by Aimée Thurlo
“There they are, two of them. They’re coming up on the hogan.”
“Do you recognize either one?”
“I can’t make out their faces from this distance, but they’ve stopped in front of the hogan.” Travis muttered a curse. “One of them must have spotted my trap. They’re not going inside.”
“Then we’d better get going again, fast,” Fox said, fear giving her added energy.
“We’ll make it, Fox,” he reassured quickly. “They’ll never get near enough to touch you.”
“All I want you to do is keep them at bay until I find the answers I need. After that, the rules are going to change. I know I have to confront my enemies sooner or later. But I want to pick the time and place.”
“Do you intend on letting me in on this fight?” he asked sarcastically.
Fox said nothing and avoided his gaze. She still wanted to protect Travis if she could. Although she doubted that he’d ever agree to let her face her enemies on her own, she wouldn’t pass up any chance to do just that, once she had some leverage against them.
She cast a furtive look at Travis and, seeing his expression, decided that some things were better left unsaid.
He glared at her as if reading her mind and muttered a vicious oath. “That settles it. I’m not letting you out of my sight from now on.”
Chapter Nine
Travis knew she’d ditch him if she got the chance. Damnation, no other woman had ever seen him as someone who needed protection. That was what they looked to him for.
Still muttering to himself, Travis stopped and took one final look behind them. It had taken special training for the men tracking them to spot the wire that would have brought half the roof crashing down on them. His gut instinct now told him that McNeely was involved. They’d received identical training. McNeely would know most of the tricks Travis had up his sleeve.
Travis glanced over at Fox. He’d set a brisk pace and she’d stayed right with him. He couldn’t help but admire that fighting spirit of hers, though, at times, he sure wished it didn’t make her so hard to handle.
“You okay? You’ve been giving me the strangest looks,” she said, interrupting his thoughts.
“I was thinking that for the girl who avoided high-school P.E. for three years, you’ve done really well for yourself out here.”
“Don’t kid yourself. I hate this. I thrive in houses with air-conditioning and big fireplaces—not the great outdoors.”
“You know, it’s time we started taking advantage of your skills. You’ve always been great in math and science, so next time we need to set a trap, I think you should design it.”
“You think he recognized your training and style?”
She’d read his mind again, he realized with irritation. “Yeah.”
“The tables will turn in our favor soon,” she said with confidence. “I know it. Once we get transportation, it won’t be a matter of tracking us anymore. They’ll have to second-guess us to keep up.”
“True, but remember they already have at least some of the answers we’re searching for. That’ll give them a definite advantage because they know where we’ll eventually have to go to look. And, if McNeely and his cousin joined up with them—as I suspect they have—they’ve added two more to their ranks. They can still pair up and look for us in two places at the same time.”
“Right now, all I’m worried about are the two after us,” she noted softly.
They walked the next few miles in silence. Travis had chosen a route over rough terrain, leaving false trails and using every trick he knew to misdirect the men pursuing them.
Finally Travis stopped and surveyed the terrain behind them. “We can slow down our pace again,” he said. “I think we’ve lost them for a while.”
Gray clouds had been building for some time, and suddenly a loud clap of thunder shook the ground. “Great. Just what we needed,” she muttered. “It looks like we’re in for a major downpour. The New Mexican monsoon season is finally here,” she added, using the popular term for the late-summer desert rainy season. “I don’t think we’ll be safe in the arroyos for a while. We could get caught in a flash flood before we see it coming.”
Travis could see her cringe every time lightning flashed across the sky, but she continued to match his pace even after the wind arrived and rain started coming down in thick sheets. The big drops were amazingly cold against his skin. “I remember how you hated thunder when you were a kid,” he said. “You’d hide in your room and turn up the radio as loud as you could.”
“I’m not a kid anymore, but I still hate storms,” she admitted.
Fox’s honesty was typical of her. He wanted to say something to comfort her, but he’d never been very good with words. He took her hand instead and, to his surprise, she didn’t pull away as they continued to struggle against the deluge.
As the air flashed with light, immediately followed by explosive thunder, he felt Fox shudder. He tightened his hold on her hand. She needed him now. Nothing was as important as that.
“You know the scientific explanation for lightning and thunder as well as you know the back of your hand. What about it scares you so much?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know. It’s not just the knowledge that New Mexico has the highest percentage of lightning strikes. Maybe it goes back to when I was very young. The noise just makes me feel like hiding. I can’t explain it any better than that.”
Her vulnerability touched him in a way nothing ever had. As she looked up at him, the need to protect her overruled everything else. He looked around for shelter, but there were no rainproof places within sight.
“There,” she said, pointing ahead. “Look at the three boulders leaning against the side of the hill. They make a primitive lean-to of sorts. It’s not much of a shelter, but it’ll do.”
The ground was getting so soft and muddy that their shoes were becoming packed with the sticky stuff. He could see that each step was becoming harder and harder for her, with the difficulty of traction and the extra weight building up on her feet. She was exhausted. “I’ve got to tell you, Fox, that’s not a good tactical position,” he said reluctantly. “If they pass by here, it’s the first place they’ll look. We really should keep going, if you can manage it.”
“Travis, please. Just for a few minutes.”
Her soft voice cut right through him. He could no more have denied her this than he could have quit breathing. “All right.”
She crawled into the small crevice with an ease he couldn’t match. As he sat next to her in the tight shelter the rocks provided, he could feel her with every raw nerve in his body. Obeying an instinct as powerful as the raging storm, he drew her against him.
“I don’t know how you do it, but you make me feel things no one has ever made me feel before.” He touched her hair, feeling its silky smoothness, then caressed her cheeks. As she leaned into him, he heard her breath catch with desire. Through the crimson haze of his own pounding blood, he took her mouth. Their tongues mated and the taste of her drove him to the edge, threatening his iron-willed control.
Fox melted against him, inviting more of the pleasures he could give her. Thunder boomed overhead and she trembled against him even as she deepened their kiss. She wanted him. Everything male in him knew it. Yet something was missing.
As he eased his grasp slightly, still holding her against him, he wondered if he’d gone completely insane. He could keep on kissing her and take pleasure in that. He was strong enough to refrain from taking that final step and making her his. So why was he drawing away?
As the thunder rolled and she shuddered, he had his answer. She was with him now out of fear. She’d surrendered to desire only because she’d needed him to push back the demons that haunted her. And that just wasn’t enough for him.
“As soon as the rain eases up, we’ll have to get moving,” Travis said.
“I know.”
Her quiet voice tore at him. She was a strong woman who was doing her b
est to face a fear she knew to be irrational. But holding her so close to his side was sheer torture. No matter how hard he tried to suppress it, the fire in him refused to die.
As the wind slowed and the thunder became nothing more than a distant rumbling sound, she pulled away from him. “I’m sorry, Travis. I’ve held us up. I’ll pick up the pace,” she said, avoiding his gaze.
He sensed her embarrassment. “You don’t have to apologize. Not for anything—and never to me.”
“You have fears, Travis, but you manage to control yours,” she said. “We’re in enough trouble. You don’t need another complication right now.”
“What’s complicated about holding a beautiful woman?” Travis countered, unable to suppress a grin.
“You’ve had plenty of practice, I suppose?” she asked.
“I’m taking the fifth on that one,” he said, then grew serious. “Fox, you have more guts than some of the soldiers I’ve fought alongside. You never lost your cool when the shooting started, and you’ve never backed away from any threat.”
“And then something simple like thunder comes along and my spool unravels.” She shook her head. “Some partner you’ve gotten saddled with.”
“Everyone has fears. They’re unavoidable. There are things that scare me right down to my boots.”
“Well, now that you mention it, I’ve noticed that I intimidate you at times.” She paused, then added, “But that’s probably because you like to be in control and I don’t like to relinquish it.”
“What?” He glowered at her. That was what he got for trying to give her some comfort. It was like trying to soothe a wildcat. “The day I can’t handle myself around a woman like you, will be the day I resign from the army and start baking pies and cookies.”
“I never knew you wanted to be a pastry chef,” she quipped.
Fox quickened the pace to the level he’d set before, almost as if trying to prove to him that she wasn’t weak. He just shook his head silently. Now, when they could finally afford to slow down some, she wanted to go double time.
“Thunderstorms fit you, Travis,” she said, choosing to cross a large field covered with purple asters and sunflowers instead of paralleling the rainsoaked wash that ran down one side. “Wind and Thunder go together well. But as you said once, I’m more like the Earth people. I’m the kind who worries about Lightning.”
The observation left him aching for what he knew could never be his. No matter what his feelings for her were, he’d never be the kind of man she needed. “It’s all part of nature. Even things that can be destructive have another gentler side. Wind and Earth are partners, you know. Wind can take seeds, and Life, to places Earth never could without it. I guess what I’m trying to say is that some things are meant for a closer look.”
Fox gave him a gentle smile. “So Wind and Earth can be temporary allies—just like we are now.”
“I’m trained for battle. It’s what I do and why I know we’ll hold our own against them. But I prefer knowing my enemy,” he admitted. “These men after us are like shadows with guns in a guerrilla war.”
“Even as a kid, you were always one to confront your problems head-on,” she said. “But you can’t do that now. And once we get something we can use against these people, the fight will be mine, not yours.”
“You’re dreaming if you think you’ll ever confront these people without me beside you. I’m going to stick to you like white on rice. You might as well accept that.”
“Not all fights are won through force.”
“But most are.” He’d expected an argument. When he didn’t get one, that was when he began to worry seriously. She was set on having her way on this, and that meant there would be major-league problems down the road—if they got that far.
HOURS LATER, THEY ARRIVED at the trading post. Every muscle in Fox’s body ached. Wistfully she remembered her old home and the security she’d found there. But all those things were lost to her now.
She reached back, touching the surface of her purse. She hadn’t told Travis because she hadn’t wanted to appear like a child—but she’d brought Chance with her. The old stuffed bear was the only tangible link she had left to her past, that connection made the toy priceless to her.
Travis glanced around the parking lot, checking out the vehicles. There were two newer-model pickups, an old van, and a weather-beaten truck. He took a closer look at the latter to confirm his guess. “That’s the truck Ashe left for us.” He pointed to the oldest truck.
“How do you know it’s that one? Any of these could be his choice.”
“There’s a jish—a medicine bundle—on the dashboard. Ashe made it for me many, many years ago.”
“How come you don’t carry it with you?” she asked, following him to the truck.
“Medicine bundles and, more importantly, the beliefs associated with them, are more a part of my brother’s world than mine. It didn’t seem right to take it with me when I joined the Rangers. I would have had to leave it behind most of the time, anyway. That’s why Ashe offered to keep it for me.” He reached for the keys he knew Ashe would have hidden inside the bumper, below the license plate, in a magnetic holder. It had been their custom for years.
As he unlocked the doors and they climbed into the truck, Fox took the jish from the dashboard. “Will you wear it now? It doesn’t seem right to just leave it sitting there.”
He held it in his hand and stared at it, lost in thought. “Do you remember what the teachings say about medicine bundles?”
“I know they’re meant for protection.”
“It’s more than that. A jish is said to be alive and, to remain strong, it must be exercised—used. Without that, it grows weak and, some say, it grows lonely. It’s not something that stores power, but it’s a source of power in and of itself. To some, like my brother, owning the jish becomes a sacred trust.”
“I think Ashe is telling you that it’ll help you now, if you’ll let it.”
Travis fastened the small leather pouch to his belt. “At one time I felt the need to walk away from those beliefs. But being back here on the Rez has put a different slant on everything for me. I’m a man now, not a kid who needs to prove his strength by standing alone and going his own way. For the first time in my life, I’m really prepared to carry this—if not strictly out of belief, out of respect for who and what I am.”
His revelation filled her with a sense of wonder and a twinge of envy. Travis was reaching out to the teachings he’d grown up with, knowing they would sustain him now. She had no such comfort. The past held mostly sorrow and questions for her.
“You know, it’s strange how things work,” Travis said. “As a boy, I never thought I’d be saying what I just said.”
A new strength seemed to burn within him. “I like the grown-up you,” she said in a near whisper.
His sudden roguish grin took her breath away. His playfulness was back, sweeping away the seriousness of their conversation. “Are you flirting with me, Fox? If you are, I’ve got to tell you, rm easy.”
“So I’ve heard,” she teased.
He was about to answer when a young couple came out of the trading post. Travis quickly started the engine and pulled onto the highway, heading north.
“Maybe you should have gone south, then backtracked. We don’t want anyone to guess our next stop,” she said.
He smiled. “Which is precisely why I went in this direction. I know how the Navajos who live out on the Rez think. They’ll give any Anglo who comes looking for one of the Dine the wrong directions. If we’d headed south, they would have said we headed north. I just wanted to make sure they knew which wrong directions to give.”
“Good strategy.” Fox laughed.
Checking the glove compartment, she pulled out some topographical maps, a cigarette lighter, ammunition, and dried fruit. “Ashe is certainly trying to think of everything.” Feeling something by her feet, she leaned down and picked up a can of lubricating spray for their vehicle, obviou
sly something left by the owner. “Near as I can figure, he’s covered all the bases,” she added with a smile.
Travis chuckled. “Ashe always thinks things through,” he said. “That’s one of the reasons he makes a good cop—and why he was always a pain as a brother,” he added with a wink.
Turning her thoughts back to their immediate problems, she added, “I know we have a list of places and people to see, but I have a better plan. Let’s visit the community college north of Fort Defiance next.”
“Why there? That place must have just been getting started when the Johnsons arrived on the Rez,” Travis said.
“Jesse Bidtah works there. He’s been Dad’s friend for forever. I think we should talk to him.”
“I know Jesse,” Travis said. “He teaches Navajo language. He was a counselor when I was in high school. He didn’t approve of my choices, but he was always there for me.”
“In that case, you might have better luck than I would, talking to him. I’ve heard that he’s gone on record siding with the traditionalists who believe that the Reservation should be exclusively for the Navajos and that no Anglos should live here.”
Travis nodded pensively. “Ashe said as much in a letter he wrote me when I was overseas. Jesse has become more dogmatic and focused on the tribe and tribal rights ever since his son got killed.”
“Poor Joey. He was such a great guy,” Fox said “He left the Reservation and became a state cop. Then one day he pulled a guy over. The man had an outstanding warrant and didn’t want to be taken in. He shot Joey and left him to bleed to death by the side of the road.”
“I understand Jesse doesn’t leave the Reservation at all anymore. Part of Jesse must have died when his boy was killed.” Travis paused. “That’s why I know he’ll help us. He knows what it’s like to lose part of his family.”
“While you talk to Jesse, I’ll go to the library. I’m very good with computers. Let me see what I can turn up by doing a search through various databases.”
