Lawe's Justice - Lora Leigh [83]
He stared at his mate. She was as serious as hell when she stood and discussed a traitor in her group as though she hadn’t nearly died sixteen months before because of his betrayal.
And she was discussing it with one of the very men she should have been suspecting.
He was thirty-four years old and he’d never been so close to losing his control as he was now. Even as a babe, or cub as they were called in the labs, he hadn’t been so close to complete mindless rage as he was now.
He had watched friends and littermates die.
He’d been betrayed over and over by his trainers.
He’d been betrayed by Breeds he’d believed were his friends.
He’d watched his mother die by vivisection and had seen countless Breed children suffer until their deaths were a mercy.
And still, he’d maintained his control because he’d had no other choice. And now, when that control was even more imperative, he could feel himself losing his grip on it.
“There’s no way to set a trap when the last thing I need right now is to have any of them know what I’m doing.” Diane shook her head at Thor’s suggestion that they find a way to trap the traitor within their group. “Besides, it can wait. I want to concentrate on finding Brandenmore’s research subjects right now. As far as the others know, I’m at Sanctuary and Rachel will cover for me if by chance one of them attempts to contact me.”
“You know where she’s hiding then?” Thor asked as he leaned against the wall, arms crossed over his chest and watched his commander somberly.
Diane breathed in slowly. He could sense the battle she waged within herself for a moment before resignation settled in. Her shoulders straightened as her head lifted proudly at whatever decision she’d been silently contemplating.
“I know where they’re at.” She nodded. “Window Rock, Arizona. The night the Breed they called Judd and the young human girl, Fawn, were supposed to be terminated, Judd somehow managed to cause the guard to wreck the vehicle and took the girl and ran with a Native American who had been contacted by an anonymous source several days before. He found them, hid them for several days, and then took them to Window Rock.”
“And just how do you know this?” Lawe could feel himself tensing, the pit of his stomach tightening at the look in her eyes.
“Because I’m smart like that,” she drawled mockingly. “And once I had that bit of information I began investigating him. He’s known for disappearing regularly and he’s known for his habit of attempting to help Breeds. He was also near the area where Judd and Fawn Corrigan were being transported for termination the night they escaped.”
Lawe stared back at her.
He could feel the ice battling against the mating heat to take over once again. To wrap around his soul, to freeze the emotional abyss waiting to spread through him and destroy him once and for all.
Window Rock, Arizona. A Native American who would be willing to help Breeds. One Lawe knew for a fact had been searching for a particular young woman who had been kidnapped decades before by the Council. Terran Martinez, his uncle. But neither Terran nor his father had been there for Morningstar Martinez. His sister.
Lawe’s mother.
“All the evidence we have verifies the termination,” Lawe pointed out.
“Because no one was left living to un-verify it,” she reminded.
“Remains were found in the cremation unit,” he argued. “Enough to prove there were at least two bodies.”
“And every guard in the building was dead,” she reminded him. “Did you find teeth? Bone matter? Anything to verify the DNA? Sex? I know how thorough Breeds are. There was nothing there or I would have known about it when Jonas gave me the file on Honor Roberts.”
“And how did you hear about this?” he asked, his tone grating. “That information hasn’t come up anywhere else.”
To which Diane smiled. “No one could verify their deaths, not even the Brandenmore scientists and research assistants I managed to talk to. I was probing into