Oh God, who was she?
Why was this woman’s pain driving inside her skull like steel spikes? Why was her fear like a blanket, heavy and hot, making it hard to breathe, to focus on the information she could have sensed from the spirit facing her.
“Cassie?” She was silent for so long, the tension in the room growing so heavy, he couldn’t resist the need to remind her they all needed answers.
Her lips quirked with an edge of bitter amusement. “I don’t always have the answers,” she stated softly, turning to him as if focusing her attention had become a task.
He barely restrained his surprise, knowing from the quiet near whisper of her voice that the message was meant for him alone.
What the hell was going on? What was the message in her neon eyes, the plea he could sense there? Raking her fingers through her hair restlessly, she turned away from him, the shadows in her eyes seemed to darken.
“I think I need to rest for a while,” she stated then, her voice quiet as she turned to her parents. “I’d like to go to my room now.”
“You can walk down with your mother and me,” Dash stated before turning to Jonas. “We’ll talk later.”
“Just let me know when,” Jonas agreed as the Wolf Breeds accompanying them led the way from the suite.
Stygian watched Cassie with narrowed eyes, knowing—just as he was certain the rest of them did—that she was escaping. Whatever she had sensed, or even seen, she wasn’t ready to reveal yet.
“There are days I have a tendency to forget how exasperating that child can be,” Jonas stated as the door closed behind Cassie and her parents.
They all had that tendency, though Stygian had rarely sensed her pain, or that feeling of a silent message, as he did now.
Stygian knew who Liza was. At least, he was pretty certain she was Honor Roberts rather than Fawn Corrigan. He knew for a fact she had not been born Liza Johnson. Honor Roberts for all intents and purposes was dead. She had died in the desert twelve years before, the night Liza Johnson and Claire Martinez had gone over that canyon in a sports car that didn’t belong to them.
Honor Roberts had died in Liza’s place. Or at least, her spirit had. Because there wasn’t a doubt in Stygian’s mind that Liza had always believed to the bottom of her soul that she was Audi and Jane Johnson’s daughter.
And, Stygian knew, her father knew the truth.
Audi Johnson knew Liza wasn’t his daughter, though Stygian couldn’t be certain what Ray Martinez believed.
If Ray Martinez knew or suspected, then Stygian intended to pay the man a visit and advise him on how to treat his daughter with respect rather than resentment.
“Before you head back to your room, we need to go over a few security revisions I want to make.” Jonas raked his fingers wearily through his hair as he moved to the conference table that had been set up and spread out with not just hand-drawn maps and notes but also several electronic data pads.
“Have you heard from Dog on the movement he’s tracking in the desert?” Stygian asked as they headed to the table. “He headed back out to meet up with his men.”
“Control advised he was in place and tracking it, but he hasn’t sighted anything yet.” Handing Stygian a data pad, he picked up his own. “Here are the changes I’m considering—”
Stygian listened, but he watched the director as much as he did the plans that had been drawn up.
Jonas rarely showed the physical signs of weariness or worry, and he hadn’t aged a day since his mating, but worry creased his forehead now and there were shadows in those mercury eyes that hadn’t been there before.
Amber was getting worse.
And the knowledge of that was taking all choice from Stygian’s hands.
Something would have to be done soon.
Dog moved into place, watching the four Coyote Breeds waiting in the overhang of the canyon’s cliff.
Moving confidently, Mongrel and Mutt flanking him, he moved along the canyon wall before stepping into the cave-like overhang.
The four Breeds looked up, their hard faces sharply hewn, their eyes cold, hard.
“Satellites tracked your asses,” he growled at the men, irritation lacing his voice. “I told you to watch your f**king asses.”
The commander snorted at the information. “Yeah, we knew that. Let them go on guard for a while, it will make them more vulnerable when we move in.”
Thane could be a bastard, and he was one of the few Breeds that Dog would hate to go up against. He was also one of the few Breeds he would trust his life with. The three Coyotes that followed Thane were of the same ilk, though their personalities varied. All four were hard, cold, almost dead inside though. And nothing or no one mattered more than preserving the Breed communities.
No matter the cost to themselves.
Dog eyed the other Breed for long moments as Loki, Mutt and Mongrel shifted behind him.
Thane was as tall as he was, at six four, powerfully muscular and without fear, he was a deadly enemy. His coloring was different from most Breeds. Rather than the blond to light brown hair, his was pitch black, his eyes blue, the Irish heritage from his mother clearly apparent.
“You still carrying a grudge?” Dog asked, knowing Thane hadn’t been happy at the loss of one of his men in an operation against a hidden start-up lab in the Middle East that had been holding abducted Breeds.
“The bastard was a death wish walking,” Thane admitted. “There’s no grudge to hold.”
Nodding, Dog moved to the gas fire ring and poured a cup of coffee into one of the extra metal mugs sitting next to it.
“We need to move soon,” Dog told them. “The Sinclair girl’s arrived, and only God knows what she might sense or reveal. Stay out of sight of those f**king satellites so we can at least blame it on the bastards in the North. That way Jonas won’t send a team your way when you make your move.”
“We know what we’re doing,” Thane stated.
“Maybe I’m just reminding you,” Dog mocked. “You have a problem with that?”
He wasn’t about to treat the Breed commander any differently than he would any other, even if he did often respect him more.
Thane quirked his lips in hard amusement.
“Don’t have a problem with that, Dog,” he drawled. “I was just reminding you as well.”
Like he needed reminders of any sort.
“Move into position tomorrow,” he told them, his gaze moving over each man. “Wait for my signal.”