“Grandfather . . .” He would have demanded answers.
Orrin’s hand shot up in a demand for silence, the strength and purpose in his dark eyes as brilliant now as it had been for as long as Lincoln had known him.
“A price will be paid,” Orrin snapped. “That we cannot stop. What that price will be, I do not know. I know only that death will come, and that Cat will face a past that will bring that death. Claire was not fated to die, Lincoln,” he ground out, his conviction in that belief without doubt. “I saw her fate at her birth, and it was not death. The winds whispered her path would be one no other would want to walk, and her heart would know scars others could not comprehend. But she is to fly from the flames and become a voice all will hear. Death is not her fate.”
But even Orrin, who understood the whispers that drifted through the breeze of the desert better than any other, completely believed his granddaughter would never truly live. Lincoln saw it in his eyes, heard it in his voice.
Claire had lost her life but she’d been unable to find her peace. She protected a young woman who would have died soon after, had his sister not died. Her spirit protected that young woman now. Protected her in ways Linc had fought to understand for years.
He’d failed Claire; he’d been determined he wouldn’t fail in protecting Cat. But he had. He hadn’t realized the evil his father was in time, and Claire had suffered again alongside Cat.
He would kill Raymond if he ever faced him again, Linc feared. No man should ever face that within himself. But if he ever faced Raymond again, then the bastard would suffer . . .
? ? ?
The tiger’s roar shattered the silence of the night, jerking Cat from the diagram Keenan had laid on the patio table just outside the kitchen.
“That’s one pissed-off tiger.” The reflection in his voice, not to mention the understatement, was almost amusing.
“It won’t take him long to get here.” She sighed. “He’s incredibly fast when he gives in to the full primal abilities he possesses.”
Keenan gathered up the papers, folded them and shoved them in the leather vest he wore. “Did you see enough of the plans?”
She’d seen all of them. The maps and diagrams as well as the locations of the Reever security details. All she’d needed was one look, a glance at best, to imprint them on her memory.
“I saw enough,” she assured him. “We won’t have long before Graeme realizes I’m gone and manages to track me down. Let General Roberts know we’ll have to stick strictly to the plan. Any deviations and I’m out of there. For both our sakes.”
“I’ll inform him of this.” He nodded in assurance, those wild Eagle eyes watching her far too closely. “Will you weather the storm your mate brings with him, though?”
“Weather the storm,” what a very apt phrase. Graeme was definitely a storm no matter his mood. Enraged Gideon or the slightly mad Graeme, whichever face he showed at the moment, he was still like a tornado sweeping through her life.
“Graeme’s storms are well known to me,” she promised, a small smile curling at her lips. “Weathering them is always an adventure, but not in the least dangerous.”
“To you,” he pointed out. “It seems the beast does have a leash, no matter what others believe.”
“Well then, let’s just keep that between ourselves,” she suggested. “Go now, Keenan, before he’s close enough to realize you’ve been here. When the beast is loose his senses are far too adept.”
With a nod, he phased from sight and a moment later a hard push of wind signaled his departure.
Turning, she watched the back wall Graeme had disappeared over hours before, knowing he’d return the same way. Where he’d gone she had no idea. He’d slipped from her, believing she slept, thinking he could sneak away from her so easily.
As curious as she had been over where he was going, who he was meeting with, because she knew he was meeting with someone, still she’d taken the opportunity to meet with Keenan rather than follow him. This meeting with Honor’s parents had been years in the making. Their desperation to finally see the daughter they’d released, rather than chance losing forever, was like a hunger ravaging their lives.
Cat had contacted them years before, giving them periodic reports on the child they feared they’d never see again. Now it was time to instigate a meeting that would fully awaken Honor.
What would happen to Liza, though, she wondered, and Claire? They had sacrificed the peace they had deserved to find to protect Cat and Honor over the years.