Unable to settle this particular question herself, she looked to Charlie.
“I saw him,” Diana told him cryptically.
“Saw who?” Charlie asked absently, taking a right turn down a small dirt road heading north.
“In the vision. I saw Cat. The elders said that it meant he was supposed to be my mate. But, if he betrayed me…”
“The elders were wrong,” Charlie said immediately.
“What do you mean…?”
“They were wrong about who you were meant to be mated to,” Charlie said. She felt something like a deep stone fall to her chest. That couldn’t be true. Cat and Diana had a bond, she had felt the talisman glow, she knew when he kissed her...
“The truth is,” Charlie continued, “there were two possible men the salt woman could be mated to. It was becoming more and more clear that the second man would be the choice. That is why Cat decided to take matters into his own hands. He wanted to be the mate at any cost.”
“And how do you know that?” Diana asked.
“I know,” he said slowly, “because I’m the other mate.”
Diana’s heart stopped fully when she turned and looked at Charlie. Everything inside of her fought against this new idea. It was not that she did not like Charlie. He was, indeed, handsome and charming but...she felt nothing towards him in that way. No true connection like she had with Cat. And, besides, it was Cat who had given her the talisman. Sure that meant something...
“But the talisman…” Diana began.
“Cat’s bewitched it,” Charlie said as they turned another sharp corner down a dirt road, “when you wear it, you see things the way he wants you to see them. You’ll have to take it off when we get to the Salt Lake.”
“But...”
“You should rest now,” Charlie said without looking at her, “It’ll take us a while to get there.”
Diana sank back in her seat but did not, could not rest. Instead, she tried, desperately to make sense of what she had been told.
If Charlie was to be believed, then nearly everything Cat had told her about the prophecy, about them, had been a lie. She was the Salt Mother but, was not meant to be mated to Cat. She was, instead, meant to be mated to Charlie.
And what would happen if she was mated to the wrong man? What would happen if she entered the Salt lake too quickly? What would happen when she entered the Salt Lake period? No one had bothered to tell her that.
She looked to Charlie and knew that he would not be willing to answer any more questions. Certainly not about Cat and mating.
So, Diana leaned her head against the cool window and tried her best not to think of Cat running his lips across her neck, his hands moving up her leg, his whisper against her ear.
She closed her eyes as she remembered him. Despite what Charlie had told her, she still desired him. She felt a thrill rush through her body and move to a pool of desire between her thighs when she imagined what Cat had wanted to do to her. What he would have done, if his nobility had not stopped him.
She tried as best she could to will these thoughts away as they drove further on. None the less, when she closed her eyes, she could see nothing but Cat’s face, staring down at her with those dark, piercing eyes.
Soon, that face disappeared to be replaced by his cougar. The smooth, tan mountain lion who, she thought, had saved her at her apartment. He padded towards her but, before he could reach Diana, she saw the large black cougar come from behind, leap over Cat and pin Diana to the ground. The cougar tore at her necklace. The talisman burned against her chest…
“Diana! Diana wake up!”
Diana’s eyes flew open and she looked around for a moment expecting to see the large black cougar bounding towards her. It took several deep breaths for Diana to convince herself that it had been a dream. Nothing but a dream.
“We’re here,” Charlie said from the driver’s seat. She looked over at Charlie who was eyeing her with a concerned expression.
“Is everything ok?” he asked.
“Yes,” Diana said hesitantly, “just had a...a nightmare.”
Diana could still feel the burning sensation of the talisman against her chest. She looked down and was shocked to find that she had not imagined that. The talisman she wore was indeed burning. It was not the calm, gentle tingle she felt when Cat touched her it was the same harsh, warning she had felt the night she saw the black cougar.
Diana saw Charlie’s eyes turn to the talisman as well.
“You should take that off,” he said almost sharply, “it’s too dangerous to have a connection to Cat while you’re here.”
Something in Diana’s head protested. Something in the back of her mind told her she would be in more danger with the talisman off than on.
“I’ll keep it on,” Diana said firmly. Charlie rolled his eyes and looked about to argue with her, “Just until we get to the lake,” Diana amended gently.
Though she still wasn’t quite sure what to believe about Cat, Charlie or anything else, she did know that, while she was in Charlie’s custody, it was best not to antagonize him.
“Suit yourself,” he said with a shrug. He opened the door and got out of the truck. Diana followed his example and they stepped out onto a dirt road without a lake in site.
“The lake’s about half a mile walk,” Charlie said in answer to Diana’s unspoken question.
“And we can’t drive?” Diana asked somewhat bitterly. She had never particularly liked walking. Not to mention, she had had a particularly exhausting day.
“It’s best if we don’t,” Charlie said.
They plodded on in silence for a moment before Diana remembered something of importance Cat had told her. It was something the elders had said as well.
“If I’m not supposed to go to the lake until I’ve been trained,” she began, “why will it be safe for me there now?”
Charlie let out a low chuckle and said: “Don’t worry Diana, you will be trained.”
“By who?”
“By me.”
Diana stopped and looked at him unsure. He looked back at her and gave her the same cocky smirk she had seen him wear when they first met.
“You don’t want to be trained by me?” he asked. The tenor of his voice made this sound suggestive. Diana blushed in spite of herself.
“I didn’t mean that,” she said quickly. She could feel a blush coming into her cheeks. Charlie must have seen it too because his smile broadened.
“I only meant,” she said trying her best to stay on topic, “the elders made it sound like training was real...involved. It sounds like a lot for one person to have to take on.”
“Well,” Charlie said as they reached a crest in the hillside, “I won’t have to take it on alone.”
“What do you mean by that?” Diana asked.
“You’ll see,” he said. An uneasy feeling took up residence in Diana’s stomach. She felt the burning of the cougar talisman against her skin. It became hotter as they neared the lake. She wondered, now, if she should have gotten in the car with Charlie if she should have come to the lake at all. Now, looking back, she wondered if she should have waited if she should have refused to leave the reservation.
But, there was no use thinking about that now. Not when she could see the small blue lake in the distance and the white sand playing along its banks.
She was here. And, sooner or later, whether for good or for ill, she would find out what being ‘here’ meant.
As they neared the lake’s edge, Diana could make out a small black dot waiting for them in the white dirt.
Her mind immediately jumped to the black cougar of her nightmares. The burning of the talisman, likewise, urged her to stop, to turn around to run back.
She did stop, frozen on the crest of the hill causing Charlie to turn around and look at her curiously.
“What’s the matter?” he asked.
“Who’s that waiting for us?” Diana managed to force the words from her mouth. Even as her talisman
continued to burn against her chest.
“You should have taken that thing off,” Charlie said with a chuckle indicating the talisman.
“You still wear yours,” Diana insisted stubbornly.
“Mine’s not connected to a traitor,” Charlie said with another cocky smile. Diana gave him a reproachful look and the smile disappeared from his face.
“Look,” he said gently, “you’ll be ok. I won’t let anything bad happen to you.”
He seemed sincere and, as Diana realized she had no other options at the moment, she nodded and followed him towards the lake.
Even as her feet plodded after him, she kept her eyes firmly fixed on the black creature growing larger near the sand of the lake. Though, it was still too dark to make out, the talisman burning, now almost unbearably hot against her chest, warned her that this was not a creature she wanted to meet.
No matter what Charlie said to the contrary, she felt a sharp instinct rise up in her to trust the talisman more than Charlie’s word.
When they reached the banks of the lake, Diana saw that instinct justified.
She screamed and backed away as, in the light of the rising sun, she saw the same black panther who had attacked her all those nights ago. The same cougar who had given her scars and haunted her dreams.
She turned and began to run as fast as she possibly could. Charlie ran after her and grabbed her arm.
“Diana!” he said, forcefully and painfully taking hold of her arm and dragging her back to the creature at the lake, “it’s not what you think. You have to trust me…”
But Diana would not listen, could not listen to him anymore. She knew what that creature was, and now, she feared she knew what Charlie was as well.
This was confirmed when the creature sat back on its hind legs and transformed into the person she had most feared since her vision at the reservation.
“Charlie, just give her the fucking sedative,” Sandra said, “she’s not going to believe anything you say. Look at her.”
Diana indeed screamed out more loudly at Sandra’s appearance and now began to thrash wildly against Charlie’s hold on her arm.
“If you think that’s best…” she heard Charlie say over her screams. Before she knew it, Diana felt something sharp, like a needle jab into the side of her arm as the world faded to black.
Chapter Two
Catahassa Yazzie gasped for breath as he rose from his bed in a cold sweat. He had seen the rogue cougar. It had come for Diana and his talisman had burned. It could have been a dream. Cat tried to tell himself that it was. Nothing more than a nightmare.
But, connected talisman did not burn for dreams alone. No, he knew what this meant. This meant that Diana was in danger.
He sat up in his bed and the yellow talisman dangling from his neck was still warm though the burning had ceased. That thought did not bring him comfort, however. For a talisman connected to another to stop burning meant either that the person on the other end, in his case Diana, was now safe or that the connected person was no longer conscious. Possibly even…
Quickly, he threw the covers off his body and jumped from the couch. His bare feet padded across the hall to the room where Diana slept.
“Diana?” he called loudly as he dared not waking anyone else. There was no answer, no sound from the room.
He knocked,
“Diana?” he called again. Louder this time. Still no response.
He opened the door and his worst fear was immediately confirmed. Diana’s bed sat empty and the back window to the dirt road off the reservation was jarred open.
Maybe she and...whoever had taken her....had not left yet. Maybe there was still time.
He rushed to the window and looked outside. There was nothing.
No cars, no horses, no people. Nothing but the sun rising over the canyons.
“Diana!” he called desperately one last time. Though, he knew, by now that his cries were useless. She was gone.
There was only one thing left that he still might do.
He rushed back to his room, found a plain white, collared shirt, slipped it over his shoulders and ran quickly out the door and to the elder’s pueblo. His Grandfather would be there. He was sure of that. And that was the only person who could help him now.
When he reached the door, he pounded on it as fiercely as he could. Now, he didn’t care who heard him. He didn’t care if he woke the entire reservation.
Diana was gone. He was sure she was in danger.
He pounded twice before the door opened slowly. He was surprised to see standing in the doorway, not his grandfather, but his father’s scowling face looking back at him.
“She’s gone,” Cat said quickly, shaking off his surprise. The animosity he felt towards his father did not matter now.
“Diana...the salt mother has been taken.”
“And how do you know that?” his father asked, scowl still in place blocking Cat’s way into the room.
“Because she isn’t in her room!” Cat said desperately, “Please, I need to see Grandfather. We need to tell the council that…”
“Lonon,” Cat thanked god when he heard his grandfather’s voice issue from inside the room, “let the boy come in. His news affects us all.”
Reluctantly, father gave Cat one last appraising look before stepping aside and allowing Cat to rush into the home.
There, he found his grandfather and several other tribe elders seated at a round table. When he looked to the right of his grandfather, Cat received another shock.
“Amanda?” he asked, “what are you doing here?”
“I sensed you were in trouble,” his sister said. The sour frown she habitually wore still in place, “I could tell you were making a mess of things here. So, I came to help.”
Cat nearly rolled his eyes. Though they were twins, Amanda had always liked to play the role of bossy, protective big sister. Her constant attempts to “get Cat out of trouble” were more vexing to Catahassa than anything else.
“Catahassa,” his grandfather said bringing Cat’s thoughts back to the matter at hand, “what news do you have of the salt mother?”
“I had a dream,” Cat said.
“So did I,” father said derisively taking his spot to the left of his grandfather at the table, “we all have dreams. They can be very misleading.”
“This was different,” Cat said through gritted teeth. He always tried to show as much respect as possible to his father when in the presence of the elders. Though, his Father sometimes made this very difficult.
“This was a vision,” Cat said definitely, “I saw Diana...the salt mother…” he amended, “being forced into the salt lake. My talisman began to burn against my chest. It was still warm when I woke up.”
Grandfather eyed him with interest. But, from the corner of his eye, he could see his father wave a dismissive hand.
“That still doesn’t mean anything,” father said, “dreams have caused talismans to glow before.”
“Not like this,” Cat insisted.
“Catahassa,” Grandfather cut in calmly before Cat’s father could respond, “what makes you think that the Salt Woman is in danger?”
“Because, I looked in her room and she’s gone,” he said desperately. He knew that they were losing time. If...whoever it was who had taken her...forced Diana into the salt lake before she was trained before she was mated…
“She could have left on her own,” Amanda said, “after all, you did mark her before we knew anything about her. Maybe it was too much for her.”
“She didn’t leave on her own, she wouldn’t do that,” Cat said.
“What makes you so sure?”
“Because…” Cat found that he was so frustrated he could not finish the thought. And, even more disturbingly, he was not certain if he would be able to express why he knew Diana would not leave him. At least in a way that Amanda or his father or even his grandfather could understand. Finally, he looked to Amanda and decided to make an appeal to the
ir own connection instead.
“Amanda, you yourself said that you came because you knew I was in trouble,” Cat said pleadingly. He was glad when he saw Amanda’s sour expression shift to one of contemplation.
He pressed his advantage.
“You know that something isn’t right, I know you do,” Cat insisted, “This is what’s wrong. This is what brought you here.”
“In this vision,” father cut in, skeptical as ever, “did you see these attackers who were supposed to have taken our Salt mother?”
Cat thought hard back to the dream. He had seen two figures mired in shadow push Diana into the water.
“It was...a man and a woman...that’s all I could see, they were veiled,” Cat said.
“Figures often are in dreams,” Father said dismissively. Cat felt something snap inside of him without being completely aware of what he was doing, he stalked menacingly towards his father.
He was halfway to his Father’s space when a wrinkled but surprisingly strong hand grabbed hold of his arm holding him back.
“Figures can be shaded in visions as well, Lonon,” Grandfather said still holding Cat in place, “do not discount your son’s words simply because you have never had a vision of your own.”
Father’s face colored at this. He sat back in his seat at the table and gave a respectful nod to Grandfather.
“Ultimately, it does not matter if the girl was taken or left of her own accord,” Grandfather said to the table at large, “she’s gone. That is the main point. In the world, on her own or in the company of enemies, she is in grave danger. I will call a council of the elders to take place at noon today so that we may decide what best to do.”
“Noon?” Cat could not help but exclaim, “That’s too late! If my vision is true, she could be dead by noon and we could lose everything!”
He could not let them wait that long. He knew his vision was true. He knew, at this very moment, Diana was in the company of their enemies. The stillness of his talisman told him that she was either lying unconscious or, perhaps, dead already.
BILLIONAIRE ROMANCE: The Unforgettable Southern Billionaires: The Complete Collection Boxed Set (Young Adult Rich Alpha Male Billionaire Romance) Page 29