Mountain Moonlight

Chapter 1

"Apache Junction," Davis said as Vala stopped the rental car in front of a store advertising camping equipment. "That's a really cool name for a town, Mom."

Seeing his enthusiasm made her almost forget the hassle to get here--how she'd argued and pleaded for ten days off so they could fly to Arizona after the Christmas holidays, which she already knew she couldn't take off. Davis would have to miss a week or so of school, but that couldn't be helped. Finally her employer had rather begrudgingly given her the seven vacation days she had coming plus another three day
s
leave of absence.

She was grateful she hadn't been fired. Heaven knows she needed the job. Since Neal's new wife had blessed him with a son last May, he tended to be careless about his child-support payments for Davis. He was equally careless about keeping in touch with his first-born son. Or maybe heartless was the right word.

Davis tugged at her arm. "Look!" He pointed. "That's it, that's Superstition Mountain."

She stared at the towering mass of rock--volcanic, she'd read somewhere--off to the northeast. It wasn't her first view of the mountain because she'd lived in Phoenix when she was young. Her thought now was the same as she'd had back then--Superstition Mountain didn't look real, thrusting up forbiddingly like it did in the middle of this flat land.

"I'm glad we came," Davis said, his gaze fixed on the mountain. "Really, really glad."

So was she. Davis probably believed he'd convinced her to make the trip because of his earnest arguments about how finding the treasure was going to make up for having to spend a lot of money to get to Arizona. She didn't intend to admit to her son that she was willing to do anything to keep the bright glow of enthusiasm in his eyes. Before John Mokesh had given him the old deer skin map, Davis hadn't been interested in anything. Even his Christmas computer game, one he wanted, failed to fill the bill.

Poor Mr. Mokesh had died in his sleep the night after he'd presented Davis with the map. To her surprise, her son had accepted the old man's death without excessive grief, saying, "Mokesh told me it was his time to die. That's why he gave me his treasure map."

"Mom, you're lollygagging," Davis said. The word came from her father and probably from his father, but it had caught Davis's attention and he liked to use it.

"I was just thinking," she said.

He grabbed her hand, tugging her toward the store entrance. Once inside, Vala told the clerk, a tanned, healthy-looking woman with a long braid down her back, that she and her son planned to make a trip into the Superstitions. "But I don't know much about camping," she admitted, "and so I haven't the faintest idea what we'll need."

The clerk's eyebrows raised. "You're planning to trek into the Superstitions without knowing anything about camping? I hate to rain on your parade but that is not a good idea. Not without a guide. That mountain isn't greenhorn-friendly. Fact is, Superstition Mountain can't be called friendly to anyone."

"A guide?" Vala repeated. "How do I go about finding one?" She hadn't planned on any extra expenses but maybe guides took credit cards.

"We got a list posted." The woman jerked a thumb toward a bulletin board near the front of the store. "Names and phone numbers. We don't guarantee any of the guides but, as far as we've heard, they're all able to bring you out of the Superstitions in almost as good a shape as you were when you went in. Any one of them can tell you what you need to buy and we'll be more than glad to sell you whatever they recommend."

Thanking her, Vala went to take a look at the list while Davis roamed through the store, examining the camping gear. The third name on the guide list was crossed off. Perversely, she wondered why, leaning closer to see if she could make out the letters beneath the heavy dark line. Was it Bruce something? Or Brian? No, that was an "a" and then an "m" after the Br. She gasped, staring at the paper in disbelief. Bram! Was it possible? The last name certainly looked like Hunter.

Turning toward the clerk, she called, "What about this Bram Hunter? Why is he crossed off?"

The woman shrugged. "That's Bram for you. He only works when he feels like it."

Glancing at the list again, Vala took a pen from her bag and squinted at the paper as she wrote down the barely legible phone number, all the time telling herself it was a waste of time. Bram had taken his name off the list, so why call him? She already knew he wasn't available as a guide and if she made the call for old time's sake, he probably wouldn't remember her anyway. Why should he? She'd left Phoenix with her family when she was sixteen and, at that age, she'd been a bookish, mousy, overly shy girl.

He might not remember her but she'd never quite forgotten him. At eighteen Bram Hunter was the most devastatingly handsome boy in the school with just enough of a shadowed reputation to intrigue every girl she knew. Including her. Her mother, unlike the mothers of her friends, had never bothered to warn her to steer clear of Bram Hunter, believing Vala was too shy to speak to any boy. Her mother had been right--in a way. But there were some things her mother never found out.

Is it possible Bram recalls that night with the same awful clarity that I do? Vala wondered.

Bram Hunter lounged on his terrace, gazing at Camelback Mountain, absently stroking Sheba, the Siamese draped across his lap. The day was warm and sunny, no more than Phoenix deserved after a week of rain. He hoped the good weather held until Friday when he'd be leaving for the Caribbean.

A squeak from the depths of the house roused the Siamese and she leaped off his lap to hurry inside to her five tiny kittens.

Motherhood had certainly changed Sheba's personality-- tied to her kittens, she'd actually become a worrier. He hoped she'd regain her zany, carefree attitude once her brood was old enough to leave for homes of their own. He'd made mistakes in his life but luckily none of them had been the mistake of tying himself down to a wife and family.

Marriage had never been on his agenda. He yawned and settled back on the lounge. In less than a week he'd be scuba-diving off St. Amaris, one of the islands the tourists hadn't yet found. He hated crowds. He wouldn't mind a stray blonde or two to spice up the night life, though, the kind of woman who wasn't looking for any real involvement, just a
few laughs. He smiled and closed his eyes.

The phone rang, jolting him. Muttering a curse, he
rose and padded into the house, aware he'd left the answering machine turned off.

"Hunter," he growled into the phone.

"Uh, hello," a woman said. "This is Bram Hunter, isn't it?" He didn't recognize her voice.

He grunted an assent. When she didn't immediately continue, he said impatiently, "What was it you wanted?"

"I was wondering if you--that is, do you remember me?" Bram rolled his eyes. Guessing games. He hated cutesy. "How the hell do I know?"

There was a pause and then she said, "I'm Vala Channing."

Vala. For a long moment he forgot to breathe. She was the last person in the world he'd ever expected to hear from. "Yes," he said finally. "I remember you."

"I wasn't sure you would. I'm in Apache Junction and I happened to see your name on a guide list."

He frowned. "I thought I took my name off that list." "Well, it was crossed off."

After another pause, he said, "Are you living in Arizona now?"

"No. Davis and I--he's my son--are just visiting here."

So she was married. "Your husband's not with you?"

"I'm divorced."

I'm, not we're. Most people said we're divorced. Was that significant? Bram shook his head. Why should he care how she worded it?

"I was wondering," she added, then paused again. Evidently Vala hadn't conquered her shyness.

"What were you wondering?" he asked.

"Well, I know you're a guide. Would you be willing to tell me something about Superstition Mountain? Davis and I are planning to hike in there and I'm not much of a camper."

Bram scowled and his annoyance showed in his voice.

"The Superstitions are no place for amateur campers."

"I've already been told that. I was hoping you'd give me a few pointers."

Her persistence reminded him of another characteristic of Vala's--she was shy but stubborn. What the hell, he had time to spend a
n
hour or so talking to her--it would take at least that long, he supposed, to convince her to try camping somewhere else. Besides, he was sort of curious to see what she looked like after fifteen years.

That didn't mean he was going to ask her into his home. Very few people even knew where he lived, much less got invited to visit. "You're in Apache Junction?" he asked.

"Yes."

"There's a cafe in town called Auntie Mame's. I'll meet you there in about forty-five minutes, okay?"

After hanging up, he didn't move for a minute or two. Vala Channing. At sixteen she'd been slender and fair-haired. Though not exactly pretty, there'd been something about her that caught his attention--maybe the somewhat exotic upward tilt to her blue eyes, eyes that reminded him of a spring sky, clear and unclouded. Or maybe the hesitant smile that lit her face on all-too-rare occasions.

It wasn't that he'd thought of her often over the years, because he hadn't. But, somehow, that one night they'd been together stuck in his memory with the tenacity of a cactus spine. And equally barbed.

In the booth at Auntie Mame's, Davis slurped the last of his chocolate shake through the straw and then eased back in his seat. "I still don't see why we can't just buy a tent and stuff and start off," he said. "We've got a map, haven't we?"

"Superstition Mountain isn't like the Catskills back home," Vala said. "I want Mr. Hunter's advice before we go any farther." What she'd actually hoped was that, once Bram recognized her name, he might offer to be their guide even though he'd taken his name off the list.

His gruffness on the phone had convinced her that would never come to pass. In fact, after his go-away-and-don't- bother-me manner, she was surprised he'd even agreed to meet her here--a meeting she was looking forward to with both anticipation and trepidation. She touched her hair with nervous fingers and ran her tongue over her lips. Did she have time to go
to
the ladies room to check her lipstick again? Probably not, but there ought to be a mirror somewhere in her shoulder bag....