Wolfsbane (50 page)

“Last week.”

“Impossible. She’s dead!” Red streaked Canyon’s eyes. “Cora.” He grabbed the laptop and dragged it closer. “She’s … she’s dead. She died … four years ago.” His voice a whisper, Canyon steepled his fingers and touched them to his lips.

But he fell quiet again as the aged voice recounted the story of interaction between a Special Forces team and her village. Matt assessed and monitored Canyon’s reactions very closely, partially to gauge his emotional state, but also to see if anything she said was contrary to what he remembered.

When silent tears streaked down Canyon’s stubbled face, Matt had his answer. It was true. Everything Corazine Mercado testified to was true. Minutes ticked by as Canyon, enrapt, watched the woman. Twice, he reached out and touched the screen. Sorrow gouged painful lines in the former Green Beret’s face.

Willow had said that Canyon came back from that mission changed—quieter, withdrawn. And knowing the story, knowing he’d invested his heart and life and found companionship in the arms of a young woman …
no wonder
.

As the story pitched in intensity, Canyon slapped the screen shut. “Stop.” He shook his head. “I can’t. I can’t …” His voice cracked. “No more.”

Was that because he feared what might’ve been told? Or was it just too painful?

“Canyon.” Only as General Lambert took the lead in the conversation did Matt even notice the psychiatrist now sat next to Canyon. “Mrs. Mercado repeatedly mentioned someone named Bayani. That name is not in any report or record. Do you know who he was?”

Tormented eyes staggered to the general. “Me.” He pawed at the tears, face red. “It was the name Awa gave me. It means ‘hero.’” A sob ripped through him. A soft snort mixed with more tears. “I’m no hero.”

“Canyon, I know this is painful—”

“You have
no
idea.” Canyon glared at the general through red-rimmed eyes and tight, quivering lips.

“You’re right. But your report never mentioned a union between you and the chief’s daughter.”

The strength that held the man’s neck up collapsed. He cradled his head in his hands. “Chesa.” With a groan, he eased back against the chair. “The sweetest, most naive … innocent …” He dragged in a ragged breath and pushed to his feet.

Matt and the general shared a glance, and in it, Matt knew to let the man have some space. This was a lot to digest. And it was only the beginning. He didn’t want the guy blowing a fuse, so they had to take this slow.

Along the bank of windows, blinds closed, Canyon stood. “What do you want? Why are you doing this?” Reverie lost, he turned, a storm in his expression. “Leave it. Leave it alone. Leave them—buried.” He shoved a finger at Matt. “You people told me to keep my trap shut, so I did. Now leave me alone!”

Matt held out a piece of paper. There was no other way to do this.

Belligerently wary, Canyon snatched it from his hand. “What is this?” He glanced down. Frowned. “I don’t … What …?”

“It’s a paternity test.”

“For whom?” His tone was shrill and implied the absurdity he no doubt felt. But his gaze gradually drifted to the girl, who had stopped playing and now watched him with frightened blue eyes.

“Your daughter.”

A scoffing laugh sparked against the tension. “Nice try. I don’t know what game you’re playing—”

“She is your ch—”

“No!” Canyon stabbed a finger toward Matt again. “See, this is where I know you’re wrong. The one sore spot in my marriage to Chesa:
She never got pregnant. It was painful and humiliating, a point of honor among our—the people.”

“When Mrs. Mercado came to us,” Hartwicke’s quiet calm voice sliced into the tension, “she repeatedly said she was doing it for Chesa and the child.” Hartwicke stood. “She fought to get to the States, to find us, so she could tell her story—and bring Tala to her father.”

“I am
not
her father.”

“How do you think she got blue eyes—blue eyes, like yours?”

Canyon waved a hand back and forth. “No.” He held his head as if feeling faint. “No, this isn’t true. Chesa
died
in that fire, and I
know
she never had my child—I was there! She died! What part of dead don’t you people get?”

Hartwicke lifted Tala, who clung to her. “I know that’s what you were told, but Chesa didn’t die that day. She couldn’t have because this child
is
yours.”

“We conducted a paternity test using your toothbrush and a swab of Tala’s inner cheek.” Matt found no pleasure in blowing the man’s mind. “The results have a 98.5 percent certainty. Tala is your daughter.”

Merciful God, help!
It couldn’t be true. Chesa had cried nearly every night in his arms, agonizing that she’d never carried his child. He tried to convince her that it didn’t matter, that he would still honor her, but it did no good.

Yet even as he looked at the little girl playing on the carpet, he saw … “Chesa.” Face wreathed in innocence. Beautiful round cheeks. Jet-black hair. Where … hold up. To birth this child she had to be— He jerked his gaze to the CID agents. “Where is she? Where is Chesa?”

“I’m sorry.” Rubart paled. “She died, Canyon. Corazine told us she lived only long enough to bring Tala into the world.”

His head spun. His world crumbled. Again. Was there no mercy? Chesa had the baby she wanted, and she would never see her grow up. A pressure built around his chest, his heart.

Something touched his arm. He jerked, disoriented. Yanked from the past and painful memories into the present laden with painful truths. Pain … why was there always pain?

“Canyon, are you okay?”

The shrink chick who’d visited the Shack—what was her name?—stood beside him.

“Yeah … sure … no.” He stuffed his hands on his belt. “This can’t be.
I mean, wouldn’t I feel something for her? A connection or something?”
The way I feel with Roark
.

Roark. Oh man. What would she think? What must everyone in this room think? That he’d killed all those people. The people who had embraced him as a
warrior
. A hero. And he’d failed them. Every one of them. Including Awa, Corazine, and Chesa … who was pregnant?

He swayed and grabbed the chair. “Why are you doing this?” Numb, he dropped into the leather cushions. “Corazine—where is she? Why bring this girl to me?” What a stupid thing to say. Canyon buried his face in his hands.
This can’t be happening
. “Don’t you people see this is stupid? I mess things up. Everything I touch, it doesn’t turn to gold. It turns to rot. Look at Tres Kruces, look at my whole freakin’ life! Why on earth would you put a child with a man like me?”

“We have more testimony from Corazine,” Rubart said. “She insists you were not responsible for what happened to the village.”

He pulled his head out of the quagmire of the past. “She … but how?” That made no sense. How would Corazine know?

Matt sighed. “She wasn’t detailed, but I think we might have a shot at clearing your name.”

“No!” General Lambert lunged to his feet. “I told you to bury that until we have more details and proof—cold, hard proof.”

Rubart’s expression darkened. “He has the right to know what we have.”

Surprise lit through Canyon at the way the two argued. But his mind hooked on one thing. “Of course she wasn’t detailed. Cora wasn’t a soldier. She was a sweet woman who didn’t know military procedure. She didn’t know I gave the coordinates—”

“Explain that to me.”

Canyon held Rubart’s gaze. “I disagreed with the strike, but when we were being overrun by radicals, I gave coordinates. I thought … I thought they were for a location more than a mile away. But …” He shrugged. “I don’t know. The bombs hit the village. Perfect strike. Don’t you get it? Cora loved me; she wouldn’t want to believe I made
that
mistake.”

Matt opened the laptop, accessed the video, and forwarded it to the segment he’d marked. He played it. Then motioned to the screen. “Right there, she says you were not responsible.”

“That’s it?” Canyon struggled to his feet, biting through the pain that leeched into his chest again. “This is … this is bull!”

“Aren’t you interested in—?”

“Don’t
go there.” Canyon shook a finger at Rubart. “Think about what you’re doing—shoving this girl into my life and opening this Pandora’s box from hell. Are you out of your mind? They’ll put me away, then where does that leave her?”

“That is exactly what I told Major Rubart.” General Lambert’s chest was heaving. “No, we will not do anything with the little we have, Canyon. I promise you that. If we cannot find more, then things stay as they are.”

Rubart planted his hands on his hips, that crisp uniform tidy and sparkling. The man should try getting his hands dirty. “So, what? You don’t want your own daughter?”

Canyon smirked. “I never figured you for a politician, Rubart.”

“I am trying to find the truth, Canyon.”

“Just … leave it alone.” Exhaustion weighted his limbs. He sat in the chair, staring at the little girl. Kneading the tension in his forehead, he watched the girl. “How old is she?” Three … wouldn’t she be about three? That’d fit the time line. Right?

Major Hartwicke crouched next to the girl, wrapping her arm around the yellow-and-white daisy dress. “Three.” She touched the tip of the girl’s chin. “And she speaks English.” Hartwicke looked at him. “Mrs. Mercado told us
Bayani
taught them all English.”

A sour taste squirted over his tongue, remembering how determined the chief and his wife were for their people to know the language. His heart constricted at the way the little girl laughed with the major, a chin-tucked coy smile-laugh.

Just like Chesa.

He snapped his eyes shut.
Chesa …

She was alive. She was alive and I left her. She was alive, I left her, and she was pregnant. Oh, Lord God, forgive me!

“Leave us.” Canyon stroked his head with his fingers, a new volatile ache whipping through him.

Once the others had cleared out, the little girl hesitated and looked around. Her gaze finally rested on him. Though something in him wanted to shove her away, deny the whole mess, he realized this was his chance. His chance to make it up to Chesa. To honor her memory by taking care of their daughter.

“Hi.”

Eerily, she looked at him with eyes he saw in the mirror every day.
The Metcalfe blues
. He pushed out of the chair and eased himself onto the carpet next to her. “You have my eyes,” he mumbled.

That chin-tuck smile melted his heart. “Lola said I have my daddy’s eyes.”

Emotion thickened his throat and he strained to swallow. Two things plucked the image of the wonderful woman who’d treated him like a son:
Lola
—the Filipino name for grandmother. And “daddy’s eyes.”

My eyes
.

He smirked. “Yeah.” He brushed the hair from her face and off her shoulder. When he did, a chain necklace caught his attention. As he touched the tiny ball beads, his heart skipped a beat. Then two.

He tugged it free. When a dog tag dangled in his hand, he sucked in a breath as he closed a fist around the tag.

“It’s all I have, Chesa.”

Brown eyes captivated his mind. “It is all the more special.”

She’d worn his dog tags proudly since he had no ring to give her for their wedding ceremony. And she’d had them on the day she died.

The day I left her
.

New agony wormed through his mind. Abandoning his wife when she was pregnant. Never seeing her belly grow large. Or seeing her give birth, seeing their daughter come into the world. Was she a quiet tormentor the way his mom had said he was? Or did she come in kicking and screaming?

He dreaded facing Roark now. Might as well squeeze lemon into that sucking chest wound. He’d complied with the agreement he’d made with Range. And it’d killed him not to visit the hospital. Not to call and see how she was doing. But he had to give her room.

Or was it the lab results that kept him away?

The girl patted his shoulder. “Are you my daddy? Lola said we were going to find my daddy.”

Pulse spiraling adrenaline-laced panic, Canyon stilled. Daddy. Yeah. Exactly how did that work?
What if that test is wrong?
A vehemence rooted itself in Canyon’s heart. This little girl was Awa and Cora’s granddaughter, which meant, even if he wasn’t her father, he was the only family she had now.

“Yeah, I am.” He blew out a breath. Owning up to it was half the battle.

At that, she chin-tucked again and eased into his arms. As if she’d done it all her life, she snuggled into him. In her hair, he could smell Chesa, that unique body scent he could’ve tracked like a bloodhound. Finally, something in his life had not ended in total ruin. Holding Tala
flooded him with so many fond memories … and peace. He closed his eyes and inhaled. With a smile, he pressed a kiss to her crown.

Twisted. Weird. But so good.

I don’t deserve her, God
.

“Love is not earned. It’s given.”

CHAPTER 35