An Inconvenient Mate

by Lora Leigh

  makes you think you can claim the tie whenever it suits you to do so, while keeping it a secret at any other time?”

  He watched the commander coolly, wondering at the difficulty the other Breed intended to give him where Isabelle was concerned. Where his mate was concerned.

  His entire body tightened at the thought, his eyes narrowing back at the commander. “She’s mine,” he stated, attempting to keep the confrontation out of his tone. “Don’t get between us, Rule.”

  “I’m not the one you have to worry about and we don’t have time for this anyway.” Rule speared him with a hard look. “My point is that you’re integral to this negotiation, Malachi. I can’t afford to have your attention divided.”

  Malachi arched his brows. “Sorry to inconvenience you, commander. I’ll be sure to delay it just for you.”

  Rule grunted at the sarcasm. “Inconvenience is exactly what it is. Can’t you just stay the hell away from her for a while? Surely it’s not painful yet? Hell, you didn’t even kiss her yet. It can’t be that bad.”

  Malachi stared back at him in disbelief, just as Stygian and Ashley were doing.

  “Wow, that’s raw, Rule,” Ashley murmured as she lounged back in the chair she had plopped into earlier. “Do you think maybe we should schedule mating, like you schedule training sessions and stuff? That way, it wouldn’t disturb your schedule near so much.”

  “I can only wish it were so easy,” Rule grunted as though unaware she had just sliced at his attitude with the sharp edge of her tongue.

  “Her room number,” Malachi stated rather than objecting or challenging the other Breed.

  Rule glared back at him. “If you go to her tonight, you know what’s going to happen. Give me a break here, Coyote. At least wait until we’ve found the bastard slicing Council and research scientists to shreds. Just if you don’t mind.”

  Malachi lifted his brow. “Evidently I do mind. Do I have to call downstairs and give my security clearance to get her room number? I will if you don’t turn it over in the next three seconds.”

  He wasn’t going to argue, growl or challenge. He didn’t need the commander to get what he wanted. It would have simply been easier.

  Rule watched him, his blue eyes icy, no doubt looking for a sign of weakness. Rule might be the commander on this mission, but he had no authority over any Breed when it came to mating heat.

  The commander had changed over the past month too, Malachi thought. A change that had begun even before his twin had begun carrying the mating scent and drawing back from active status. Even though Lawe hadn’t claimed his mate, he had still shown his awareness of her by taking himself out of active mission status.

  Rule Breaker and Lawe Justice had always fought together, even in the labs they had been created and trained in. They had covered each other’s backs, taken bullets for each other and made certain each was protected while ensuring each mission went off in synchronized perfection.

  Had the commander changed because his other biological half was no longer there to cover him? It seemed rather hard to believe, especially considering the fact that at times they had fought separately over the past few years and performed with the same stone cold precision as they did together. Anything was possible, but Malachi didn’t consider this one probable.

  “Five forty-two,” Rule growled. “She’s just across the fucking hall from you. Now, will you at least consider my request that you wait twenty-four hours? Mating heat and negotiations with your mate’s uncle doesn’t go hand in hand, Malachi.”

  “The candle room.” Ashley’s tone echoed with interest now as she sat up in her chair, ignoring the rest of Rule’s statement.

  “Damn,” Stygian growled. “I don’t know what scent she was using when we came up the hall, but it was so damned sexy I think even I was aroused.”

  “The one she used later was just as good. I don’t know where she got those candles, but the coya would seriously love the person who made them. They smelled like heaven last night. I swear, the scent of lavender had me sleeping like a baby,” Ashley sighed.

  And that was nothing less than the truth. The scent of those candles had taken out the stale, acrid scent of too many strangers tracking after one another in the hotel. It was a hotel scent, one all hotels carried and all Breeds found unpleasant. But the candles’ scent later in the night had been relaxing, a soothing blend that had eased Malachi as well, just as the earlier one had been so evocative of sex and seduction that it had intensified his arousal. He should have known the scent was coming from his mate’s room. He should have realized she hadn’t run far.

  “Hey Mal-baby, make sure you find out where she got them,” Ashley pleaded prettily. “So I can get some for the coya.”

  Ashley’s coya, who was Malachi’s as well, was the much loved, in some cases revered, female alpha of the Coyote packs.

  “We need all our senses alert for this meeting.” Rule sighed, casting Malachi another hard glare. “Lawe will be arriving within days, and when he does, our mission here will begin in earnest. Mating her now will only endanger her.”

  Malachi felt something shift inside him. A dark edge of primal denial raising its head with a shift in the calm he normally kept himself centered with.

  “She’s already in danger.” He knew it. Had sensed it. But it had only been after her friend had whispered something to her and her gaze suddenly raked the room with a flash of terror in the cobalt blue depths.

  “You don’t know that, Malachi.” Despite his denial, Rule tensed further, his tone becoming darker.

  “Something frightened her, sent a particular scent of fear rising from her,” Malachi stated as he straightened from the wall he had been leaning against, angry tension making him restless. “A fear I’ve only scented after our women were raped in the labs.”

  The three Breeds he faced came to instant attention then.

  A low growl rumbled in Stygian’s throat. Ashley’s gray eyes narrowed, her hand dropping to the knife sheathed to her thigh as she rose slowly to her feet, but it was Rule’s reaction that, despite the genetic tie to Isabelle, still surprised him.

  His lips flattened, nostrils flaring as he flexed his fingers against the arms of the fine leather chair he sat in. Rage flashed in his ice blue eyes, burning like a cold flame before Rule managed to quickly bank the emotion.

  The battle for control was short, but obviously difficult. Turning his head slowly, the commander flashed Ashley a look as the corner of his lip lifted, flashing a wicked sharp canine as a rumbled snarl vibrated in his chest.

  “I have the room two doors down from her,” Ashley stated, her gaze savage as she gave Rule a sharp nod. “Emma is two doors the other way. Trust me, no one will harm her while she’s in her room.”

  Malachi and Stygian were both across from her.

  And Rule expected him to stay away from her?

  His mate?

  His mate who carried the scent of fear and of a woman’s soul scarred in one of the worst ways possible?

  Did he have the strength? Malachi knew there was no way he could stay away from her for more than a few hours. The hunger for her was throbbing, not just in his cock, but in his chest. The protective fury that had begun building the second he had seen that terror on her face was hardening inside him.

  She belonged to him. Her life was now tied to his and vice versa. Her health, her happiness, her pleasure, was now his responsibility. And if Malachi knew one thing, it was how to fulfill his responsibilities.

  “Her sister, Chelsea, is in the room connecting to hers, and her friend, Liza, in the one on the other side of her.” Rule returned to the e-pad, pulling up information as he spoke before lifting his gaze to Ashley once more. “I want a report on her and her friends by morning, and I want to know by God what it is she fears.”

  “And the other information you wanted me to gather?” Ashley asked.

  The information on four young women, two of which could possibly be the two women the Breeds had bee
n searching so desperately for.

  “It can wait,” Rule decided. “It’s waited for twelve years now, it can wait another day to begin the search. Lawe should be here within the next two nights and we expect our suspect to arrive tonight, if he’s not already here. At the latest, he’ll arrive either just ahead or behind Lawe and Diane. I rather doubt we’re going to have time to complete our mission as well as his before he arrives.”

  Their mission was to receive acceptance by the Navajo Council chief and it’s head advisor to conduct the search for a Breed that had been systematically killing scientists and researchers attached to the Genetics Council and to a pharmaceutical research company tied to Breed testing and research.

  Ashley nodded firmly. “It shouldn’t take more than a few hours to get the information on them. They’re well known enough they shouldn’t be able to hide much of their lives.”

  But Malachi was already ahead of her. He didn’t play one-up by informing Rule he had this covered. Let the commander play first cousin, he would turn down no help in protecting his mate.

  But neither would he ever depend upon others to protect her either.

  “The meetings should end about noon tomorrow.” Rule lifted his gaze to Malachi now. “Just in time for Lawe and Diane’s arrival two days from now. Protect her, learn what danger stalks her. But mating her before Lawe arrives is out of the question, Malachi.” The order in his tone was clear. “After that, I can ensure both your protection and have another team in to cover your duties. Until then, for all our sakes, for your mate’s sake, we need to make the mission priority.”

  Malachi nodded sharply. He didn’t argue. He wasn’t one to stand and debate or rage, and he sure as hell wasn’t above lying if the situation called for it. He was, after all, a Coyote Breed. They took the path of least resistance whenever possible. Fighting and raging when they could achieve their objectives in a more efficient manner didn’t seem logical. And Malachi in particular had always felt it best to move around an obstacle rather than punching his way through it.

  He ignored Rule’s suspicious look. Rule wasn’t a stupid man, and he’d known Malachi long enough to know that it wouldn’t matter the order given where his mate was concerned, Malachi would do as he felt best.

  The commander had this night, and this night only, and he had it only because Malachi had promised his mate a sensual little game. A game he was certain she had no idea of the rules. A game that neither of them would lose, because once he caught her, the pleasure would change both their lives.

  And they would both win.

  Chapter Three

  I was here, and I was searching, always knowing somewhere, you waited.

  Wait. Why in the hell had he given in to Rule’s request and in to that so-called “head start” his mate had played for?

  Dumb ass. His alpha had always said Malachi’s sense of fair play was overrated. The next morning he was beginning to believe him.

  The horniness was killing him.

  All he could think about was the woman. His mate.

  He was supposed to be thinking about his job, not fucking her until they both collapsed in exhaustion.

  He was giving her the game though.

  A sensual little note beneath her door last night, written himself. “My bed was cold without you to share it. I found you love, are you certain you need more time. MM”

  Would it be enough to satisfy her? If not, there was always the small gold charm he had arranged to have delivered to her. That of a single curved tooth, to match the emblem on the side of his mission suit as well as his enforcer uniform. A token of his knowledge of what she was to him. His mate. Though he knew she wouldn’t realize that until he actually had her beneath him.

  Pacing the room, his dick throbbing, his tongue swollen, Malachi struggled to keep his attention on the live video feed from the conference room. The human participants were unaware of the eyes that watched and were attempting to dissect every move and every word.

  It was all he could do to keep his eyes off the woman, though.

  Off his mate.

  She was exquisite.

  So exquisitely not perfect that she had every dream he had ever dreamed of what his mate would be paling in comparison.

  Breed females were perfect in every way. They were created to be just that, perfect. To mesmerize men, to lower their enemies’ guard and heighten their senses. They were created to ensure the males they focused their attention on became willing sexual slaves to their beauty and to their sexual prowess.

  Isabelle Martinez was such a polar opposite to what was supposed to be his perfect match that he could only feel a surge of immeasurable pride.

  He had spent the night immersed in learning all he could about the woman he knew was his mate. He should have been researching those Rule was meeting with, but he’d been unable to get past Isabelle. Or the fact that he had found his mate in this place, at this time. As Rule said, a very inconvenient mating.

  His inconvenient little mate.

  He grinned at the thought.

  A touch so simple as the nip to her ear had cemented what he had known before she had even walked across the room. An exchange so minimal as to be nonexistent in the sharing of a drink, and the glands beneath his tongue had begun swelling with mating hormone almost immediately. The spicy taste in his mouth, the surge of lust that tightened his dick and had his body aching for her, was wearing on his self-control.

  But he had known as his eyes met hers across the room, as he’d sensed a hunger that matched his own, rising inside her, what she would be to him.

  Her promise to bite his chest had that particular part of his anatomy aching to feel her sharp little teeth.

  And he wasn’t joking. Once he got his hands on her, he was going to fuck her for a week. Night and day. He was going to keep his cock buried so tight and so deep inside her that even the thought of releasing her would have her crying out in denial.

  He’d elected to watch the meeting via live feed rather than being at the meeting. There was no way he could have kept his hands off her. No way he would have lasted through the meeting. He would have dragged her out of there within minutes and not long afterwards, she would have been screaming his name in pleasure.

  That wouldn’t exactly inspire her family to give the Breeds the permission they needed to conduct a search on Navajo Nation property.

  “She’s pretty.”

  He’d heard Ashley enter the room, but she was at his side before he’d realized she had the time to get there.

  “Thank you,” he murmured, feeling that surge of pride again.

  She was pretty. So very very fucking pretty.

  The compliment might have seemed lacking, but Malachi found no fault with it. The last thing he wanted was perfection or true beauty.

  Pretty, though, pretty was warm and compassionate. It was filled with mercy, and with gentleness. Just as his mate was filled with it.

  Everything he’d learned about her assured him that his initial perception of her was right on the money.

  “She has a loyal sister and a good friend in Liza as well,” Ashley assured him. “Neither of them were needed after the meeting started. I just had lunch with them, and neither of them are willing to discuss that scent of fear she carries. They refuse to betray her.”

  “But they admit she has reason to fear?” he asked her.

  Ashley shrugged.

  Malachi caught the movement from the corner of his eyes before turning his full attention to her.

  “Let’s say, I know the reason is there,” she told him as he glared down at her. “They’re clamming up each time I mention it, but even I can sense it, just as Stygian admits to scenting it before she left the table the night before and moved across the room to you. It was just for a second, though. As though the thought of something had frightened her.”

  He turned back to the screen that displayed the conference in the meeting room which was being held on the secured twenty-fifth floor that t
heir rooms were on as well.

  Isabelle sat calmly at her uncle’s side as Rule argued for permission for the Bureau of Breed Affairs to conduct an official search on Navajo land and asked for the cooperation of the Navajo Nation Council in finding the rogue Breed that Rule stated they suspected was in the area.

  The truth was, they knew he was headed there, if he hadn’t already arrived. A bloodthirsty murderous Breed who had sliced a path of death and horror through the few remaining research scientists who had worked for the drug manufacturer Phillip Brandenmore before his death.

  “It’s hard to promise cooperation, Commander Breaker, when we have no idea who or what this Breed is that you search for, or his genetic ties to the Nation. You’ve also shown no proof of his crimes and are unwilling to give us full disclosure of why you believe he’s here. He must have a reason for being in our territory at this time. Added to that, you have no way of identifying this rogue Breed. It’s like asking Russia to let you into their secret service files because a murderer used a knife specific to the USSR.” Ray Martinez watched Rule closely, as though already suspecting the deception Rule was practicing.

  And how could they suspect it if they didn’t something to hide?

  “Just as it’s difficult for us to make the request, because we don’t have the information you’re requesting, Councilman Martinez. And I assure you, the rogue we’re after has had far more time to devise ways of killing his intended victims and avoiding us, unless we find a link back to him.” Rule sighed as he stared across the table at the chief of the Navajo Nation. “I’m not asking for more than I’m willing to give, sirs. We’ll keep you informed every step of the way, but we need the freedom to conduct our investigation before he kills again. And he has every intention of killing again.”

  “Who does he intend to kill? We have no Council scientists or researchers here. We have no one in the Nation who could be a target to such a man.” Orin Martinez, the Navajo spirit advisor, spoke up, his gaze a endless deep dark blue as he glanced toward the eye of the camera supposedly recording the meetings.

  For the briefest moment, Malachi had a sense that this particular human was well aware of any strange electronics around him, before focusing his attention back to the Navajo leader.

  Tall, broad, his graying black hair straight and long where it was tied back at his nape, Ray Martinez was a confident, powerful man for his age of sixty-five.

  He was in his second four-year term as chief of the Navajo Nation, and through the six years he had guided the Nation so far, he had kept the promises he had made to solidify the Nation and ensure its prosperity.

  The Nation was gaining a powerful presence in the White House as well with the Navajo senator elected into office during the last term. Jobs were coming into the counties the Navajo controlled and more native small businesses were being incorporated. Added to the lower rate of unemployment, and Ray Martinez had ensured his mark in the history books.

  “And what freedom do you believe you’ll need in this investigation?” Ray crossed his arms over the fine white shirt he wore and leaned back in the comfortable chair he’d taken at the head of the conference table.

  Now, this was where Rule was likely to get into a hell of a lot of trouble if he wasn’t careful.

  Not that Rule was never not careful. He simply sometimes forgot that tact and politeness were essential when dealing with such men.

  “We’ll need access to your Nation files to ascertain the possibility that our rogue could have formed any alliances with any of your people based on their familial ties, DNA and genetic connections as well as possible political affiliations or agendas. We don’t know what he looks like, but we have the genetic and DNA profile used in his creation as well a working knowledge of the groups he’s infiltrated over the past year. Several of which I know your people have access to as well. Our need for confidentiality requires we keep the genetic typing confidential for the time being, but the moment we’re able, I promise we’ll ensure you have that information as well.”

  How did a man stand in front of his uncle and deceive so easily? Malachi wondered. Which was exactly what Rule was doing. Standing before this man as though they shared no blood and lying straight to his face.

  “He’s good,” Ashley murmured as she crossed her arms loosely over her breasts as she crossed one knee over the other and watched. “We should have made popcorn for this one.” Instead, she popped the gum she was chewing.

  Ashley and her love for bubble gum were almost legendary.

  “There are times he’s too good,” Malachi commented as his attention moved back to the mate he’d agreed to delay taking. He was drawn to her like a moth to a flame, unable to keep his eyes from her and willing to drown in the fires he knew would burn between them.

  Waiting to take her was a bargain he had regretted the moment he’d made it. Unfortunately, he had seen the wisdom in Rule’s request. Had he mated her, there would have been no way she would have made that meeting. And there would have been no way to convince her uncle that she wasn’t ill if the mating began as heated and fierce as he knew it would.

  Hell, it was already driving him damned crazy and all he had done was drink from the glass she had drank from and nipped her cute little ear. He’d wanted to mark her. The urge had been nearly overwhelming to go ahead and sink his teeth in the base of her neck, where it curved into her shoulder.

  He would have licked the little wound, but the hormone that had began swelling in the glands beneath his tongue would have already begun taking the pain from the bite. It would have entered her system at the point of the bite and made the need to have each other impossible to deny.

  It was already impossible to deny. If she were there in the room with him, he would have already had her stripped, fucked and knotted.

  His cock throbbed in his jeans. Thick and heavy, the iron hard flesh demanded the presence of his mate, demanded that he take her, mark her, brand her as his, no matter the obstacles.

  “Damn, get your mating hormones under control there, Mal,” Ashley grimaced as she glanced back at him. “All that male lust and testosterone are about to poison me.”

  “You’re not tied to that chair, Ash,” he grouched right back at her. “You can leave anytime.”

  “Yeah, if I didn’t want to watch Rule weave a little bit of his magic. I just don’t want to drown in the smell of your raging hard-on while I’m doing it,” she snorted, her gaze flicking over him again before she turned back to the monitors.

  The raging hard-on was about to kill him. He swore his dick had never been so hard as it had been since Isabelle had guided his hand, the glass clasped between his fingers, to allow her to sip from his drink.

  Her eyes had been sultry, filled with feminine heat and hunger. He had sworn he’d seen a woman dying to taste the pleasure he could bring her, in that look. A pleasure Malachi knew would send them both racing to complete oblivion.

  He forced his attention back to the monitor, forced himself to attempt to decode the expressions of the Navajo Council members as Rule attempted to convince them to give him what he wanted without restraint.

  It wasn’t working well at the moment because these were men who had something to hide. Something they feared the Breeds learning.

  The argument raged between Ray Martinez and Rule. The chief refused to listen, just as Rule refused to give up.