by Natalie Ann
Now he helped her into the back seat, shut the door, and then slid behind the steering wheel. He listened a moment as she struggled to latch her seat belt, quelling the urge to offer her help. He’d discovered she was an independent little thing, and if he offered to come to her aid too quickly, she wouldn’t hesitate to express her exasperation with him.
Casting a glance at her in the rearview mirror, he smiled. She was the image of her mother, with her head of tight, dark curls and her skin like porcelain. So small and innocent. However, today’s events had to be talked about, no matter how much he might like to bypass the moment.
After he heard the latch click securely, he asked, “You want to tell me what happened today?”
Her gaze met his in the mirror. “I know I’m in trouble for hitting Billy Whitefeather. But he told me Grace was a stupid name. He said I wasn’t Indian. And that I didn’t belong in this school.”
Mat’s nod was nearly imperceptible.
“So,” she continued in a rush, “I told him Whitefeather was the stupidest name in the whole, wide universe. And that my dad was sheriff. And that I could go to this school if I wanted to.”
So he’d been correct when he’d told Grace’s teacher that his daughter could give as good as she got. A smile threatened the firm line of his mouth, but he wrestled it into submission. Now was not the time to laugh at his daughter’s antics. He needed to nip this behavior in the bud.
“He made a fist and I knew he was gonna hit me,” she explained. “I was scared, but I slugged him first. And ya know something?” Unadulterated wonder made her eyes go round. “He cried like a big, fat baby.”
Mat knew it was wrong, but he’d be lying if he didn’t plainly identify the emotion flashing though him as nothing less than pride. Even though he was brand-new at this dad business, he guessed that no parent wanted their child to be a pushover. He was happy to discover that Gracie could stand up for herself. But it was certain they’d have to work on how she went about it.
“It’s not nice to hit people,” he told her.
“But Billy said—”
“I heard you the first time. But you need to know, Grace, you can’t go around hitting everyone who says something you don’t like.”
“But he—”
“Honey—” his tone was firm “—there are no buts. Hitting is wrong.”
The look on her face told him she was crushed. All Mat wanted to do was give her a big hug and assure her that everything was going to be okay. But he forced himself to remain silent. She needed to contemplate her behavior. To realize the magnitude of her actions.
Our job is to shove them right back. Julie’s advice regarding setting firm boundaries floated through his mind.
Mat’s fingers were trembling as he pressed the ignition button and fired up the engine. He sighed. Being the disciplinarian was a necessary part of parenting, Grace’s teacher had just informed him, but it wasn’t a part of his new job as dad that he was going to enjoy very much.
***
The morning sun glowed through the window panes, rays of light glinting directly on the large jar of pennies that sat on the battered credenza. The jar was significant to Mat. While working with the NYPD, he’d placed a penny in the jar every single day that he’d finished a shift and returned to the station house alive.
Lucky pennies. His jar of luck. It reminded him to be grateful for every day he was here on earth.
Several of his colleagues who had worked as cops in the city hadn’t been so lucky. All Mat had to do was close his eyes to visualize the grief-stricken, tearstained faces of the wives and children of his fallen comrades. Those funerals he’d attended had been the reason he’d remained single all these years. Those sad occasions had also been the reason he’d brought Grace here to Misty Glen Reservation. To a slower, safer way of life.
One particularly new penny in the jar caught the sunlight, gleaming like coppery fire. Immediately Julie Dacey’s glorious head of red hair came rushing into his mind with the force of a flash of lightning.
Wispy heat curled down low in his belly as a bolt of pure desire rumbled through him. Mat’s jaw tightened. It had been three days since he’d met his daughter’s teacher, and since then the woman had invaded his thoughts more times than he cared to admit. She was a looker, she was, with her head of wild ginger curls and a smile that could make a man give up his life’s fortune if she asked for it.
The woman was a tactile person, someone who was comfortable touching those within range. She’d reached out to him several times during their meeting, and each and every time Mat had felt the air heat up, felt his heart thud, sending his blood rushing through his veins.
He’d been surprised when she’d said she and her brother were alone. He’d wanted to ask her more about her situation, but Gracie’s arrival had interrupted them.
Raising a teen must be an awesome task. Mat was impressed by Julie’s dedication and her willingness to take responsibility for her brother. He couldn’t help but wonder how she’d come to find herself in such a situation. He’d have loved the chance to talk to Julie about it further.
“Why don’t you just admit it?” he whispered to himself.
You’d have done just about anything to make that meeting last a little longer. You were attracted to that fiery-haired woman the moment you saw her, right there in that first-grade classroom, amid all the bright primary-colored shapes and alphabet letters hanging on the walls. And you've been thinking about her ever since.
He sighed, resting his elbow on his desk and his jaw in the V between his thumb and fingers, blind to the forms on his desk needing completion.
It really hadn’t mattered that he and Julie had been in the most inopportune place, he realized. A classroom where children learned and played sure wasn’t the perfect location for him to experience that kind of desire. Nonetheless, that was exactly where he had experienced it.
Getting involved in his daughter’s teacher’s private life should have been the last thing on his mind. He had papers to file, forms to complete, a police station to run. A little girl to raise.
Still, the sunlight continued to gleam through the window, making that jar of copper pennies wink and smile... reminding him of one beautiful woman.
***
Julie paced the close confines of her small living room, anxiety nibbling at her nerves like ravenous mice after a slice of fresh Swiss. Where was Brian?
She’d arrived home from school to an empty house. No note. No phone message. Nothing. He was often out when she came in from work. But in the past he’d always left her a note. Well, almost always. And he never failed to return before dinner. She was saving up to buy him that cell phone he’d been nagging her about, but she still had some outstanding bills to pay off before she felt comfortable increasing her calling plan.
The meat loaf she’d cooked sat on the counter, stone cold. The mashed potatoes had congealed into a hard lump. And there was little hope for the limp green beans stuck to the bottom of the pan.
The sky had darkened long ago, and Julie didn’t have any idea where her brother might be, or what trouble he might be getting himself into. Ever since that shoplifting incident, she’d been worried sick. She didn’t know the names of any of the boys he’d met since their move to Misty Glen. Brian had been steadily uncommunicative about his friends. She didn’t have a clue whom to call or what to do. For all she knew, he could have been struck by a car while he was riding his bike and was lying unconscious in the emergency ward of the local hospital. During that moment of panic, Julie had called the dispatcher at the Misty Glen police station. The woman had been so nice in her efforts to calm Julie and had assured her that no accidents had been reported.
Still, the lesson plans Julie had intended to organize for her students sat on the table, untouched. Worry had her too upset to think straight, too distressed to eat.
So she paced. Wrung her hands. And waited.
The knock on the front door nearly made h
er jump right out of her skin. She rushed to the door, sure that Brian must have lost his key.
The sight of Mat Makwa standing on her doorstep stole every thought from her head.
“Evening, Julie,” he greeted her. “My dispatcher got word to me that you called. I thought I’d stop by and check on you. Is everything okay?”
The concern on his handsome face nearly made her knees buckle. All Julie wanted to do was lean on him, unload all her troubles onto his shoulders. He was barely in the door when she let her concerns roll off her tongue.
“I don’t know where Brian is. He’s never been this late before. He hasn’t called. He didn’t leave a note. He could be out there getting into trouble. He could be hurt. He could be—”
“Okay, now—”
Mat’s voice was soft, gentle, and so were his hands as he slid his fingers over her upper arms.
“—don’t let your imagination get the best of you, Julie.”
Something happened when he gazed down into her face. The molecules in the air heated and swirled, danced and constricted. Julie felt as if she’d suddenly been enveloped by a warm, downy blanket.
The smoky spice of his cologne filled her lungs like a drug. For some reason, the idea of laying her head on his shoulder didn’t seem the least bit strange. The relief he offered was too tempting to resist and she leaned into him. He held her for what seemed a delicious eternity. She felt safe. She felt as if nothing bad could ever happen to her. Soon her heartbeat steadied and her tense muscles relaxed.
Leaning away from her, yet obviously unwilling to release her completely, he murmured, “Take a deep breath.”
Although she felt impelled to answer him with a small nod, leaving the safe haven of his arms was the last thing she wanted to do. This hazy stupor held her a willing captive.
Then she began to tremble with some unnamable thing, something that had nothing whatsoever to do with fear and distress over her brother. A silent yet humming electricity seemed to crackle about them, snapping and sparkling like bare high-voltage wires.
How had this energy manifested itself so quickly? Or had it been there all along and she was only now comprehending it?
She studied his gaze as he studied hers.
Brian pushed his way through the front door.
“Hey.”
As he spoke the greeting, he lifted his chin at her and Mat as if coming in this late was commonplace, as if he arrived home every day to find his sister in a man’s arms.
Immediately Mat released Julie, and without his nearness to warm her, she was hit with the sensation of being chilled to the bone. But the appearance of her brother caused her to be bombarded with several emotions all at once: relief that he was safe and sound, anger that he’d caused her such worry, irritation that he seemed untroubled by the situation. Heck, he acted as if there wasn’t a situation at all!
“Hey, man—” Brian grinned at Mat “—I don’t know what brought the police here, but whatever it was, I didn’t do it.”
“You’re not in any trouble,” Mat assured her brother. “I’m just here to check on your sister.” Solemnity knitted his brow. “She was worried about you.”
“Oh.” Brian looked from Mat to Julie, unspoken curiosity lighting his eyes. “As you can see,” he said to her, “I’m okay.” Then without another word he turned with the clear intention of making for his room.
“Hold it! Where have you been?” Julie demanded.
Brian shrugged. “Out.”
“Out where?” She raised her hands, palms heavenward, her level of frustration impossible to contain. “Brian, you’ve got school tomorrow. You should have been here doing your homework long ago. Dinner is ruined. You left no message telling me where you were going or who you’d be with. What is going on with you? You’ve never done anything like this before.”
There was pointed accusation in her tone. She heard it. But there wasn’t a thing she could do about it. Anxiety had taken control.
His red hair, with its wiry texture, was sticking out in several directions. He was sweaty and grimy. But Julie was too upset to remark on his physical appearance.
His face turned crimson. Being reprimanded in front of Mat embarrassed him that much was evident.
“If I had a phone, you could have called me,” he declared. “I’m going to bed. Like you said, I have school tomorrow.”
He moved to duck around her, but she planted herself in front of him.
“Oh, no, you don’t.” She glared at him. “You’re not walking away from this. You’re going to tell me who you’ve been with, where you’ve been, and what you’ve been doing.”
“I don’t have to tell you nothin’.”
Correcting his grammar never even entered her head; she was too overwhelmed by his insolent tone of voice.
“You’re not my boss,” he went on. “I’m old enough to come and go as I please.”
For several seconds Julie was so shocked she couldn’t get her tongue to work. But then it loosened. Oh, boy! Did it ever loosen.
“You’re thirteen years old,” she yelled. Then she poked herself in the chest. “I’m responsible for you. Besides that, we’re a family, Brian. I don’t go off without telling you where I am, what I’m doing, when I’ll be home. I deserve the same consideration from you.”
Had that loud and angry lecture really spewed from her throat? What must Mat think of her? She felt as if her mind and her body were no longer her own. Frustration and impatience had taken her hostage.
“I’m not talkin’ about this!” Brian asserted hotly.
Refusing to meet her gaze, he shouldered his way around her, and Julie was aware of the stench of cigarette smoke clinging to him. She opened her mouth to call him back, but Mat’s hand on her shoulder quieted her.
“Let him go,” he quietly suggested.
The gentle pressure of his fingers calmed her, and that idea was comforting to her. Strange. Unexplainable. Definitely out of the ordinary for her. Yet comforting, nonetheless.
Brian’s bedroom door thudded closed.
“That boy is going to make me lose my mind,” she whispered.
She turned, her gaze falling on Mat’s face for the first time since her brother had returned home. Instantly she remembered the churning heat that had surrounded them as he’d held her close, and awkwardness descended on her like a thick, blinding fog.
Mat, on the other hand, didn’t seem the least bit ruffled.
“Continuing this conversation with him now will only escalate the argument,” he said. “At least you know he’s safe.”
Julie sighed. That much was true.
“Now that I know he’s okay,” she quipped, jerking at the hem of her top, “how many years would I spend in jail if I strangled him for making me worry?”
He laughed out loud, and the sound of it broke the tension pent up inside her. She grinned.
“Raising kids these days is tough,” he allowed.
“You don’t know the half of it.”
He looked at her quizzically and she knew he wanted her to elaborate, but she didn’t know him well enough to be laying out her life story for him.
“Let me just say that my brother didn’t have very good role models in his life.” After a moment she softly added, “I just hope he’s not blundering down the wrong road.”
Mat’s brow smoothed. “It looked to me as if he was acting just like any other rebellious teen would.”
Oh, if only she could be certain that was true. “You really think so?”
“I do. And in my line of work, I’ve seen my share of them.”
He offered her a half smile, and Julie was struck with the notion that it was the sexiest thing she’d ever seen in her life.
“I’d bet my last dollar that tomorrow morning, he’ll apologize for coming in late. You mark my words.”
His face brightened and he reached around to pull his wallet from his hip pocket.
“One of the first things I did when I came to the
rez,” he told her, “was to start a single parents group. We meet at the Community Center.” He handed her a card. “You’re more than welcome to attend the meetings.”
She balked. “But I’m not Brian’s mother.”
“Doesn’t matter,” he cut her off. “You said it yourself just a moment ago. You’re responsible for him. You’re raising him on your own.”
“Well...”
“Just think about it,” he said. “It’s good to have others to talk to.”
Silence tumbled down around them as they exchanged a silent look.
Her smile felt coated in hard plastic. “Well, thank you for stopping by to check on us. I really appreciate it.”
“I’m the sheriff. Checking up on people is what I do.”
After he’d said good-night, Julie stood in her small living room, thinking. That odd, breathtaking heat she’d felt when Mat had held her against him. The way his touch had calmed her when she’d felt such frustration at her brother’s refusal to tell her where he’d been.
Mat stirred something in her. Something amazing, something… mysterious…
Then the stern, self-preserving voice in her head turned scolding. You don’t know Mat Makwa. He’s a stranger. It’s stupid for you to trust a man you don’t know.
She’d been hurt by men she’d loved in the past. Hurt beyond measure. Her father. Her stepfather. Men who hadn’t deserved the trust she’d so innocently placed in their hands. It would be best for her to stay away from Mat. He made her feel things she didn’t understand.
A thump from Brian’s room had Julie blinking her way out of the foggy haze of her thoughts and looking down the hallway. Apprehension crept over her. She loved her brother, but acting as his guardian often left her feeling filled with doubt. Sure she taught six-year-olds how to read and write, add and subtract, but what did she know about raising a teenager? And with Brian’s background, she had more than the normal teen problems to deal with.
It sure would be nice to have somewhere to go for advice. Somewhere to turn for help.
