In a year of intense rains, runoffs and flash floods had carved out the land in many places and revealed surprising gorges as well as caverns once hidden behind thin stone walls and packed desert sands.
It was one of these caverns that he stepped into, aware that Orrin didn’t wait alone. With him were four of the Unknown, Navajo warriors selected to protect the secrets the chiefs oversaw.
One of those warriors, Lincoln Martinez, stood silently, his features, marked by warrior’s paint, nearly obscured by the design they used.
“I’d love to know how you figure out when we need to talk.” Graeme shook his head as he took a seat at the small fire Orrin had prepared.
Orrin watched him closely, the solemn wisdom reflected in his gaze just as deep and just as knowing as it had been so long ago.
“The winds whisper to those willing to listen,” Orrin stated quietly. “Many just prefer not to hear.”
It was his standard answer when Graeme asked how he knew whatever he knew at the time.
The winds whispered the secrets to him.
“Does Claire hear the whispers when she’s awake?” he asked the old Navajo, not in the least surprised when Orrin sighed heavily at the question.
“If so, she did not tell me, nor did the whispers that drift by me,” he said softly. “My granddaughter, even at a young age, was well versed in keeping her secrets.”
“She loved the night, didn’t she?” Graeme asked then, wondering how much the chief did know where Claire was concerned.
Orrin’s head lifted, his gaze staring beyond Graeme’s shoulder before he turned to the warriors and nodded to the cavern opening. All but one left the natural enclosure. Lincoln moved from where he stood, though, and took a seat next to Orrin.
The Navajo hiding in the small crevice leading to another cavern came forward then, his saddened features and bitter gaze attesting to the fact that none of the Martinez family had escaped the repercussions of one son’s actions.
Terran moved to Orrin’s other side, sat and stared back at Graeme silently.
“You spoke to Claire?” Orrin asked then.
“Last night.” Graeme nodded. “You told me once Cat awoke that Claire would find her rest, Orrin.”
He hadn’t known of the ritual until he’d scented Cat in the same body that he’d known carried a different scent years before. It was then that Orrin had come to him in the desert and explained the actions the chiefs had taken to save Cat and Honor, as well as Judd.
“The ritual was to place your Cat in a sleep so deep none could find her,” he said softly, a small, rueful smile tugging at his lips. “Perhaps the winds did not tell me how determined that little Breed was to rule her fate, no matter who others believed she was.”
“Plastic surgery was performed after the ritual?” Graeme wasn’t pleased over that. He’d liked Cat’s looks fine when she was a child.
But Orrin nodded. “The surgery was required to alter her facial features to more closely match those of Claire’s.” His voice hoarsened with emotion then. “Barely six months after the ritual Cat awoke and Claire went away for such a long period of time I feared she would not return. Then the Breeds began arriving, and Claire would return when they were near. She was your Cat’s protector when needed, but otherwise, she slept so deeply that even I, with all my knowledge of the intricacies of that ritual, could not find her.”
Yes, his Cat was determined, Graeme agreed silently. He had no doubt she’d come awake with a vengeance, but he doubted Claire had slept as much as Orrin suspected.
Graeme knew how desperately Cat had ached for a friend who couldn’t be taken from her as everyone had been taken in the research center. She would have kept Claire awake every second possible.
“What happened the night Claire died?” Graeme asked. “What sent a fifteen-year-old racing into the desert with her father’s vehicle into a canyon guaranteed to kill not just herself but also the girl she claimed as her best friend?”
Orrin merely shook his head, lowering it silently as though he didn’t know.
He knew something.
Growling, Graeme glanced to Terran, who did the same, then to Lincoln.
“Are you going to lie to me as well, warrior?” He freely released a portion of the madness just waiting to leap free and do whatever necessary to protect his mate.
His body heated where the stripes emerged, his vision became so clear no detail was missed and those extrasensory abilities he’d acquired when giving himself to the pulsing fury became so much sharper he could almost hear the thoughts of the brother who himself ached to know why.