Chapter Seven
Morning sunlight swept away the night’s gloom, painting the Navajo Nation in bright yellow and azure blue.
Caleb pulled into the Episcopal mission lot a half hour ahead of schedule.
Stepping out of the Jeep, he shrugged into his black suit coat, the ache in the back of his shoulder a reminder of the previous night’s events.
Crisp, clean air frosted his lungs.
The church was a study of right angles—flat-roofed, squared off, clad in red sandstone.
An ornate white cross topped its bell tower.
A white van from the funeral home sat near the end of the gravel strip.
Two black Tahoes with official Navajo Nation plates took up the front spaces closer to the blue entrance doors.
His shoulders locked, muscles strung tight.
He hadn’t arrived early enough—his grandfather was here.
Gravel crunched underfoot as he approached the covered entrance and pushed into the vestibule.
The furnace belched out warm air, smelling of aged wood, worn stone, and old leather.
The sanctuary beyond was bright and airy, white stucco walls lined with Navajo art, the ceiling high and crossed with weathered wooden beams.
He strolled down the aisle between white pine pews, his gaze drawn to the large silver and turquoise cross.
White roses and Asiatic lilies spilled from pedestal stands on either side of the sandstone altar.
Their cloying scent dragged him back to a different funeral.
A teammate. Killed in combat. He understood that kind of death.
This? This was different.
Breathing through his mouth, he shoved the memory away.
Two men stood deep in conversation at the pulpit.
One of them, Floyd Parker, he recognized from the funeral home.
Thick around the middle, thinning gray hair and a red flush to his pasty white complexion, he fit the stereotype in Caleb’s head of a funeral director.
He noticed Caleb’s approach and hurried over, speaking in a hushed tone that was as much a part of his work ensemble as his black suit and tie.
“Mister Varella. Everything is arranged. Once again, I’m sorry for your loss.”
The hollow ache in Caleb’s chest tightened. “Thank you. I’d like to see my mother.”
“Of course. If you’ll follow me.” Parker led him through a side corridor. “Your grandfather is with her now.”
Caleb swallowed the curse forming. He’d hoped for a few precious moments alone with his amá .
No such luck.
Two Diné men in dark suits flanked a closed door—a security detail. Their alert posture, watchful gazes, and suit coats sized to accommodate vests and concealed weapons all added up to executive protection, like him.
Only it wasn’t his mother they were guarding.
Opening his suit coat, he waited for the pat down. “I’m not carrying.”
The older of the two gave him a full visual sweep, then stepped aside. “You can go in. ”
It was on the tip of Caleb’s tongue to remind the man that everyone was a potential threat to a high-profile figure—even so-called family.
He shrugged instead. Not his client. Not his problem.
His hand closed around the doorknob.
An unexpected wave of grief punched him in the chest. He swallowed hard.
Lillie Blackwater Varella hadn’t been easy to love.
But she’d been his mother. From the time he was a small boy, he’d run interference between her and his father when his old man was high or drunk and looking to take it out on someone.
After his father died, he’d kept his mother sober when he could, fed and dressed in clean clothes when he couldn’t.
At eighteen, he’d left for the Army, angry and with no small amount of guilt.
Because he’d known if he didn’t leave, he’d never get out.
Still, he should have done more. Visited more. Checked in more. Not just money and phone calls. The last time they spoke, his mother had sounded good. Maybe a bit lonely, but clean and sober.
Squaring his shoulders, he entered the room.
An old man in a black suit stood at his mother’s coffin. When he turned, Caleb’s feet rooted in place.
Benjamin Blackwater.
Shicheii— his mother’s father. President of the Navajo Nation.
The bodyguards on the other side of the door were for him.
The last time Caleb had seen his grandfather was at his grandmother’s funeral, twenty-two years ago. Back then, the man had seemed larger than life—tall with shoulder-length black hair. A face carved of granite that softened when he looked at his family.
Or maybe that had just been Caleb's childhood imagination.
Now, the hair was short, mostly gray, though the thick black brows remained. The lines etched into his grandfather’s face were new, but his bearing wasn’t. He stood straight, a leader to his core, his gaze sharp as obsidian as it raked over Caleb.
Caleb's mother had followed her father’s rise—from tribal council member to leader to president.
She’d told Caleb stories about Ben Blackwater’s achievements—stories she must have gotten off the Internet.
She didn’t use social media or, as far as he knew, engage with other Navajo living in the Phoenix area.
Still, she’d been proud of her father. Loved him.
Even if he and the rest of her family hadn’t loved her back.
“ Yá’át’ééh , Grandson.”
Ben’s eyes carried a pain Caleb refused to acknowledge. His grandfather had no right to look grief stricken—not when he could have extended a hand to his daughter in her time of need.
“Hello, Grandfather.” Caleb joined the older man beside the casket. “Thank you for allowing Mom to be buried in the family plot.” The words tasted like ash on his tongue. Bitter but true. His grandfather had at least done that much.
“She was my daughter. Much loved, despite the distance between us.” Ben’s gaze centered on Caleb. “As are you, Grandson.”
Keep your damn mouth shut. He wouldn’t dishonor his mother by causing a scene at her funeral.
Ben gestured toward the sympathy floral arrangement—white lilies, yellow roses, and baby’s breath nestled in greenery—on a stand beside Caleb’s mother’s coffin. “From your colleagues, I believe.”
Caleb sidestepped and angled his head, his gaze narrowing on the card tucked into the arrangement.
With our deepest sympathies to Caleb and his family. Dìleas Security Agency.
A quick smile touched his lips. Sophia and Penny had to be responsible. The men might be the muscle at Dìleas, but the women were its beating heart.
He made a mental note to text Sophia later, then turned back to his grandfather, searching for neutral ground.
“Strange, isn’t it? Mom and Shima’ Sani’ both died when they were fifty-two.”
One from cancer. The other from fentanyl she probably thought was a pain pill. Five years clean. All it took was one bad day. One bad pill.
His grandfather sighed, the sound heavy with remembered loss. “Your grandmother foresaw her death. She prepared for it in the way of the Tódich?íinii —the Bitter Water Clan. She lived in harmony with her fate.”
He touched the polished wood of his daughter’s casket. “Lillie’s path, too, was determined before she was born.”
Caleb’s jaw clenched. Fire crawled up his spine.
“Does it help you sleep better at night to believe that?”
Shit. So much for keeping his mouth shut.
“I don’t believe in your traditions. I don’t believe in fate. Grandmother died because of a lack of decent medical care. Mom died because her family turned their backs and let her waste her life on a good-looking loser.”
His accusation landed like a grenade in the stillness.
Rather than anger, his grandfather’s expression conveyed sorrow. And something else. Something Caleb couldn’t quite decipher.
“We were very proud,” Ben continued after a long moment, “to learn you served in the Army and had become a Green Beret.”
The old man kept track of him ?
The forgotten boy deep inside Caleb soaked in those words like needed rain.
He covered the emotional jolt with a sneer. “You mean you were shocked I didn’t end up like my father.”
His grandparents had despised Julian Varella and never hid it. Handsome. Charming. Manipulative. Drug dealer. He charmed Lillie Blackwater, got her pregnant when she was eighteen. From him, Caleb had learned what kind of person he never wanted to be.
Ben’s eyes narrowed. “You have a warrior spirit. It has served you well. But now it’s time to make peace with your family. I suspect there’s much you don’t know.”
“I’m not here to make peace.” Caleb’s voice cut sharp. “I’m here to bury my mother. As soon as that’s done, I’m gone. Back to my life.”
He lifted his chin toward the closed door—and the armed sentries beyond it.
“Like your boys out there, I get to use my warrior spirit to keep people safe. Only I get paid a helluva lot more than they do—and I’m not stuck on the rez.”
It was a childish jab. One his grandfather didn’t react to. His expression stayed neutral.
But the boy Caleb used to be—the one with an emotionally fragile mother, the one written off as the drug dealer’s kid—remembered the sting.
Silence. Then Ben spoke. “There is more to this life than money and status, Grandson.”
Before Caleb could respond, the door opened.
David and Vanessa Blackwater stepped inside. Faces from his early childhood. Zach’s parents.
His uncle was a younger version of Caleb’s grandfather, dressed in a dark suit and white shirt with a bolero tie, his short black hair threaded with silver.
His aunt’s dark hair was swept up in a bun.
A traditional Navajo red sash wrapped the waist of her long-sleeved black dress.
Behind them was his cousin, in a navy suit.
The woman accompanying Zach made the rest of the room fall away.
Gia wore a sleeveless black dress that hit just above her knees, black ankle boots, and a gray scarf with turquoise clusters draped gracefully over her shoulders. She’d braided her hair in a French plait, the end curling over one shoulder.
When their eyes met, she offered a tentative smile.