan.”

  “I’ll talk to you later,” she said. “Mal wants me at the club.”

  Sam went back to Adalyn’s bedroom to find her sitting on the bed. Adalyn looked at her.

  “Where’s the washer?”

  “I’ll show you,” Sam answered.

  Adalyn got to her feet and gathered up the lingerie and nightgowns. “I’ll need to have some of these things cleaned.”

  “We’ll take care of it Monday.”

  She nodded. “Samarra, I don’t want you to feel like you have to be with me because I put my feelings out there, okay? Don’t tell me you want me and then break my heart day-by-day a lie at a time.”

  She shook her head. “I couldn’t do that to you, darlin’,” she told her. “I’d never bother playing you that way.”

  “The first time you lie to me, I’ll let it go, the second time, I’ll get some tranquilizers and shoot you in the ass when you go out to run so you can’t go see her. The third time, I’ll just leave.”

  Sam gave her a skeptical look. “Where you figuring on getting the tranqs?”

  “Sydney.” She shrugged.

  “Okay. See the scary part is she’d get them for you,” Sam said as she closed the distance between them. “I’m in love with you too.”

  “Then, don’t lie to me and don’t keep things from me,” Adalyn said coldly. “I’m not a child, so tell me what the cop wanted.”

  “You really want to know this?” Sam cupped Adalyn’s face between her hands.

  “Yes.”

  Samarra told her what she’d just told Sydney. “If it comes down it, which it usually does in our world, I’ll track them and kill them. That way they’ll no longer be a threat to you.”

  Adalyn wrapped an arm around her neck. She wasn’t going to get used to this kind of justice, but she’d learn to understand it.

  “I don’t want you killing unless you have too.”

  “A—”

  “No.” She put a finger to Sam’s lips. “I understand you’ll have to sometimes but this might not be one of those times. Let law enforcement handle it.”

  She opened her mouth to speak and Adalyn rose on tip toe to kiss her into silence.

  Their tongues tangled in a hot lazy kiss that curled Adalyn’s toes against the carpet. She sighed curving her arm around Sam’s neck as Sam deepened the kiss.

  “Samarra, I need you,” Adalyn said as she clenched her hands in Samarra’s shirt. She pulled the shirt from her pants and ran her hand under the fabric to find skin and lace. She scrubbed her hands up her lover’s back.

  Sam broke the kiss to tug her shirt over her head. She tossed it aside and Adalyn smiled.

  “I love the color of your skin,” she murmured. “Can I touch you?”

  “Touch me, darlin’,” Sam urged. I want your hands on me.”

  Adalyn trailed kisses from Sam’s collarbone to her shoulder. She nipped her skin lightly and Sam growled.

  “Harder,” she commanded. Adalyn kissed Sam’s warm skin with her tongue and then bit her harder. “Just like that.”

  Adalyn ran her hands down Sam’s back before gripping her hips as she kissed the top of one mound. She reached around to unhook Sam’s bra and pushed it aside to flick her tongue over a taut peak. She closed her lips over the tip and sucked.

  “Yes,” Sam rasped the word out.

  Adalyn trailed a finger down the placket of Sam’s pants and moaned as she felt the dildo beneath her hand. She lashed the tight bud of Sam’s nipple before sucking it harder and then moving on to its twin.

  “Adalyn, darlin’, you’re driving me crazy,” Sam said and growled low in her throat as she pushed her fingers into Adalyn’s hair.

  Adalyn flicked the nipple again as she undid Samarra’s leather belt then the button of her pants. She caught the nipple between her teeth to the tune of a harsh gust of air before blowing over the turgid peak as she pushed her hand inside Samarra’s briefs. Her fingers wrapped around the dildo.

  “Addy, let’s get rid of some of these clothes.” Samarra ripped Adalyn’s shirt up and Adalyn lifted her hands allowing Sam to peel it away.

  Cool air kissed her skin and she sighed. She was on fire, her skin burning. Sam kissed her again as she palmed Adalyn’s breasts before releasing the clasp of her bra.

  She brushed the straps down Adalyn’s arms and gave one firm mound a light slap and then dipped her head to bite the fleshy curve before spearing the rosy nipple. Then, she took it between her teeth and tugged lightly.

  Pleasure rolled through her and Adalyn hissed and pushed her fingers into her lover’s hair. Sam laved the tight bud and sucked it as she pinched its twin. The effect was a delicious kiss of sensation that made her juices flow from her.

  “I love the way that feels,” Adalyn panted out.

  Sam licked over the twin as she plucked the vacated nipple. Her tongue glided around the areola before her teeth scraped at the little tip. She sucked it hard, her cheeks hollowing.

  “Samarra!”

  Sam gave her breast a light swat before she straightened and turned Adalyn to face the bed. “Put your hands on it.”

  Adalyn put her hands on the mattress wondering what Sam had planned and then she knew. Sam was peeling her cotton lounge pants and panties down and delivering a light swat to her ass. She gasped as the sting slithered through her. Sam dropped her hand on her left butt cheek sending a ripple of pleasure through her with the hard tap. She repeated the action on her right cheek before hitting her harder.

  “Mmm,” Adalyn moaned.

  Sam kissed the back of her neck before whispering, “I love it too.” She gave her another tap before trailing kisses down her back. She bit the curve of her ass and then drew her tongue along the slit of her pussy.

  Adalyn shivered. Two fingers opened her and a wet tongue speared her clit, circled it. Then a thumb stroked over the pulsing button lightly while Sam pushed her tongue inside her.

  Adalyn closed her eyes and groaned roughly. “Oh baby, yes,�
�� she cried and worked her hips trying to get Sam’s finger at just the right angle.

  Sam licked along her labia taking sticky juices into her mouth before thrusting her tongue into Adalyn’s pussy. At the same time she rubbed her finger around her clit before stroking it.

  “Samarra, please,” she cried.

  Sam withdrew from her and Adalyn moaned in frustration. A moment later a hard tap stung her ass before Sam moved closer and positioned the head of her dildo at the entrance of Adalyn’s body.

  Adalyn shuddered, her breathing ragged, and her skin damp. Sam slowly slid into her tight clasp, parting the tight tissues. Adalyn gripped the sheets, eyes closed as sensation washed over her. She caught her bottom lip between her teeth as Sam glided deeper into her.

  “I love this,” Adalyn moaned and reached back to stroke one hand along Sam’s jaw. “Samarra, what you do to me is indescribable.”

  Sam kissed the side of Adalyn’s neck and gripped her hips tighter and filled her completely. Adalyn sighed roughly. Samarra took her with slow, rhythmic strokes as she used one hand to work Adalyn’s clit. The pressure of her fingers was light, almost a teasing caress that kept her burning as Sam took her higher.

  “Oh hell, it’s so good,” Adalyn cried as she thrust back to meet Sam’s thrust while her nails dug into the back of Sam’s hand as she worked her clit. “Oh, God!”

  “Adalyn,” Sam rasped out her name as she drove faster into Adalyn. Sam gave her clit a hard tap and Adalyn’s body jerked.

  “Uh-ahh!” Adalyn let out a hard cry as her orgasm took her over.

  Behind her Samarra’s cry was harder as she came too.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Adalyn rolled onto her back, breathing hard, and she reached for her lover. Samarra pulled her into a sitting position and kissed her softly.

  “I love you, Samarra,” she murmured and collapsed onto her back on the bed. Adalyn waited for Samarra to say something when she didn’t Adalyn tensed.

  “Adalyn,” she said softly as she sat down on the bed. “You touch places inside me I never thought I’d let anyone reach again.” Sam caressed her stomach. “It scares me how much power you have over me.”

  Adalyn sat up, hope taking wing inside her. Something that had only been meant to be a fling could become so much more if Samarra didn’t run from her. “You’re safe with me, Samarra.” She caressed her cheek. “I promise.”