He heard Brim curse. Suddenly there were bodies blocking him, enraged growls and curses as his men were pushing him back, Cavalier’s men holding him back.
Snarls filled the room, primal, enraged.
“Enough dammit!” Brim shouted above the din. “Damn you two.” He turned on Del-Rey. “What the hell did you expect, you stupid bastard? You insult her in front of twenty Coyote Breeds that she all but gave her life for and expect them to take it lying down when your stupid fucking brother abuses her.”
Del-Rey spun, fists flying, feet lashing; within seconds he had taken down the Breeds trying to hold him back, just as Cavalier did.
They faced each other now.
“My coya is a target,” he told the other man, realizing in a flash of insight what he had done.
“What I did may have been foolhardy, but it was to protect my mate. My coya.”
Cavalier paused.
“I would give my life for her.”
Del-Rey stared into the other man’s eyes. He wouldn’t fight him unless he had to. He would never fight the man that would stand and face death to protect the coya, Del-Rey’s mate.
“We swore loyalty to you, because of her,” Cavalier informed him, and it was no more than what Del-Rey had already known. “She was our coya before you mated her.”
Del-Rey nodded. “I know that, Cavalier. Now she’s hurt. I have to find her. Help me find her.”
Cavalier sneered at that. “If you hadn’t taken her bodyguards, you wouldn’t have to search for her.”
Del-Rey’s eyes narrowed, fear flashing through him. “Her bodyguards were not reassigned.”
Surprised looks turned on him. Two pack leaders’ eyes widened.
“Alpha, the rescending of status took her bodyguards. They’ve been reassigned since the memo went out.”
Del-Rey turned on him. Icy, murderous fury filled him.
“Find her,” he growled. “If I don’t have the location of my coya within the next twenty seconds, the lot of you can pack your asses out of this base and get fucked. You stupid bastards,” he yelled back at them. “Did I tell you to do this? Did I tell you to endanger my fucking mate?”
“No, Alpha,” Brim answered for them, the sneer in his voice unmistakable now. “You rescinded her status. By refusing to accept her official vows, you rejected her.” Flipping on his own link, he began barking out orders as Del-Rey’s jaw clenched in fury.
Hell, he’d managed to fuck this one up royally. He stared at every man in the room now.
“Within the next fucking hour, you will receive memos,” he snarled. “My mate, my coya, will be making her official vows this spring. And pray to God she’s alive to make them, or every damned one of you will die for being stupid.”
“And you, Alpha?” Cavalier growled furiously. “You did this to her, not those of us who face you now. You placed suspicion on her shoulders by rejecting her. Your men only followed your lead.”
Del-Rey pinned him with primitive fury. “I’ll already be dead, Cavalier,” he informed him. “A man doesn’t live without his soul. Take that woman from me, and that’s what you’ll see. Exactly what the Council strove for. A Coyote without a soul.”
With that, he strode from the infirmary. Fuck this. He knew how to find his mate. He knew her scent unlike anyone else could know it. He knew his mate, her pain and her tears. And that was the scent he followed.
To no avail. Before the night was over, the caverns echoed with his howls of rage. Coyotes were searching the mountain, the heli-jet was in the air, and teams were dispatched to Haven.
Del-Rey’s coya had disappeared along with three of her female Coyote bodyguards. And some feared she had disappeared forever.
CHAPTER 23
Dr. Armani didn’t slip Anya into the main portion of Haven. She met her and the three bodyguards as they pulled to the bottom of the mountain in a stolen all-terrain.
Sharone and Emma helped Anya into the passenger seat before the doctor slid into the back with Ashley and Emma as Sharone drove, lights out, to a hidden entrance into the medical facility.
The cut from the knife that had fallen from the table and grazed Anya’s leg was deeper than she had at first believed. Her wrist was broken and the side of her head ached from its impact with the wall.
Nikki was silent as she applied a skin adhesive over the leg rather than the antiquated stitches used for smaller injuries. Anya’s wrist was placed in a hard plasti-cast and secured in place before the doctor cleaned the abrasion at the side of her head and carefully applied a film of adhesive there as well.
“I can’t believe he allowed this to happen.” Nikki’s voice was rough with unshed tears. “I need to get the lupina in here. She has to see this. There’s no way the Breed tribunal won’t grant you complete safety against those monsters, Anya.”
Anya lifted her head in shock. “It wasn’t their fault, Nikki,” she whispered. “They think I betrayed them.”
“Fuck them!” The harsh fury was followed by a hard grip to Anya’s shoulders as Nikki shook her fiercely, a tear slipping free and running down her dusky cheek. “Look at you, Anya. It doesn’t matter why. Jax laid his hands on a woman. A human woman, weaker than himself, unable to defend herself, and he let her be harmed. That is not Breed honor, that is a monster.”
Anya shook her head. “It was an accident.”
“It was fucking abuse,” Nikki yelled in her face as Sharone, Emma and Ashley paced the room.
“Abuse, Anya. There is no excuse; there is no forgiveness.”
Ashley snarled as she jerked the doctor back, her enraged face nose to nose with Nikki’s. “Your hands hurt her. Keep them off her unless you’re treating her.”
Nikki stared back at the younger girl, and Anya saw the torment in her face.
“Ashley, I’m okay, it didn’t hurt,” Anya whispered. “Come here, little sister.”
Ashley was breaking apart on her. The feral animal she fought to keep hidden was breaking free at the rage and pain filling her. Anya hadn’t been the only one betrayed. These young women who had so hoped for a normal life, for freedom and laughter, had been betrayed as well.
The others hurt, but Ashley, who had so depended on Anya’s laughter, her support and affection, had suffered the most.
The younger girl tore herself from the doctor after a last warning look, but rather than coming to Anya, she paced again. As though her slight body contained too much energy, too much power for her to contain.
“Ashley’s right,” Nikki admitted roughly. “I shouldn’t have touched you. It was no better than what that fucking Coyote did.”
Nikki was cursing. It was supposed to be a bad thing when Nikki cursed.
“Doctors Chernov and Sobolova will be at the spa in Advert late tomorrow afternoon.” Anya swallowed back her tears. “Del-Rey is going to be watching for us. We have to get Alpha Gunnar and the lupina there for this meeting and get asylum requested.” She pushed the fingers of one hand through her damp, mussed hair. “Jax messed my plans up.”
Ashley snarled viciously, a primal, animal sound that caused Anya to wince. “And Ashley needs her nails done. She gets rabid when they chip.”
Poor Ashley, her nails were bare and natural, the polish gone, the pretty little designs painted on them had disappeared. They had been filed to sharp little points that were strong enough to lay open flesh.
“I should have killed him rather than cutting the side of his ear off,” Ashley bit out. “I should have done what Cavalier was unwilling to do and sliced his throat.”
“That wasn’t what I wanted, Ashley,” Anya whispered. “The alliance has to stand. We agreed to that; it’s the only safety for the Coyotes.”