“He wished to be buried with us, and we are going to be put by Timothy. We would like to ask you for permission to bury him by our family. He was part of our family, Lance.”
“Was it that man who was fooling around with my daughter?” he asked, hopefully.
Oh, Blackhawk saw the spark in his eyes, and that was all kinds of wrong, but he couldn’t go there.
This was a dance.
Instead, Ethan pulled out his phone and showed him a picture of him and Jet. Ethan had his arm around the man’s shoulders, and they were laughing about something.
It had been at a family BBQ last year.
Lance RunningWolf didn’t even consider it.
“No,” he stated.
Ethan tried.
“He’s our family.”
Still, Lance wasn’t having it.
“He was a marine. He’s not one of us.”
When Ivan opened his mouth to say‘once a Marine, always a Marine’,” Callen gave him a look.
This was hard enough.
When dealing with the reservation chief, silence from anyoneNOTNative, or the Shaman, was golden.
“I am sorry for your loss, Shaman, but the answer is no. Again, he’s not of our people. Your wife, and life partners are a different situation.”
“Husbands,” he said, correcting him.
Lance agreed to that.
“What happens in your bedroom is your business. It is not uncommon for our people to take multiple partners many, many years ago, so I’ll give you that, but this man is not‘married’to a Blackhawk. So, again, no.”
Ethan kept trying.
“Can we petition the council so I can plead my case to everyone?”
He shook his head.
“No.”
Blackhawk looked at his brother. That’s when Callen knew he was up to bat.
“Chief, we’re willing to make a donation.”
The man shook his head.
“What more could we want, Callen? You’ve helped us with medical care, a civic center, and all the services we desired. This isn’t something you can buy for us. We know the Sacred Burial Grounds are just that. Putting someone there, who is not of us, is against the rules. While Tom would break the rules for Timothy, I will not. That’s not how I plan on running our reservation, so thank you, but again, no.”
Callen went there.
“Catherine was buried there. Tom let her be placed there,” he offered.
He stopped him.
