by JoAnn Ross
It was raining when Tara finally pulled into the driveway of her grandmother's home. Storms in Arizona's high country could be wild, and this one was no exception. Lightning flashed and thunder boomed like cannon fire. Wind wailed like the cries of lost souls in the treetops and drove the rain across the windshield of her sensible sedan with a force that had rendered visibility next to impossible as she'd driven the last thirty miles up the narrow, curving road to Whiskey River.
Then suddenly, a jagged bolt of lightning lit up the sky in a blinding white sulfurous flash, illuminating the house.
It hadn't changed. Tara didn't know why she thought it might have. Beneath the cloud white gingerbread trim, the fish-scale siding was still sky blue and the patterned windows flanking the arched front door were the same colored glass that Tara remembered gleaming like a princess's jewels when the morning sunlight streamed through them.
The copper roof of the tower had shone briefly in the bright light like a welcoming beacon and reminded her of summer tea parties she'd hosted for her grandmother and her dolls in that octagon-shaped room overlooking the garden.
This was the home where Brigid had given birth to her daughter, Lina, who, not wanting to break the chain of Delaney women, had kept her maiden name when she'd married, handing it down to her own daughter.
This was also the house where Brigid had soothed her granddaughter's broken heart after what Tara would always call the "Richard debacle." And proving that life was indeed made up of concentric circles, her grandmother had died here, as well. Of an accident, Tara thought firmly.
"Well, Grandy," she murmured as she looped her hands over the steering wheel and gazed at the house that was once again shrouded in rain and darkness, "you got your wish. I'm here. Although I'll be damned if I know why."
She took the key her grandmother's attorney had sent her out of her purse, then retrieved her overnight bag from the back seat. The larger bags in the trunk could wait until tomorrow.
She considered waiting a bit longer in hopes that the rain would at least slow down. But a glance up into a sky draped in black clouds assured her that the storm had stalled directly over Brigid's home.
"Nice welcome, Grandy. The least you could have done was use a few of your powers to turn off the waterworks."
She counted to three, then opened the car door and, holding her bag against her chest, made a dash for the front porch, which took longer than planned because she had to stop and unlatch the white picket gate.
By the time she reached the wide porch, she was drenched, and shivering. She'd forgotten how cold it could get in the mountains.
Beneath a winged griffin door knocker that had frightened Tara when she was a child was a shiny new doorknob. Wondering what had happened to the old hammered-brass handle she remembered having polished on more than one occasion, she managed to insert the key into the lock and was vastly relieved when it fit.
Just as she turned the knob, a clap of thunder shook the porch. An instant later she was blinded by a flash of brilliant white light. The acrid smell of sulfur assaulted her nostrils and a black veil drifted across her eyes.
Then Tara crumbled to the wooden floor beneath her feet.
Gavin, who had dozed off in a large wing chair positioned to give him a good view of the front windows, was jolted awake by the crack of thunder and almost simultaneous bolt of lightning. On some subconscious level, he'd been aware of a loud thud just after the lightning flash that had obviously struck very close to the house.
"All right!" It was what he'd been waiting for, an opportunity to catch the vandals in the act. He ran into the foyer and yanked open the ornately carved front door.
Instead of the teenage boys he'd thought he would find, Gavin found himself staring down at a seemingly lifeless form lying at his feet.
When another flash of lightning—thankfully more distant this time—lit up the sky, he stared in disbelief at a woman who could have stepped right out of that long-ago photograph of Brigid Delaney.
3
Tara had no idea how long she'd been unconscious. One minute she was standing on the familiar front porch fretting about a missing door handle, the next thing she knew she was in some man's arms, being carried into the darkened house. The house where her mother believed Brigid had been murdered!
"Put me down!" she demanded as she desperately tried to remember the self-defense training class she'd taken after nearly being mugged as she left her San Francisco office late one night.
"And have you swooning at my feet again?" Although the woman resembled a young Brigid Delaney, Gavin realized she had to be the granddaughter, the hotshot accounting whiz Brigid had boasted about.
"I didn't swoon." Tara glared up at him, frustrated when the deep shadows kept her from seeing his face. "I never swoon."
"Could've fooled me." Although it was not easy, maneuvering across the crowded room in the dark with a wiggling, angry woman in his arms, he managed to make his way to the red brocade chaise.
"If you're planning on raping me," Tara said between gritted teeth as she landed on the antique fainting couch with a bounce, "you should know that I've studied karate."
"Good for you." Gavin reached into the drawer of the papier-mâché table and pulled out the box of matches he knew Brigid kept there. Storms were a routine part of living in this remote corner of the state, making power outages commonplace. "Perhaps, after we get to know each other better, you can entertain me by breaking bricks with your bare hands."
The match flared as he struck it on the roughened side of the box, casting his face in an orange glow that made him look almost demonic. Her head still reeling, Tara tried to judge her chances for escape as he touched the match to the fat beeswax candle on the table.
"Who are you? And what are you doing in my grandmother's house?"
"I'm Gavin Thomas. The guy who sent you three separate letters wanting to know what the hell you wanted me to do with this place."
Sensing what they'd been about, and receiving disturbing vibrations from the envelopes that bore the bold masculine script, she had burned the letters without opening them.
"I don't recall receiving any letters." She lifted her chin and looked him right in the eye. "Obviously, the postman misdelivered them."
"Or you mistook them for junk mail and tossed them out," he said, deciding not to call her on the obvious lie. At least not yet.
"I suppose that's a possibility." Refusing to let him get the upper hand, she did not avert her gaze. Not even when his lips twitched and a wicked, knowing look came into his eyes. "If I had gotten the letters, what would they have said?"
"That I'd promised Brigid I'd look after the place until you arrived to take it off my hands. The last one mentioned, as politely as I could think to put it, that although I intended to do my best to live up to my word, I wasn't prepared to take on a lifetime commitment."
"Because you're not a man who enjoys commitment." It was not a question.
"You called that one right." The last time he'd allowed himself to get seriously involved with a woman, he'd ended up in prison. Gavin was not eager to repeat either experience.
"Yet my grandmother still entrusted you with her house."
He shrugged his shoulders. "I tried to tell her I wasn't the stick-around type. She didn't believe me."
"My grandmother was infamous for her ability to only see what she wanted to see." Tara decided, for discretion's sake, not to mention that Brigid's intuitive sense of people was very seldom off the mark. "You haven't answered my second question," she reminded him. "What are you doing here in the middle of the night?"
"I was sleeping. Until you woke me up by collapsing on the porch."
Tara rubbed her temple where a headache was pounding. "I don't understand what happened."
"From the crack that woke me up, and the sulfur smell when I opened the door, I'd say lightning struck close by. Probably one of the trees. I'll check in the morning. I'd guess that the force knocked you down." Leaning
down, he brushed away the auburn hair that had fallen over her forehead and examined a rapidly growing lump.
When his fingertips stroked her skin with a slow touch that was meant to be soothing but in reality was anything but, Tara jerked her head away. "I suppose I should count myself lucky I wasn't hit myself."
"Definitely."
The air around them grew thick with the scents of rosemary and yarrow emanating from the burning candle. Rosemary, Tara remembered, was used to weave a spell of remembrance, and love. As for the yarrow, Brigid had told her that if you put a sachet of it beneath your pillow, you would dream of your true love.
"You should probably get out of those wet clothes," Gavin said when Tara began to shiver. "Before you catch cold."
She was wearing a blouse the color of a buttermilk biscuit tucked into a pair of snug jeans.
"Good try, Mr. Thomas. But I'm not that naive." Nor foolhardy.
"The name's Gavin. And believe me, sweetheart, I was only trying to keep you from catching cold."
The sparring helped. Helped clear her head and calm her nerves. "Aren't you considerate?"
"That's me," he agreed with equal sarcasm. "Mr. Consideration."
She should have been irritated. Instead, dammit, she was undeniably interested. "Well."
She took a deep breath, then wished she hadn't as she watched his steady gaze slip from her face to her breasts. She glanced down and realized the tailored silk blouse that appeared so staid when worn with her oat-meal-hued suit in the office had suddenly become far too revealing for comfort.
The material was clinging to her breasts like a second skin and her nipples had pebbled—from the cold, she assured herself—and were pressing against the wet silk in a way guaranteed to instill dangerous thoughts in just about any man.
"On second thought, I think I will change my clothes."
"Good idea." His unenthusiastic tone said otherwise. Although he truly didn't want to be responsible for her catching pneumonia, Gavin found himself more than a little reluctant to surrender the view. When his gaze returned to her face and he viewed her poisonous glare, he knew she'd been reading his thoughts.
Since he was not accustomed to apologizing for being either human or male, he gave her wet shoulder a fraternal pat.
"Your overnight bag is still on the porch. I'll go get it."
He was back in a moment.
She'd managed, during that brief interlude, to regain a bit of composure. And caution. "If you don't mind, Mr. Thomas, I'd like to see some identification."
"I was wondering when you were going to think of that." He reached into his back pocket, pulled out his billfold and handed it over. "You'll find an Arizona driver's license, American Express card, a couple of Visas and a Mogollon County library card. That should convince you I'm who I say I am."
She glanced through the plastic-encased cards and lingered momentarily over one, thinking that it was unfair for any mere mortal to look so sexy in a driver's license photo. His dark hair, swept back from his forehead, was disgustingly thick, his hooded eyes were so darkly brown as to be almost black and his jaw could have been chiseled from granite. She decided that the cleft in that square chin was definitely overkill.
"You seem to be who you say you are," she agreed. "But that still doesn't mean I can trust you."
"Your grandmother entrusted her house to me," he said pointedly. "And there's a letter waiting for you on the upstairs dresser that will undoubtedly vouch for me, as well."
"She left a letter? For me?"
"It's got your name on the envelope."
"Why didn't you send it to me?"
"Because I had my own letter instructing me to leave it for you to read when you arrived. Besides," he pointed out, "it's a good thing I didn't forward it, since all my other letters appear to have gotten lost."
Once again his tone told her that he knew she'd been lying. She would have been uncomfortable about that had her mind not latched on to another thought.
"Don't you think that's strange? Her death was so sudden, but she'd already written letters to both of us to be read after her death?"
"I did in the beginning. But then I decided she was just one of those people who likes to plan ahead. I've heard of people leaving instructions with their lawyers. Or letters in safe-deposit boxes."
"I suppose that makes sense," Tara allowed. "Since you were included, you must have been close to her."
He shrugged. "She was lonely." His tone was edged with a hint of censure she tried to ignore. "She didn't have any family in Whiskey River, and I was a stranger here, as well. So, I guess you could say we kind of adopted each other."
"Did she happen to mention to you what she did for a living?" Tara's voice held an unmistakable challenge.
"You're not talking about her mail-order herbal business."
She folded her arms across her chest and met his gaze with a long, level look of her own. "No, I'm not."
"She told me she was a witch. Since the fantasy seemed harmless enough, I didn't let it bother me."
"How open-minded of you." She reached out and took the gray overnight case from his hand. "And for the record, Mr. Thomas," she said as she headed toward the doorway and the stairs that led to her grandmother's bedroom, "it wasn't any crazy old lady's fantasy. My grandmother was a genuine, card-carrying, crystal-gazing, spell-casting, druidic witch."
That said, she swept from the room, leaving Gavin to wonder if lunacy ran through the genes of all the Delaney women. Or just the gorgeous ones.
Her grandmother's bedroom was just as she remembered it. Cabbage flowers bloomed on the yellowed ivory wallpaper and the antique sleigh bed was covered by a quilt that had been in the family for generations. Celtic animals and geometric patterns echoed the stone carvings and metalwork of that ancient time.
She found the letter on the dresser, just as the annoying man downstairs had told her. The handwriting was a bit more spidery than she remembered, but there was no doubt that it was her grandmother's. And even if she hadn't recognized the delicate script, the energy emanating from the ivory envelope was unmistakable.
The paper was handmade, speckled with dried flowers and herbs from the garden, and carried the familiar lavender scent that Tara had always associated with Brigid. She inhaled the evocative fragrance and sighed.
"I'm sorry, Grandy," she said softly. "I should have been here for you. In the end." Instead, she'd continually put off her grandmother's requests that she visit, leaving a lonely old woman to befriend the man down-stairs. A man who was not only a stranger, but an obvious disbeliever, as well.
Feeling horribly guilty, Tara sat down on the thick feather mattress and began to read.
Dearest Tara,
If you're reading this, it means you've overcome your reluctance to return to your roots, at least temporarily. And although I have always understood your need to follow your own spiritual path, it saddens me that past circumstances have caused you to view the gifts you've inherited as a curse, rather than a blessing.
I realize how difficult this journey has been for you, darling Tara. And just as I cannot erase the pain you've suffered, neither can I promise instant miracles.
But what I do promise is this—if you stay beneath this roof for one cycle of the moon, your life will inexorably change. At the end of this time you'll be able to put the past behind you and move on.
You've already made the first step, Tara. Now I'm asking you to trust in your grandmother, who loves you, one last time. I promise you will not be disappointed. Blessed be.
The traditional words of farewell blurred through the mist of tears gathering in Tara's eyes. She had to blink to clear her vision in order to read the PS.
I know Gavin Thomas is not the type of man you're accustomed to. But since his arrival in Whiskey River, he's come to mean a great deal to me. In fact, I consider him almost like family. It would please me very much if you could open your heart to him, if only as a friend. His own road has not been an easy one.
I believe you may find you both have much in common.
"Dammit, Grandy," Tara muttered, "this really is dirty pool. Even for you."
She glared up at a needlepoint-framed photo of her grandmother and was struck by a resemblance she'd never before noticed. Except for the fact that she had a time-saving, no-fuss haircut, she could have been looking in a mirror.
"I cannot believe that you're asking me to give up my life in San Francisco to move in here for a month, befriend an obvious nonbeliever, come to grips with my past and, oh, yes—you're not fooling me for a minute here—in my spare time I'm supposed to fall in love with your precious Mr. Thomas, which isn't going to happen because I'd rather kiss a toad."
As if possessing an energy all its own, the lie reverberated around the room until she could practically feel it bouncing off all the flowered walls. Tara closed her eyes and shook her head. It was impossible. She simply couldn't do it. Whiskey River held too many painful memories.
The thing to do was to spend the night here, since the idea of driving back down that twisting mountain road in the dark was less than appealing. By tomorrow morning, the storm would have passed and she could go to Kauai as originally planned, where she would spend the rest of the days she'd allotted for her vacation basking in the sun before returning to her uncomplicated life.
As impossible as others might find it, Tara could actually hear her grandmother's voice challenging that last thought.
"All right. So, in this case, uncomplicated may translate to boring," she allowed. "But it's what I like."
It was also, she admitted as she changed into dry clothes, what she needed. A boring, predictable, normal life.
She left the bedroom on her usual brisk, efficient stride determined to send Mr. Gavin Thomas back to wherever it was he'd come from.
