Frost Burned

because he had no idea I was changing the rules of the game on him. I was not Coyote’s daughter, not quite. But that was okay because being almost Coyote’s daughter in my dream would be enough.
    Adam’s lips came down upon my own and I opened my mouth. Looking into his eyes, I pulled the things that were killing him into me, swallowing down the silver that was poison to him and nothing to me.
    He didn’t understand at first, but when he did, he struggled, but it was my dream, not his. In this dream, I wasn’t a coyote shapeshifter trying to hold a werewolf, I was Coyote’s almost daughter, and I had all the strength of the world in my arms.
    “Mine,” I told him, though my mouth was still fastened to his. “Mine.”
    I meant that he was mine, but also that the silver he took from the pack to save them was also mine to bear, not his. I also used the word to call the silver from his body into my own, the silver and the ketamine and all the rest of the harm that had been done to him.
    But he was an Alpha werewolf, and he was more than a match for me, even in my dream.
    He roared, ripped free of my hold and off of our bed—in my dreams it was still our bed at home, not the one in Kyle’s spare bedroom. It wasn’t anger in Adam’s voice when he spoke.
Mercy, you don’t know what you’re doing.
It was fear.
    I started to go after him, but had to stop, kneeling on the edge of the bed because I was sick to my stomach. Either the silver or the ketamine wasn’t sitting well. Heck. Maybe it was the DMSO for all that I knew. Adam . . . he was better, I could feel his strength, could feel the pack stir in alertness because they could feel it, too.
    Don’t do that,
he ordered retroactively, coming to his feet. He knew how well I followed orders. He looked away, took a deep breath, and reached out toward me.
If you die . . .
    I didn’t think it would kill me, no matter how much my stomach hurt. But I wasn’t going to show him that it had affected me. “Not my day to die,” I told him.
    He stared at me, and I lifted my chin and stared back at him. There wasn’t a pack around who needed to see me bow down to the Alpha. He could have made me drop my gaze anyway. I wasn’t immune to his dominance, just stubborn. I could see the moment he gave up.
    I remembered that there were other things I needed to know.
    “Did you find out where you are being held?” I asked, then, seeing the answer on his face, I continued, “Any clues at all? Do you smell anything? The river? Sagebrush? Diesel?”
    Dust, Mercy.
His voice was quiet. Then he looked around himself. I don’t think he was seeing our bedroom like I was.
Dust and Peter’s blood.
    I’d heard that kind of rage in Adam once before. He’d torn the corpse of a man I’d already killed into small pieces. The men who had made themselves our enemy had no idea what they had done.
    They are sending a helicopter to pick up Darryl and me. Soon.
    “They’re still sending you out after the senator?” I thought that our call to the police would have preempted the attack.
    Yes.
    We’d told the police about why Adam and the pack had been taken. They seemed to be taking our word seriously.
    They know. They told me it would be more difficult now, but they didn’t seem to be really bothered. Either the attack itself is what they want—or there is something else I am not seeing.
    He sat back down on the bed and put his hand against my forehead.
Are you okay?
    I smiled at him. “Ariana is going to see if she can contact Bran. Maybe he can ride to the rescue.”
    Adam considered that.
What about the vampires?
he asked.
    I stared at him. “Marsilia hates me, and Ben bled all over the back of her Mercedes.”
    The AMG?
    Something distracted me. Something terrible. “What is that smell?”
    I woke up with Ben licking my face as earnestly as a cat—which hurt. His breath made my eyes water—and I have a high tolerance for nasty odors.
    “Jeez, jeez,” I said, scrambling away from him. I hit something hard, then kept moving away from Ben when whatever it was fell to the floor with a thump and freed up some space on the bed.
    My stomach hurt. Not like the flu or even bad food. More like I’d swallowed something that was eating me alive. The truly vile smell of Ben’s breath didn’t help. “Ben, your breath stinks. Have you been eating roadkill?”
    “Ow. Ow. Ow,” moaned Kyle from the floor where I’d knocked him. I’d forgotten he was in the bed with