by Leeda Vada
“Of course, dad,” Rand answered. “Where are you going?”
“I don’t know,” his father answered in defeat. Closing the door, he disappeared into the rain.
#
Despite Dr. Malachi’s protests, Apollo left the hospital and sought his mate. A signal from Jace—the Shielder assigned to Belen during the attack—led him to her.
He found his wife on her knees in the small chapel in a private area of Alpha House. She was kneeling, her hands gripping her rosary. “Hail, holy Queen, Mother of Mercy, our life, our sweetness, and our hope. To thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve: to thee do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears. I believe in the Holy Spirit; the Holy Catholic Church; the Communion of Saints; the forgiveness of sins; the Resurrection of the Body; and the life everlasting.”
Speaking softly, Jace informed him that she had been reciting these same lines over and over. Apollo knelt and pulled her into his arms. “Help me, Apollo,” she pleaded, her hands clutching at her throat. “I can’t breathe,” she gasped.
He turned her head and pressed it to his chest. “Shhh,” he whispered, “Let me breathe for you,” he whispered. “Give me some of the pain. I loved him too.”
He flowered kisses on her forehead, nose, and eyelids. He stroked her back and arms. “I love you, my Lupa,” he murmured.
“Your love won’t bring him back, Apollo,” she cried. “It won’t make Jonathan alive again.”
Belen clutched the collar of his shirt and shook him, her eyes drenched with sorrow and pain.
“Bring him back, Apollo. Make him alive again,” she sobbed. “I asked God, but He would not answer me. He would not answer me!” she shouted, her grip on his collar tightening. “Make him answer me, Apollo. You are the mighty Alpha. Fix it. Bring Jonathan back.” She collapsed against him, still uttering curses at the fate that had not spared the innocent life.
#
Apollo did not know how long they sat there, his tears mixing with hers. He rocked her in his arms until her weeping subsided, and her body finally stilled.
One firm knock on the chapel door stirred him. He lifted Belen and tenderly laid her on the pew.
“I’m sorry to disturb you, Apollo, but the transport with the children has just landed. I thought you would want to talk to them before the rumors reached them,” Duncan informed him.
Awakening at the Commander’s voice, Belen came to her feet and said, “Of course, I’ll go.”
“No, we’ll both go,” Apollo said, taking her left hand into his and giving it a tight squeeze. “Together,” he reminded her.
“What about Canaan?” Apollo asked Duncan.
After a moment’s hesitation, Duncan responded, “He’s gone.”
“Gone where?” Belen asked.
“He didn’t say,” Duncan replied. “As soon as the Scythians left with Calli’s body, Canaan left in his jet.”
“Who went with him?” Apollo asked.
“No one,” Duncan answered, and then added, “He took what was left of the fetus, his son, and boarded the jet. He piloted it himself.”
Belen gasped and turned to Apollo, “We must go to him.”
“No,” countered Apollo. “He wouldn’t want that.”
“We can’t leave him alone,” Belen protested.
“Yes, we can, and will,” Apollo said firmly. “Canaan’s a man who has just lost his mate and child. We will respect his right to grieve his loss in his own way. We owe him that.”
Chapter Forty-One
Glancing down, Eshe saw that Bena had fallen into an exhausted sleep. She would find a cot in the nursery and let her rest there.
Not paying close attention to where she was going, Eshe walked into a solid masculine wall. Her arms were clasped in an iron grip, preventing her from losing her balance.
“Hold on. Where are you rushing off to?”
Eshe looked up into Neo’s concerned expression.
“Are you all right?” He glanced down at the sleeping child. “Is Bena hurt?”
Eshe used all her strength to control her roiling emotions. “No, we’re both fine. I’m just taking her to the nursery to get her away from everything that’s going on.”
“I’ll walk over with you,” he said, lifting Bena from her arms.
“You don’t need to do that. I’m an Enforcer too, remember? I can protect us from here to there,” she protested.
“Not today, sweetheart. Too much is happening.” She struggled to keep up with his long strides.
“I need to talk to you.”
“Later. Let’s get your little sister settled first.”
#
After dropping Bena off, Neo led her out of the building. “Let’s go back to the chapel. We can talk there with some privacy.” He took her elbow. “Come sit down.” He pulled out a flask and insisted she take a sip.
“What is it?”
“Vodka.” He took her face in his hands and tilted her head so he could look directly into her eyes. “Eshe, the poison was deadly. Calli almost died. The baby didn’t make it.”
“No!” Eshe gasped, then collapsed into his arms. “This can’t be happening. Neo, tell me it’s not happening.”
“I’m so sorry, baby,” he said, dropping his forehead to touch hers. “I wish I could. His little body couldn’t stand up against the toxins. By the time the Amazons arrived, they could do nothing.”
“The Amazons? What were they doing there?”
“Laura summoned them. They took Calli with them to Artemis, their stronghold inside Scythia, to see if they can save her.”
Eshe looked up at the strong, virile man holding her. She had worshipped Neo from afar for years, even before he became an extended part of their family as Tau’s bodyguard. Though he only saw her as Canaan’s little sister, she had made him the protagonist in her adolescent fantasies. Now, she needed him to assume that role and make the horror of this day go away.
But her own needs would have to wait. Protecting her little sister had to come first. She pushed herself away from Neo and stood up. Using the backs of her hands to wipe her tears, she took a seat on the pew across from him. “What do you want to talk to me about?”
“We are interviewing everyone present at the shower. Were you there?”
“Of course I was there. Why do you have to interview us?” Eshe asked, cautiously. “The surveillance video can show you who was in attendance.”
“That is one of the problems, one of several problems,” he replied. “The video feed was sabotaged, so there is no recording of what happened.”
“What? How could that be?”
“That is what Duncan and his team are trying to figure out. We’ve suspected a saboteur in the house for a while now.”
“I don’t understand.”
“When Calli was attacked, she sent a call out to Canaan for help. Canaan never got that call. Someone intercepted it. We traced the call to Alpha House and have been investigating everyone who has had access to the residence. With what happened today, there can be no doubt that the attack was an inside job. The saboteur has to be someone very close to the family.”
“Or a family member? That’s what you’re not saying, isn’t it? Can you really think that one of us would hurt Calli or her child? That one of us would hurt a baby of our own blood. How can you even consider that?”
“I’m not saying or thinking that. But I know that the saboteur has access to the house and is so familiar that their presence would not be questioned.”
“But who? We know everyone who comes inside. We have guards and surveillance cameras everywhere.”
“If the saboteur is a familiar person, guards and cameras would be ineffective. Since there is no video of what happened today, we are compiling a list of everyone present by interviewing the people we know were there. I need you to find Chayton in Apollo’s study and give him your list. Are you up to it?”
“Of course.”
Placing his hand gently on
her back, he urged, “Come on. I’ll go with you.”
#
As Neo escorted her to her father’s study, Eshe remained silent. She was absorbing what Neo had told her and assessed its implications for Bena.
“Did you see what happened?”
At Neo’s question, she snapped to attention. “I saw Calli drink something. Then she started convulsing.”
“Did you see who gave her the drink?”
Eshe did not hesitate. “No. I turned around just as she was starting to swallow.”
“We have the cup, and you’re right. The poison was in the drink, but no one seems to remember who put that cup on the side table next to her. The Scythian healer was able to identify the type of poison from what had spilled from Calli’s lips after the convulsions began.”
As Neo listened to Eshe repeat her story to Chayton, adding a list of other names of attendees, he knew she wasn’t telling them everything. So did Chayton, whose heightened ability to detect the truth was off the charts. It was one of the reasons he was the leader of one of Commander Duncan’s two premier Stealth teams.
Why was she lying? Neo knew Eshe better than anyone. After all, he had loved her ever since he had been assigned to Alpha House. Her physical beauty may have been what other people noticed about her first, but the beauty of her character was what had drawn him in: her honesty, courage, independence, compassion, and loyalty.
There was no way she could have been part of a plot to destroy her brother’s mate and his unborn son, her nephew. If she was hiding something, and he felt strongly that she was, then she was doing it to protect someone. But who?
It couldn’t be the person he suspected. He couldn’t imagine Eshe lying for a housekeeper, but he had to confront his grandmother ASAP.
#
Neo found her in the larger of the two general use kitchens in Alpha House. She was stirring a large pot on the stove.
“Donoma, it’s time to finish our conversation,” he said as he approached her.
“We have nothing more to discuss, grandson of mine.”
“I just need the answer to one question. Did you have anything to do with the attack on Calli and her baby?”
Donoma turned to face him. She stared into her grandson’s eyes and held his gaze. She did not reply to his question.
The dread that had pawed at Neo on his way over to confront her began to tear into his gut. The bottom fell out of his world.
How could this be happening? To find a connection to his family only to lose it? He had taken an oath to protect all things Canid and especially the Powhatan Alpha’s family. And here was this woman who claimed to be his family, the only person who existed that connected him to his birth mother and father. The two of them were the last of the Gambian Sere line.
What was he to do? If he turned her in, she would face Canid justice, which would demand her execution. The Canid Council would have no choice. Any death, and especially that of a child, would be met with swift, uncompromised justice.
His grandmother had suffered—and suffered much—but her suffering could not justify the violent assault she perpetrated on Calli and the unborn child.
Finally, Donoma spoke, “My actions gave justice to hundreds, thousands. It was not equal justice, but it was the best I could do.”
“You speak so coldly of what you’ve done,” he noted. “How can you be this way? Where is your heart, your conscience?”
“The blood and screams of our dying villagers washed them away. Using Apollo’s heir to destroy his line as he had destroyed mine made my revenge sweet.”
“What are you talking about? What do you mean?”
“Innocent little Bena carried the cup from which the mother of the innocent unborn Jonathan drank,” she said, bitterness dripping from her words. “Poetic justice, don’t you think?”
Neo’s eyes widened in horror. Donoma was insane. She was correct when she had said her heart and conscience no longer existed.
“If you knew I lived, why the need for murder?”
“Because you live as Canid, a mestizo, not Sere. Our clan dies with me. I could have appealed to you for help, but I wanted to spare you having to choose between loyalty to your Gambian blood family and your Canid adopted family. You have made a home for yourself here. I did not want to take that away from you. As you survive, a part of the Gambian race survives in you and your descendants. I am going to my quarters now. There, I have a journal containing a history of our people. I wrote it for you. I want you to read and treasure it and pass our story on through your offspring.”
Neo did not stop her as she left the kitchen.
#
Neo jumped at Eshe’s voice, “Are you all right?”
“Fine. What can I do for you?”
Eshe was not buying that. “I need to talk to you. I did not tell the complete truth during the interview.”
“I know.”
“How can you know?”
“Because I know you.”
“What are you going to do?” Eshe asked nervously.
“I’m going to take care of it.”
“What do you mean exactly?”
“I mean that the ‘complete truth’ dies here. You and I will never speak of it again.”
“But that’s not possible. Chayton and Duncan will not stop looking until they discover details of who is responsible.”
“I will handle the Stealth team.”
“How?”
Gripping her shoulders, he stared into her eyes. “Just leave it to me,” he said sternly. “You and I never had this conversation. Understand?” Before she could respond, Neo added, “As a matter of fact, you and I will have no more conversations. Period.”
“But, Neo...”
“No buts, Eshe. We no longer exist for each other. Your priority right now is protecting the innocent. I failed in my duty to do that. You must not.”
Eshe watched him walk away from her, unaware of the tears that rolled down her cheeks.
#
A grandmother’s life for a grandson’s, for the continuation of a people, for her beloved husband, her daughter, her twin granddaughters, for all those who had preceded them. A more than fair trade, she mused.
The impact of the bullet flung her back ten feet into the opposite wall. There was a smile of contentment still on her face as Neo kneeled and took her into his arms.
#
Chayton received the zip drive that Neo had sent via Tau. A camera had recorded Neo’s conversation with Donoma in the arboretum the day before. It also had an abbreviated recording of her confession in the kitchen.
Neo had added his earlier decision not to alert Chayton about what he knew of her deception, information that, with further investigation, may have prevented the attack on Calli and her baby.
By the time Chayton and Duncan arrived at the female quarters, Neo was on his knees cradling his grandmother’s body in his arms. The blood from the small bullet hole in her forehead invisible as it soaked into Neo’s black Shielder uniform.
#
Need time between scenes
The Powhatan Council had convened a meeting. Duncan knew there were things that Neo was keeping secret. His silence prevented a serious split in the Canid pack. Any revelations of communication between Donoma and the members of Apollo’s family would fuel rumors of collusion between those who supported Belen and those who supported Calli.
The dissension between the two women was no secret, and the death of Calli’s child and the attempt on her life would strike some as too convenient to be an accident.
There were still others who wished Calli gone, especially after the scandal of her trial. To them, Jonathan had been Calli’s child, a child tainted by the animals who raped her. Therefore, Calli’s detractors saw the child as an abomination, conceived by a contaminated mother. This was the argument they used to justify the destruction of the fetus. They didn’t see the perpetrators as murderers, but as soldiers in the war to preserve the sanctity of their speci
es.
They wanted Canaan free to find another mate, and they knew that as long as Calli lived, that would not happen.
Duncan’s argument was that Neo was the last of his species. Though his failure to report his grandmother had resulted in the death of a Canid child and the near death of its mother, Neo was not directly involved in the attack.
“If we believe him when he says that he believed his grandmother when she promised that she would quit her vendetta against Apollo’s family, then it would not be justice to sentence him to death. He paid for his mistake when he executed his grandmother, the last of his blood line,” argued Saxe, who had volunteered to defend Neo in the closed Council hearing. “Donoma’s vendetta was the result of the Were vendetta against her family. Were we any different than she in our massacre of her family? The bloodletting has to end,” he appealed to Apollo, who was viewing the proceedings on closed circuit from his hospital bed. “Let it end here,” Saxe urged.
“You can say that, Chandler. You can afford to be forgiving. It was not your grandchild who was poisoned, his life cut off before he could take his first breath, his mother’s body ravaged and tortured. Every organ flooded with a poison so virulent that her body no longer exists in any recognizable form,” countered Belen bitterly, her knuckles white as she gripped the edge of the table. “What will you say to Canaan? Do you tell him to forgive Donoma, to exempt Neo for his deceit and naiveté? For his betrayal of his oath of loyalty to the Canid pack, to the Cumberland Nation?” she concluded.
“Then let the decision be Canaan’s. Let him make the call,” proposed Saxe.
“No,” interrupted Belen, rising. “You will not put that burden on Canaan. He is carrying enough. We are leaders. Now we must lead.”
She turned to Duncan who was chairing the meeting because of Apollo’s weakened state. As Lupa, it would have been Belen’s role, but because of her connection to the dead child, she had excused herself.
“Duncan, state our choices. Then, we vote, and we all, as one body, support the outcome. We leave this room as one in that decision, and this meeting is never to be spoken of again.”