Free Bengal's Heart by Lora Leigh

with me peaceably?”
    “I doubt it.” She would have kicked at him if she thought it would do her any good.
    “That’s what I thought,” he snarled. “Lawe, finish up here, and escort those damned Coyotes off this mountain,” he suddenly ordered. “I’ll meet you back at base.”
    Where the hell base was, she had no idea, but before she could protest or question anything, he was pulling her down the path once again. Where the hell he actually thought he was taking her, she wasn’t sure. The one thing she was certain of: She most likely didn’t want to be there with Cabal.
    “This isn’t going to work,” she hissed furiously.
    “It’s working fine for me.”
    Of course it was working fine for him. She had no doubt in her mind.
    If there was one thing she knew about Cabal, it was that his superior arrogance worked perfectly. For him. What it did for others was another story.
    The path veered to the left, the opposite direction of the valley she had been heading for. This was just her luck, of course. And there wasn’t a chance in hell that Cabal was going to let her in on whatever was going on here.
    “This won’t stop me.” She didn’t fight his hold now. She’d learned over the years of watching mated couples what came of pushing a male Breed too hard. Especially when he was agitated. Cabal was definitely agitated.
    Poor fucking kitty.
    She hated this. She hated being dragged behind him and forced away from the direction she wanted to go in. She hated being forced into anything anyway. He was taking her choice away from her, with no explanation, with no reason.
    “Ignoring me won’t work either,” she informed him, hearing the shakiness in her own voice.
    He was affecting her, she couldn’t help it. There was something about being this close to him that made her too warm and made her too damned nervous.
    “I’m not ignoring you,” he informed her shortly. “Just shut the hell up, Cassa, until I can get over the fact that a fucking Coyote was chasing you through the forest. Do you have any idea what it did to me to see him on your ass like that?”
    Anger filled his tone now.
    “So why didn’t you just shoot him?” she asked with mocking sweetness. “Or dump him in a volcano? Isn’t that the preferred method of disposing with irritating Breed enemies this year?”
    “That was last year. This year it’s a pit of alligators. Didn’t you get the memo?”
    “Do I ever get the memo?” she muttered. The Breeds didn’t inform anyone of anything. They made a point of being closemouthed and stubborn.
    “I’ll make sure you get the next one.”
    She just bet he would. There wasn’t a chance in hell he was going to tell her anything, unless he was forced to. If he kept dragging her around like a child, then he was going to find out just where he could shove his memos.
    Tightening her lips to hold back the angry words eager to fall from her tongue, Cassa tromped behind him until they came to an area where their wicked black mountain Raiders were parked. The powerful, high four-wheel-drive vehicles held four easily, and if she wasn’t mistaken, one of them was outfitted with a lethal automatic rifle on the roll bar that encased the top of it.
    “Get in.” He jerked open the passenger door to the nearest vehicle.
    Cassa eyed the darkened interior suspiciously before eyeing him more so. “Why?”
    “Because I said to.” Before she could do more than draw a shocked breath, he had lifted her into the seat and slammed the door closed.
    She should jump right back out of the vehicle, she thought furiously, but that little click she’d heard a second after the door slammed was probably a lock. And more than likely it would take her longer to figure out how to unlock it than it would for him to get into the vehicle and stop her.
    Instead, she crossed her arms over her breasts and glared out the windshield as he moved into the driver’s seat and started the ignition.
    The soft hum of the motor was