Daughter of Destiny Read Online Free PDF Page A

her.
    â€œTh-thanks, Major. I appreciate your words….”
    â€œCall me Mike, Kai. You look like you really need a cup of coffee.” He pointed to a sideboard behind his desk, where a coffeepot sat on a warmer.
    Nodding, Kai smiled thinly and said, “Yeah, I think I’d like a cup of coffee now. Thanks…”
    Mike ambled over and poured two cups. “Cream? Sugar?”
    â€œStraight and black.”
    He smiled wryly. “Spoken like a true Navy aviator.” He handed her one cup and then leaned against the desk again. She sipped the steaming coffee and he saw her tense features relax a little. “So, what you’re wanting is monetary and logistical support from Perseus to locate these three crystal totems, right?” Perseus was the organization founded by Mike’s boss, Morgan Trayhern. It was a covert team of military trained men and women who came to the aid of others when government intervention wasn’t possible.
    â€œYes, exactly.” Kai studied his dark features and saw him thinking as he sipped from his own mug. “I haven’t a clue as to how the other two women are going to be found.” She rubbed her wrinkled brow. “Maybe they’ll appear to me in a vision later, after I find the first totem. I really don’t know how this works….”
    Mike smiled benignly. “In my experience, whoever issupposed to go after it will get the message, just as you have. And come forward when called to do so. But let’s not worry about that right now. Let’s take this one step at a time, shall we? Let’s get you on the trail of the Paint Clan crystal mask.”
    â€œI don’t have any money. What little I’d saved went for a civilian attorney to defend me against the charges, but I lost the case…. Lost everything—my good name, my family’s honor. I’ve shamed them—shamed my nation—and I can hardly live with it. All because of Thorval. Looking back on it, I think he was jealous of me. When I bagged those two MiGs, he went after me. He couldn’t stand the fact that a woman combat aviator had two kills to her credit when he had none.”
    Nodding, Mike said, “Unfortunately, there’re men like that everywhere in the world, not just in the service.”
    â€œI know. So I was more or less forced into this mission, Mike. I don’t really think I’m the best one to handle it, but I keep getting a dream every night about the crystal mask. It’s over in Australia. I recognize the continent. In the vision, I can see the land and the face of a very old Aboriginal woman. I know she’s a medicine woman for her people. And I know she knows where the crystal mask is hidden.”
    â€œYou need bankrolling, Kai.”
    She searched his face. “Could you do that for me? I have no way of paying you back. I don’t want to work for Perseus, I want to fly. That’s what I really want to do…but with a BCD, I’m not going to be hired by any commercial airline company.”
    â€œI know,” Mike murmured. He saw the ravages of pain in her eyes—eyes as blue as a mountain lake. “Look, let me talk to Morgan about the possibility of such a mission. This sort of request is a little out of the ordinary for us. We generally help people in foreign countries who can’t be helped through regular ambassadorial channels or through the political process. We handle a lot of undercover missions, but this one is different. We’re not going after people, we’re going after a special object, a crystal totem. My boss is not exactly educated about Native American spirituality, nor does he necessarily believe in it.”
    Mike smiled slightly and drummed his fingers on his desk. “However, his son, Jason Trayhern, just married a full-blood Apache woman, Annie Dazen, and she comes from a family of medicine women. And Jason was healed by that medicine, not via