Books by Linda Conrad

by Conrad, Linda

  Lexie must’ve fallen asleep at some point, because the next thing she knew Michael was shaking her awake. “Come on, sleeping beauty. Aren’t you ready to go see your son?”

  “Michael? Did you find them? Did you find the right petroglyphs?”

  He nodded as he helped her stand. “I did. And I entered them into the computer. It’s going to take some heavy-duty translating work, but it looks like we’ve found our answers. We’ll be the first to reach the parchments—long before the Skinwalkers.”

  With renewed energy, Lexie leapt into the air and threw her arms around his neck. “Thank heaven. That must mean the war will be over soon.”

  “I hope so.” He gently pried her arms away and let them drop back to her sides. “There’s nothing more important than beating the Skinwalkers.”

  She must’ve had a frown on her face at being pushed away, because he quickly turned his back and began reworking his pack in preparation for the return trip.

  After a few moments, he spoke over his shoulder. “On second thought, there is something more important. It’s Jack. All the Dine children are the reason we’re fighting this war.

  “We do battle with the evil for our homes and our clans,” he continued. “And for our hearts—our loves.”

  In his voice she heard a kind of plea for understanding. But she didn’t trust her own heart enough to listen.

  13

  L ook at that face. Just look at that magnificent face.

  Michael’s heart tripped wildly as Lexie smiled over at him from the passenger seat. He’d been sitting like a big lump, driving them out of Monument Valley. He had assumed the most important things were getting her back to civilization and out of his truck as fast as possible.

  Now he suddenly felt like someone had just slammed their fist into his chest and told him he needed to slow down. Barely able to breathe due to what he’d just seen on her face, Michael blinked and slowed the pickup.

  Such things weren’t possible in the real world.

  He chanced another glance. And there it was. He’d been right the first time. One look at her and he’d had a vision of his children, his whole future, staring out at him from those expressive hazel eyes.

  Turning away from the tantalizing sight, Michael wondered if he was truly doomed forever. She didn’t want him.

  There must be something he could do to change her mind about him. Some way to keep her close. Just long enough to undo the damage he’d done and start talking about their futures.

  He wanted to keep her safe. But he also wanted her to need him as much as he needed her. Was that possible now?

  A stray thought broke through his consciousness. A weird thought, about his parents’ relationship. How had his father managed to find the right answers to win over his own bride? Michael knew his parents’ marriage hadn’t started out with love. Their marriage had been arranged by their traditional families, yet they always seemed happy enough.

  As he drove toward his sister’s house, Michael’s thoughts continued winding round and round. His mother. An arranged marriage. Could that be a possibility for him, too?

  Maybe he needed to have a long talk with his mother. He needed an ally—and soon.

  “You’re sure you don’t mind?” he asked Lexie as he turned the pickup into the college lot. “It’ll only take a few minutes to find the reference book I need then we can be on our way.”

  She shook her head and stared out the window. “With all those books you have in your home library it’s hard to believe you need one more, but I don’t mind if we stop at the college for a few minutes. It’s still light out. Jack will no doubt be more interested in his afternoon pony riding lessons than he will be in seeing his mom.”

  The melancholy was clear in her voice. He felt his heart prick in sympathy with the loving mother who’d had to leave her own child.

  “What’s going on here?” she asked as they pulled into the campus parking lot and saw people and cars everywhere.

  “Looks like there was a parade of some sort,” he said with a shrug. “I’d guess it’s just now breaking up. The kids were probably protesting something. That sort of thing seems to happen a lot on Dine campuses.”

  Several small groups of young people were standing around, some of them having animated conversations. Michael found a parking spot a little apart from everyone and cut the engine. He had been prepared to take Lexie with him as he ran into his office, but there were plenty of people milling outside this afternoon. She should be safe enough in the crowd for a few minutes.

  “Lock yourself in and roll the windows down just a crack. I’ll leave the keys in the ignition in case you want to turn on the air conditioner. I’m going to take my laptop with me so I can match up some of the pictographs with the right reference book. But I won’t be long.” He opened his door then turned back to her.

  “You’ll be okay, won’t you?”

  “Of course. Don’t worry.” She smiled at him again, but the move seemed to take a heroic effort. He could see the deep smudges of exhaustion and worry under her eyes.

  He jumped out of the truck and pressed the door locks behind him. Taking off toward his office with his laptop slung over one shoulder, he listened for any signs of Skinwalkers. He heard nothing except for the sounds of students talking and laughing together.

  Michael felt reassured. Temporarily at least, everything was normal.

  Lexie closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the headrest. It seemed like a thousand years had passed since they’d last been on this campus. Was it only yesterday or the day before?

  Her body felt tired. But it was a good tired. The message she’d given Michael had helped him to locate something important to the Brotherhood.

  Yawning, she got more comfortable. But it seemed as if she’d only had her eyes closed for a minute or two at most when they popped open again. Something felt wrong.

  The sky had suddenly turned that lavender twilight color she’d seen once before in the high desert. And the background noises of the kids and cars she’d barely been aware of had grown silent.

  She turned her head to see if everyone had left her all alone in the parking lot. But what she saw sent a chill up her spine. A group of male students had gathered around the pickup, standing in a semicircle about ten feet from her, and they didn’t look too friendly. In fact, a few of them seemed downright angry about something.

  No one spoke. No one moved. They simply stood out there glaring at her.

  Swallowing back a slice of fear, Lexie fought her nerves and tried to decide what to do. Should she roll the window down and talk to them? Getting that close didn’t seem very smart.

  What did they want with her? If she climbed out of the truck and went in search of Michael, would the crowd turn into a mob and hurt her?

  Minutes went by. Long, scary minutes.

  Just when Lexie was about to scoot over to the driver’s side and start the engine in case she needed to make a quick getaway, she heard a high-pitched woman’s voice speaking in Navajo. After a second or two, she spotted a Native American woman pushing through the crowd. Lexie recognized her right away as the assistant professor Michael had introduced. What was the name again?

  Lexie remembered her name just as Amber Billie stepped to the side of the pickup and knocked on the driver’s window. “These idiots are leaving.” She waved at the crowd with deliberate movements until they began dispersing. “But I think I’d better sit with you. To be on the safe side.”

  Lexie took her first real breath since she’d opened her eyes, then she unlocked the doors. Amber climbed in behind the wheel and locked up after herself.

  “Are you okay?”

  “I guess so,” Lexie replied, noticing her voice sounded shaky. “What was wrong with those people? What did they want?”

  Amber shook her head and rolled her eyes. “They were just a few stragglers left from the Save The Dine From Witchcraft protest march. A bunch of troublemakers, that’s all.”

&nb
sp; “But why did they seem so mad at me?”

  The corners of Amber’s mouth lifted in a wry smile. “For one thing, you’ve become the subject of some wild rumors around the college over the last few days. And for another thing, having Get Out Witch! painted on the side of the pickup might not be the best idea if you don’t want to be bothered.”

  Lexie had totally forgotten about the paint. She shifted to look out her side window as most of the crowd wandered away—though she heard some of them grumbling under their breaths.

  “Thanks for coming to my rescue,” she told Amber without turning around. “I’m glad you were here.”

  “What are you doing just sitting alone in the college parking lot?”

  Lexie looked back and saw the concern in Amber’s deep chocolate eyes. “Michael came to get a reference book from his office. He said he wouldn’t be long.”

  Amber nodded. “Good. Then where are you headed from here?”

  “To Michael’s sister’s house to see my son. Why?”

  “You have a son? A Navajo child?”

  “Yes, of course. My deceased husband, Michael’s brother Daniel, was his father. What’s wrong?”

  Amber shifted in her seat. “I realize you don’t know much about our traditions.” The expression on the pretty assistant professor’s face was serious and troubled. “But you must see how things would appear to others. Especially, to those people whose lives are ruled by superstition and fear.

  “As far as anyone can tell from a distance,” Amber continued, “bad things tend to follow you around. After all, your car was caught in a flash flood. And we’ve heard a wildfire chased you down the mountainside. Natural catastrophes don’t seem coincidental when they’re happening one right after the other to the same person.”

  “But—”

  “I wouldn’t worry too much about it if I were you, though,” Amber cut in reassuringly. “After all, you’ll probably be leaving the rez soon anyway. Your witchcraft concerns and other problems will all dry up when you can put this place behind you.”

  The growing lump in Lexie’s throat threatened to choke her. “Actually, I’ve decided to stay. My son likes it here with his relatives. I want him to learn his father’s traditions, learn the language. And he wants to go to school and act like a real Navajo child.”

  Amber lifted her chin and flipped her long hair off her shoulder. “I hate to tell you this, but your son won’t be welcome at any traditional school. If his mother is considered a witch, the other kids will make his life miserable. They won’t play with him or make friends. Their parents won’t let them get anywhere near him.”

  Lexie didn’t know what to say. This whole witch business seemed as unbelievable to her as the idea of Skinwalkers had at first. But she guessed it wasn’t really such a stretch to believe that a stranger would think a woman who talked to ghosts was probably a witch.

  “How can I fix things?” she finally asked, letting her eyes plead with Amber for advice. “I can’t stand aside and let my child go through that. Is there anything I can do differently to make life better for him here?”

  Perhaps, Lexie thought, it might help if she refused to be the delivery person for any more messages. But when she thought the rest of it over, there wasn’t much she could change about the natural disasters that seemed to follow her around. She may as well be the Message Bearer.

  “If you were Dine yourself,” Amber began, after she’d screwed her mouth up in thought, “you could have a special Sing done. That would change the way you’re perceived as far as the traditionalists are concerned. But—”

  “Michael and I have been looking for the old medicine man who can do just that,” Lexie interrupted.

  “When we find him and have the Sing done, won’t I be cured?”

  Amber patted her hand. “The only way a Sing would help is if the People thought you were truly following the Navajo traditions and believed in them. Otherwise, it would just look like you were playacting for appearances sake and that would make things worse.”

  “Why couldn’t I do it for real then? Follow the traditions, I mean. What else are the requirements?”

  “Following the Navajo Way would take an entire life change on your part. I’m not sure you—”

  “I’m willing. I’ve wanted to do that anyway for my son’s sake. I’ve even been getting lessons from Michael. What are the other requirements?”

  Amber sat back and seemed to be studying her. “There’s one big thing I can think of that would definitely help your cause. But…well—”

  “What? I’ll do whatever it takes. Tell me, please.”

  Amber took a deep breath and then smiled. “Okay, but remember it was you who asked.

  “You see, the widow or widower of a traditional Navajo is supposed to marry the deceased’s sibling, or at least a first cousin if a brother or sister isn’t available. In the long history of the People it’s been done that way in order to keep the clans pure and the bloodlines going on into the future. Way back in the day, a single mother with a child was asking for terrible trouble if she tried leaving her family to remarry outside. Her child might be shunned—or worse. So a brother-in-law would step in to offer protection and to become a father for her children.

  “But I don’t suppose you’d consider doing such a thing today,” Amber added with a grin. “It’s not something familiar to a modern society, not even in Dinetah. ”

  A streak of raw panic flooded Lexie’s senses. It wasn’t as if she’d never contemplated being Michael’s wife. The idea had been floating around in the back of her mind ever since his mother first mentioned it.

  But Lexie was mentally exhausted at this point. Simply worn thin from trying to be the sturdy and reliable single mother who’d had to face nightmares she’d never even heard of before. This witch trouble was fast becoming the worst of the lot. She just couldn’t handle all the problems alone anymore.

  Raising her eyebrows at Amber as if to say no biggie, she shrugged a shoulder. “Thanks for the advice. That idea sounds just right for me. In fact, I think my mother-in-law is probably already inviting the wedding guests.”

  The knock on his office door brought Michael’s head up from where he’d buried it in the reference book. He hadn’t meant to stay in his office so long, but he’d wanted to make sure the book he collected was the one that could do him the most good with his translations.

  Getting up from his desk to unlock the door, he gave the clock on the wall a quick glance and was unhappy to see he’d already left Lexie sitting out in the truck for going on twenty minutes. She would have every right to be angry. He’d known how antsy she’d been to see Jack.

  He opened the door, fully expecting to see Lexie standing there with a scowl on her face. “I’m sorry. I completely lost track—”

  “Professor Ayze, you need to come quickly.” The person on the other side of the door wasn’t Lexie. Michael recognized him as that young Assistant Professor Gorman, the damned fool who had probably started the rumors about Lexie being a witch. Gory was not someone Michael had been looking forward to seeing today.

  Then the tone of the man’s words began to sink in. “What’s wrong?” Michael asked roughly.

  “Your friend, the Anglo woman, she’s in big trouble outside. There’s a group of students hanging around who’re talking about making her leave the campus. They don’t want her kind here. I overheard one of them say something about sending a few rocks her way so she’d be sure to get the point and not come back.”

  Oh, hell. Michael grabbed for his office key and locked the door in two seconds flat. Without wasting another word, he brushed past Gorman and took off toward the parking lot at a dead run.

  What had he been thinking? He should’ve known better than to leave her alone.

  By the time he got within sight of the pickup, Michael’s heart was pounding and he was trying to decide the fastest way to drive to the hospital from here. If anything happened to Lexie, it would kill him. He wouldn’t want t
o take so much as another breath of air without her.

  But when he hit the edge of the parking lot and looked toward the pickup, he realized there wasn’t anyone standing nearby. No gangs of angry teens, nor any student hate groups anywhere in sight. The truck looked as quiet as it had when he’d left it there. Gulping in air, he blinked back the wetness that had been blurring his vision and took a good long look at his pickup.

  The words Get Out Witch were more visible than ever. He’d forgotten all about them. He must’ve lost his mind to keep driving around Dinetah like that.

  Trying to see if Lexie was still inside the cab through the growing twilight, Michael kept moving and was surprised when he spotted both her and Amber Billie sitting in the front seat. He stopped, taking a moment to compose himself.

  “Michael,” both women said when he wrenched open the driver’s door.

  Amber moved quickly and pushed at his chest, making him take a step back while she climbed down out of the cab. “You sure took your sweet time,” she told him with a frown and a tap of her foot. “Leaving this woman out here alone was not the smartest thing I’ve ever seen you do.”

  “Then there really was trouble?” he asked. He’d been all set to go back and punch that worthless Gorman in the mouth for giving him the scare of his life.

  “No,” Lexie said from the passenger seat.

  “Yes,” Amber said at the same time.

  He decided it would be best to keep his mouth shut and let the two of them sort it out.

  Amber shot Lexie a quick glance over her shoulder and started in. “When I first got here, a crowd of young men I didn’t recognize had surrounded your truck. I sent them on their way before things got serious. But I hate to think what might’ve happened if I hadn’t come out when I did.”

  Pointing to the painted words, she scowled up at him. “Whatever were you thinking to drive to the campus with that on the side of the truck?”

  Right. He’d been asking himself the very same thing. But it didn’t seem too important to explain himself to Amber. Lexie was the one he was most concerned about. She was too quiet.