by Jae
"No," Griffin answered. She had heard Helen's steps coming closer right before Jorie's last statement, so unless Helen had a Wrasa's hearing, Jorie's secret was safe. "I'm sure she didn't hear."
Jorie's tense shoulders finally relaxed.
"But maybe you should tell her," Griffin said. She wasn't doing it to help Jorie improve her relationship with her mother, she told herself. She was doing it because if Jorie was busy dealing with her mess of a private life, she would neglect her writing. It would give Griffin more time to figure out what to do.
"No," Jorie said. "Nothing of what my parents wanted for me has come true. At least let her have this one last hope for a little while longer."
Griffin frowned. Whenever she heard Jorie talk about her relationship with her mother, everything sounded so complicated, so muddled by guilt, pride, and disappointment. When she listened to Helen talk about her daughter, things seemed so much clearer. Only one emotion was shining through: love. Griffin had never been an expert on family relationships, but she was trying to understand what Jorie was talking about. "What do you think they wanted for you?" she asked.
"Well, for one thing, a better job," Jorie said.
So it's not just Wrasa parents who have very clear expectations of what kind of job is acceptable for their children. When Griffin had first joined the Saru, she had done it mainly to get her fathers off her back and maybe to help her mother get a part of her good reputation and family honor back. She liked some things about her job with the Saru, but on missions like this one, the things she hated were becoming more and more obvious. But of course, she couldn't discuss the pros and cons of her job with Jorie, so she just nodded at her to go on.
"They never came right out and said it, but I know they always wanted me to get a 'real' job," Jorie said. A bitter-tasting hue of disappointment overshadowed her fresh coconut scent. "My mother thinks writing is just one in a long line of weird jobs that I never had for very long."
She thinks Helen doesn't want her to be a writer? It was obvious to Griffin that Jorie had never talked about it with her mother. "Your mother doesn't think that at all," she said before she could stop herself. "She read all of your books, and she seems quite proud of them — and of you."
Jorie snorted. "How would you know?"
"Hey, don't lash out at me. I'm not the enemy here." In fact, Griffin thought gloomily. I am.
"Sorry." Jorie rubbed her neck. "It's just... My mother never read one of my recent stories."
"That you know of. Your mother told me otherwise. I know she has a secret stash of J.W. Price novels somewhere," Griffin said.
Dark lashes blinked as the truth of Griffin's words sank in. "So this is what you were talking about at your pancake meeting? Were you talking about me the whole time?" Clearly uncomfortable with being the topic of conversation, she looked away to flick foam off her hands and back into the sink.
Griffin's lips formed an amused smile. "What else do your mother and I have in common?"
"So you mentioned a sister. How many siblings do you have?" Jorie asked.
Griffin allowed the change of topics, knowing she wouldn't get any more personal information out of Jorie if she pushed her. "Two sisters, one brother."
"Must be nice," Jorie mused. "Do you get along?"
Griffin rolled her eyes, a human gesture she had learned to imitate. "Like cats and dogs." Or rather: like Puwar and Kasari. "I haven't even seen Chiron, my younger brother, in years. He lives in Australia."
"Chiron?" Jorie cocked her head as she listened to the sound of the name. "What are the names of your sisters?"
Telling her couldn't hurt. If she wanted to learn more about Jorie and her book, she needed to open up a little too. "Kylin and Leigh."
"Chiron, Kylin, Griffin — and Leigh? Let me guess. One of your parents named the three of you, and the second parent named Leigh."
As usual, Jorie didn't miss a thing. She was indeed a worthy opponent. Griffin nodded. In Puwar society, children always got their mothers' last name, and mothers were responsible for picking their first names, while most Kasari cubs were named by their fathers.
"So who's the mythology fan, your mother or your father?" Jorie asked.
"My mother," Griffin said. It wasn't true. Her mother hadn't named them for mythological creatures because she was a fan of human folklore. After all the harsh criticism she'd had to take from her parents, the council, and the Wrasa community while she was pregnant, Nella had named her twins after chimerical creatures as an act of revenge and to reassert her rebellious, independent streak. For the most part, Griffin could appreciate the irony of being named after a creature that was part lion, part eagle, but sometimes it had made her life even harder, and she understood why her fathers had given Leigh a normal, unobtrusive name.
"So what hidden treasures are you guarding?" Jorie asked with a wink.
Griffin froze. "Excuse me?"
"Didn't you know that according to legends, Griffins — or Gryphons — are supposed to be the guardians of hidden treasures?" As a writer, Jorie knew something about a lot of things, including mythology.
Griffin shook her head. She hadn't known. Her grandfather had made a point of teaching her Wrasa legends, not human mythology. But how fitting. I'm a saru, guarding the greatest treasure of all — the secret of our existence and the safety of our species. I wonder if Mother has inherited just a bit of Grandfather's gift after all. But Nella hadn't always been so prophetic when naming her children. She had named her only son, fathered by a Puwar, Chiron after a respected oracle of Greek mythology, hoping along with all the other Wrasa that he would inherit the gift of his dream-seeing grandfather.
He hadn't.
"What about your name?" Griffin asked.
Jorie hopped up onto the kitchen counter and dangled her legs.
Griffin remained where she was, though, not hopping onto the counter too. Human furniture was fragile and might not carry her weight. "So, how did you end up with an unusual name like Jorie?"
"My full name is Marjorie Carol, after my two grandmothers," Jorie said.
"Your mother said you were three when they adopted you. Didn't you already have a name?" Giving up her true name seemed wrong to Griffin, and she wondered whether humans really thought nothing of just changing a child's name.
"I did, but my birth mother didn't want me to keep it. Maybe she wanted me to start a new life with a new name and new chances, so my parents — my adoptive parents — chose my new name," Jorie said.
Griffin was fascinated — and dismayed. Giving up a child for adoption was unheard of in Wrasa society. Every single child was loved and needed for the survival of their species. Well, Griffin thought bitterly, every child but an antapi. "Do you know why she gave you up for adoption?" she asked gently. It was a very personal question, so she needed to tread carefully, like a tigress tiptoeing closer to her prey.
"From what little I know of her, she wasn't married when she got pregnant with me," Jorie said, surprising both of them by answering openly. "She brought shame on her family by having a child out of wedlock, and she knew that growing up with a single mother and without a father would make me an outcast in Chinese society."
Chinese? Jorie was born in China? I'll have Leigh look into it. Hard to understand why not having a husband would be a reason for giving up a child. In Puwar society, most children grew up with single mothers, seeing their fathers only once in a while. "Have you tried to contact her?" Griffin realized she had, for the most part, stopped asking to gather more information for her investigation. Now she was asking because she couldn't imagine what it must have been like for Jorie to grow up not knowing who her biological parents were. As difficult as growing up with a Puwar mother and Kasari fathers had been, at least she had always known who they were and that they were basically good people even if they often didn't see eye to eye.
"When I was eighteen, I accessed my adoption records. I learned that I was born in the Tarim basin in West China, in a small vil
lage whose name I can't pronounce, and that my birth mother's last name is Wang." Jorie pulled her feet up and put her chin on her knees, a gesture that made her look even more vulnerable. "Not that it was any help in finding her since Wang is one of the most common last names in China. It might not even be her real name. I guess I'll never really know."
Which means that this will probably be a dead end in the investigation too.
Jorie's face was calm, and Griffin wondered whether Jorie had found peace with the fact that she would never know her birth mother. "So J.W., your pseudonym...?"
"I chose it to honor the woman who gave birth to me and the wonderful people who raised me," Jorie said. She unfolded her legs and jumped down from the kitchen counter. "I'm sorry to be so impolite, but I'm all talked out for today."
"It's okay." Frankly, Griffin was surprised that Jorie had opened up and told her as much as she had. From the look on Jorie's face, it had surprised her too.
"I'm sorry you had to listen to all that family drama," Jorie said when she walked Griffin to the front door. "I know that wasn't what you signed up for when you agreed to answer a few of my questions about big cats."
She's pulling back because now she feels exposed, as if she has told me too much. Griffin recognized Jorie's behavior because she herself had done it thousands of times before. Her Kasari half always wanted intimacy and close bonds to another person, but her Puwar half made her uncomfortable once she had achieved it and caused her to pull back. "It's okay. Really. I'll call tomorrow morning to see if your mother wants to have pancakes again," she said but didn't ask if Jorie wanted to come. She needed a break from being around Jorie so much.
It added to the doubts she had about her mission, and she couldn't afford that.
"Okay. Goodnight." Jorie closed the door behind Griffin. She didn't ask whether she could come with them to have breakfast either.
* * *
"Don't leave them on the grill for too long," Cedric shouted across the backyard. "You know I like mine rare." He leaned back in his chair and lifted his nose up into the air, enjoying the scent of olive oil and sizzling steaks. He kept one eye on Kelsey, the pack member who was flipping the steaks, while his attention was mainly focused on the four children racing one another through the backyard.
His muscles tensed, ready to intervene whenever they ventured too close to the grill with its glowing charcoal briquettes. Their parents were around somewhere, but as the pack leader, he was ultimately responsible for their well-being. He was their protector, a task he took very seriously. There were too few of them as it was.
"Then maybe you should do something about it," his father grumbled next to him.
Cedric turned his head to look at him, keeping the children in his peripheral vision. "What?"
"There are too few pups in the pack," Gregory said. Apparently, Cedric had voiced his thoughts out loud. "As the alpha, it's your responsibility to mate and have a few pups on your own, like Cyrus would have."
Cedric's gaze slid back to the grill and the woman behind it. The wind ruffled her fallow hair streaked with darker brown.
"Ah." His father flashed a wolfish grin at him. "You like her too."
It was one of Gregory's better days. And he was right. Cedric found himself watching her quite often. Still, he stayed away from Kelsey. His brother had tried to court Kelsey, and while every other woman in the pack would have been flattered by the attention, Kelsey had never shown any interest. Now Cedric was reluctant to try his luck — not just because he feared rejection. Like the wolves into which they could turn, Syak mated for life, and if he chose Kelsey, he wanted to make sure he wanted her for who she was as a person, not just because she was a trophy, one final win over his dead brother.
The object of his attention wandered over and set a plate with a two-inch-thick steak in front of him. It was tradition for the alpha to get his food first, but Cedric always made sure his people had something to eat before he took the first bite.
With a respectful nod, Kelsey turned to walk away.
"Sit." Cedric stopped her, pointing at the chair next to him. Maybe his father was right. Maybe he should take the time to court her properly, as it had been done in the old times, before Wrasa had adopted human traditions and given up their own.
Kelsey turned back around. The gaze of her orange-brown eyes flickered up to his, then down to the chair. "The grill," she said.
"Paul will take care of it," Cedric said. He gave the man at the table across from him a nod that had him hurry over to the grill.
Nervously licking her lips, Kelsey sat.
The smoky scent of the meat wafted up as Cedric cut the steak in two and nudged one half over onto the empty plate in front of Kelsey.
The eyes of every Syak in the backyard were on Kelsey. If she took a bite of the steak, she would accept much more than just his food.
"Tas..." Kelsey kept her hands tucked against the sides of her thighs, not touching the fork or the knife next to her plate.
Part of Cedric wanted to order her to eat the damn steak, but he didn't.
His cell phone rang.
Cedric cursed loudly — loud enough for every pack member to hear. In truth, it was a welcome distraction. It offered him a way to walk away without losing face in front of the whole pack. "Excuse me," he said to Kelsey, grabbed his cell phone, and stepped inside.
* * *
The phone was picked up after the second ring. "Jennings."
Griffin knew her tas was getting impatient, so she cut right to the chase. "I've learned a lot of new things about Jorie Price tonight," she said without identifying herself first. With his perfect hearing, Jennings would know who she was — and, of course, she was the only saru working the Jorie Price case right now.
"Finally! Investigating this writer has been like... well, like herding cats," Jennings said, and Griffin heard the smirk in his words. "So, what did you find out? Leigh said you had her check out adoption records?"
"Yes. Ms. Price was adopted when she was three. She was born in China. Her father is unknown, and she knows very little about her birth mother — only that her last name was Wang. That's where the 'W' in her pseudonym comes from." It felt strange to report the things that Jorie had told her with so much emotion last night so matter-of-factly now, but Griffin was used to it. Only Wrasa with above-average emotional control were considered for the Saru.
"Wang?" Jennings asked and laughed.
Griffin settled back against the headboard of her bed. "Yes. Something funny about that?"
"Well, in case your Chinese is a little rusty... Wang means 'king,'" Jennings answered.
"And that's funny?" Wolf humor was strange.
"Ever looked at your mother in her animal form?" Jennings asked. This time, he was the one who enjoyed her having to drag the information out of him.
Maybe working so closely with cat-shifters is rubbing off on him. "Of course I have. What does that have to do with the name of Jorie Price's birth mother?"
"The stripe pattern on top of a tiger's head resembles the Chinese character 'wang,'" Jennings explained.
"That's just coincidence," Griffin said. This case was making less and less sense to her. Things were getting more complicated by the second.
"I didn't say it wasn't," Jennings answered. "You've met Ms. Price up close and personal. There's no chance that she could be Wrasa, right?"
That had been one of Griffin's first questions to the council too. "No chance," she said. "The Maki held a knife to her throat. No Wrasa would have been able to keep from shifting under such a direct attack." Even Griffin, who had years of Saru training, had almost shifted to fight the Maki, even knowing that the attack was part of her own plan. "No, she's human. She smells like a human." Although a nicely smelling human.
"Then this information is just another dead end," Jennings concluded, now once again growing impatient.
"Maybe, but her father is unknown, and her mother apparently didn't want to be found. I know there
could be a very simple explanation for it," Griffin said. "Maybe her father was a married man, or it was just a brief affair and he didn't want a child. And maybe her mother made it impossible for Jorie to find her because she wanted to start a new life too and didn't want anyone to know she had a child out of wedlock."
"Sounds like a perfectly logical explanation," Jennings said.
Still, Griffin couldn't help wondering. "But what if her father or someone else in her family was Wrasa? What if Jorie is part Wrasa? She has a lot of characteristics that remind me a little of a cat-shifter." Maybe that could explain why Jorie was so intuitive about the Wrasa — and why Griffin felt so comfortable around Jorie.
"You're a biologist, Westmore. You know better." There was no doubt in Jennings's voice.
As a Wrasa scientist, Griffin knew that humans and Wrasa having children together was impossible. They didn't belong to the same species or even to the same order. The rare one-night stand between humans and Wrasa had never led to a pregnancy. "Still... I want to be sure," Griffin said. Too many doubts and questions were running through her mind where Jorie was concerned.
"Okay, then get a DNA sample from Ms. Price and send it to our lab. That should take care of your concerns." It was clear that Jennings didn't believe that Jorie had even one drop of Wrasa blood. "What else did you find out?"
To her surprise, Griffin found herself reluctant to tell Jennings. It was very personal information. Still, it was information that could save Jorie's life. "The newest scene has the first kiss between Quinn, the shape-shifting main character, and her human love interest."
"And?" Jennings asked, clearly not interested in hearing about human ideas of romance.
Griffin had made the same mistake. Whenever Quinn and Sid had a more personal interaction in the book, she had skipped ahead. "They're both women," she said.