by Donna Fasano
She suffered a moment of tension as Chay began to explain how he and Tori had met on the far side of Misty Lake near her B&B. Chay had no idea about Tori and Grayson’s affiliation, but she needn’t have worried. When she’d finally approached Grayson with a request for counseling for the abused women who stayed with her, the shaman had promised never to discuss her work with anyone. He’d been true to his word, infinitely trustworthy, and Tori knew he wouldn’t mention her work, even to his grandson.
As she’d watched Chay drive away from Freedom Trail yesterday, Tori had planned to discuss with Brenda her wish to tell Chay about Brenda’s presence and all that it meant. Tori had wanted to set Chay straight about why she couldn’t have a bunch of people coming and going when she had someone secreted away at the inn.
However, she’d gone inside to find Scotty hovering over a sobbing and furious Brenda. Apparently the woman had phoned the bank, only to discover that her husband had closed out both their checking and savings accounts, leaving Brenda without a penny to her name.
Earlier, Tori had tried to get Brenda to at least visit an ATM to retrieve some money for herself, but Brenda hadn’t been in any shape to do much more than lie curled in a fetal position and cry.
Some women, Tori had discovered over the years, could be bullied into a strong resolve. Others used anger as a means of getting through the most difficult part of separating from their abusers. Still others—women like Brenda—had been so beaten down that they had no self-esteem to speak of. These woman couldn’t take being pressured, even if those strong-arm tactics might be for their own good… or the good of their children. These women needed coddling. At least for a bit. They needed time to figure out how their lives had gotten to such a state and what they were going to do now that they were on their own.
Brenda had spent the day in such turmoil that Tori hadn’t even considered broaching the idea of telling Chay about her and Scotty. Instead, Tori had spent hours assuring Brenda that she could start over again. That she and Scotty had a wonderful chance at a new life free from fear and pain and torment. Once Brenda had calmed down, she and Tori had then sat at the kitchen table and started talking about making some plans that included, for starters, a trip to the court for a protective order against Tommie. Agreeing to such an action had been a huge step for Brenda.
“Can I offer you both something to drink?”
The shaman’s question brought Tori back to the present. She said, “No, thank you. I’m fine. In fact, I was thinking of taking a walk. I saw a produce stand a couple of blocks up the road.” She looked over at Chay. “Would you mind, Chay? That way you and your grandfather would have more freedom to, you know, talk about things.”
Chay, she knew without a doubt, possessed a strong enough character to deal with her bullying him into discussing his dreams with Grayson. The twinkle in Chay’s onyx gaze told her he was cognizant of the message she was sending.
“That will be fine,” he told her. He walked her to the door. “I’ll be sure to talk. About everything.”
They shared a smile. Softly she said, “I won’t wander far.”
The screen door closed behind her and she heard Grayson Makwa say, “Tori’s a special woman.”
“Yes, she is,” Chay agreed.
A thrill coursed through Tori.
It shouldn’t matter to her what Chay thought of her. But it did.
She strolled a short distance down the street, stopping at the produce stand. She made small talk with the woman who sat under the awning with a baby harnessed her chest with a long length of cloth that left her arms free so she could accommodate her customers.
The squash looked plump and green and Tori chose two. The beans were fresh, the last of the crop, she was told, when she asked for a pound, which she decided then and there would be delicious simmered with some leftover ham for dinner.
Tori watched the woman. Frequently her fingers would trail down the length of her baby’s body, smooth over its rounded behind, pat its back. She discovered that her hand had inadvertently found its way to a spot low on her tummy.
Would she ever have a baby to cuddle?
She blanched, her heart feeling as if it had skipped a couple of beats.
Tori couldn’t remember a time when such thoughts had crossed her mind. Of course, she’d had dolls as a toddler. Her maternal instinct had been developed by playing Mama just like that of millions of other little girls, but those childish fancies had faded into oblivion somewhere along the line.
First she’d run headfirst into puberty. Then she’d galloped through her young adult years, attending community college while at the same time trying to help her aging parents at the inn. She’d begun dreaming of taking over the business someday and had wanted to learn everything she could about the running of Freedom Trail. Then Tori had witnessed the trauma Susan had experienced: caught in an abusive relationship yet stubbornly determined that there was some way to change her husband into that wonderful knight in shining armor she’d thought him to be prior to marrying him.
Her sister’s ordeal had filled Tori with a kind of hopelessness at first. Her parents, and Tori, too, had tried to talk sense into Susan. Tried to get her to listen to reason. Tried to get her to separate herself from her husband for good. But Susan would have none of it.
At times, Tori had resented her sister. Susan had made the whole family sick with worry. And that hadn’t seemed fair to Tori.
But her sister’s tragic death had filled Tori with a rage she’d never imagined she could feel. And it was that fury that had placed her on the path of getting herself informed about physical and psychological abusers and the people they mistreated. That knowledge had helped Tori immensely. Through educating herself, she was able to help her parents deal with their guilt and grief. Helped them to move on with their lives. Understanding the issues had also helped Tori to map out her own future. A future of helping victimized women. A future that didn’t have room in it for husbands and babies of her own… not when she was so busy taking care of other women and their babies, protecting them from the battering, controlling husbands they had made the terrible mistake of marrying.
So why now? she wondered. Why would the sight of this precious infant have her pressing her palm to her belly? Why had her thoughts turned so wistful and longing?
Instinct had her gazing back toward Grayson Makwa’s brick bungalow. Her brows rose in surprise when she saw Chay walking toward her. After paying the woman for her produce purchases and bidding her good day, Tori went to meet Chay.
“You didn’t stay very long.” She couldn’t keep the comment from spilling from her.
Chay’s only answer was a shrug.
“Chay,” she said, her tone pressing, “you haven’t seen your grandfather in years. You should have been there hours not minutes.”
“I couldn’t very well do that with you waiting, now, could I?”
Aghast, Tori’s mouth opened. “Don’t use me as an excuse—”
Chay laughed. “It is just too easy to get you riled. Look, Tori, Grandfather has some things to do. We plan to meet again, okay?”
Satisfied with his answer, she smiled and nodded. “Did you tell him? About your dreams?”
They walked down the street together back toward Chay’s truck.
“Yes,” he said. “But I don’t know what good it did. Grandfather offered me no answers.”
This surprised Tori. She knew Grayson to be almost uncannily knowing, a person who had an eerie sense of understanding about a person’s problem and the root of it almost before any talking had been done. And as a shaman, Grayson had a responsibility to offer advice to those who came to him seeking it.
In the past, Tori had seen Grayson counsel the women who stayed with her, with amazing results. He had a way of making a person see her life clearly. If a person understood her past, she’d heard Grayson often say, then she could better see where she wanted to go in the future.
“But he did offer me this.” Chay he
ld up a plain brown paper sack. “It’s an herb meant to induce a deep sleep,” he continued. “And vivid dreams. Grandfather feels that maybe this will help me to focus in on what’s happening in my dream. To better decipher the meaning.”
They reached the back of the truck and moved along the passenger side. Evidently Chay meant to open her door for her. Tori couldn’t help but think that was sweet of him.
“So are you glad you came to see Grayson?” she asked.
She made to climb into the cab, but he stopped her, his fingers warm on her forearm.
“What I’m most glad about—”
In a heartbeat, the air thickened and heated, and Tori got the sense that the autumnal sun had shifted in the sky to a spot directly overhead. That it shone down on them, its concentrated rays heating the space right where they stood to an unbearable temperature.
“—is that you’re with me this morning.”
The husky quality of his voice sent shivers skittering across her skin like the warm spray of an unexpected rainstorm. A vague thought that he was once again avoiding Grayson as a topic of conversation hovered at the very edges of her brain, but she gazed up into his face and the hazy notion fluttered away. With the backs of his fingers he grazed a gentle trail up her jaw line, then smoothed his thumb over the curve of her ear. She was only barely able to stifle the shudder that threatened to rumble forth from her very bones.
Sudden hunger made her blood slog through her veins.
She shouldn’t…
She shouldn’t…
The muddled thought echoed, ricocheting in the strange empty chaos that had assailed her mind. Her thoughts were an odd mixture of blankness and disarray. There was something she shouldn’t do, but before she could figure out what it was she’d become completely lost in the mesmerizing depths of his coal black eyes, in his compelling aura, in the titillating prospect that his lips might press to hers.
Oh, how she wished they would.
And they did.
His mouth captured hers in a kiss that could only be described as soul satisfying. Hot. Sweet. Luscious. Mind numbing.
Chay pulled back, his gaze powerful. He tucked curled fingers under her chin, dragged the pad of his thumb over her moist bottom lip. The heady desire etched in every sharp angle of his face made Tori’s heart pound furiously.
“Whatever happens with all this,” he whispered, “whether I find answers to my questions or not, I do know one thing. I feel blessed by The Great One to have met you.”
They shared one last, long look, and then Chay inched back so she could slide into the passenger seat of the truck. The door slammed shut… and Tori’s mind cleared.
In an instant she remembered what it was she shouldn’t do.
And why.
~oOo~
The ax sank into the log with a satisfying thwack. Chips went flying, and Chay loosened the blade from the wood with a firm twist before raising the ax above his head and swinging it down again. This time the blade cut through, and the chunks of timber tumbled several feet apart. He set down the ax, retrieved the wood, and placed the cut pieces on the neat stack he was making.
The cabin was there for the tribe’s use. Anyone could stay for as long as they liked, but the Kolheek way was to leave the place as you’d found it. The chilly mornings had forced Chay to light a fire in the woodstove, so he was replacing the firewood he’d used over the past weeks.
Although the day was cool, the sun’s rays knifing down through the trees combined with the arduous task of cutting the wood had forced him to tug off his shirt. He swiped his forearm across his brow and then set another large piece of wood up onto the huge old tree trunk, hacked and nicked with thousands of ax marks. He arched the ax up high, but the rustle he heard in the brush had him relaxing his shoulder muscles, the steel head of the ax coming to rest on the mossy ground.
Sunlight glinted golden against Tori’s long flaxen hair, and Chay felt his heart sing at the sight of her. He hadn’t been able to figure out this complex woman. She held an overwhelming allure for him, and had since their very first meeting. He got the impression, no, he pretty much was certain, that she felt the same about him. There was something almost mystical about the fascination they found in one another.
However, Tori seemed to run hot and cold. She’d allow herself to dabble in the fine art of flirtation one moment—and quite frankly, it was a pastime she was rather adept at—but the next minute she’d turn aloof, as if she were doing all she could to restrain the desires she so obviously felt.
“Hi,” she called out to him.
He lifted a hand in silent greeting, then automatically reached for his T-shirt and pulled it on.
“I was taking a walk.” She paused several feet from him. “I heard the chopping. And was curious.” Her eyes slid away from his face.
There it was again. That distancing dance she performed. Chay got the sense that she wanted to seek him out, yet at the same time she didn’t. As if she were enticed and intrigued by the idea of waltzing with him, but for some reason she felt that enjoying the music and the movement was off-limits.
“Just cutting some firewood,” he explained.
She nodded. When she took her bottom lip between her teeth, Chay was reminded how lusciously sweet her honeyed mouth tasted.
“So… how have you been?” Between her fingers she twirled a long piece of wild grass that she’d evidently plucked from somewhere along the path that had brought her to him.
I’ve been going out of my mind waiting for you to call, a silent voice intoned. But rather than expressing that thought, he found himself being just as honest on another subject altogether.
“I’ve been feeling a little under the weather today.”
He didn’t know what it was about Tori that invited a person to unload his problems, but he realized that every time he was with her he ended up unburdening himself.
She moved closer, a silent invitation for him to expand on whatever might be bothering him. Dark emotions rushed up to engulf him, causing him to regret opening this can of worms. He sighed.
“I’ve been wondering,” he began haltingly, “why Kit-tan-it-to’wet would allow such bad fortune to befall one person while good fortune is bestowed on another.”
Bewilderment shadowed her deep blue eyes, and Chay felt compelled to explain further.
“Why would the Great Father condemn one man to a wheelchair for the remainder of his life and leave me strong and whole?”
Understanding dawned, lightening her gaze. She moved close enough that he could smell her warm, fresh-rain scent. “People have wondered for thousands of years why bad things happen to certain people and not to others. I guess it’s just not meant for us to know everything.”
He realized what she said was true, but the cloud that had descended on him didn’t lift.
“Chay, from everything you’ve said about the accident, you have nothing to feel guilty about. You cannot hold yourself responsible for the irresponsible acts of others.”
This, too, was true. He moistened his lips and remained silent.
Tori was inches from him now and she reached out, her fingers creamy-pale against his swarthy skin. The contrast affected him and he couldn’t seem to take his eyes from the spot where their flesh made contact.
Evidently unaware of what her nearness was doing to him, she softly whispered, “You were cleared by the courts of any wrongdoing. You told me so yourself. You have nothing to feel guilty about. Cut yourself some slack. The judge cleared you. Now you need to clear yourself. Forgive yourself.”
She meant only to console him, he understood that. But the attraction that sucked him into a vacuum each and every time he was with her pulled and tugged at him now. He was in clear danger of succumbing to its lure yet again.
The magnetic energy that swirled at ever-increasing speeds and threatened to bring him to his knees was so strong that she couldn’t help but perceive it. Her gaze darkened to a rich sapphire as the animation in her f
acial muscles eased into a different kind of intensity. Her breath quickened, her full, rounded breasts rising and falling more noticeably.
Then she did the most extraordinary thing. She slid her fingers from his forearm, balled her hand into a fist and pressed it tight to her diaphragm. She swallowed, and although she didn’t actually step away from him, her body eased back.
The resulting space was all that Chay needed. He inhaled deeply. Exhaled. And then he shook his head as he emitted a nearly inaudible chuckle.
“Thanks,” he told her.
Her expression was inscrutable.
“I don’t know what that is,” he continued. “But every time I’m with you my head gets so clogged up with it that I just can’t think.”
Tori remained silent, her blue eyes pensive.
“It’s pretty clear that there’s something between us. Some powerful force that just becomes… overwhelming.” His thoughts and words were coming slowly, but he pressed on. “It’s also obvious to me that, although you’ve been tempted a time or two by this… thing, these feelings that swoop down on us, you have some reason for wanting to avoid it.”
While he was terribly curious about the motivation behind her desire to evade the very physical and emotional attraction between them, he felt obliged to speak his mind about these encounters.
Before she could respond, he added, “I’d like to avoid it, too.”
Her blue eyes widened, making it plain that this wasn’t what she’d expected to hear from him. He’d given this matter much thought over the past few days.
“I’ve spent my whole life shying away from relationships,” he admitted. “Don’t get me wrong. I’ve dated. I’ve enjoyed plenty of friendships with women. But the moment things become intense, I turn tail and run.”
The contemplative emotion that had flattened her gaze faded, replaced by a cautious curiosity.
“I can’t really tell you why.” He realized in that instant that he was being entirely truthful with her. He shrugged. “It could be because I equate serious bonds… relationships… with grief. Let’s face it, my mom died when I was a baby, and my dad was never the same. He died when I was six. I’ve faced the deaths of an aunt and two uncles. And I told you at dinner how my other aunt left the reservation, taking her daughter with her. None of us have seen either of them since. Alisa would be in her early twenties now.”
