Page 16 of Healing Creek (Arena Dogs #3)

Chapter Eleven

Grace brushed the tears from her cheeks. She’d known Creek would notice. What she hadn’t expected was to end up in his lap. He lifted her and pulled her against his chest.

Right there.

In front of the whole table.

The sound of chatting and movement came to a halt and all eyes were on them. She should have felt exposed and afraid, but Creek’s arms wrapped her in warmth and support.

“What’s wrong, Grace?”

She allowed herself to lean into the embrace for a moment before she straightened her shoulders and met his gaze. She sniffled. “There’s something I need to tell you.”

Flecks of gold lightened Creek’s brown eyes. “You can tell me anything, Grace.” He brushed the tears she hadn’t been able to stop from her cheeks with the backs of his fingers. “Do you want to go to the garden to talk?”

He was halfway to his feet when she pried herself from his grasp and stopped him with a hand on his chest. “No.” The garden would be perfect.

Safe, private…and cowardly. Her fingers tightened in the cloth of his shirt.

“I think… I think we need Mercury. And…” She dared a glance down the length of the table and almost lost courage.

With a finger under her chin, Creek turned her face back toward him. His eyes demanded she finish her thought. “I’d like Samantha to be there, too. If that’s okay.”

He took a breath to speak, but Samantha beat him to words. “Of course, I’ll be there.” The woman’s voice was calm and confident and reassuring, but it was Creek’s gaze that held her focus. It was Creek’s words that she clung to. Creek’s reassurance that allowed her to breathe.

“It will be all right. You’re stronger than you believe, my butterfly.”

***

They ended up moving to a small workroom near the ship’s bridge.

Creek explained they were using it as a sort of command post, and it was where Mercury had been while the others were eating.

Much to her relief they kept the group small.

Creek and Grace walked there in silence with Lo and Samantha and when they arrived Mercury asked the humans that had been there, including Knock, to leave the room.

They sat at the table and Creek pulled her chair close to his.

He squeezed her hand and turned sideways in his chair to face her.

“There’s something you need to tell us, Grace? ”

“Yes. I…” She hesitated so long she feared they’d see that, even in her truth telling, she was choosing how much to reveal. “I told you about my family and about how they’re all scientists.”

Creek nodded.

“Well, my sister is a geneticist. That is, she…”

“We know what a geneticist does.” Mercury’s growly voice interrupted. He was growing impatient.

“Right. So, she’s the reason I was kidnapped.

” Now she’d hurried it too much. “Six months ago, my sister disappeared. Most of my family thought she was probably off working on some secret project and…” she shrugged.

“I guess they were right. But I was worried that she wasn’t doing it willingly.

You see, I knew what research she’d been doing.

I knew it was dangerous.” Her words tripped over each other as she spoke faster.

“I knew if anyone else found out. Found out what she was working on then, well…”

“Grace, breathe.” Creek’s strong voice stopped her and allowed her to inhale much needed air.

She nodded. “She was researching the Arena Dog genetic codes.”

There was a collective breath that should have sucked all of the air out of the room, but Grace kept going.

“And Roma found out. They kidnapped her. They wanted her to work on the fertility problem. And when she wouldn’t cooperate, they paid Morgan to kidnap me.

They’re using me, threats to hurt me, to force her to work for them. ”

She stopped then. To let it sink in. She was shaking and her stomach was in knots.

The sound of chair legs scraping back from the table scratched across her nerves like sandpaper.

It was Diablo. Red flashing in his dark eyes. He was up on his feet but not moving closer. He paced in a small pattern on the other side of the table.

Mercury’s stormy gray eyes thundered at her as he leaned forward on a growl. “I think there’s more to tell.”

Her cheeks were wet again. Heavens, she was a leaky faucet dripping everywhere. She sniffled.

A warm soft squeeze of her hand pulled her gaze back to Creek. His ears were alert. His face relaxed and patient. “Go on,” he encouraged.

Could he really accept all of what she had to tell them? What was worse? The connection to Roma that she’d hidden or neglecting to warn them about the threat of Patel and Santos still on the ship? She held his eyes, not allowing herself to see the obvious alarm on the faces of the other men.

“Before we met. Before you found me. A man came into my quarters. He was working with the men that came from Roma—to destroy the Abundance . He was going to take me off the ship and take me to where they’re holding my sister.”

Grace heard low growls and whispers all around her, but she focused on Creek.

His hand holding hers. The concern in those brown eyes.

“He warned me if I told anyone, he’d make sure my sister was killed, and if I kept his secret and left the ship with him, he’d take me to my sister. I’ve been so worried about her.”

“He’s still on the ship?” Creek’s gaze flashed away from hers for only a second then it was back, warm and reassuring.

“Y-yes. Him and another man. They’re in the slave hold now. They’re the two men who got in a fight the day the auction guests were supposed to leave the ship. They didn’t want to leave without me.”

Finally, Creek’s features hardened. “You let me leave you there with men who’d threatened you.” His scowl deepened. “You must have been very afraid.”

Could he really be more upset by that than all her other lies of omission?

“Is the com unit in the med-bay locked down?” Diablo’s growl was so thick she could barely understand him.

Samantha pushed back her chair and stepped into Diablo’s path. “Yes. I made sure myself.” She stroked hands up his broad chest. “I know what you’re worrying about and I’m telling you our secret is safe.”

Grace realized what she wasn’t saying and hurried out the reassurance she knew they needed. “I didn’t tell them about the baby. I didn’t even know about it the last time I saw them. I would never tell them about that. I swear.”

Hadn’t she thought herself that a baby would mean they might no longer need her sister. Of course, she decided, there would be no benefit to her sister. They were never going to release her alive.

“I wouldn’t lie about this. Don’t you see, I’ve already accepted the fact that if I don’t go with them…

” She took a shaky breath. “My sister is going to find out that Morgan and Roma don’t have me anymore and she is going to stop cooperating.

Just by telling you this I’m condemning my sister to die sooner.

But I know she’d rather die than help them enslave another generation of Arena Dogs. ”

Samantha looked at her with sympathy in her eyes. “Oh, Grace, no. You’re not responsible for whether your sister lives or dies. Grand Owens and the rest of the Roma owners are the ones to blame. Not you and not your sister.”

Mercury spoke calmly. “Why is your sister researching our genetics?”

Oh damn. She was really hoping they wouldn’t ask that question.

“She found lab notes from the geneticist who created the Arena Dogs. It turns out the reproductive problem is more of a feature than a flaw. The geneticist engineered the problem when she realized how your people would be used. You see she didn’t know she was creating slaves until—”

“Your sister found these notes?” Diablo growled.

“She found them all right.”

“Grace,” Creek barked. “What aren’t you saying?”

She sighed. “The geneticist was our great aunt.” Heavens save her. Had she just admitted that, right out loud?

“Your relative is our dreaded creator?” Mercury spoke without emotion, as if his mind was too busy accessing the new information.

“She was.” Sadness mixed with her anxiety as Grace tried to imagine what it would have been like to know the woman she’d come to understand through the journals and logs she left behind.

“When Roma discovered she’d sabotaged the project by making it impossible for Arena Dogs to reproduce, she knew they would torture her to get her to undo it. She killed herself.”

“And you’re afraid your sister will sacrifice her life as well,” guessed Creek.

Grace nodded.

Mercury moved around the table and Creek got to his feet to block him from approaching Grace. The two men stared each other down. Grace got to her feet and pulled on Creek’s arm until he moved. He kept ahold of Grace’s hand, twining their fingers together as he stood at her side.

She was so grateful to him. She might have melted to the floor in a puddle without his support. Instead, she faced Mercury, spine straight, eyes lifted.

“It seems your family, like mine, has reason to hate Roma,” he said, and Grace nodded.

“This changes much of what we believed about our creator. And it seems like we have a common ancestor.” Mercury clasped her arms, claw tips gentle against the soft fabric of her top.

“Welcome to the family, our brave little sister.”