A Certain Kind of Hero (17 page)

It was she who broke the silence, because well enough wasn't well enough if it had to be left alone.

“This complicates things, doesn't it?”

“How so?”
Damn,
he
had
to ask. And then he couldn't help dipping the damn question in cold brass. “What do you want to make of it, Raina?”

“Nothing,” she said tightly.

Nothing at all?
Have it your way, then. “It's as simple or as complicated as you want it to be.”

“What about you?”

He stared at the curve of the tent roof. “I'm flexible.”

“Really.” She covered herself with a corner of the sleeping bag. “Then I certainly appreciate the use of the condom.”

“There's no other way these days, right?”

“Right.” She turned her face toward the wall. Her throat felt scratchy, lined with sand. “Funny. I got used to thinking none of that pertained to me, but now…” She swallowed hard against the encroachment of awful heartache. “Now I guess it does.”

“I guess so.” He jammed his hands beneath his head and stared hard at the nylon ceiling. “Some women buy their own now. Dutch treat.”

She shut her eyes tightly. “I'll keep that in mind.”

T
here was a part of Gideon's brain that was fully aware of the fact that sex was one of life's great wild cards. It was the great complicater. The gate to heaven, the road to hell. He didn't know how many times he had to prove that to the other part of his brain. One look at the woman sitting as far away from him as the pickup's bench seat would allow should have been all the proof necessary. If you wanted to get somewhere with a woman, leave sex out of it, at least until the trapdoor to hell was safely frozen over.

Things had changed between Raina and him, and the reason was clear. Raina had broken her own rules.

He'd never been quite sure what the rules were. He'd learned one or two hard lessons during his tougher years, and he'd taken those into account. Otherwise, he thought he'd read all the signals right. But, damn, for a while there she'd turned into a wounded bird. After the rain, they'd paddled back to Jim's place, with her in retreat and him walking on eggs. Her
conversation had been soft and thready. She'd admired every bird, every bee, every bend in the waterway, like someone taking her last look at the world. When they got back to Pine Lake he half expected her to ask him to drop her off at a convent, or maybe a tomb, where she was ready to inscribe the epitaph herself:
Gideon Defender loved me to death.

But she'd mended her own wings by the time they'd reached his house. The melancholy clouds disappeared from her eyes, replaced by distant, clear-day blue.
Distant
was the key word. Things had definitely changed.

Most women were hard to figure, but this one was a doozy.

When they pulled up to the house, Gideon was surprised to find his driveway blocked by a Jeep bearing the official seal of the Pine Lake Chippewa Band. This must have been a piece of the plan he'd forgotten.

“Wonder what Carl's doing here.” He said it casually, but Raina's eyes turned anxious. “He's not a cop,” Gideon hastened to assure her as he set the pickup's parking brake. “He's one of our game wardens. He gets out to the Skinner place pretty often, so I asked him to kinda discreetly make sure things were going okay with Peter.”

She flung the pickup door open. “I knew it was a mistake to leave him with—”

“Hold on now.” Gideon hurried up the driveway to catch up with her. “Let's not jump to any conclusions. Peter must be here, too. Otherwise Carl couldn't have gotten in the house.”

They walked in on what appeared to be nothing more than a friendly card game, with Peter hosting his grandfather and Carl Earlie at the kitchen table. All three looked up when Gideon and Raina came in, but the greetings were ominously guarded.

“We figured we'd save you a trip out to Arlen's,” Carl explained as he threw in his poker hand. “I'm gonna give Arlen a ride home.”

Peter looked at his watch. “It's Sunday night. You said you'd be back Sunday afternoon. These guys have been waiting here for two hours for you to get back.”

“We got caught in the rain.” Gideon turned a chair away from the table and straddled it, bracing his forearms on the backrest. This was a switch. A kid watching the time on his parents.

Parent.
Parent and guardian. Whatever. The damn complications came in battalions.

“Did you wear your grandfather out?” Raina asked as she stepped close behind her son's chair.

He looked up at her and shrugged. “We did a lot of stuff. Spent a lot of time at the powwow. I learned how to do a dance.”

The chin jerk he made toward his grandfather was a new mannerism for Peter. It seemed perfectly natural to everyone in the room but Raina, who knew him better than he knew himself and noticed every change in him lately with a mother's mixed feelings. He was growing up. He was forging new connections. He was slipping away.

“What was that dance,
nimishoomis?
” Peter asked.

“Traditional grass dance.” Arlen shared his nod of approval with Peter, then Gideon. “He did pretty good. We started making him a bustle.”

“And the other thing I'm supposed to tell you is that I—” Peter cast a quick glance Carl's way, checking to see whether the man had changed his mind about the requirement. Clearly he hadn't. “Well, Tom and Oscar and me went out kinda late, and we had a couple beers.”

Raina's response was automatic. “Oh, Peter, you
didn't.
”

“No big deal,” Peter complained. “Nobody got drunk or anything.”

“I was in bed sleepin',” Arlen reported. “I told him not to be sneakin' out. He didn't listen. Looks like he wants to learn some things the hard way.”

“This isn't going to work, Peter.” Raina laid her hands on Peter's wiry shoulders, while he hung his head, staring at the five cards he would never play.

Carl shoved his chair back from the table and rose to his feet. “Listen, I'm gonna get out of the way here and take Arlen on back.” He turned to Gideon. “The other thing is, Rosie said to tell you that Judge Half wants to see everybody over at the court tomorrow afternoon.”

The news hit Raina like a wrecking ball. “That hardly gives me time to get hold of my attorney.” She wanted it over, but she wasn't ready. She noticed the ace in Peter's hand, and she wondered where hers was. She had no cards to play, in fact. Nothing but a mother's commitment to her child.

Gideon spoke quietly, avoiding her eyes. “All he'll be able to do is advise you, Raina.”

“You mean I won't be represented?”

“You'll be heard,” he said impatiently, as though she were speaking out of turn and in front of the wrong people.

But a rising sense of desperation kept her going. “I don't like the way that sounds.”

“Call your attorney.” His curt gesture smacked of resentment, even though his tone was utterly controlled. “You're right. You should have an expert around to advise you.”

“There's something else,” Carl announced officiously. He straightened his uniform, tucking his shirt into the back of his pants. “Arlen here says there's been some kind of secret meetings going on between the Strikes Manys and some of
them big-shot sportsmen. They're all hot against the settlement, so they're talking about finding ways to defeat it so the treaty ends up in court.”

“Where the sportsmen are betting we'll lose, and the Strikes Manys are betting we'll win. Makes for a strange alliance, doesn't it?” Gideon shook his head. “Why are you telling us this, Arlen? I thought you didn't approve of the settlement.”

“I don't. But the Strikes Manys are fooling themselves real bad, talking with those guys about working together. We picked our leaders, even though some of us never voted for certain ones.” He gave Gideon the loaded eye. “But they're who we've got, and they're Indians, at least.”

“Those damn rednecks just wanna use the Strikes Manys to make it look like they're not against Indians,” Carl said. With a sardonic chuckle, he added, “Hell, they
love
Indians. Some of their very favorite people are Indians. Like those guys who play for Cleveland and Atlanta.”

The tension eased with the three men sharing in the bitter humor over one of their least favorite institutionalized insults to Natives.

“Dealing with those guys is gonna mean trouble for all of us. You need to read up on Red Cloud and Spotted Tail,” Arlen told Gideon in passing as he angled toward the door.

“What for?” Gideon challenged kiddingly as he saw the guests out. “They were ornery Sioux.”

“They were Indians. And they spent a lot of years trying to compromise with the white government.” Arlen summed up his parting bit of wisdom with a solemn nod. “Some things change, some things don't.”

After Arlen had left with Carl, Gideon figured it was time for a serious family-type powwow—the kind he'd rarely experienced, up until this summer. Raina and Peter were the
ones who knew the ropes with this family business, but she was on edge, and he was sulking.

“How about some sandwiches?” Gideon suggested when he joined them in the kitchen.

“Not hungry,” Peter mumbled, awaiting the inevitable cave-in with studied apathy.

“No, thank you.” His mother folded her arms tightly under her bosom, her prestorm stance equally well rehearsed.

“All right, then, let's all—” Gideon glanced back and forth between them “—have a seat.”

“Let's just get it over with,” Peter suggested.

Gideon shook his head. “I don't know about your mom, but I'm not gonna lay into you over this sneaking out, Peter. Things are a little up in the air right now, and you took advantage of the situation. I don't feel real good about that, do you?”

“It was no big deal,” the boy reiterated stubbornly. “If Carl hadn't come along, nobody woulda had to know.”

“Listen, if this all goes okay tomorrow—and I really don't think we'll be looking at any big upsets—you and me are gonna have a little talk about some of the ruts along the road to manhood.”

Peter rolled his eyes and sighed dramatically. “Not
this
again.”

“Yeah,
this
again.” Gideon's hand was allowed to rest on the boy's shoulder only briefly before Peter shrugged it away. “You don't need to be drinking now, Peter. You've got too much goin' for you. Booze can only get in the way.”

“You got another false tooth to scare me with?” He indicated Gideon's lower half by way of the chin jerk he was quickly perfecting. “Maybe a wooden leg or something?”

“No, but I can bar the window and sleep outside your door, if that's what it takes.”

“You'd be a fire hazard.” Peter saw the chance to play both
ends against the middle and, like any normal kid, he used it readily. “Anyway, with any luck, we'll be goin' back home. Right, Mom?”

The question took Raina by surprise. Suddenly she had her little boy back. Her prodigal son was ready to be taken home. And, just for a moment, all that mattered was that he was ready, and that he had turned to her.

Tears scalded the back of her throat. If she spoke, they would surely surge upward and reduce her to an emotional wreck. She had no answers, anyway, but she gave a quick nod and opened her arms to him.

That he permitted a hug—even returned it—felt like something of a victory, particularly when Gideon's pat on the shoulder had been turned away. Oh, God, she was a poor excuse for a woman of character! But Raina was willing to take her small triumphs however they presented themselves these days.

 

The next morning Peter was up earlier than Gideon expected. He himself was up earlier than he wanted to be, after last night. He would have given anything to have been able to take Raina to bed and make the world—mostly
his
world—go away for her. But, of course, he was dreaming with his eyes wide open on that score.

Peter was helping himself to a bowl of the Lucky Charms he'd asked Gideon to stock for him. “Mom's downstairs, sleeping on the sofa in the den,” he reported.

Gideon headed for the coffee fixings. “Let's try to be real quiet. She hasn't been sleeping very long. Couple of hours, tops.”

“She's been up all night?”

Gideon nodded solemnly.

“Did she think I might run off or what?”

“She just wanted to stay close by.” Gideon shoved the pot under the faucet and ran some water. “She's a strong woman, your mother. She's worried about how all this is affecting you. You need to give some thought to what it would be like to be in her shoes right now.”

“And not cause any trouble.”

“That would help.” For a kid Peter's age, it was probably a lot to ask, considering the circumstances. “It's gonna work out.”

“You think so?” It was a rhetorical question, quickly followed by the real concern. “Yeah, but how?”

“We'll know soon enough.” Gideon turned the coffeepot on, then turned to watch Peter slurp spoonfuls of tiny pink and blue marshmallows into his mouth. “Your grandfather didn't have a chance to make a sweat with you?”

Cheeks puffed out like a foraging squirrel's, the boy grunted, “Uh-uh.”

“That's maybe what we should've done this weekend. Might have kept us all out of trouble.”

“You guys haff any twouble up in the Noth Wooz?” Two big gulps slid audibly down Peter's throat. “Run into any bears?”

“No bears.”

“Too bad.” The spoon clattered in Peter's bowl. “How come you don't have a beard?”

“What?” From bears to beards? Gideon rubbed his chin as if there had been some hair there just a minute ago, then pulled a dubious scowl.

“I was just thinking—my dad didn't have much of a beard, either.” On his way to the sink, Peter stopped to check out the reflection of his profile in the toaster. “Do you think I'm ever gonna get a beard?”

“Why? You wanna be shavin' every day?”

“I was kinda wondering when I might start.”

Gideon shrugged. “I maybe shave once a week.”

“I noticed my grandfather doesn't have much of a beard, either.” Peter gave his cereal bowl a hasty rinsing.

“Natives usually don't. It works out pretty good. We don't have to go around with little pieces of toilet paper stuck to our faces.”

“Huh?”

Gideon chuckled. “I hear some of those muscle-bound pinup boys shave their chests, too. So if you ever wanna be a muscle-bound pinup boy, you've got the Chippewa advantage.”

“I don't care about chests. It's just that some of my friends are starting to shave—” Peter did a double-take and let out a belated hoot. “You gotta be kidding. They
shave
their
chests?
”

“Strange world, isn't it?” Gideon smiled, pleased with the lead-in he'd inadvertently given himself. “A guy needs the old tried-and-true ways just to help him keep his head straight.”