Jenna Kernan - Native Born

Cassidy’s heart ached at the possibility of losing her daughter.

“They can’t take you for long. Even if the judge overturns my custody, you remember what I told you?”

“I’m twelve.”

Cassidy nodded.

Amanda recited by memory. “Twelve-year-olds can request to be adopted away from their tribe.”

“That’s right.”

Amanda frowned. Ever since they’d discovered who she really was and that she had another family out there, Amanda had been increasingly unhappy. Of course the opening of her adoption and the challenge for custody upset her. Why wouldn’t it?

“They can’t win,” said Cassidy. “Because you are old enough to choose.”

Amanda moved her legs restlessly under the covers and seemed to want to say something.

Cassidy waited.

“Can you at least take a picture of them?”

“What? Why?”

“So I can see if they look like me?”

How she wished she could go back to the time when they both thought she had no one but her mom and dad and Grandma Diane. When there was no one else.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” said Cassidy.

“Please?” asked Amanda.

Cassidy tucked the covers back in place. “I have to go pack and you have to go to sleep. Good night, sweetheart.”

Amanda kissed her mother and then flopped to her side. She said nothing more as Cassidy walked to the bedroom door and waited.

She was about to give up when Amanda flopped back to face her.

“Be careful up there, Mom.”

“I will. I love you.”

“You, too.”

Cassidy closed the door and headed to her bedroom to pack. She was good at packing. A tour of duty with the US Army had taught her that. And also how to fly helicopters. She’d put in for a transfer from her first assignment with the FBI after Gerard died because she couldn’t stand to live in the home they had chosen together. They’d ended up in Southern California.

After she had finished in her room, she carried her suitcase, briefcase and duffel down to the hallway. She told Diane all she could about where she was going. But she didn’t tell her that after this assignment she would finally get her transfer. Would Diane come with them or would it be just the two of them again?

She didn’t know. What she did know was she needed the custody decision so that Amanda could tell the judge she wanted to be adopted again by her mother. Then she needed to get away from this part of the country. As far as possible from the Apache tribe. Until then, she was keeping her daughter away from the Cosen brothers.

* * *

“SO YOU WON’T change your mind?” Clyne asked Gabe.

“Do you know how many officers I have?”

Clyne did, of course. Twelve officers for twenty-six hundred square miles. Only it was eleven since he’d lost a man in January.

“I need help, Clyne. Not just on processing evidence in the Arizona crime labs. I need investigators. Because if you think this is over with you are mistaken. All we did was slow them down. They’ll be back and I don’t want my guys killed in gun battles with Mexican cartel killers.”

Clyne did not want that, either.

“But why her?” He meant Agent Walker.

“Do you know anything about her?”

“All I need to know.”

“That’s bull. She’s highly qualified and she knows what she is doing. She knows all the players. You have to trust me on this.”

Clyne tried for humor. “She’s a real company man, huh? She probably wears that FBI T-shirt to bed.”

That gave him a strong image of pale legs peeking out from beneath a navy blue T-shirt that ended right below her slender hips.

Clyne growled. He stood with his four brothers, all now wrapped in blankets and perched as close to the fire as possible as their uncle Luke added the stones to the fire. The stones were among the Great Spirit’s creations and so had a life force and power like all things in nature. Luke would be tending the fire and passing the hot stones into their wikiup for the ceremony of purification. Their uncle was the only one dressed appropriately for the chilly night air, warm enough to unzip his parka and remove his gloves.

“When will she be here?” he asked.

His uncle took that one. “Tomorrow morning. Late morning, I think. In time for the BIA presentation.”

Their people had a love-hate relationship with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, who oversaw business on the reservation for the federal government. But the BIA had money Clyne needed for their water treatment facility so he would do his best to play nice.

Luke poked at the coals, judging the heat. “Almost ready.”

Clyne began to shiver and Clay was now jumping up and down to keep warm.

Kino nudged between Clay and Gabe. He still had a white bandage on his throat. A visible reminder of how close they had been to losing him. Clyne remembered Gabe’s words about not wanting to lose any more officers to this war with traffickers. He knew from Gabe that his men had been outgunned. The cartel killers had automatic weapons and the tribal police force was issued rifles, shotguns and sidearms. It was not a fair fight.

Clyne looked from Gabe to Kino. Would the FBI presence on the rez help keep them safe or put them at greater risk?

“Will she bring Jovanna?” asked Kino.

Gabe cast him an impatient look. “She doesn’t want her to meet us.”

“But the attorney says we’ll win,” said Kino. “Any day and we’ll win.”

“And she’ll slap a petition to allow Jovanna to choose to be adopted,” said Clay. “Our attorney said so.”

“Nothing we can do about that,” said Gabe.

They all looked to Clyne, as they had since he’d came home from the endless fighting in the Middle East to assume his place as head of this household.

“We have a petition, too. I spoke to our attorney yesterday.”

Before he was almost killed. She wouldn’t do something like that. Set him up, would she? Killing him wouldn’t stop this. She must know that.

“Our sister can’t make a fair choice unless she has had an opportunity to meet us,” said Clyne.

Clay grinned. “Think that will work?”

“I do. It’s logical. It’s appropriate.”

“How long will we have her?” asked Kino.

A lifetime, Clyne hoped. His sister belonged here with them in the place of their ancestors.

“I’ve asked for a year,” said Clyne.

Kino gave a whistle.

Luke poked at the stones. “You boys ready?”

They shucked off their blankets and ducked into the domed structure. All of the brothers had built this sweat lodge. The stone foundation lined the hollow they dug into the earth and the saplings arched beneath the bark-and-leather covering.

Clay and Kino moved to sit across the nest of fresh pinon pine and cedar branches. Clyne was glad the two had somehow managed to leave their pretty new wives for the evening to join their elder brothers in the sweat lodge.

Outside the entrance to the east, the sacred fire burned. Their uncle would stand watch, providing hot stones, protecting the ceremony.

Clyne sat in a breechclout made from white cotton. Both Gabe and Kino preferred loose gym shorts and Clay sat in his boxers, having forgotten his shorts. Luke passed in the first stone, using a forked cedar branch. Clyne moved it to the bed of sage, filling the lodge with the sweet scent. More stones followed as Clyne and his brothers began to sing. When the stones were all in place Luke dropped the flap to cover the entrance and the lodge went dark, black as a cave, the earth, a womb, the place where they had come from and would one day return. Here their voices joined as they sang their prayer.

Gabe used a horn cup to pour the water of life over the stone people, the ones who came before Changing Woman made the Apache from her skin.