The Cougar's Pawn (6 page)

“Hey, have you maybe considered just
asking
a woman to be your mate? That’d eliminate the kidnapping situation. Just sayin’.”

“You want to be my mate?”

“Absolutely not.”

“There you have it. That’s why we don’t do that.”

“There’s a such thing called courtship.”

“You want me to court you? Is that all?”

“No!” She stamped her foot. “I want you to send me home.” Besides, she didn’t think the dude would know courtship even if it bit him in his … exquisitely molded … muscular … She gave her forearms twin pinches, hoping the pain would chase away her licentious thoughts. It worked. She gave a silent cheer.

“Can’t do that. As much as I would love to toss you onto the fastest thing headed east, I’m somewhat disinclined to do so now. The cougar part of my brain has decided it likes your scent.”

“Well, that sounds lovely in a
Silence of the Lambs
kind of way. I’ll have you know there’s not much meat on me. Certainly not enough to enjoy with a nice Chianti.”

His cheek twitched. She was pretty sure that was
practically
a smile. Maybe she could disarm him. Keep him amused long enough to get him to turn his back, and then she’d pull a Houdini. Or at least dial 9-1-1.

“Like Mom said, I’m harmless unless I’m forced not to be. I’m not going to hurt you, and the cougar part of me isn’t going to let me rest if you’re out of my sight. At least, not until … ”

He let the words trail off, and when he didn’t pick them up after a minute, she reached across the seat and nudged his arm. “You’ll let me out of your sight when?” There had to be some sort of escape clause to the mess.

Prodding him was like pushing a telephone pole. Solid man. Nothing in excess, except his pride. Different from ego, and ego was something she knew well. She could sense it in auras, and alphas like him tended to have large ones. His was odd. Strong, but restrained. Tentative, maybe. She believed he didn’t want to hurt her. Things might be easier if he did. If he had just wanted to hurt her, she wouldn’t try so hard to make sense of him.

“Never, if my goddess has anything to say about it,” he said finally.

A half-answer, but she didn’t think pushing the issue any further would get her anywhere, so she didn’t. He had his mind set, and so did she. She was starting to dislike his goddess, and Lord knew the last thing she needed was more enemies.

She could forgive him for what he’d done in the name of his goddess.
Really
, she could. He was a product of his world—his clan—and she was a product of hers. Some woman out there would make a suitable mate for a desert-dwelling cougar, but it wouldn’t be her.

He’d done what he had to.

So would she. Once she figured out what that was.

Mason pulled up the parking brake and killed the engine.

Ellery was asleep with arms crossed and head pressed against the window. He hated to wake her because in sleep, she couldn’t snipe at him, but there was no way he’d be able to get Nick’s car seat in through the driver’s side. He couldn’t move the seat. One of these days, he’d need to get a new truck—one with a crew cab—but money had been so tight up until recently that a big purchase hadn’t been on his priority list.

It was probably a good idea to let her sleep until after he fetched Nick. That way, she’d be less likely to run while he was tending to his errand. He’d have to teach her that running was pointless. He’d always find her. His cougar half wouldn’t let her get far.

And his damned cougar half was the reason he had two weeks to get his shit together—to extract consent from a woman who’d threatened in no uncertain terms to render his balls useless. At that point, the cougar would take over and try to do the job himself. He would fail, of course, because human women didn’t tend to understand cat language very well. If she refused him, he’d be stuck as a fucking cougar for the rest of his life, however long that would be.
La Bella Dama
must have really been in a man-hating mood when she cursed the cougars with that particular caveat. Some of the guys in the glaring called her
La Bella Muerte
—Pretty Death—because, shit, sometimes death seemed like the better option than giving her what she wanted from them.

Mason didn’t want to die as a cat. He just wasn’t optimistic. Most Cougar men somehow managed to sweet-talk their captures into staying—into
understanding
—but no one had ever accused the Foyes of talking pretty. They didn’t have to talk pretty. Power was enough for most women. Ellery didn’t seem to be so entranced by it, though, and maybe that was because she had her own. He’d never heard of an alpha taking a witch mate. If they had, they certainly would have bragged about it. Mason certainly didn’t intend to. If he were lucky, he’d find a loophole and get himself out of the mess. Ellery was hardly a fate worse than death, but he was
so
not ready to be anyone’s mate, especially not hers. He couldn’t handle her on top of all his other responsibilities. Didn’t want to try.

He got out of the truck, left the door slightly ajar so as no to wake her with the slam, and ran around to the front of the building. The gas station was actually a rest stop that housed a small restaurant Jill frequented. The food sucked, but she’d eat anything. Coyotes weren’t picky like Cougars. Cougars only ate what they trusted.

He found her in her usual booth, bent over a nearly gone blue-plate special, with Nick in his high chair at the end of the table.

Mason scooped him up, and held his tongue about the baby’s state of dress—just a too-large T-shirt and a diaper which looked to be full. She always either underdressed him or overdressed him, as if she had no awareness of the temperature and how it affected humans. And that’s what Nick was. He’d never be Cougar and never be Coyote, not without intervention. Born Coyotes needed two coyote parents, and with their gene pool becoming smaller with each passing year, the chances of a full-blooded Coyote being born was slim. He could always be made into one as an adult with a bite or deep enough scratch, but Mason didn’t see that happening. He wouldn’t let that happen. Not to
his
son.

Nick would never be Cougar, either, because he lacked the genetic trigger. It only conveyed when a Cougar was with his mate. Jill hadn’t been it for Mason, but he’d never meant for her to be. She’d been a one-night-stand, and his cat half wanted to leave it at that.

He tweaked Nick’s nose and took the bag Jill handed over to him.

She didn’t even look up.

“Where’s his car seat?”

“Backseat. Door’s open.”

“Kinda have my hands full. Can you get it?”

“I’ve had my hands full for weeks.”

Mason ground his teeth. Tempered his words. “How long do I have him this time?”

“I dunno. I’ll call you. Me and the gang might ride the bikes up to Sturgis.”

“Have fun.”

“Yep.”

He left the restaurant without another word. Arguing with Jill was pointless. Coyotes tended to be far better parents in their animal forms than in their people forms. Flightiness was in her wiring. Most of the time, she was a competent-enough parent, but he did worry about the
rest
of the time. Nick couldn’t shift along with her, so her being a good Coyote mama didn’t do him a damn bit of good.

Mason dropped the bag next to Jill’s trunk and one-handedly wrestled the car seat out of the vehicle.

It was facing the wrong way, as always. He always installed it rear-facing, but every time he fetched Nick, he’d find it turned the other way. Nick was such a scrawny thing. Mason wished she would take more care. Wished he could just … take him from her. But, that just wasn’t done with their kind. Not without causing ill will between the two groups, and that was the last thing the Cougars needed. More drama. As Alpha, he’d been trying to tamp down the amount of drama in the group since his father died—to make the Cougars at least a little bit civilized. They couldn’t be fighting over women and territory all the time as if they didn’t have human brains. He was trying to put a stop that shit. No one seemed to be appreciating it. There was more in-fighting than ever, and he was starting to wonder if he was cut out to be Alpha at all. He’d only taken the job in the first place because the only others he’d trust in the job were his brothers … but he didn’t want the burden to fall to them. That’s what it was. Pure burden. People in the glaring wanted him to play God and perform miracles for them, and in return all he got was sniping, criticisms, and challenges. Hoping for a little support from the oldest families in the glaring had been pointless. They were all caught up in the power plays. The Marquardts. The Delacroixs. The Sheehans.
Especially
the Sheehans. If they weren’t Cougars, they’d be vultures.

He hitched Nick up in his left arm, tossed the bag over his shoulder, and grabbed the seat’s handle.

Ellery’s head was still against the window when he returned to the truck. He set down the seat and bag and knocked gently on the glass.

She started, whipping her head left to right, then spotted him outside. Her forehead furrowed as her gaze focused on him. She tried the handle, moved her lips into something that resembled a curse, and rolled down the window.

Her gaze fixed on the bundle in his left arm. “Um, I can’t open the door.”

“I’ll open it. I need you to hop down so I can install his seat.”

“His …
seat
.”

“Right. It’s a bit cold out here for him. So … ”

“Oh.” She unbuckled her seatbelt.

He pulled the door.

She got out. “This was your errand?”

“This is my son. Nick. Could you hold him while I get his seat installed? I wouldn’t normally ask, but since you’re here … ”

“Your son.” There seemed to be an unstressed question in her statement, or perhaps an accusation. He wasn’t ashamed. Never would be. She could judge him all she wanted.

“Mm-hmm.” He handed her the baby.

She looked down at Nick, forehead still furrowed. A tense, awkward hold. Her nose crinkled.

He scoffed. “You know what? Forget it. Give him back. I shouldn’t have even asked. I thought you’d be civil.”

“This has nothing to do with civility.” She squeezed Nick’s bottom. “This is me being pissed about someone’s lazy parenting. He’s soaked. That’d be obvious from five yards away.”

“Oh.” The rage that had been building in Mason’s gut flopped just like that—as if she’d just gone and thrown a bucket of ice at it.

She scowled at him even as Nick stared at her with curiosity. He should have been crying by then. Strangers made him anxious.

Huh.

Mason shifted his weight for a few seconds, and when the crying didn’t start, he hauled the seat up and climbed into the truck after it. “He probably has a rash, too. Can probably wait to change him until we get back to the house.”

“It’s not like he’s uncomfortable or anything, right?”

“He’s not crying.”

“If that’s the attitude you take, he’s probably become a little baby martyr. He senses you like him more when he doesn’t cry or complain, so he just doesn’t do it.”

Shit
. She really knew how to deal those blows, and that one hit home. He tried the best he could with Nick, just like he did with the Cougars, but sometimes, he felt like he lacked sufficient qualifications to be either Alpha or dad.

She knelt and unzipped the bag. Transferring Nick to one shoulder, she patted around in it. “There are no diapers in here.”

“Of course not. That would make my life too easy.”

She sighed. Stood. “Give me some money. You took my wallet.”

He turned around in the seat and wedged his billfold out of his back pocket. He plucked out a few bills and handed them to her.

She snatched them.

“Don’t try anything funny, Ellery. I can see the diapers and formula through the gas station window. I can see the cashier’s counter. Get them. Come straight back. No unnecessary conversation, no note-passing. Got it?”

“Jerk.”

“Yep.”

She stormed off, muttering under her breath with Nick holding onto her hair for either dear life or shits and giggles. He probably thought it was a curious new toy.

“Don’t get too attached, kid.”

Mason had the seat installed, bag stowed in the back, and heat cranking when she came back.

She thrust a bag containing a container of powdered formula and an open pack of diapers at him, put Nick on his back, and changed his diaper in less time than it took for her to give Mason a complete cursing-out. “You people are trifling.” She tossed the dirty diaper at him.

Sighing, he grabbed the formula bag, got out of the truck, pitched the diaper into the nearby trashcan, and stowed the bag in the back.

“It’s not me. It’s his mother,” he said when he’d belted himself into the driver’s seat.

She buckled Nick in and gave him a strip of string cheese to chew on. “He can’t even be a year old. He’s barely got any teeth.”

“Ten months.” Mason started the truck and got it back on the road. “Late teether.”

“Ten months. Wow. And here you are on the hunt for a new mate? Seems like you already have one. How many months ago did you and his mother break up?”

“We were never together. She is not and was not my mate.”

“Nick’s amber eyes and reddish hair say otherwise.”

“I mean we were never a
couple
.”

“So, Nick’s just a collision of genetic components, huh?”

“He’s my son.”

“Mm-hmm. Generally, people feel a certain kind of way about the mothers of their children. Normal people, anyway.”

“Are you gonna lecture me like my mother, too? Unbefuckinglievable.”

“I feel like someone should, and since I’m here”—she shrugged in his periphery—“might as well be me.”

“You never made a mistake, Ellery?”

“I don’t consider children mistakes.”

“I’m not implying that Nick is one, only that I was careless when dealing with his mother. Coyotes have always been on my no-fly list. One night, I made an exception.”

“His mother is a Coyote? Oh
God
, what does that even mean? Is he going to throw a tantrum and shift into some furry thing if he gets upset enough?”