Because she had believed in his word. She had trusted him. And over the six years they had worked together, she had believed there was more binding them than a job.
“He swore before we met that my family wouldn’t suffer,” she told him. “He swore for six years as I did what he told me, risking myself and my family if I were caught, that they would not be punished or harmed unless there was no other recourse but to wound them to protect their own.
We had an agreement.”
“You have the secured emails that have been retrieved, Director Wyatt, that back up Ms.
Kobrin’s statement,” Cassandra interjected.
Jonas looked back at her with faint surprise. “I didn’t need proof of her statement, Ms. Sinclair,”
he told her. “I merely needed to clarify that she was aware of the risks in contacting Alpha Delgado before she did so.”
“Ms. Kobrin.” Merinus Lyons, wife and mate to Alpha Lyons, the Feline prides’ leader, spoke up then. “Do you feel that you were, at any time, raped?”
The question had a deadly tension beginning to fill the air. Anya hadn’t expected that question.
“I never stated I was raped,” she answered.
“No, you didn’t,” Merinus agreed. “You have instead petitioned this tribunal for separation from a man that we know for a fact is your biological and, we suspect, your emotional mate. No mate has ever done this, no matter the anger or misunderstandings. As a woman, as part of this tribunal, I’d like to understand why you’ve taken this stance.”
“I wasn’t raped.” She shook her head. “Not by Del-Rey. I feel raped by the insanity of these laws I’m forced to abide by, and I feel raped by a hormonal phenomenon neither Alpha Delgado nor myself had control over. I had no choice but to accept him as a lover because of the loss of control this biological connection forced. I resent that this tribunal feels that I should subject myself to that feeling whenever Alpha Delgado is present. And I resent that the choice could be taken out of my hands. That, Prima Lyons, is the worst sort of rape.”
Merinus stared back at her for long moments before inclining her head in agreement. “Thank you, Ms. Kobrin, for that clarification.”
Silence filled the meeting room then, as though the men and women heading the tribunal hadn’t expected her answer. And she could feel Del-Rey staring at her; from the corner of her eye she could see the dark, brooding frown on his face.
“Would you say, Ms. Kobrin, that perhaps you and Alpha Delgado have been forced into a position that neither of you wanted?” Alpha Lyons asked then.
“I would say that,” she stated.
The pride alpha stared back at her relentlessly. “Yet you’ve seen Alpha Delgado’s statement that his intent all along was to take you out of that facility and claim you as his lover. You were sixteen when he first met you. From that point on, he was aware there was no chance he would leave you there. No chance that he didn’t intend to convince you to stay with him.”
She glared at Del-Rey then. “Then he should have been careful about the order he gave to have my family wounded,” she stated. “Once we arrived here, he should have never refused my request to contact my family.”
“Even if that contact threatened your family?” Alpha Lyons asked her then. “Ms. Kobrin, by contacting your family, you put them in the position that the Genetics Council has proof that they can be used against you. Their prime objective at this point is to capture Breed mates. Could your father be used to draw you from Haven? Would you give your life for your family?”
Her lips trembled. She stared at Cassandra. She hadn’t considered that. The Council rarely struck out at humans any longer, because the propaganda against them was so strong.
Cassandra stared back at her in sympathy.
“No,” she finally whispered. “I didn’t know this.”
“Yet you were sent Alpha Delgado’s statement, explaining his reasons and his actions, which he gave this tribunal,” Callan further stated. “Did you read that statement?”
She shook her head. She hadn’t read it. She didn’t want to read it or hear his reasons why.
“It wouldn’t have made a difference,” she finally told them clearly. “He lied to me, countless times. He destroyed my trust in him, and he knew for six years that he would do it. I don’t trust him, Alpha Lyons. Don’t doubt that this petition of separation is sincere. I promise you. It is.”
“Ms. Kobrin.” Wolfe Gunnar, alpha of the Wolf packs, spoke then. “Are you in love with him?”
She jerked in surprise at the question. “My emotions shouldn’t come into this, Alpha Gunnar.”
Did she love him? Until she ached with it. Was she going to allow him to control her body and her life because of it? Not in this lifetime.
Wolfe stared back at her for long moments before nodding his head slowly. “Perhaps you’re right,” he finally agreed.
“Perhaps that’s a question we should ask Alpha Delgado,” Cassandra suggested then, turning her head to Del-Rey as Anya held her breath in fear. She knew the answer. “Alpha Delgado, are you in love with Ms. Kobrin?”
Del-Rey stared back at her broodingly. “I can’t say I’m in love with her,” he finally stated. “I’m a soldier, Ms. Sinclair, not a damned poet. I claimed her. As proven, she’s my mate. Nothing else should come into this.”
Anya lowered her head and stared at her hands, hope dwindling inside her no more than seconds after it had burned through her soul. If he had said yes, would she have followed through with this petition? She knew she wouldn’t have. She couldn’t have denied him if he had sworn he loved her, even though she knew his word wasn’t worth the signature he had scrawled on his statements.
“I see,” Cassandra said heavily, her head lifting to stare back at the women on the tribunal. “And we wonder at such a young woman’s need to be separated from the man who only claims her,”
she sighed.
“Ms. Sinclair, may I ask a question?” Del-Rey asked, his voice as lazy as his slouched position in his chair.
“Of course, Alpha Delgado,” Cassandra said with a hint of surprise.
“We have several mated males on this tribunal. Alpha Lyons, Alpha Gunnar, Enforcer Jacob Arlington, and Enforcer Aiden Chance. Tell me, gentlemen, were you in love with your mates when the mating heat claimed you?”
Each man grimaced heavily. “Maybe we just weren’t aware it was love,” Alpha Lyons finally said with some amusement as he glanced at his wife beside him. “But have no doubt, Alpha Delgado, we learned quick enough.”
“Who is to say that I couldn’t learn as well?” Del-Rey shrugged then. “Being a Coyote doesn’t make me stupid, merely less willing to recognize emotion, I believe. By separating herself from me, my mate is stealing that chance from both of us.”
“He’s very clever with words,” Cassandra murmured under her breath.
“He is at that,” Anya said sadly. “He’s very good at twisting words.”
“I also noticed that Ms. Kobrin was decidedly less honest in her answer to that same question,”
Del-Rey pointed out then.
“Ms. Kobrin has the right to request that her emotions not be questioned,” Cassandra argued.
“Mating heat and the proven psychological effects are clear bases that she not be questioned regarding emotions that she may not be clear on at this moment.”
Del-Rey’s lips quirked mockingly, his black eyes gleamed in knowledge as Anya lifted her head and stared back at him.
“If I hadn’t wounded her family and made it look like a clear attempt to harm them, then they’d be dead,” he stated then. “The Council would have killed them and I knew it. But, I will admit, even without that risk, they would have felt my wrath. They endangered her from childhood to the moment I kidnapped her. Their lack of concern for her well-being would have been punished.