Seized

by Lynne Cantwell

  “I should be charging you for all this phone usage,” Shannon said with a smirk. “Fifty cents a call, right here in the ol’ kitty.” She cupped her palm and held it out to me.

  I smirked right back. “Now you know why I bought you coffee.”

  We had a quick dinner at a Mexican place near Shannon’s office and set up our game plan for the next day. Charlie was meeting us at Shannon’s at 10:00 a.m., which would give us more than enough time to go over everything with him and get downtown by noon.

  Afterward, we stood outside Shannon’s office to say our goodbyes. “Do you guys want to stay in town overnight?” I asked. “Shannon’s got room at her place, and so do I. Or I could get you a hotel,” I amended hastily.

  “Thanks for the offer, but I’ll pass,” Looks Far said. “I’m an old man. I like to sleep in my own bed. And it’s not a bad drive.” He looked at his grandson. “Coming?”

  Joseph said to me, his voice low, “Will you be okay tonight?”

  “Of course I’ll be okay,” I said. “Why wouldn’t I be okay?”

  “I’ll stay with you, if it would make you feel better.”

  “It has nothing to do with that. I just thought I’d make the offer, in case your grandfather didn’t want to make the drive twice in two days.”

  He searched my face. Amber glimmered in the depths of his blue eyes. “I’ll stay.”

  “No! Joseph, this is ridiculous. I don’t need you to protect me.” I almost pushed him, but stopped myself in time. “Your grandfather needs you worse than I do.”

  “No, he doesn’t,” he said, his gaze never leaving mine. “There aren’t any gods after him.” He left the inescapable conclusion unsaid. What he did say was, “Don’t worry, I’ll sleep on the couch.”

  I opened my mouth. Then I closed it. Then I said, “That’s not what I was implying, and you know it.” I wasn’t exactly sure what I meant by that, but I forged on anyway. “Let’s be honest here, bucko. You’re the one who will feel better if you stay with me tonight.”

  Amber flared in his eyes. “Guilty as charged, counselor.”

  I sighed. “Well, then. Short of a push, I guess I’m stuck with you.”

  He gave me a canine grin. “Glad you see it my way.” He called to Looks Far, “Go on, Grandfather. I’m staying in town tonight.”

  “Be careful, Joseph,” the old man said.

  “I am always careful,” Joseph replied with some exasperation. It sounded like an old battle between them.

  I threw up my hands and walked toward the Cube. “See you tomorrow, everyone.”

  Joseph was silent on the ride to my place. While one part of my brain was responding to the traffic, another part was busily trying to think of something to say. Finally I said, “How did you call me yesterday?”

  He turned toward me. “On my cell phone.”

  “Right,” I said, “but every time I’ve been at your grandfather’s place, I haven’t been able to get a signal. What did you do, fly out to the county road?”

  He grinned mischievously. Then he sighed and said, “No, I can’t do that to you. You deserve honesty. If you hike around the side of the mountain for a little ways, there’s a spot where you can pick up a signal.”

  “Good to know,” I said.

  The conversation lapsed again.

  I couldn’t stand it. I broke the silence once more. “So how does an owl carry a cell phone? Or a coyote, for that matter?”

  “Trade secret,” he said mysteriously. “And before you ask, I also can’t tell you how I was able to get dressed so fast at Civic Center Park.”

  “Damn,” I said, with real regret, and he laughed.

  “Maybe I’ll tell you sometime,” he said.

  I pulled into the parking garage of my apartment building and swerved neatly into my spot. “Nice maneuver,” he said.

  “I’ve had lots of practice. Let’s go up.” I locked the car, then unlocked it again to get my box of stuff from the back. Joseph took it from my hands, his fingers brushing mine, and I jumped. I realized belatedly that the next thing to a wild animal would be sleeping on my sofa that night. To stop my brain from running away with that train of thought, I said, “I wonder if it would have worked.”

  “Hmm?” The elevator arrived. I pushed the appropriate floor and the doors slid shut. “You wonder if what would have worked?” he prodded.

  “I almost pushed you to go with Looks Far,” I said. “I wonder if you would have done it.”

  “Nope,” he said.

  “You’re awfully sure about that.”

  He shifted his grip on the box. “I have a theory about your gift.”

  The doors opened. “Let’s hear it,” I said as we walked to my door. The key slid in easily. I flipped on the light and gestured to the kitchen island. He pushed the door shut with his shoulder and put the box where I’d indicated.

  “I think,” he said, as we removed our coats and I hung them in the closet just inside the door, “your gift only works on someone who’s predisposed to do what you want them to do.”

  I thought about that. “Could be,” I said. “The driver who jumped out into traffic – who knows how long he or she was sitting there before I pulled up behind them? And Brock certainly had an incentive for proposing to me.”

  “Shannon’s right, you know. I wouldn’t blame Odin for all of it,” Joseph said. “You’re an attractive woman, Naomi.”

  “Are you flirting with me?” I asked teasingly.

  “I thought I was stating the obvious,” he replied.

  My face grew warm. I turned toward the kitchen so he couldn’t see the blush I knew was starting. “Would you like some coffee? Tea?”

  “No thanks,” he said.

  “Ovaltine?” I asked, with a fake German accent, drawing out the “O”.

  “Nothing! Thank you!” he responded forcefully, and we shared a laugh. “‘Young Frankenstein’ is one of my favorite movies,” he said.

  “It’s one of mine, too. Um.” I looked vaguely toward the living room. “Will you be okay? There are some pillows and an afghan….”

  “I’ll be fine,” he said, but he didn’t sound fine.

  “Okay, then,” I said, turning toward my room.

  “Shit,” I heard him mutter, and then he spun me around. His eyes were amber, and glowing, the way they had been in the sweat lodge as I came out of my trance. His mouth descended on mine, forcefully at first – then, as I responded, almost wonderingly.

  I too was surprised at my response. Joseph tapped a well of emotion in me that I’d never known existed. It was as if his kiss opened a door, and someone I didn’t know rushed out to greet him.

  He crushed me to him, and I clung as if my life depended on it. “Make no mistake,” he growled in my ear. “If your breakup weren’t so recent, there is no way I would let a wall separate us tonight.” Then he let me go. “Goodnight, Naomi.” He crossed to my sofa in two steps and flung himself onto it, his face pressed into the back cushions.

  “Goodnight, Joseph,” I whispered.

  I went into my room, closed the door, and leaned back against it. I was trembling again. Way, way too much was happening to me in too short a time. I wondered whether I would ever be able to find my way back out of the quagmire I was in now.

  Or whether I would ever want to.

  In my dreams that night, I relived Joseph’s embrace over and over again. Each time, it seemed, a dark-haired presence in a white buckskin dress hung over us, laughing with delight.

  Chapter 10

  I awoke bleary-eyed but fully cognizant of my situation. To wit: I had no job; I had no boyfriend; the head of the Norse pantheon was apparently after me; and a Native American goddess had tapped me to save the world, or humanity, or at least bring to heel my own God, to whom I still paid lip service, at least. And I hadn’t had any time to find my father. But more importantly, there was a coyote-human hybrid in my living room who wanted to sleep with me.

  “I tell you what,” I said sarcast
ically as I swung my legs out of bed, “life just doesn’t get any better than this.”

  Normally I would start the coffee and then shower and get dressed, but it seemed like a good idea today to get dressed before leaving my bedroom. A few minutes later I emerged, fully clothed, to the smell of coffee brewing and the sight of an equally bleary-eyed Joseph at my breakfast bar.

  He took one look at me and said, “Yeah. Me neither.”

  I put my hand on his shoulder and snatched it away. His arm reached around my waist, jumped back. Then he said, “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” and gave me a plain old hug. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t know what got into me last night.”

  “It’s okay,” I said. “I’m sorry, too. It wasn’t one of my best nights, either.” I inhaled without thinking, and got a whiff of unwashed male.

  “Bathroom’s in there?” he asked, pointing through the bedroom door.

  “Yeah. Sorry. I sort of locked you out, didn’t I?”

  “It’s okay.” He got up and headed through the doorway. I heard the bathroom door shut. Then the shower came on.

  “Well,” I said to the coffee maker, “that was awkward. I can’t wait to find out what the rest of the day has in store.”

  Joseph called his grandfather on our way over to Shannon’s office (“He’s got a landline for the business,” he said offhandedly) and asked the old man to bring him a clean shirt. After he rang off, I said, “You know, you guys don’t have to come with us downtown if you don’t want to.”

  “What, and break up the team?” he grinned. “Anyway, I wouldn’t miss this duel between Brock and Charlie for the world.”

  I soon found out what he meant. Charlie Frank was already at Shannon’s when we arrived. His face was classically Native – brown-skinned, hawk-nosed, high cheekboned – but his hair was cut short and styled, and he wore a well-cut, charcoal gray business suit with a sober, navy blue tie.

  He grinned when he saw me, and stuck out his hand. “You must be Naomi.”

  “And you must be Charlie.” We shook. “Where’d you go to law school?”

  “CU-Boulder, class of ‘98. You?”

  “DU, class of ‘02. Do you have your own practice?”

  He shrugged. “I dabble here and there.” He handed me his card.

  “I wish I had one to give you,” I said, “but I’ve just left my most recent firm.”

  “I heard,” he said. “Let me know if you need advice on setting up your own shop. There are risks to working for yourself, but the rewards are worth it. At least in my case, they have been.” He flashed me another grin.

  We got down to business as soon as Looks Far arrived. While Joseph excused himself to change clothes, I said to Charlie, “I don’t know much about trust law, and I certainly don’t know if the rules change when a tribe is involved.”

  “In this particular case,” Charlie said, “we are working solely under white man’s law. As the trust administrator, I am empowered to speak for the tribal council. However, I can’t sign a sales contract. If Durant offers one, I would have to take it back to the council for their approval.”

  “And they won’t be inclined to agree,” Joseph said, fixing his shirt collar as he came back into the room. “They could table Durant’s offer indefinitely.”

  “That’s right,” Charlie said. “As you have all surmised, the tribe would not agree to sell this particular piece of property at any price. The white man has taken too much from us over the years. We lost these sacred lands once. We will not lose them again.”

  “Do you think a condemnation proceeding would succeed?” I asked. “From the documents I happened to see on Brock’s desk, I believe that’s going to be their next plan of attack.”

  “It’s unlikely to go anywhere,” Charlie said, looking around the room. “In some parts of the state, maybe. But we’re talking about Boulder County. I hardly think the People’s Republic of Boulder is going to agree to revoke a Native American tribe’s deed to sacred land.” He turned to me. “Now I have a question for you.”

  “Shoot.”

  “I’ve been turning this over all the way here, and I just can’t figure out why they’re pushing this so hard when they haven’t laid the groundwork. They would have to get state legislative approval to put a casino in Boulder County; right now, the only places in Colorado where casinos are legal are in Black Hawk, Cripple Creek and Central City, and on the reservations near Four Corners.”

  “I forgot about that,” I said, mentally kicking myself. “I guess I haven’t been focused on the big picture.”

  “You’ve had a lot going on,” Shannon said in my defense.

  “Here’s another thing,” Charlie went on. “The economy is recovering, but it’s still not in great shape. Sure, the project will generate jobs, which will generate tax revenues for the county. But who’s got the money to buy a vacation condo these days?”

  “Good point,” said Shannon.

  “I thought so,” Charlie said, giving her a quick smile. “I just can’t figure out their angle. It’s as if Durant has a personal vendetta against you, Looks Far.”

  I shook my head. “That can’t be it. He thought Looks Far was you. He called him by your last name the other day, and claimed I was lying about his real name.”

  Charlie looked thoughtful. “I’ve never heard of the guy.”

  “Maybe he’s got something against Indians in general,” Joseph offered.

  “Maybe he’s just a crankypants who wants what he wants, when he wants it,” Shannon said.

  “Shannon, can I use your computer for a second? I meant to look something up last night at home and forgot,” I said. I glanced at Joseph involuntarily; he appeared to be busy studying the marquetry pattern on the top of Shannon’s coffee table.

  “Sure,” she said.

  “Let me know what you find out,” Charlie said, and excused himself to go to the restroom.

  “Actually,” I muttered, typing “Durant Development” into the browser bar, “I should have done this days ago. Here we go.” I waited for the page to load, then poked around for investor information. “Durant Development, headquartered in Texas, is a subsidiary of H&M Hrafn International….” I stumbled over the pronunciation of “Hrafn,” then tried it a couple of different ways – with and without an aspirated “h”, with a short “a”, with a long “a”.

  It was the long “a” that got Joseph’s attention. “Did you just say ‘raven’?”

  I eyed the computer screen doubtfully. “Maybe.” I pasted the word into the browser bar and hit “enter.” “You’re right, I did. ‘Hrafn’ is Old Norse for raven.”

  “And Huginn and Muginn,” Shannon said, “are the names of Odin’s ravens.”

  I turned away from the computer surveyed the room, wide-eyed. “You mean Odin owns this corporation?”

  “Or someone he’s recruited,” Shannon said. “Maybe the same way he recruited Brock.”

  “But I still don’t get why he’s involved in this at all,” I said, frustrated.

  Joseph’s grin was widening. “I don’t know, either,” he said, “but I know exactly how to get them to leave Grandfather alone.”

  “Let’s hear it,” I said, as Charlie came back into the room.

  Joseph shook his head. “Later. After the meeting downtown.”

  I sighed. What’s one more mystery? Then I glanced at the clock on Shannon’s computer and said, “We’d better get going if we want to be on time.”

  “I’m going to stay behind,” Joseph said. “You guys will have to fill me in.”

  I stared at him. “I thought you couldn’t wait to see the Charlie-Brock smackdown.”

  “I couldn’t, and I’m sorry I’m going to have to miss it. But there are some things I have to do.”

  I must have been exuding frustration, because Shannon stepped in. “Joseph is our man of mystery,” she said lightly. “Who’s driving?”

  I was the last out of the door. “Hold the fort,” I tossed over my shoulder at
Joseph, trying to keep the sarcasm from my voice.

  “Look at me,” he commanded. Unwillingly, I turned around.

  He closed the distance between us with two strides, and lowered his voice. “I didn’t want to say anything in front of Charlie,” he said, “because it’s going to involve skinwalking. I told you how the tribe feels about it.”

  I dropped my eyes. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I should have trusted you.”

  “Trust is earned,” he said. “And so far I haven’t given you much reason to trust me. But I am trying to start now.” He glanced toward the others, then back at me. “Coyote and Raven go way back. I don’t know much about the Norse gods, but I’ve got to assume that Odin’s pet ravens are just as adept at trickery as my – as Coyote’s fellow Trickster god,” he amended. “So I am pretty sure I know how to get at this guy. But I’m going to need your help. Okay?”

  “Sure,” I said. “Whatever you need.”

  He sighed. “It’s killing me to let you go without me. If Durant comes at you again….”

  “Don’t worry,” I said brightly. “The firm has a bouncer.”

  He looked dubious, but he let me go.

  I wasn’t lying, exactly. There’s an elderly security guard who sits at a desk in the lobby where guests have to sign in. It felt odd to have to sign the guest book; it was the first time I’d had to do it since I’d interviewed at the firm ten years before.

  Up we went in the elevator. I led the way to Perry’s conference room, feeling more confident because, even without Joseph, our entourage outnumbered the other side’s.

  Perry, Brock, and Leo were already waiting for us. Lunch was laid out on the sideboard: the ever-present sandwiches, potato chips, and cookies from the restaurant across the street. I remembered declaring to someone two weeks before that if I had to eat one more turkey sandwich from that place, I’d have to kill someone. Funny how things change. Looking at the spread today, I felt almost nostalgic.

  Hands were shaken all around, and we served ourselves lunch. That’s when I realized I really would have to kill someone if I had the turkey again. I opted for ham on rye and joined in the lunch conversation, which consisted of an exchange of general pleasantries on the surface, and a covert sizing up of the other side.