She could only pray she'd learned to lie without that particular response.
"I can't be sure," he growled. "She stinks of fear, pain and Styx. Mating changes the scent too much at first to be able to detect something as subtle as a lie."
If she managed to get her hands on Styx, and she prayed she did, then she was so going to make him hurt for the confusion she was feeling at the moment.
The more they mentioned that damned mating heat, the more it made the tabloid stories sound true rather than the product of a reporter's fanciful imagination.
And all that aside, as she watched Gena's face, she slowly sat back down in the chair and allowed her fingers to slide between the seat cushion and the arm, where she had hidden only one of the many weapons in the house during her last visit.
This was her refuge. The only place she had been able to escape for a few days of peace. She'd used it rarely, but she'd kept the house prepared, just in case.
"Then I say she's lying." Gena decided with a cold, hard smile. "And I've decided she needs to be convinced to tell us the truth."
Storme shook her head slowly. "Don't do this, Gena. It's not going to get you what you want."
Gena's lips curled in furious mockery. "Six years I've had to shadow your skinny ass and pull it out of the fires you were too stupid to keep from walking into." Gena shook her head in disgust. "You won't kill a Breed, even when they're running you to ground like a hound would a hare. Still, you just tuck your little tail and run like the frightened little rabbit you've always been. Well, bitch, your running days are over. I'm so going to enjoy listening to you scream as he rapes your skinny ass."
Storme's fingers curled over the butt of the weapon tucked at the side of the chair cushion. She didn't have much of a chance. It was going to be damned close. And bullets weren't always a good bet against a laser-powered weapon.
"You're not going to beg me to believe you?" Gena tilted her head, the short spikes of her dark blond hair throwing an odd shadow across the room as she advanced on Storme.
Just a little closer, Storme thought. She hadn't anticipated that Gena would be the one to come closer to her. She'd expected Marx. But this was even better.
"Get up, Breed tramp," Gena ordered as she extended the weapon and motioned furiously. "It's time to find out how a Coyote fucks. While I watch." She came closer. "And he follows orders so well. He'll fuck you just like I tell him to."
An inch closer. Gena laughed and pushed the barrel of the weapon into Storme's shoulder.
Storme moved.
Her hand lashed out, gripped Gena's wrist and twisted. The laser-powered weapon discharged harmlessly into the wall as Storme threw all her weight into the surprise move, twisted and slammed the other woman into the wall as she jumped to the back of the chair, covered her face with her arms and launched herself through the window.
CHAPTER 18
Hitting the ground, Storme barely managed to smother a cry as she felt a sharp, raking fire along her side, where her shirt had shifted high and revealed vulnerable flesh to the glass raining to the ground ahead of her.
She would check it later, she promised herself as she struggled to her feet and began praying. It wasn't the first wound she had taken, and it would likely not be the last. If she survived, that is.
She could hear the discharge of laser fire even now, as she raced into the forest surrounding the cabin. Raised voices and automatic rifle fire began to echo in the distance as she ran as though the hounds of hell were snapping at her heels.
The sounds of laser fire and bullets combined were echoing behind her as she raced through the night and the thunderstorm that had threatened opened up in the heavens above.
Rain poured to the ground, making the ground slippery, wet. The sounds behind her indicated that there were others besides Gena there. Others who were possibly delaying Gena and Marx from following her.
Breeds. Breeds had been hiding in the night, but it hadn't been Styx. If Styx had been there he would have saved her. He would have been there in the cabin. He wouldn't have waited.
Her breathing hitched on a sob as she stumbled, went to her knees and fought to hold back the tears and the pain welling inside her.
He would have been here, if he could have been. He wouldn't have made her run through the night as she fought for her life.
"You whore!" Gena's enraged scream echoed in the darkness as weapon fire broke, then began the rat-a-tat-tat once again.
It was like hearing hell. Like being in the middle of a war that she had no idea how to fight.
Her fingers curled around the butt of the weapon she had managed hold on to. Forcing herself back to her feet, she kept running. She had been running for ten years, it was the only thing she knew. Maybe, if she kept running, she would forget. She would forget that for a while she had been warm and safe. That for a while she had known something she had never known before.
She didn't have much of a head start. Hell, she probably didn't have a head start at all considering how fast a Breed Coyote could run. If Marx was behind her, then she would be lucky if whoever had delayed them gave her a few minutes at best.
But if she were lucky, very very lucky, she might be able to flag down a car on the busy road and get a ride to the nearest town. It would be easier to lose Marx and Gena in town. It was harder for a Breed to track individual scent when faced with so many scents, she knew that. It was one of the reasons Council members, former trainers under warrant by the Breeds, and soldiers that had been a part of brutalizing Breeds had moved to such locations as New York City, Los Angeles, Dallas.