Morgan's Mercenaries: Heart of Stone (17 page)

Maya nodded. How she wished that she could find a man like Roan Storm Walker, who was Inca’s partner. She had met him several times, and always she was impressed with his quiet, strong demeanor. Together, he and Inca were working in Brazil to protect the Indians from the miners and those who would cut down the rain forest.

“Good,” Maya whispered, releasing her hand. “Because I want to spend at least a little while with you…to catch up on gossip and that sort of thing.”

Inca raised one thin, black eyebrow. Her gaze settled on the army officer. “My sister, I think what would be best for your healing was if you were to spend some time with the major, too.”

Stunned, Dane got up. “No,” he replied, his partial laugh strained, “I don’t think Captain Stevenson wants to spend any more time with me than she has to, Inca.” Dane tried to avoid the shocked expression on Maya’s face as he lifted his hand in farewell. “I’m going to hit the rack. Thanks, Inca.” He held his hand out to her and shook hers warmly. “I’ll see all of you later. Good night…”

“I
have wonderful news, my sister,” Inca said after Dane left, and the hospital was quiet once more. She reached out and gripped Maya’s hands, which rested on her blanketed lap.

Anything was better than having to respond to Inca’s statement about her seeing more of Dane York. Still, Maya felt guilt eat at her over the reply Dane had made before he left. Why couldn’t she have been a little more sensitive to him? A little more kind, rather than lying here staring at him after Inca’s unexpected suggestion? Discarding her morose thoughts, she turned toward Inca and saw joy burning in her sister’s eyes. She placed her hand over Inca’s long, strong fingers. “What? Tell me. I could use some good news.” She laughed a little unsteadily.

“Well,” Inca whispered huskily, “when I received word that you were badly injured, I was upset. I talked it over with Roan. I decided to try and teleport and not
wait to fly by airplane from Brazil to Peru.” She wrinkled her nose and laughed demurely. “Now, I know members of the Black Jaguar Clan have teleporting as their specialty, and others of the Jaguar Clan must work at it for a long time before they learn the skill,
if
they do.”

“You’ve done it before,” Maya said, searching her memory. “You teleported into Peru when Mike Houston’s wife, Ann, was in trouble. Right?”

“Yes, that was the one and only time I was able to do it successfully.” Inca released her hand and pulled the leather thong from around her neck. A jaguar claw was suspended from the end of it. “When I met Ann, I gave her one of my two jaguar claws. I told her if she ever needed me, to call me, and I would be there.” She tucked the claw beneath her dark green T-shirt again. Reaching out, she captured Maya’s hand once more, her eyes gleaming with excitement.

“It worked! I was so surprised. But I was happy, too, because if I could not have been there, Ann would have died before Michael could have reached her himself.”

“It was very brave of you,” Maya murmured, knowing the story well. “And I know Mike Houston is forever grateful to you.”

Inca nodded and licked her lower lip. “Listen, there is more!” Eagerly, she leaned forward. “Roan agreed I should try to teleport. Well, you know how you must be feeling in a very peaceful and harmonious place in order to attempt it?”

Rolling her eyes, Maya said, “No kidding. Ninety percent of the time when I try to do it, I’m not in a state of harmony. I can’t control my emotional state that well to make it happen, so don’t feel bad.”

“How true,” Inca murmured wryly. “I felt that, to reach you, I could do it, Maya. Roan supported my decision. I went into our meditation room, sat down and closed my eyes. I began to do the breathing exercise that we were taught, when suddenly Grandmother Alaria materialized in the room!” Her voice was filled with awe. “Can you imagine my surprise when she appeared? This is the first time she has ever visited me like that.”

Maya’s brows rose. “Wow. Yeah, that’s extreme all right. Why did she appear to you? What was going down?”

Gripping Maya’s hands, Inca grinned broadly. “She told me that I could not teleport to you. That I must take the airplane instead. I was shocked. I asked why. I told her how seriously wounded you were. Grandmother raised her hand and gave me that look she gives us….”

Maya laughed weakly. “Yeah, the ‘look.’ I know it well.”

“She said that you were going to be all right. She had gazed into the future and seen that you would live. And,” Inca’s voice wobbled slightly as she added, “she said I could not teleport because I was with child! And when one is pregnant, one cannot teleport or it could harm the babies.”

Maya gasped. She saw the joy dancing in Inca’s willow-green eyes. “Babies? You’re pregnant?”

Inca gave her a proud look. “Twins, Maya. Grandmother Alaria said I was carrying twins.”

Shocked, Maya sat there, her eyes widening.

Inca moved her hand tenderly to caress her abdomen. “She said our mother’s side always had twins, and that we carry this heritage within us.” Her eyes shone.

“And they are fraternal—one boy and one girl, Grandmother Alaria said.”

“Oh, this is
wonderful
news, Inca!” Maya placed her arms around her sister’s shoulders and hugged her as hard as she could. They sat there and held one another, laughing and crying together.

Eventually, Maya eased away. She wiped her eyes, sniffed then found a box of tissues and pulled some out, handing them to her sister, who was still sniffling. They blew their noses together and wiped their eyes. Maya’s grin was uneven.

“Hey, this makes me an
aunt twice over!
How about that?”

Laughing, Inca blotted her eyes self-consciously. “Yes. You will be an aunt.” Reaching out, she gripped Maya’s hand. “Do you realize what this means? It means that these babies I carry will have a
family,
Maya. They will know who their mother and father are, who their aunt is….” Inca pressed her hand against her trembling lower lip and stared at her twin. Tears spilled down her cheeks.

“Oh, Inca…” Maya whispered. Leaning over, she pulled Inca into her arms and just held her. She knew all too well the pain of abandonment that Inca’s early loss of their parents had caused her. Maya knew that in a way, she had been the lucky one; she had been adopted two weeks after their parents had been murdered, by the colonel and his wife at the American embassy in São Paulo. Inca, on the other hand, had been passed from jaguar priestess to priest, all her life, until she was sixteen years old, when she’d gone to the Village of the Clouds to begin her metaphysical training in the Jaguar Clan.

Pressing a kiss to Inca’s hair, Maya squeezed her
eyes shut. Hot tears jammed into them. She heard the relief, the pain and the joy in Inca’s weeping. All she could do was hold her sister, rock her gently and let her cry. There was such beautiful strength and caring in Inca. And at the same time, such a bleeding wound in her heart from the trauma of being abandoned and not knowing that she had any family at all. Inca had searched all her life for family. And when she’d gotten kicked out of the Village of the Clouds for making a bad decision, she had lost the only close relations she’d known. It had devastated her.

Hurting for her past pain, Maya pressed her cheek against Inca’s hair and gently ran her hand slowly up and down her long, strong back. Murmuring words of comfort, she felt grateful that she had her foster family, who loved her, as she loved them. Understanding how much the twins meant to Inca, and to her husband, Roan, Maya knew that this would help Inca heal even more since their marriage. Smiling through her tears, Maya whispered, “You’re twice blessed, Inca. I’m so happy for you and Roan. These little babies you carry are gonna be the luckiest kids alive. You’ll spoil them rotten. You’ll be such a great mother….”

Inca pulled out of her arms and used her hands to wipe the tears from her face. Her eyes were red rimmed, but she was smiling. After blowing her nose, she took several more tissues to blot her eyes. “Grandmother Alaria said I was two months along. I did not realize it. I had missed two moons, but I thought it was because of all the stress we were under.”

Maya moved several damp strands of black hair away from Inca’s cheek. “How wonderful. I’m so happy for you. Does Roan know yet?”

Inca smiled. “Yes, I told him right away. He picked
me up, Maya, and he twirled me around in a circle until we were both so dizzy we fell on the floor. We laughed. We held one another. And we cried. But they were tears of joy, not pain.”

Maya leaned back against the pillows. She felt exhausted and knew it was because of the power of Inca’s healing. She held her sister’s damp, happy gaze. “I can’t think of two people more deserving than you and Roan.”

“He is going to fly me to his home in North America. I will meet his family. I am excited but scared. I do not know what they will think of me.”

“They’ll see you as part of their family,” Maya murmured soothingly as she reached out and patted Inca’s hand. “Don’t worry. I’m sure they’re going to be as happy as you are about your babies.” She grinned a little. “So a girl and a boy? Is that what Grandmother Alaria told you?”

Nodding, Inca put another tissue in the pile collecting on Maya’s bedcover. “Yes, she is positive of this.” Her lips curved softly. “And I have been in contact with their spirits already, Maya. It is wonderful. They are so excited about coming into the world through me. They are very strong spirits. Spirits with a purpose.”

“Hmm, I don’t doubt that. Look at you, how strong and mission oriented you are.”

Laughing, Inca said, “As if you are not?”

“Guilty as charged.”

Looking around the small hospital room, Inca whispered, “When I touched you, to allow the healing energies to come through to you, I felt great loneliness in you, my sister.”

Frowning, Maya nodded. She avoided Inca’s gaze, resting thoughtfully upon her. Maya knew that during
a healing, all aspects of a person—their thoughts, their pain, their joy, their past and present—were available for the healer to perceive. “Yeah, I feel a little alone, I guess.”

Inca slid off the bed and straightened her T-shirt. Her gaze never left Maya. “You feel very alone, my sister. Why?”

One corner of Maya’s mouth quirked. “It comes with the territory here, Inca. As a squadron commander with fifty-some people under my care, I get a little worried about them, their safety, especially with Faro Valentino’s Kamovs out there. That’s what got me into this mess—a third Kamov came out of nowhere and nailed me and Dane. We were lucky it didn’t blow us out of the sky.”

“Sometimes, when a person must carry such heavy loads, having a partner helps,” Inca murmured, coming back to the bed and placing her hand on Maya’s slumped shoulder.

“A partner?” Maya said. “You can’t share a squadron command position, Inca. I have Dallas, and she’s a great X.O.”

“No,” Inca replied, gripping her by the shoulder and giving her a small shake, “I am talking about a partner who can hold you, as you just held me as I cried in your arms. A man who can complete you. Give you a harbor of safety when you are feeling very vulnerable and naked to the world around you.”

Maya stared up at Inca. Even though her twin didn’t have the schooling or the worldliness that she did, the wisdom in her eyes touched Maya to her soul. She felt a little frightened by how much Inca saw in her, and yet Maya knew she was safe with her sister.

“Even now, I feel your fearful response, my sister.”

“Yeah…well, for twenty-five-plus years I’ve gone on alone in an emotional sense, Inca. Somewhere in myself, before I found out the truth about us, that you were my sister—I felt alone. Alone in a way that most people don’t have a clue about.” Scowling, Maya whispered, “Just having you around, being able to talk to you, contact you, has helped me a lot, whether you know it or not.” She gave her a lopsided smile, tears coming yet again to her eyes.

Inca nodded, her own eyes gentle with understanding. “Our love as sisters is one thing, Maya. I talk of another love. The kind that Roan and I share.”

“Oh…that…” Maya rolled her eyes. “Forget it.”

“What? That you could love a man? That he would support you, care for you, hold you when you felt so alone and burdened?”

“Inca, you’re naive. I know you mean well, but you know the rules of the Black Jaguar Clan. We’re here to do the dirty work. We’re the dark underbelly of the Jaguar Clan.” She looked around and gestured. “This cave, this squadron, is what I do best. This is my mission. It doesn’t leave me
any
time for a private life. I’ll never be big on marriage, kids and family. In a sense, I’m a big mother hen to fifty-some people. I handle people problems twenty-four hours a day. I have no
time
for something like that, Inca.”

“So,” she whispered, “who holds you when you feel like crying?”

Wincing, Maya avoided Inca’s probing look. “You might be naive, but you aren’t dumb,” she muttered.

Moving quietly to the window, Inca pushed the white curtain aside and watched the activity within the cave for a long moment before she turned again. When
she did, she saw Maya frowning, working hard to keep her emotions at bay.

“When I placed my hands on Dane, he had a similar feeling in him.”

Maya snapped her head up and looked across the aisle to where Inca was standing. Her sister had placed her hands on her hips and stood watching her from the shadows. “There are a lot of lonely people around,” Maya muttered defensively. “So what?”

“He cares for you, Maya.”

Snorting, she dragged in a deep breath and said, “I’m sure it’s out of guilt over the way he treated me and the other women pilots who had the misfortune to be studying under him.”

Shaking her head, Inca slowly moved from the shadows into the light, halting near the end of Maya’s bed. Picking at the coverlet, she murmured, “No, his turmoil is not about guilt. I know the difference between those emotions. He is lonely like you. He is a man with many responsibilities, who carries as many burdens on his shoulders as you do. Perhaps, if you find time in the coming days as you rest and recuperate from this trauma you have endured, you might spend some time with him.”

“Oh, and do what? Talk about the weather?” Maya moved uncomfortably. She wanted to get up, get dressed and get back to work. However, Dr. Cornell had ordered bed rest for the next two days. Tomorrow, one way or another, Maya intended to work half a day at her office, whether the doctor approved it or not. She was off the flight-duty roster for a full week. That put an added strain on the pilots who had to keep flying, which bothered Maya greatly.

Inca laughed softly. “Ah, I see you trying to evade
me, my sister. No, you do not need to talk of the weather with him. He is a man of deep convictions, of goodness. Perhaps you can explore those things with him?”

“Look, I owe him my life,” Maya muttered darkly, “isn’t that enough? I think what he did for me more than rights the wrongs from the past, as far as I’m concerned.”

“That is good—you are willing to forgive. That is a start.” Inca smiled again. “I felt him, Maya. I felt his heart. I grazed his spirit. He has his weaknesses, but do we not all have them?”