Eden Burning / Fires of Eden

by Elizabeth Lowell

  So Jan wants a second honeymoon, does she? Chase thought. More likely she just wanted to get Dane away from that red-hot sex machine for a while.

  “Win or lose, I’ll take Sandi and Mark for two weeks this summer,” Chase said. “Jan could use the break. She’s looking tired.”

  Or like a woman worried about keeping her thick-headed husband from making a fatal mistake.

  “Oh, you’ll lose,” Dane said, confident as a cat closing in on a mouse. “Nicole’s not like Lynette. You’ll see.”

  Chase simply leaned back and smiled. Nicole Ballard, alias Pele, was exactly like Lynette.

  And he would prove it.

  4

  Early the next afternoon Nicole rode the bus from Hilo to the national-park visitors center. She was accustomed to the bus trip, because she didn’t have a reliable car—it was being worked on right now—and most of her part-time jobs were up on the volcano itself.

  But it was no hardship to take a bus up a road where orchids grew in the ditches and giant fern trees arched protectively over the warm, damp ground. She enjoyed the changing vegetation as the bus climbed the gentle, lava-ravaged slope of the volcano. From Hilo’s tropical rain forest at sea level, the bus climbed through croplands, then through native ohia and koa forests and lava flows, and finally to the top of the crater of the volcano itself, where there was little but bare black rock and steam vents.

  While she watched all the changing shades of green, she ran through a mental list of what she had to do today. Not laundry, thank God. She had taken care of that first thing this morning, along with some gardening, housekeeping, and grocery shopping for Grandmother Kamehameha.

  As for her own little cottage, it was as clean as it was going to get for a few more days. She needed to do some preliminary sketches for Grandmother’s birthday more than she needed to dust. Bobby’s mother had asked for a sketch of Benny, the youngest of her grandchildren. Nicole would make sure she got a good one.

  She should also check with Jan again and set aside some time to go over sketches that might be useful to include with the written proposal for “Eden in Shades of Green.” Then there was teaching; she had three classes of dance students, but not today. Usually on the days she didn’t teach, she would put in four or five hours as a research assistant at the Volcano Observatory.

  Actually, “research assistant” was too glorified a title for her work, but it kept the bureaucratic pigeonholers off the scientists’ backs. What she did for them defied a single label. She handled logistics on projects for those scientists who couldn’t organize their own wallets, much less something as complex as getting men and materials to the same place at the same time with the right equipment for some of the elaborate experiments being conducted on the volcanoes.

  Sometimes she poured coffee and watered plants. Sometimes she filed papers. Sometimes she typed field notes into a computer. Often she put reports into English rather than the obscure technical language of experts, which sounded more like a chemistry textbook than human speech.

  And sometimes she went with scientists to new lava flows and sketched them as they scooped scalding vapors into containers for later analysis. Once she had gotten so close that her sketch pad curled and her feet blistered despite her asbestos-lined boots.

  No matter what she was doing, she absorbed the good-natured arguments around her, and she asked questions of the more patient scientists. She wanted to get some feel for the inner workings of the volcanic island that called to her as no other place ever had. Not only did the knowledge itself please her, she had discovered that the more she knew about the mysterious, majestic volcanoes seething beneath her feet, the more depth she brought to her drawings.

  She loved that part of her work the best, the drawings, but the project she had been working on was finished. There was no point in starting another one until Dane’s brother got up and running on his kipuka study. Then she would have some idea of how much time to budget, and when, for the kipuka project.

  Until then she was on her own. While that was hard on the bank account, it was great for everything else. She had been wanting to finish her series of sketches on the Volcano House Hotel, which was perched on the rim of the volcano’s huge mouth, overlooking what once had been a lake of heaving, molten stone.

  The old frame building was newly painted a shade of dark brick red that contrasted with the black lava of the volcano rim and the thick growth of ohia and ferns that crowded right up to the edge of the cliff—and sometimes spilled over. She had already sketched the pathway along the rim beneath the Volcano House’s big windows, the ragged cracks and deep holes where the old road had been abandoned to the restless volcano, and the tourists who ranged from nervous to bored to awed in the presence of the living volcano. Now she wanted a view of the hotel from the caldera floor, where cracks in the rock steamed with the volcano’s hot breath.

  The path down to the caldera floor was well marked. The many paths across the lava weren’t. The floor of the caldera was made of molten stone that had cooled until it became a shiny black lid over the raging forces beneath. The type of lava she walked on now was called pahoehoe. It was slick, smooth, and hard, and once had been about the consistency of syrup.

  Pahoehoe could be as thin as a fingernail where large bubbles had formed and cooled without breaking. There was no way to tell how solid the lava was except by walking on it. Since no one wanted to get sliced to the bone by breaking through a crust of sharp lava, the safe routes over the caldera were marked by occasional piles of stone. If there was any doubt as to what was a safe trail and what wasn’t, all Nicole had to do was follow the dull ribbon left where many feet had worn off the original glossy finish of the lava.

  Unfortunately, the view she wanted wasn’t on the normal routes. She left the path and scrambled across a patch of much rougher aa lava. While this kind of lava was safer because it didn’t form big blisters, it was like walking on knives. Every time she felt the sharp edges gnaw on her shoes, she remembered the first time the Hawaiian names for various kinds of lava had been explained to her. Pahoehoe had the same easy flowing, liquid sound to it as the lava itself had when fresh: pah-hoy-hoy. Aa lava, on the other hand, was rough and thick and sharp and thus had made its own name when the early Hawaiians walked barefoot over it, saying “Ah-ah!”

  Nicole doubted that was how the lava had really been named, but she loved the story. And she was grateful for the tough hiking shoes she wore. They went well with her sturdy khaki shorts but looked odd with her flowered silk halter, which was part of an old dance costume and very comfortable. But all resemblance to Pele ended at the halter. Her hair was braided and pinned securely on top of her head. Loose hair was a nuisance when she was hiking or sketching.

  After a few minutes she found the place where she had sat and sketched before. Here the aa gave way to a sinuous tongue of pahoehoe that was as black and shiny as the day it had cooled after its fiery birth. Once the stone had been thin and quick-flowing. Now it was a motionless mound curved into billows and swirls, as hard and nearly as bright as a mirror.

  Bracing her sketch pad on her knees, she began a study of the old frame building that brooded over the frozen lava lake. She had been meaning to complete her series on the Volcano House Hotel for months, but something else always came up. Now that Dane’s brother had arrived in Hawaii to lend his name and expertise to the Islands of Life project, she wouldn’t have much time to work on sketches just for her own pleasure. But until Dr. Wilcox was ready to begin working on the project, she was free.

  Not that she wasn’t anxious to work on Islands of Life. She definitely was. The endurance and beauty of life in the face of overwhelming odds had always fascinated her. She felt a kind of sisterhood with the kipukas, survivors of past volcanic eruptions, past devastation.

  She felt the same about the gradual return of life to barely cooled lava slopes. The grace and stubbornness of life made awe prickle through her, and with it a feeling of strength at being part of
that resilient force. She was eager to work with and learn from Dr. Wilcox, a man who had made the study of volcanoes and returning life his specialty.

  Her hand hesitated over the sketch pad for a moment. She wondered if Dr. Wilcox would be as funny and friendly and easygoing as his brother, Dane. She hoped so, because she would be spending a lot of time with Dr. Wilcox. But as long as he wasn’t an octopus in drag, she wouldn’t complain about his personality. She would rather spend her time in stony silence than deal with a man who thought he was God’s gift to the inferior half of the human race.

  It wasn’t that she couldn’t handle herself if Dr. Wilcox was as bad as Fred, the horny vulcanologist who acted like every female was dying to lie down for him. She handled Fred. She could handle anyone.

  But she would have to spend a lot of time out in some very isolated kipukas with Dr. Wilcox. If he was an octopus in drag, the hours would be tiresome until he got the message and gave up. And he would give up. All the men did, sooner or later. She just kept smiling and wisecracking and saying no. Even good old Fred had given up.

  Eventually. Sort of.

  A shadow fell over her paper, blocking out not only the light but her view of what she had been sketching.

  She looked up, blinked, and decided that thinking of the devil worked just as well as speaking of him. All six feet two inches of God’s gift to Hawaiian skirts stood in front of her. About two inches away from her nose, to be precise.

  “Hello, Fred,” she said absently, returning to her sketch again.

  And wondering for the hundredth time what women saw in “Dr. Fred.” His broad shoulders, muscular legs, sun-streaked brown hair, and wide blue eyes didn’t raise a quiver in her. She took that as just one more sign of her own frigidity, the kind of feminine coldness that even a volcano couldn’t warm. Fred Warren had set more women’s hearts pounding than anything on the island except a massive eruption.

  “Hi, my little jalapeño. Saw you drawing. You looked lonely.”

  “Nope,” she said cheerfully. Then she changed the subject in a way guaranteed to distract a scientist. She asked about his work. “She singing in harmony yet?”

  Fred knew that she was asking about Kilauea’s record of having harmonic tremors before most eruptions. “Getting there. Quakes are coming in swarms, but they’re not really lined up in a row yet. She’s working on it, though. Getting hotter and readier by the second.”

  “Must have heard you were back from vacation.”

  “So you missed me, huh?” He showed Nicole a double row of perfect white teeth.

  “I died for you. Didn’t you get the funeral invitation?” She leaned to one side so that she could see around him. Frowning, she measured the real Volcano House against the one she had sketched. A little more shadow along the edge of the building . . . yes, that would do it.

  “You don’t look dead.” He glanced over the curves filling out her hiking clothes and all but licked his lips.

  “Miracle drugs. You survive, it’s a miracle.” She put her fist on his knee and pushed. Hard. “You’re gorgeous, but you aren’t a historic monument yet. Move it. You’re in my way.”

  “This better?” He crowded right against her knees, giving her a close-up view of his brief hiking shorts and muscular thighs.

  “Yuck. You ever think of shaving your legs?”

  Fred laughed and backed up, shaking his head. “You dancing at the club tonight?”

  She nodded.

  “When are you going to do a solo in my bed?”

  “Same as always—just as soon as you can dance or drum me right off the Kipuka Club’s stage.”

  He grumbled and said, “No fair. Even Bobby can’t do that, and he’s as strong as a bull.”

  “Takes more than strength.”

  “Yeah? Like what?”

  “Stamina. Finesse. Determination.” She looked up at Fred suddenly. “And red hair.”

  “I’ll dye it.”

  “A few pounds off wouldn’t hurt,” she agreed innocently.

  Fred groaned at the pun and gave up. “See you tonight, beautiful.”

  “Yeah, but I won’t see you.”

  “Why not?”

  “Spotlights blind me.”

  “Ever heard of Braille?” he asked with a sideways leer.

  “On your perfect body?” Dramatically she flung the back of her hand across her eyes as though she was about to faint. “Be still my beating heart.” She lowered her hand and changed the subject again. “Marcie wants to know if the hotshot pool for this month is closed.”

  “Marcie?”

  “The new haole from Washington State. Ph.D. Seismologist. She’s sure she can predict eruptions from the quake patterns better than anyone else.”

  “Marcie.” Frowning, Fred tried to place her. Every summer there was a flood of new people ranging from visiting VIPs to graduate-student gofers.

  “Blond,” Nicole said, shading in one edge of the building. “Cleavage from chin to navel. Green eyes that only women ever notice.”

  “Oh, that Marcie.” He smiled slowly. “So she wants to play, does she?”

  “I don’t know about that, but she does want to get some money into the hotshot pool.”

  “Thanks. I’ll check her out for tremors.”

  Shaking her head, Nicole watched Fred stalk off over the lava in search of more willing game. As soon as her glance fell on the side of the house again, she forgot about his relatively harmless lechery. It definitely needed more shading to catch the sense of age and weathering beneath the new paint. And over there, too, an echo of that shading on the rim itself . . .

  She lifted her pencil and worked swiftly, losing herself once again. The insistent cheeping of her watch alarm finally broke through her intense focus. She muttered a few words, sighed, and shut off the alarm. Then she noticed the fading light.

  “Damn! I set it for three-thirty, not five-thirty. Didn’t I?”

  The only answer was the position of the sun in the sky. Five-thirty. No doubt about it.

  If she made the next bus, she would have just enough time to get home, shower, and race to the Kipuka Club before her advanced students finished their Friday-night act.

  On second thought, forget the shower.

  She leaped to her feet and started running across the volcano floor.

  5

  Nicole finally managed to grab a shower in the washroom behind the Kipuka Club’s stage. Still wet, she wrapped her costume into place and started pulling at hairpins and the scrunchies that kept her braids from unraveling. Impatiently she brushed her hair until it swirled around her like a warm cape.

  Too warm.

  If she hadn’t liked the scent and feel of her hair sliding over her skin, she would have cut off the silky mass a long time ago. But there was something delicious about the texture and weight of her hair and the way it echoed every movement of her dance.

  But why couldn’t it have been black or brown or blond? she asked herself silently.

  Because it’s red came the swift reply—the words that her mother had used every time her tall, skinny daughter complained about her bright mop of hair.

  Cocking her head, Nicole listened to the faint sounds coming from the stage despite the soundproofing. The students were chanting back and forth, ending their act with a dance of their own creation, a hip-twitching mixture of Tahitian and nightclub dance moves that evolved into a dreamy version of Hawaii’s majestic hula.

  She had just enough time to finish dressing. She hurried to a small changing room backstage and pulled traditional wrist and ankle decorations from a drawer. Just as she bent over to pull on her softly clashing shell anklets, the drums began a rhythmic pulsing.

  She froze, knowing instantly that Bobby wasn’t the drummer. This drummer was different. Cleaner. Quicker. More intense.

  Bobby was very good.

  This drummer was extraordinary.

  Anticipation of her own coming dance bloomed in Nicole as she pulled a ginger-flower lei from
the refrigerator. The cool petals made a wonderful contrast to the heat of her body. The flowers heightened the golden tone of her skin and deepened the fiery lights in her hair.

  The thick tassels of dried grass she carried in each hand repeated the sunny color of the flowers splashed on her lavalava and halter. A cross between a long, soft brush and a small pom-pom with a handle, the grass tassels rustled and snapped with each motion of her wrists, emphasizing and enhancing the rhythms of the dance.

  Soundlessly she stepped out, closed the door behind her, and went to stand behind the rear curtain of the stage. There she moved to the slow, stately rhythms of the hula, warming her body for the strenuous Tahitian dance to come.

  Instead of accompanying the dancers with a chant, Bobby was playing Bolivian panpipes, an instrument made by natives of the high Andes Mountains of South America. The pure, husky sounds of the pipes tugged at something deep within Nicole.

  Bobby played two pipes at once, each pipe containing half a scale. Harmony was possible. Barely. To get it, he had to move his mouth very quickly and blow in short, sharp spurts. The result was a ghostly staccato that evoked spirits chanting to one another across bottomless mountain chasms.

  Shivers of pleasure coursed over Nicole’s skin as the primal drums and husky pipes called urgently to the dancers. The possibilities of the dance raced through her, making her want to sweep aside the curtain and begin the sensuous movements.

  Applause erupted as the stage vanished into darkness. While she stepped onto the stage through a slit in the curtains, the less experienced dancers streamed by her, leaving the advanced students on the stage. The dancers’ quick comments told her that they had been as excited by the new drummer as she was.

  Impatiently she looked toward the drums, but there wasn’t enough light for her to make out more than the silhouette of a broad-shouldered, powerful man whose short hair was even darker than the nearly black stage. He could have been haole or Hawaiian, old or young or anything in between.