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 their 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.