Stormwalker (13 page)

I suddenly wanted more than anything to get on Mick’s Harley with him and tell him to take us wherever the road led. We’d done that before, riding all day, making love all night, sleeping in some hotel in the sunshine until we got hungry enough to get up and find food.

I wanted to taste that life again.

“Fremont get a ride home all right?” Mick asked me.

“Yeah, he’ll be fine. I think we cured him of going after skinwalkers.”

“Good.” Mick’s eyes were blue again, not the solid black or fiery red they’d been during the fight.

The way he looked at me brought back every reason I’d fallen in love with him. I was sweaty from running, had reddish dust creasing my skin, and my hair was tangled. I probably had chocolate on my lips too. And still he looked at me as though he wanted to devour me.

“I’m not leaving you, Janet,” he said softly.

I didn’t want him to. I selfishly wanted him to stay and make me feel safe, protected, wanted.

“I’m too tired to argue about it.” I rubbed my hand through my hair, feeling it dusty too. “We can argue some more in the morning. I need a shower.”

Mick caught me before I’d taken two steps. He cradled my face in his hands, thumbs softening on my skin. “You are so beautiful, Janet. I don’t think you understand how beautiful you are to me.”

My heart beat faster. I was exhausted and angry, afraid and unhappy. My mother wanted me, and she wanted to kill my friends to get to me. But right now, with Mick in front of me, I just wanted to bury myself in him and forget.

I smoothed my palms down his wet back, sliding fingers beneath his waistband, following the tattoo around his waist. “I don’t mind you telling me,” I whispered.

He smiled, lips curving sinfully, then our mouths met.

I let him ease my shirt off over my head, open my tiny lace bra. He flicked his thumbs across my areolas, making them rise to points, then he leaned down and took a nipple gently between his teeth.

I wanted to make him feel good. He’d fought hard out there, done everything he could to protect me, killed a skinwalker with his bare hands for me. I popped the button of his waistband and slid my body down his leg.

I crouched there in my dusty jeans and boots, naked from the waist up. He hadn’t put on underwear after his shower, leaving his arousal for me readily obvious and accessible.

Mick made a raw noise as I took him in my mouth. I loved the familiar way he tasted, loved the gentle tug of his hand fisting my hair, loved the heat of his skin.

I moved my tongue over his shaft, gratified when he shifted in response. His skin smelled like soap and warm water, a scent I could bury myself in. I reached between his legs and gently cupped his balls, finding his scrotum firm and tight. His hand in my hair moved in answer.

“Janet,” he murmured. “I promise you, I never stopped loving you.”

I didn’t know how to respond to that. He’d break my heart again if I let him, and I was in danger of letting him. I answered by speeding up my feasting on him, and he groaned.

I stayed down on him until he couldn’t stand it anymore, and then Mick lifted me, took me to the bed, and made love to me like a wild thing.

Mick had been gone from the bed when I woke up and seemed to find plenty to do so that we didn’t have a chance to talk alone. I didn’t mind, not really wanting to continue arguing with him.

The painters and carpenters pretty much took over, so I told Mick I had a couple errands to run in town and got out of the way. Taking my rented SUV, I dropped in on Fremont to make sure he was all right. He was exhausted and a little groggy, and he didn’t want to talk about the night before. I asked if there was anything I could do for him, and he said no. He looked so sad and tired that, after making him coffee, the best I could do was leave him alone.

Next I went to the decorators to talk about furniture. I chose pieces designed for comfort and decided to use my own framed photographs as artwork. I could commission other Native American artists like Jamison to create art-works for the hotel as well, which I could also offer for sale to the tourists. I liked the idea of providing a way for people who needed the funds to get through the freezing winters the high desert could throw at us. Even these days many Diné had to rely on wood-burning stoves as their only source of heat.

The problem with my decision was that I’d sent all my photos not in galleries and gift stores back home to Many Farms for storage. I’d either have to ask someone to drive them down to me, or I’d have to fetch them myself. The thought of walking into the long, low house outside Many Farms made me cringe. Home. Why did I fear it so much?

Next I went to the little phone store outlet and got a replacement for the cell phone that had gotten smashed in the accident. They let me keep my phone number, and I got a phone with more functions for the same price, so at least that worked out.

After that I headed for Paradox, which was somewhat busy today. Tourist season hadn’t officially begun, but visitors had already started arriving in Magellan in search of magic. Several gray-haired women in light-colored clothing wandered through the aisles, staring in curiosity at the packs of tarot cards and displays of crystals, while a woman wearing a pendant of the triple moon of the Goddess calmly filled her shopping basket.

I discussed spells with Heather Hansen, the owner, a witch with a solid grasp of magic and the ethics of it as well. We talked about protection spells and spells to enhance aura reading as I bought more smudge sticks and candles.

Next in my rounds was Hansen’s Garden Center, run by Jamison and Naomi. Naomi, busy in the greenhouse, greeted me with a smile and told me Jamison was in his art studio.

The hogan-like studio in Naomi’s backyard was new, the old one having been destroyed last Christmas during a battle with a skinwalker. Inside Jamison was chipping away at a black stone, but he put aside his tools to greet me. Naomi’s ten-year-old daughter, Julie, had been watching Jamison with great concentration, but she broke off and waved to me when she saw me come in.

“Jamison’s teaching me to sculpt,” she said out loud and in sign language. Julie had been born deaf, but had learned to speak as well as sign.

“What I’m allowed to,” Jamison amended. “Nothing involving sharp tools, or Naomi would take my head off.”

I smiled with Julie, then the three of us chatted for a few minutes about comfortable, mundane things, while Julie taught me a few signs. The little girl thought me backward because I’d never learned sign language, so she made sure to teach me something new whenever she saw me. In return I taught her a couple of Diné words, which she learned with quick precision.

By tacit agreement, neither I nor Jamison mentioned the fight last night in front of Julie. I asked Jamison if I could commission some of his art for my hotel, and told him of my plan to feature the art of local Native Americans. He liked the idea and said he’d work on something special.

That pleased me. Jamison was a well-known sculptor, and his works commanded high prices. Having his art in my lobby could be a nice draw. The highest compliment I’d ever received was when Jamison attended a showing of my photos in a gallery in Flagstaff. The art patrons had gaped to see such a famous artist at a novice’s exhibit, but once Jamison had given my artwork his nod of approval, people lined up to buy my pictures. I’d made a nice pile of cash on that show and gained the confidence to try more.

After we’d run through our art discussion, Jamison sent Julie off to help Naomi. Perceptive Julie rolled her eyes and left the studio. She knew we’d talk about the exciting stuff once she was gone.

“How is Naomi dealing with you being a Changer?” I asked as we watched Julie stride toward the Garden Center. “She thought she was getting a good-looking Diné and ended up with a mountain lion.”

Jamison laughed. He had a warm smile, black hair pulled into a braid, beautiful dark eyes, and a deep, smooth voice. I’d known Jamison since high school, when he’d been kind to me, a scared, messed-up teenage girl. Jamison had some shaman powers, and he’d helped me learn how to control my storm magic. Not only that, but I’d discovered a friend with a warm heart. I’d have fallen in love with him myself, but I was too terrified of hurting people to pursue relationships. Not that Jamison had ever suggested we go out or be more than friends. I wasn’t his soul mate. I’d been happy for him when he met and moved in with Naomi, eventually marrying her. Jamison deserved the love Naomi lavished on him.

“She’s fine with it.” Jamison’s smile made me envious. He and Naomi had a love and a trust that had been tested and stood firm.

I stuck my hands in my pockets, hesitant about broaching the next subject. “Jamison, how did Mick fight the skinwalkers?”

Jamison picked up a cloth and started polishing the black rock he’d been working on. “With some damn good fire magic. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“Did he change into anything? He stripped off, so I wondered . . .”

Jamison shook his head. “I think he just didn’t want to burn up his clothes and have nothing to walk home in.”

I sighed. “It’s embarrassing, Jamison. I sleep with the guy, and I don’t even know what he is.”

“I think he’s some kind of firewalker, as far as I can tell.”

The mirror had called Mick a firewalker, but I’d never heard the term. “So, what is that? Do firewalkers look like dragons?” Dragons might not be real, but that didn’t mean a demon or something couldn’t resemble them.

“I met a firewalker in Mexico, a human, not a shape-shifter. They can tap into fire for their own purposes, bend it to their will, the same way you can with lightning and wind. Mick is similar, but not the same. The firewalker I knew couldn’t conjure fire from nothing. With Mick, it was like the fire was inside him.”

“I’m not an Unbeliever,” I said, frustrated. “Why won’t he tell me?”

“Now,
that
is a relationship issue. Which means you two have to work it out for yourselves.”

“Thanks a lot, Jamison.”

“It’s wisdom I’ve learned the hard way. Don’t keep secrets from Mick and then wait for him to be honest with you. You either trust him with all you’ve got, or you walk away.”

I touched a mountain lion carved from red sandstone that stood prominently in the middle of the room. It was unfinished—the lion’s head and shoulders flowed toward me out of jagged red orange rock.

“This is beautiful. Would you let me display it at the hotel?”

“No.”

The answer was immediate and without thought. “I’ll make you something else,” Jamison said when I looked at him in surprise. “The lion—it’s special to me and Naomi.”

I stroked the animal’s smooth forehead. “I can see that it’s special.” I could feel so too. Its aura was one of strength and wildness and, at the same time, peace. “I’m sure whatever you come up with for me will be beautiful.”

I kept running my fingers over the sandstone as I gathered my courage to broach the next subject. “By the way, if you’re going to Chinle anytime soon, would you mind driving on up to my dad’s to pick up the photographs I have stored there? I want to display them in the hotel when it’s done. I’d pay for your gas and tell them you’re coming so they can get them ready for you.”

Jamison picked up his chisel and turned to his black stone. “No.”

“It’s just that you go home so often, Many Farms isn’t far from you, and I can’t leave the hotel . . .”

I trailed off as Jamison looked at me, his brown eyes intelligent. “You have to go back sometime, Janet. Face your ghosts. Believe me, it’s worth it.”

I wondered what Jamison’s ghosts had been and if he could possibly understand about mine. He looked at me awhile longer before he turned to his stone and gently chipped a bit from it.

I swallowed, thanked him again for agreeing to do a sculpture for me, and left before I started whimpering.