“Wyatt. Boy, come on in and stop swappin’ lies out there. There’s been a couple of gators gettin’ all frisky lately on the lawn. I wouldn’ want you to run into them. And the Rougarou has been a visitin’ folks up and down these parts lately. Wouldn’t want you or your friends to be caught out in the open.” Grand-mere’s voice cut through the night. Clear. Crisp. Welcoming.
Wyatt smiled for the first time. Just the sound of her voice settled the knots in his gut. “You’re smokin’ that pipe again, Nonny. I thought the doc told you to stop.”
What the hell is Rougarou? Malichai asked, using telepathic communication.
Local legend mainly used to scare the crap out of wayward boys to keep them out of the swamps and bayous at night, Wyatt answered with a quick grin. Not that the tactic was particularly successful.
“Doc’s not even wet behin’ the ears yet, Wyatt,” his grandmother said. “I ben smokin’ this pipe nigh onto seventy years now. I’m not about to quit now.”
She was sitting in an old sturdy, hand-carved rocking chair on the verandah, pipe in one hand and a shotgun close to the other. Wyatt frowned when he saw the gun. He took the pier in several long strides, covered the circular drive and the lawn in a few leaps and landed on the porch in a crouch beside his grandmother.
She was very small and fragile looking, the shotgun nearly as big as she was, but her hands were rock steady. She wore her silver white hair braided and looped in a bun at the back of her head. Her skin was thin and pale, but her eyes were clear and just as steady as her hands.
“What the hell’s goin’ on, Nonny? Did someone threaten’ you?”
She took the pipe from her mouth. “Greet me properly, boy. I been a missin’ you for a long while now.”
“I’m sorry. You worried me holdin’ that shotgun so close.” He leaned in to kiss her on both cheeks. “You smell like home. Spicy pipe tobacco, gumbo and fresh-baked bread. I’m never home until I get close to you, Nonny.”
Nonny blinked back pleased tears and turned her face away from him. “Since when did you learn to leap around like a jungle cat, Wyatt? They teach you such things in the service?”
Wyatt’s heart jumped. He hadn’t thought about using his enhancements in front of his grandmother. “I learned to run fast right here in the bayou tryin’ to get away from that switch of yours.” At least that wasn’t a lie.
She gave a little sniff as she looked past Wyatt to the two men who followed him much more slowly. Her sharp eyes couldn’t help but notice that the taller of the two was limping and the shorter one had dropped back behind him, almost as if he were a little reluctant to come here, but clearly he was really looking out for the other one, his gaze sweeping the bayou and surrounding buildings constantly.
She stepped up to the porch column, studying both men. “Are you hurt too, Wyatt? It seems the lot of you are all injured in some way.”
“We took some fire,” Wyatt admitted. “Helicopter went down and we were trapped behind enemy lines, but we made it out. Each of us took a hit or two, but we’re good. We’ve come to help you out with your problem and maybe get a little rest and recoup.”
“Just what does ‘a hit or two’ mean in terms of injuries, Wyatt?” There was a note in his grandmother’s voice warning him she wanted information.
Wyatt sighed. Sometimes there was no getting around his grandmother. She could be stubborn and tough when she wanted to be. “Malichai took a hit in the leg. It was pretty bad, but I was able to repair the damage right there. Ezekiel took both of us down, protecting us when someone lobbed a mortar in our direction. His back took the brunt of the fire. And I had a couple of smaller injuries, a ricochet when the helicopter first took fire and a stab wound just below my heart. Joe, our pilot got the worst of it, but Mordichai, Zeke and Malichai’s brother, is with him, seein’ to him.”
Nonny closed her eyes for a moment and hugged the pillar tighter. She swallowed hard and then took a deep breath and nodded. “Thank the good Lord none of you were killed.”
“It wasn’ even close, Grand-mere,” Wyatt lied, and kissed her cheek. “I want you to meet my good friends.”
The two men made it to the stairs and halted. Neither took a step closer. There was no denying the way their eyes glowed like a cat’s in the dark. His grandmother had been hunting all her life. She wouldn’t fail to notice such a detail, but she simply smiled at them both.
“Any friend of Wyatt’s is welcome here. I expect you’re both hungry. There’s always food on the stove. Simple, but nourishin’.”
“Nonny, this is Ezekiel and Malichai Fortunes. My grand-mere, Grace Fontenot. Nonny.” Wyatt introduced.
He couldn’t keep the notes of love and of pride out of his voice. His grandmother had raised four big Cajun boys, pretty much on her own, and they’d been wild. In truth, he’d brought Ezekiel and Malichai home with him not only because they were his best friends, but because he felt both of them could use a good dose of his grandmother. They needed to know what home and family really was. The cat in them was always seeking to get the upper hand with its need to hunt.