Cougar's Courage (Duals and Donovans: The Different)

by Teresa Noelle Roberts

  Desperate, Cara hung on to that. “That’s something. She knows you. She likes you as much as she likes anyone. So maybe she can work with you.”

  Instead of answering, Gramps walked to the rustic twig shelf and opened his tobacco jar. The longhouse filled with a rich fragrance. She waited, feigning patience, as he loaded the pipe, lit it, took a deep draw and let out a puff that smelled nothing like the harshness of cigarette smoke.

  Finally, he answered. “It doesn’t work that way. I can’t take your guide, and I’m not sure what we can do for you and Jack other than pray you don’t end up killing each other. But I’d be willing to try something if I could. Sheer gumption’ll get you a long ways in this shaman business, Cara. Important tip. If you try something impossible, but you throw heart and spirit into it anyway, it just might work.”

  She slapped her hand down on the bunk. Magic surged as she did, so the frustrated gesture carried far more force than it should have, jarring the solid construction and making the tin cup of oily coffee jump, splashing its contents onto the furs and blankets. “So try the impossible, dammit. Do something to invoke Coyote. Try some magic without Coyote and see if it lures him back. Jack says Coyote still hangs around you sometimes. Maybe if you just did your thing, it would work.” Cara reached into her pocket and pulled out her cell phone. She didn’t know why she bothered carrying the damn thing, since the battery was long dead. Maybe as a reminder the outside world existed. “Hell, call him and ask him to pop round for a nice steak dinner.” She handed her grandfather the phone.

  He studied it curiously, and she realized he’d probably never used a cell before. Some of the villagers who’d spent time in the outside world had them, but they were uncommon and worked only sporadically.

  “The green button means go, right?” He began to dial. “What do you think? 1-800-COYOTE sounds promising.”

  “I was kidding, Gramps. The phone doesn’t work anyway.”

  Gramps cackled so loudly they could probably hear him above the Arctic Circle. “It doesn’t matter if the phone works, Cara. I’m calling Coyote. If he wants to take the call, he will.”

  He held the small red-and-silver device out a little gingerly and dialed.

  Despite a dead battery and no signal, she could hear it ringing.

  She froze when she heard a voice.

  “Coyote’s not home right now,” it said. It was raspy, whisky-and tobacco-laced, prankish and intimate, yet doing its best to sound like a machine. “Or he is, but he’s eating or fucking or napping and doesn’t feel like being interrupted. Please leave a message at the sound of the…”

  Then the tone changed, no longer pretending to be a recording. “Sam, where have you been? Your time’s almost up. Expiration date quickly approaching. But I don’t think earth’s quite done with you yet.”

  Cara didn’t think her grandfather, with his weathered bronze skin, could turn pale. She was wrong.

  Then again, she didn’t think a cartoon sledgehammer could pop out of her phone and bop her grandfather on the head. “I never left you, Sam Many-Winters. You’re a moron. I’ve. Been. Right. Here. All. Along.” The last six words were punctuated by more bops on the head with the impossible hammer. The blows didn’t seem to hurt. If anything, each one left Gramps looking more focused and determined. “All you had to do was ask properly, and by properly I don’t mean one more snore of a ritual, but in your own way. Now that you finally did, yes, I’ll take you up on that steak—with a side of whoop-ass for sorcerers.”

  With the last one, the door blew open, even though Cara had latched it behind her out of habit, and a coyote trotted in.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  A coyote in a battered Stetson, holes cut for his ears. His tongue lolled out, and he left muddy paw prints on the floor.

  The coyote—who had to be the Coyote—trotted up to Cara and proclaimed in a downright seedy voice, “Hubba-hubba, you are one hot lady, even if you have cat all over your spirit. So, Sam, aren’t you going to introduce me to your lovely, tall friend?”

  Gramps opened his mouth to say something. Probably, judging from his expression, something you’re not supposed to say to your long-lost spirit guide.

  Lynx materialized and smacked Coyote on the nose with a large, viciously clawed paw. “There’s a reason your dick is detachable, Coyote—so you can leave it at home and not make a fool of yourself quite so often. Cara is Lily’s daughter, Margaret and Sam’s grandchild. Mine to guide, not yours to play with. Unless she feels like slumming with a canine, I suppose.” She batted at him again.

  Coyote yelped, buried his wounded nose between his front paws and, from that ignominious position, said, “Sorry, old friend. Didn’t realize this was your granddaughter.” He looked up again and grinned a doggy grin. “Hey, granddaughter or no, you have to admit she’s gorgeous. And, sweet stuff, I know we canines aren’t quite up to snuff for you cat-aligned types, but no one who’s slummed with me has had any complaints, and I promise not to leave fleas in the bed.”

  It was so over-the-top that Cara couldn’t help laughing. A quick glance at her grandfather revealed that, under a look of indignant horror, he was struggling not to chuckle himself.

  Then the door banged open again.

  Jack burst in, his form halfway between the familiar hunk and a cougar. Without hesitation, he backhanded Coyote, who ducked and rolled before Jack actually made contact, then skittered across the floor. “Mine!” Jack roared, half a human roar of indignation, half a cougar’s snarl.

  Coyote laughed. Gramps laughed. Even Lynx tittered politely.

  Jack didn’t crack a smile.

  Cara had never seen someone shaking with rage before, but Jack was. Shuddering with rage and the effort not to commit further violence.

  He shuddered visibly as he shifted to his full wordy form. More naked than not, his eyes wild, he grabbed Cara and kissed her. One big hand traveled up and down her body. The other fisted itself in the hair at the base of her neck possessively, tipping her face up to him for a deeper kiss.

  “Mine,” he growled again, into her mouth, and the word, barely audible, shuddered throughout her body.

  Cara’s pussy sprang to instant, damp attention. Her nipples crinkled. As usual when Jack touched her, her common sense decided to take a vacation.

  This time, she caught her common sense by the scruff of its neck and dragged it back kicking and screaming.

  Summoning all her willpower, Cara pulled away. “Jack,” she said, pleased she could keep the needy quiver out of her voice, “what the hell were you thinking?”

  “I was thinking”—his eyes blazed—“that no mangy mutt gets away with speaking to you like that.”

  “That mangy mutt is my grandfather’s MIA spirit guide, asshole. They’re finally talking again and you try to smack him into next week. Do you want to help Gramps or kill him? I wouldn’t blame Coyote if he washed his hands of all of us.”

  Coyote snickered, then said, with what sounded like genuine regret, “Sorry, cousin. I was only having a bit of fun with your lady friend. She’s very pretty and too damn serious. Couldn’t resist.”

  “You should know better. You’re a powerful avatar, but as long as you’re in physical form, I can kick your furry ass. Payback would be a bitch, but that’s a risk we mortals will take for our mates.”

  “Sorry about that. I smelled cat, but I figured guide, not mate. She has Lynx all over her aura, and Lynx’s girls are such fun to tease. So very earnest, but they always have such sweet laughs.”

  Jack smiled. “Fine to make her laugh. Just keep your paws to yourself.”

  Coyote nodded. “Mates are off limits.” He looked at Cara and added, “But if he bores you or doesn’t treat you right, come talk to Coyote.”

  Both males sounded almost genial again, which just went to prove that, human or furry, males were incomprehensible once their hormones got involved.

  Relief that they weren’t about to come to blows allowed Cara to focus on one alarming
word.

  “Mate?” Her voice rose to a grating, squeaky note. “Mate? Don’t I get some say in that? In my world, a man asks, and it usually takes longer than two times in the sack to bring it up.”

  “You’re not in your world anymore, Cara. You’re in mine. And you’re my mate. Simple as that.” Jack’s lazily possessive voice sent a thrill through her treacherous body, even while it enraged her brain.

  “Then I’m getting out of your world as soon as I can. You’re fun, but this is too weird for me.”

  Gramps cleared his throat. “What about that little matter we were discussing earlier, Cara?”

  “Oh, shit.” Well, they’d had good luck asking unlikely things of Coyote today. Why not one more? The worst that could happen would be he’d say no.

  Okay, the worst that could happen was that it would blow up in her face, but she’d take that chance.

  She crouched down next to the small canine with the huge aura. “Coyote, I need your help. Jack’s cougarside thinks he’s my spirit guide, but I can’t see how that’s going to work, especially not since wordy Jack and I have a few things to work out. You’d be a lot more fun, and everyone knows you’re the most powerful avatar of all. Would you do me the honor of being my guide?” She didn’t look at Coyote as she said the last words, but glared at Jack instead.

  “Of course, Cara. And for your gram’s sake, there won’t even be any naughty business, though I can’t promise no flirting.” He winked at her, then craned his neck to wink at her grandfather.

  She hugged Coyote.

  He smelled like a wild thing, strong and pungent, a scruffy, scrappy, wet-dog smell. She thought of the clean, sun-warmed fur smell of Jack’s cougar, which clung to him even in human form.

  Still, she buried her face in Coyote’s ruff, to show her gratitude—and to emphasize the disconnect with Jack, Jack’s out-of-line possessiveness, Jack’s cougar, and most of all, the part of her that still vibrated from his possessiveness and wanted to take him up on the whole “mate” thing, even if the word made her feel like she belonged in a National Geographic special.

  Jack’s face fell, and a cougar’s snarl passed his human-seeming lips. It could have been a noise of fury, despair or both, but it sounded dangerous, feral.

  He turned and banged out the door, stumbling as if drunk on violent emotion.

  Lynx hid her face between her paws, a very human gesture. Some rebellious part of Cara’s brain, attempting to evade the mess, wondered if Lynx could peer between her furry toes like a child covering her eyes in a scary movie.

  Gramps stared in silence for a moment.

  Then he laughed. No, he roared. He cackled. He slapped his knee repeatedly. He choked on his own laughter. Cara sprang to her feet to check on him, but he kept right on laughing and waved her off. Finally, he sank to the floor, still laughing, but with tears streaming down his face.

  Coyote trotted over and nuzzled him, head-butting like a German shepherd trying to get his master’s attention. “Old friend,” Gramps said, “I’m glad you’re back.” He put his arm around Coyote.

  “Silly shaman. Your shadows got so dark you couldn’t see me, but I was still here, waiting for someone to slap some sense into your head.” Coyote raised a forepaw, put it on Sam’s shoulder. “About time someone finally had the guts. She’s a good kid.”

  Something in the gesture made Cara squint at the avatar.

  The shaggy canine form was definitely there, but superimposed on it was a straggly old man even skinnier than Gramps, his gray hair in braids, a Stetson on his head, wearing an ancient Coyote-and-Roadrunner T-shirt similar to one Cara had seen her grandfather wear often.

  He had a hand on her grandfather’s arm, doing one of those slightly awkward guy hugs. She couldn’t see Coyote’s face, but the air around him trembled with moisture, like it did when Grand-mère wept.

  “Your grandkid’s okay,” Coyote said gruffly. Then he turned, staring at her intently through two sets of superimposed eyes, almost canine and not really human.

  The effect was creepy. She suspected it was supposed to be, because he had to know she could see both forms.

  But both faces were friendly, and both looked a little teary-eyed. “Come here, kid,” he said in that raspy old voice of his.

  Gingerly, she obeyed.

  He extended a hand/paw for her to shake. “You still have a lot to learn about magic,” he said, “but you’ve got the spirit to be a shaman, and the ability to think on your feet and come up with a way to turn a situation to your advantage. This is going to be great!”

  “Think Cara has any idea what she’s in for?” her grandfather asked, a bit hoarse from laughing, a bit sniffly from crying.

  Coyote literally howled. “Not hardly,” he choked out. “I’m not sure what I’m in for, except it should be funny, and by funny I mean funny telling the story afterward but occasionally painful and embarrassing while it’s happening. But I promise you, Sam, I’ll take good care of her. And you.”

  She found Coyote’s honesty oddly comforting.

  At least if she was confused, she wasn’t alone.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Jack ran, not bothering to shift because he wanted the advantages of his wordy brain.

  Okay, want might not be the correct world. He’d rather go cougarside and find some tasty animal to kill and eat, which would relieve his frustration, but he needed the advantages of the wordy brain.

  Running wasn’t the right response, but he didn’t know what was.

  Things had gotten fucked up beyond belief.

  Cara had rejected him, both as a guide and as a mate.

  Then again, what kind of asshole tries to beat up Coyote? What sensible woman would want to associate herself with someone that dumb?

  Bad enough if he’d taken a swing at some random old guy who’d perved on Cara. Cara was perfectly capable of deciding for herself if some flirty old man was offensive or funny and kind of charming. She was a cop and a shaman, not a helpless flower, and she’d take offense at him beating up his elders.

  But taking a swing at Coyote surpassed any stupid thing in the history of stupid. It took a lot to get Trickster pissed off at you. He/she definitely had a sense of humor and could see the funny side of most mistakes. But this time Jack had gone too far.

  You just didn’t go around fighting with avatars, even if they were saying crude things to your mate.

  Especially if your mate might not actually be your mate.

  The cougar was firmly convinced Cara was his. Part of Jack’s wordy self liked that idea, but he figured it wasn’t the smartest part of him. His smarter parts could get behind seeing where things might go with Cara. She was sexy, smart, tough, magical—everything he’d figured he wanted in a girlfriend. But from “friend with benefits and potential for more” to “mate” was a big leap.

  Now that he had some distance from Cara, from the smell of her skin still imprinted with his scent, he sounded like a nutcase to himself and could only imagine how he’d sounded to her. They’d both experienced a certain amount of lust at first sight. Maybe they had the potential for more, but between her recent losses and the whole thing about possibly being her spirit guide—not to mention the attacks on the village—he should count himself lucky she was giving him a chance at friends with benefits.

  What the fuck had possessed him to claim her in that crude, rough way?

  He was well outside the village’s protected territory now, running on the side of the main road toward the next town, and his wordy body was begging for mercy, but he couldn’t get out of his own head.

  He’d blown it with Cara, as a lover, as a teacher, as a guide. Forget being her mate. He’d be lucky if she ever spoke to him again.

  And he’d beat on Coyote, which mean he’d be lucky if his magic didn’t backlash for the next twenty years. That would be annoying in any case, but with the attacks on the village still an unsolved threat, it was potentially deadly.

  Although Coyote had l
aughed and didn’t seem all that upset. After all, Coyote had his own history of doing crazy things because of females (not to mention males and the occasional watermelon, lake or star). Maybe it would be okay with Coyote.

  But Cara might never speak to him again.

  He got the oddest thought image from his cougarside, something he could only interpret as “Relax. Everything’s under control.” His wordside couldn’t quite see things that way, but with the cougar so relaxed, some of the sick tension eased up. Maybe his animalside had seen or smelled something his wordy side had missed.

  Either that or the cougarside was drunk on mating hormones. Natural enough, but Cara had every reason to be freaking out, and she’d figured out a way to break the spirit-guide bond to create space between them. He’d wanted that space too, wanted a chance to think, but realizing they were mated changed everything. How could he get Cara to understand what it meant to be mated when it wasn’t something humans normally did? How would he get her to forgive him and give him another chance?

  “Get her alone,” a deep voice said somewhere to his left. “Don’t give her any choice except to listen to you. Women appreciate a firm hand.”

  Jack stopped running so abruptly that he flailed like a cartoon character.

  A man walked toward him through the tangled bushes that lined the side of the road. Dressed all in black, from his bowler hat to his wool coat, which looked like something that belonged in a museum, to his boots, except for a soft, expensive-looking gray scarf, he looked like he should be strolling in a cemetery smoking a clove cigarette and collecting inspiration for lousy poetry.

  His eyes were older than his twenty-something face, though. Way older, not Grand-mère ancient, but not just a young man bitter beyond his years. Definitely a Different of some kind. But what kind? Reading Jack’s thoughts smacked of sorcery, but sorcerers lived normal human life spans.

  Unless they dealt with demons or other dark powers.