“Four Coyotes.” She sighed. “For little ole me? That scared of me, Malcolm?”
His jaw tightened, his hands clenched on the weapon.
“If you want me, come fight me,” she suggested with a laugh. “I dare you.”
Every Coyote there seemed to perk up.
Liza stared at the back of Diane’s head in disbelief. Everyone knew you didn’t make a dare in front of Coyotes. Good or bad, there wasn’t a Coyote living, it was said, who wouldn’t take a reasonable dare.
Or was that the point? This woman would know more about Coyote Breeds than most. She was more than just an agent for the Bureau; she was the director’s sister-in-law. No doubt, she knew all their strengths, their weaknesses, and exactly how to get to them.
“A thousand on the girl,” the leader murmured, proving the supposition.
“Shut the f**k up, Dog,” Malcolm raged, his body shaking with fury as he wiped his hands through his short dark hair.
“I got your thousand on the prick there. He has muscle where she doesn’t.” Loki took the bet before turning to the other two. “Mutt, Mongrel? You two in?”
“Thousand on the girl,” another Coyote drawled.
“Thousand on the prick.” Black-haired and intense, the last nodded his assent.
Malcolm was about to explode with the anger surging through him. A wave of brick red swept over his face as his brown eyes glared back at Diane in pure disdain.
Diane smiled in anticipation.
“Knives or fists?” she asked, evidently knowing his strengths as well as his weaknesses, just as she did the Coyote Breeds.
“You f**king whore,” he snarled, his teeth clenched, as a muscle throbbed in rapid reaction to the tightening of his teeth.
“I win, we walk away,” she demanded as she kept her eyes on Malcolm.
“I’ll kill you first,” Malcolm charged, his face reddening further as the flames of fury burned beneath his flesh.
“Take the challenge or walk away,” Dog snapped. “We won’t take her without the fight.”
Liza couldn’t believe this. “They’re betting my safety on a f**king fight?” she muttered incredulously, knowing Cullen was there, and praying he would have an explanation that would make sense.
“We got this,” Cullen promised as Liza fought to breathe. “Bureau Breeds have all of you covered. Just be ready to roll when they pull you out. We’ll capture one of the Coyotes coming in behind this mess when this is over and interrogate him.”
The mess being the less-than-bloodthirsty Coyotes ranged around her. They looked mean enough, heartless enough, yet Liza detected the flash of laughter in Dog’s gaze once again as she met his eyes.
Liza stared at the tableau around her, wondering just how often Breeds turned danger into a joke.
She didn’t particularly like it.
Dog’s smiled was clearly anticipatory, but he nodded easily. “Whip his ass and you walk. He whips yours—you run. How’s that?”
Diane gave a sharp, firm nod as she smiled at Malcolm. “It’s a bet.”
As Diane accepted the terms, the enforcers for the Bureau of Breed Affairs stepped from the cover of the trees and surrounded them.
Liza was still trying to get a head count when one of the few couples she knew, Megan Fields Arness and her husband, Braden Arness, stepped up to her and gripped her arm.
Megan muttered, “Let’s go,” at her ear.
She didn’t want to leave.
Liza had to force herself to hold back the involuntary protest. She wanted to stay. She needed to stay. The fight that was about to commence would no doubt display a variety of skillful moves she had yet to learn by attempting to watch the agents from the Bureau spar from a distance.
Grimacing, she followed Megan, knowing that convincing the other woman and her mate to allow her to stay wasn’t going to happen.
The link in her ear was silent, which was standard operating procedure whenever Control knew another Breed was within hearing distance.
The acute hearing and exceptional sense of smell were only two of the extraordinary senses they possessed. So much as a sizzle of static and any Breed within feet of her would sense it.
“Well, look who’s joining the party, boys,” Dog drawled as Megan and Braden hurried her away. “Looks like the bet’s off.”
“The hell it is.” The last thing she heard was Diane’s lover stepping into the fray, his voice a hard, animalistic growl.
That growl, its raw fury, brought on a flash of another memory threatening to intrude, to overcome reality as Liza was hustled quickly to safety.
They were occurring more frequently since the Breeds had arrived in Window Rock, bringing with them a disconcerting fear that Liza hurriedly pushed back.
Show no weakness.
Show no fear.
Show no mercy.
Show no remorse.
Those were the first things they were taught when they were accepted into the Navajo’s Breed Underground Network.
A Breed’s ability to sense those specific emotions was too well honed to allow any of those working with the network to go out without first being trained—rigorously—to hide them.
And now, that training was coming in damned handy.
Hell, it had been coming in handy for nearly two months now.
And now, Liza was nearly accosted by Breeds on a morning run designed to learn exactly why the Genetics Council had arrived on the tail of the Bureau of Breed Affairs.
The Bureau wasn’t telling the truth about what they were after; the deception had been detected and confirmed by its own sources. Unfortunately, those sources had no idea exactly what the Breeds were after either.
CHAPTER 1
Watching Diane Broen entering into a fight while the Breeds around her were taking bets on who would win, who would lose and how many blows it would take to do them in seemed fascinating. Still, Megan and Braden were forcing her away from the fray.
Actually, it was insanity.
The very Breeds who at first appeared intent on abducting her and the human enforcer, Diane Broen, now seemed to be working on the Bureau Breeds’ side. They had even encouraged the betting with the promise that if Diane won, they would walk away without the prize they had been paid to collect.
Namely, Liza herself.
She watched until she was pushed into a Dragoon and couldn’t see anything more. Damn them, she wasn’t a child anymore, yet that was exactly how she was being treated.