Coyote's Mate

CHAPTER 24

Daylight was riding the mountains as the all-terrain moved over back roads, following satellite imagery of hidden cabins that could possibly be Breed safe houses. There were many in and around Advert, Del-Rey knew, though he didn’t know the locations of each as he should have.

He liked to say Coyotes were lazy and shiftless, that they were more rogues than warriors; otherwise, they’d be Wolves. It wasn’t true. They liked to play the game. They liked to convince the world they were that harmless, but the truth was, they were exacting in their deliberate sloppiness.

“Team one.” The general link opened to his comm. “Alpha, we’ve scoured this side of the mountain,” Brazon reported. “We found two cabins, empty. One with a vacationing family.

Thermal imagery gives us a single adult female, an adult male and two minors. That’s it.”

“Turn north,” he ordered. “There are five cabins on the slope. Thermal tracking picked up smoke from two of them.”

“Heading north,” Blazon acknowledged as Del-Rey propped his elbow on the side of the door and ran his hand wearily over his jaw.

God, where was she? Was she as cold as he was?

He stared at the thick, heavy blanket of snow that covered the mountains around them, and for a moment he was back in time. He was ten, staring out the bars over his windows as he watched the soldiers chain Brim by a collar around his neck, in the middle of a snowstorm.

There had been a doghouse to huddle in. There had been no warmth. The five-year-old Brim had been naked and depending on Del-Rey to save him. Because Del-Rey had sworn he wouldn’t let the boy die.

Brim was blue by the time the soldiers dragged him into the warmth of the cells. He had shaken and shivered for hours as Del-Rey coordinated the Coyotes in the cell so there were two to warm him and the others to hide it.

It had taken him nearly six hours to manipulate the guards and the scientists into deciding to bring him in. There had been so many others he hadn’t been able to save.

What if he couldn’t save his mate now? After the years he had trained to protect his people, would fate laugh in his face and let him fail with his mate?

God, where was she?

“Team six,” he spoke into the comm link. “Any sign?”

“Negative,” the team leader reported. “We have four and five working a grid through town, but nothing’s shown. City council seems to be meeting today. Strange for a Sunday, don’t you think?” the leader mused.

“Keep your eyes open, cover the back roads out of town as well. I want her found.”

“We’ll find her, Alpha,” the team leader swore. “We won’t let our coya go unprotected.”

But they had, and it had been his fault. He should have thought. The animal genetics were too close to the surface. He’d thought the Coyotes that knew him, trusted him, would see what he didn’t tell them. That he was protecting his coya as he protected his brothers. By denying her.

Instead, they had seen suspicion and distrust. She was a human, not a Coyote, and he’d rejected her despite the fact that she was his mate.

“Alpha Delgado, this is Base.” The communications supervisor came on. “Switch to private.”

Del-Rey flipped the link to a private channel, including Brim in the transmission.

“Delgado here.”

“Alpha, we found a transmission, erased. I was able to track it from the coya’s computer.”

“And?”

“Alpha, the transmission originated from her private computer to a public forum and bounced to France. Transmission was to Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Separate identities. Another transmission tracked from Austria to the coya’s line in private chat arranging a meeting and then confirming said meeting for today. I ran the identities myself. Doctors Chernov and Sobolova from the Russian facility. She’s contacted Council scientists. Were you aware of this?”

God love her. He closed his eyes, battling his fears for her. Her drive to protect the Coyotes was going to get her killed.

He thought fast. “You didn’t get that memo?” Protecting her was his prime importance.

“No, Alpha, pack leaders did not receive their memos in regards to this,” the team leader stated soberly. “But there was that communications blackout and shutdown.”

“That explains it.” Del-Rey’s throat felt tight with emotion. “Your coya was contacting doctors she thought would aid our unique genetics.”

“So why meet them alone?” the pack leader asked.

“I don’t know, because she was fucking attacked in her own home?” Del-Rey snarled. “Stop asking me damned questions and find her. I want the location of that meeting.”

“There was reference to a secondary contact, Alpha,” he was told. “The only person she speaks to by phone or link is her family.”

Del-Rey’s eyes narrowed. “Track down her father and those three useless cousins of hers. Find out if they’re where they’re supposed to be, and if not, find out where they went.”

“On it.” The link disconnected as Del-Rey cursed viciously.

“Head to town,” he ordered Brim. “She’s in town or close. She wouldn’t risk a cabin to meet those doctors in. It wouldn’t be secure enough.”

“She’s intelligent,” Brim agreed. “She a strategist as well. She would choose a place she feels she knows, one she thinks she can control.”

Oh yeah, that helped a lot. He’d be damned if he knew where Anya went when she went to town.

“Team three.” He contacted the team that had served as her primary security off base. “List known locations your coya traveled to in town.”

The list was like a fucking map of the town.

“What the hell was she doing in every fricken bar in the damned county?” he snarled, glaring at Brim.

Brim shrugged. “I was with you. Wasn’t my fault. Alpha Gunnar was supposed to supervise that.”

He plowed his hands through his hair as the vehicle surged through the snow that had begun falling again, and headed into the town outside Haven.

He could feel the tension tightening inside him, a sense of fear gripping him whenever he thought of her out there alone, arranging meetings with Council scientists without his protection.

Why hadn’t he paid more attention to her insistence, her fear for the people she called her own?

His arrogance and ignorant pride were cutting at him now. He should have never stripped her of her title, her authority. He should have listened to her.

Hell, she had contacted a ghost when she was sixteen, and walked into a bar filled with the worst humanity had to offer. She had done it bravely, with confidence and courage, and faced him even after he informed her he was going to kill her.

He should have known that courage hadn’t been extinguished. He should have seen her determination to ensure a stable life for the Coyotes. For him and their children.

“We’ll find her, Del-Rey,” Brim repeated. “You can fix what’s been wounded.”

“Can I?” he asked his brother then. “Is there any way to repair what I’ve done to her, Brim? I didn’t just strip her of her status, I stripped her of her pride.”

“And still she came to you every night.” Brim shrugged. “Remember this the next time you’re riding high on your own arrogance, and it will bring you back fast. She’ll forgive you.”

It was a good thing forgiveness wasn’t linked directly to whether or not that forgiveness was deserved. Because Del-Rey knew he, least of all, deserved it.

“We’re moving into town,” Del-Rey announced into the link as he thought of something else.

“Team Leader Four, put two men on that city council meeting. That has my hackles rising for some reason.”

He couldn’t figure out why either. He turned to Brim. “Inform Alpha Gunnar of that little meeting. It’s Sunday for God’s sake. Since when did they start meeting before daylight on a Sunday morning?”

“Good time to do it,” Brim stated. “Wouldn’t be too many to notice it. We don’t patrol town, just the area around Haven.”

Maybe that should change. Maybe some of the money the Coyotes had in their coffers should go toward Breed-friendly politicians in this town.

He grimaced, fighting back his impatience, his fears. He’d find Anya, he told himself. He had to.

There was no other answer acceptable; there was nothing else he could live with.

The cold had seeped into her bones. Anya sat in the small basement of the safe house, huddled in a heated blanket, and wiped her tears away as she glanced at the clock once again.

Three hours before they made the journey from the house to the spa. Del-Rey was surely looking for her by now. What price had Jax paid for the confrontation in the kitchen? Was Cavalier well?

Was Del-Rey warm?

She shuddered at the questions that had tormented her through the night.

They had listened to the heli-jets moving overhead for hours that morning. Satin Belle and her Wolf Breed female enforcers reminded her too much of Ashley. They joked, laughed, did their nails and compared clothes. But Ashley hadn’t joined in.

The younger Coyote Breed female was still silent, her gray eyes hard as she cleaned her weapons. Sharone and Emma had followed suit, checking their weapons, going over their plan and watching the Wolf Breed females closely.

Satin, the obvious leader, was brazen. She was sharp-tongued, sharp-witted and, like all Breed females, so beautiful it almost hurt to look at her.

“We have confirmation Alpha and Lupina Gunnar are in place and prepared for the meeting,”

Satin stated as she finished drying her nails, after listening closely to whatever was going through her comm link. “We have Director Wyatt in town, Alpha Lyons and Alpha Delgado.”

Satin’s brows lifted as she turned to Anya. “He sounds pissed and he sent a message.”

Anya stared back at her.

“He says to tell his coya he made a mistake. It will be rectified the moment she returns.”

Anya shook her head. It was too late; she had gone too far to turn back now, and he would never allow this.

“Respond to his message,” she said painfully. “Say, ‘There is nothing to rectify.’”

Satin stared at her soberly for long moments before nodding and sending the message. A second later her eyes widened, she winced, then cut the link.

“Wow, Coyotes know how to howl,” she stated in awe. “That was a good one.”

Anya flinched. Coyotes howled only in rage as far as she knew.

“Let him howl,” Ashley growled. “This is his fault. Let him suffer.”

“Ashley.” Anya hardened her expression. “This is not his fault. He wanted to protect me.”

“Against what?” she sneered. “His own arrogance? What was there at Base to protect you from except his stupidity?”

She shook her head. “Tonight, I’ll ask that question. When this is over, I want the three of you to return here and stay secure until I know the punishment for this. I won’t have you suffering further.”

“Oh yeah, we’re just going to tuck our little tails and hide under our beds while our coya wades into danger headfirst again,” Ashley snorted. “Get real!”

“That’s an order, Ashley,” she said firmly.

Ashley leaned back. “I didn’t get the memo making you coya again. Technically, that order’s not worth shit, Anya. And even if I had gotten such a memo, you can forget it. Where you go, I go.

Period.”

Anya inhaled roughly before turning to Sharone for help.

“I’ll not be taken from your side again, Coya,” Sharone stated. “Neither will Emma. We’ve discussed this and we agree. Whatever your punishment, we’ll share it.”

Would she have done any less? Anya knew she wouldn’t have, but it hurt to know that by nightfall, she could be sharing space with them in a cell.

“Hey, you gotta be tough to be a cowgirl, Coya,” Satin stated. “Get ready to pony up and ride. I want to be in place ahead of time.”

Anya rubbed at her arms. She had received the message earlier from her father that he and her cousins and the two scientists were in place and waiting to head to their meeting.

The spa on a Sunday was the perfect place to meet. It wasn’t overcrowded, but it drew a fair crowd from surrounding counties. The enclosed gardens were secluded and made for privacy and relaxation. Tea parties were held there as well as private luncheons at the time Anya would be there.

They would slip into the gardens and into the spot they had selected for this meeting. Alpha Gunnar would be given the location once they arrived, and he would move in with his enforcers.

She unwrapped the blanket and struggled to pull her shoes on.

“Coya, let me help.” Emma was there, taking the shoes from her and unlacing them before helping Anya slide them over her feet.

Her entire body screamed in protest at each move. The bruises from her fall, the broken wrist and the wound at her thigh were little when compared to the headache that blazed in her skull.

“Pony up,” she whispered achingly. “I’m tired, Emma.”

Emma stared into Anya’s white face and felt fear curdle in her stomach. She was a Breed that had never known fear until these past days, but she knew it now. Her coya was drained, freezing with a chill, running a fever. Emma could feel her pain, and she could smell something more that she couldn’t put her finger on, something that had her instincts screaming out in warning.

“They’re doctors,” she said, swallowing tightly. “They’ll fix you.”

“Can you fix a broken heart?” Anya asked, her uncasted hand reaching out to lay her palm against Emma’s cheek.

Anya had done that long ago, when they were children, when she had found the girls, dirty, sleeping on rags, naked. She had petted Emma’s face and promised her a bed. She had promised Ashley pretty clothes. She had promised Sharone that one day, she would smile. Anya had kept her promises even at the worst cost to herself.

Emma lifted her hand and touched her coya’s face then. Her friend. Her protector. “One day, you will smile again,” she promised.

The curve of Anya’s lips was sad, almost broken. “I hope you’re right. So.” She breathed in roughly, breaking Emma’s heart as she gathered her courage around her. “Shall we pony up, my friends?”

Satin Belle stared at the little human who fought to pull herself to her feet, despite her exhaustion. She inhaled slowly, made certain her senses weren’t lying to her, then made another call to her alpha.

“Yes?” Gunnar came online as Satin moved into the other room.

“The coya is breeding,” Satin said softly. “I advise against this. We should meet with teams, get her to Haven and take care of this ourselves.”

Gunnar was silent for long moments. “What’s her status?”

“Feverish, weak, extremely pale. I can scent conception, Alpha. I don’t know how her bodyguards are missing it, and it’s sapping her fast. I’ve never seen anything like this.”

“Teams three, eight and ten are converging on your location. Has she told you where she’s meeting the doctors?”

“Not yet. I’ll contact you when we have it and move in then. We can’t wait much longer, she’s going to collapse . . .” She paused.

“Satin?” Wolfe’s voice snapped into the link.

Satin moved to the door, stepped into the main room and cursed at the sight of her two Wolf Breed enforcers unconscious on the floor.

“Son of a bitch,” she cursed. “They’ve flown. My girls are down, I repeat, my girls are down and the others have flown the coop. Get those teams in here now.”

“I knew better than to trust those bitches,” Ashley snarled as she helped Anya sit up in her seat, holding her upright as Sharone maneuvered the car they had stolen the night before from its hidden parking place. “Damn them.”

Anya tried to shake awareness into her head. Something was wrong, she could feel it. She needed Del-Rey. She was so cold her teeth were nearly chattering. She was off balance, feverish.

She couldn’t believe what they overheard. That Wolfe and Hope would betray her. That the Wolf enforcers she had been sent to would be ready to turn her over to security teams so quickly.

Armani was going to be pissed off.

“Something’s wrong with her.” Emma worried. “She’s getting too weak.”

“We’re going to meet with damned Coyote doctors,” Sharone cursed. “They’ll know what’s wrong.”

Anya hoped they did. She felt off balance, dazed. She needed Del-Rey’s touch, but the sexual intensity of the mating heat was missing. She could feel herself inside, crying out for him.

“Call him,” she whispered.

“What?” Ashley’s voice was frantic. “Anya, you have to sit up. You can’t be sick. Tell me what’s wrong.”

She forced her eyes to open. “Call my mate. Call him, Ashley.”

Her eyes widened in distress. “Coya, I don’t have a link,” she whispered. “We didn’t bring links.”

She shook her head. “When we reach the spa, take me to my papa and call my mate. I need my mate. Now.”

“We need to find Del-Rey,” Sharone insisted. “The meeting is only an hour away; we’ll have just enough time to get in place.”

“There are Breeds scouring the city,” Emma hissed. “Let me out. I’ll find a team and radio Del-Rey. What’s wrong with her?”

Anya could feel fear skating over her now. She shuddered, shook with it. She needed his touch desperately. She felt as though she were going to die without it.

She inhaled roughly. “The spa,” she said again. God, she could surely make it that far. “Get me there. Call from there. I need Del-Rey.”

“We’re nearing the spa, Coya,” Sharone answered, worry thickening her voice. “We’ll call him from there, I swear it.”

Del-Rey lost control at Satin’s message. His mate was pregnant and she was without him. She was ill, feverish, reacting with the same symptoms as a Coyote Breed with a life-threatening wound.

“Find her.” He turned on Brim. “Find her now.”

Brim was staring around the street they were on, his expression intense, furious.

“She would go somewhere she thought was safe,” Brim muttered. “A place she could feel comfortable and protected in without her security force.”

“Where?” Del-Rey snarled.

“The spa.” They turned on Jax where he sat in the backseat with Cavalier.

“What?”

Jax swallowed tightly. “Her security force could only surround the spa. They couldn’t go in.

Women only. Out back is a huge garden area. Secluded little places for lunches and stuff, all kinds of evergreens and sheltered grottos. They went there a lot. All-day trips.”

“Edge of town.” Brim hit the gas. “That fucking spa. We had a dozen reports from the team leaders of her security force concerning their inability to adequately protect her there.”

“She’s a fucking woman. Women like spas,” Del-Rey snarled. “I had it on the list to disapprove when Wolfe called laughing at me and asking about flowers for my funeral. They like to be girly.

They can’t be girly with a man hovering over them.” He repeated Wolfe’s words.

“Get there,” Del-Rey ordered. “Get there now. Those city council members managed to slip past the two men we had on them. My fucking neck is itching, Brim.”

“Alpha, this is Communications,” a voice barked at his ear. “Sofia has the identity of our problem but lost sight of it. Subject of interest is missing. Estimated flight at an hour and a half.

Sofia is trying to track but we fear he’s headed to your location. I’m sorry, Alpha, we lost him in the confusion here.”

Fuck. Fuck. Sofia had finally found the spy in Base, only to have him slip free. Enduring the pain her presence brought to Anya had been bad enough. Sofia was brash, angry that Anya had refused him eight months before, but she had been his only chance to identify that leak. She had played the disgruntled and rebuffed lover, when nothing had been further from the truth. She had played it too far. And now Anya was paying the price.

“Find them,” he growled. “Find them now.”

He looked at Brim, fear eroding his control further. “The city council’s going after her. They know where the meeting is; they won’t bother kidnapping her—they’ll kill her.”

The vehicle’s speed increased as Brim cursed.

Del-Rey clenched his fingers around the weapon he carried and clenched his teeth in rage. He’d known there was a leak in Base. The attack on Anya that night in the mountains had begun his suspicions. Only a member of the base would have known her schedule, her habits. And only one that worked Communications would have been able to give out the locator codes on the comm links.

He had been betrayed from within. Being careful, cunning, weeding the chaff from the harvest hadn’t worked in this case. He’d chosen the wrong Breed and placed him in the wrong team.

Once again, he’d failed his mate.

He ran his hand over his face, wiped away the sweat and swore he could feel himself bleeding on the inside. Anya was suffering, ill and carrying the child he knew she had ached to give him once she had gone off the hormonal therapy.

As though that child meant more to him than she did. She couldn’t know that nothing meant more to him than she did, because he hadn’t shown her that. He hadn’t proven it with his love.

And now she didn’t trust him enough to have him at her side.