She flushed. It was a lie, but it wasn’t. Her body was dying for him. The very knowledge that he was in the building was enough to increase the arousal.
“I want you to assure me this is voluntary,” her mother said softly. “Your father and I need to know this is what you want.”
What she
wanted?
Was her mother crazy? Had she and her father somehow gone senile and she hadn’t seen it, suspected it? And here she thought they knew her so well?
“As voluntary as any other mating?” she asked in disbelief. “I slept with him willingly. I didn’t suspect he was my mate before he touched me. What more can I say?”
That he knew?
That the lying bastard had known they were mates and rather than warning her had let her step into her own destruction?
Her mother was watching her too closely, too compassionately.
“Do you know who he is?” she asked long moments later. “Cassie, do you know who your mate is?”
She wasn’t going to cry. She wouldn’t let her lips tremble, her tears fall. She wouldn’t give into the betrayal she felt, no matter how much she wanted to.
“I know who others believe him to be,” she finally stated, using the line Jonas had given her. “Just as I know he’s not what others believe. He’s my mate.”
She had to stare into her mother’s eyes and say those words. She had to lie to her mother. It wasn’t the first time she’d done so, but it was the biggest lie she’d ever told her and Cassie hated it.
Thank God it wasn’t her father questioning her. He could smell a lie. She didn’t know if she had enough self-control to lie to him and keep that scent from emanating from her. Even at the best of times that ability was iffy.
“Very well.” Her mother nodded. “I’ll let your father know. But you know he’ll want to see you soon, don’t you? Both you and your mate.”
Her chin lifted. “He has a name.”
She stared back at her mother defiantly, and she couldn’t even say why, because she hated the deceptive bastard.
Compassion softened her mother’s face. “He’ll want to talk to you and Dog soon, then,” she said gently, nearly breaking Cassie’s determined façade. “You know, Cassie, your father and I would do whatever it took to ensure your happiness. You have only to ask.”
And what could they do?
Kill her mate? Breeds had only one mate. Endure this arousal, unquenched, for the rest of her life? The way it was building now, she couldn’t imagine such a thing. She’d never survive it.
As much as she hated the Coyote, she was stuck with him for the time being. Possibly for life.
No falling in love. No happily ever after. No mate that she at least knew one good thing about. No, her mate was a Coyote. A Council Coyote at that.
“I went into this willingly,” she finally whispered, hoping, praying, her mother believed her. “Please, don’t let Daddy think otherwise, Mom. He’s not what others think he is.”
He had helped her every time she needed that help. He had saved Kenzi, and in doing so, saved Cassie’s sanity.
“Have you seen Kenzi yet?” she asked her mother, hoping to change the subject as they left the shower room.
“She’s refusing to see us.” The strain in her mother’s voice could be heard now. “I left your father to talk to Rhyzan. There seems to be a problem between him and Kenzi.”
Rhyzan Brannigan was the Coyote Jonas had picked as his deputy director of the Federal Bureau of Breed Affairs. An exceptionally striking, cold Breed.
“He could be a problem,” Cassie admitted. “Rhyzan doesn’t care much for me for some reason. It could affect how he’s treated Kenzi.”
She had no idea why Rhyzan was antagonistic toward her, but from the moment they’d met, she’d felt it, despite his later attempts to seduce her.
“You never told me that.” Once again, a statement with a question behind it. Her mother was incredibly good at that.