The Guardian (15 page)

“Ah, the real reason you came in here.” Fala's smile didn't waver, but she snapped, “Just stay out of the way.”

“Can I help while I'm sitting here? Open a can? I cook a mean TV dinner.”

Fala's gaze locked with his and her face colored up as they both remembered the frozen dinners he'd cooked after they'd made love.

“Isn't that right, Fala? You've tasted my cooking.” He shot Fala a surreptitious seductive glance.

“I don't think you can ruin a TV dinner.” Her mouth hardened again and she seemed unable to meet his eyes and looked down at his chin. “You should go back to bed. We'll bring you something to drink.”

Meikoda's smile dropped away, making her cheeks look gaunt and haggard. “It will do him good to sit up.” She looked at Stephen. “We do not have soda, but we have herbal tea. It will help with your healing.”

He nodded, afraid to say no. The old Guardian put him on edge now that he was under her close scrutiny.
There was something in those ancient, perceptive eyes that scraped away one's soul and revealed the true nature within. Nothing could be hidden from those eyes as blue as the sky and as limitless in ability. He hoped she couldn't detect his duplicity, so he forced himself to meet her gaze. But he couldn't stare long into those soul-stealing orbs, so he shifted his gaze between Fala and her grandmother.

Meikoda sensed his discomfort, took pleasure in it with a leathery smirk, then put a kettle on to boil.

She was definitely a snag in his plan, but he'd have to find a way around her to get to Fala. He looked at the six plates Nina had laid on the table and asked, “Expecting company?”

Nina nodded. “Akando is coming to dinner.”

Stephen felt unbidden jealousy tug at him. No. Not jealousy, he reminded himself. He just didn't want Akando anywhere near Fala, not until he got that charm off her neck and he could give her negative suggestions about him. He just had to make sure the whelp kept his distance until he found a way to remove the amulet.

He managed to look confused as he said, “Akando? Who's that?”

“Oh, Fala's fiancé.”

The prick of jealousy again. He hated the sound of
fiancé
anywhere near Fala's name. She was never going to marry him. Still, Stephen didn't like it. He'd take great pleasure in making Fala forget all about her duty and this coming marriage. Indeed, he would.

Fala still faced him, and he noticed the first two buttons of her shirt lay open, exposing a delicate pie-shaped slice of flesh on her chest. He remembered the
taste and feel of its smoothness against his mouth and it made his lips tingle, until he looked lower, to the swell of her breasts where the silver bear charm boldly sat, exposed to his view. The paws were outstretched, claws drawn, fangs poised in a growl. The carved eyes seemed to look right through him, to glow, to mock him. Soon, he'd get it off her neck and destroy it.

As if the old Guardian read his mind, her gaze shifted and flayed him, and he knew the few moments of truce between them had ended. There'd be no more smiles from her. The ease he'd felt only a moment ago died, and he tensed again, pulling back on the emotional armor he usually wore. His leg began to bounce.

The old lady's eyes didn't miss the movement.

He forced his knee to sit still.

She said, “I believe I owe you a debt of thanks for saving my granddaughter. She told me all about your bravery.”

“It's my job, ma'am.”

“A strange job you have, Mr. Winter.” The gaze narrowed, the heavy crow's feet around her eyes stretching. “We did not know that the government knew anything about the supernatural world.”

“They know more than one would expect.”

“Since I expect little of white men, I'm certain the knowledge is only superficial. The white man will never begin to comprehend our world. He does not have the patience for it. He seeks instant gratification. He takes and takes and gives back nothing. He sees with blind, greedy eyes.” Her gaze sharpened to tiny blue rattlesnake slits in a calculating look that pierced him.

“We do the best we can with our limited knowledge.”

“The knowledge of dark magic?”

The old Guardian couldn't possibly know it was only dark magic BOSP could harness and control? Had she sensed the dark magic cloaking him and assumed it was work-related? He tried to read her thoughts….

Suddenly he crashed into her mental blockade and felt dizzy. He grabbed the table so he wouldn't fall out of his chair. His head pounded as it tried to break apart. He'd never come up against such inner power.

The old Guardian raised her gray brows in a challenge as if she knew what she had done to him.

In that instant, he was certain she could have caused him a lot more pain if she had wanted to. Was it a warning? Did she know about his plan? No, she couldn't read his mind. It was protected. But she could suspect him of something devious. He'd have to tread lightly around her.

“Are you okay?” Fala took one step toward him before Meikoda caught her arm and stopped her.

Nina set her coffee down and hurried to his side. “You need help?”

He waited for his mind to recover and squeezed his eyes closed a few times against the pain. Finally he could think clearly again and waved Nina away. “I'm fine. Just a little discomfort.”

“I can fix a tisane for that.” The old woman's smile stretched her parchment skin down in the hollows of her cheeks.

“No, no. I'm fine.” He wasn't about to drink her herbal remedies.

“But you did not answer the question,” Fala said. “Does BOSP use dark magic?”

He decided to take the truthful route and he nodded. “Yes, we use dark magic.”

“You told me you used both.” Her eyes registered uncertainty and distrust.

“I told you I had dabbled in both.”

“Dabbled?” She sliced the potato peeler through the air.

“As a boy, I practiced white magic. Initially, my warlock powers came from white magic.”

The old Guardian interrupted. “You see, the government has trained him to split hairs well.” She sneered at him as she spoke to Fala.

“You're right.” Fala shook her head, the charm on her chest moving in and out as she appeared to struggle with believing him.

“I never lied to you, Fala.” He forced himself to maintain eye contact as he dealt with the falsehood.

“Only twisted the truth,” Fala said.

Nina piped in. “He wasn't really lying, Fala.”

Thank you, Nina.
At least he had one person on his team.

The old woman took down two cups from the cabinet and said, “It matters not. What is done is done.” She touched Fala's shoulder. “My granddaughter seemed to think she belonged in the white man's world, but she has since realized the error of her ways. Haven't you, Fala?”

“Yes,” Fala said in a staunch, resolute tone, but she gulped hard and the light left her eyes.

Stephen disliked seeing her so miserable. And what
had the old hag meant by saying Fala didn't want her life away from the reservation? He knew from having read Fala's thoughts that she was torn between both worlds. He'd been banking on that very desire to lure her away from the old Guardian and the elders to save his brothers. It was too late for that. She wasn't likely to leave the reservation now. But he could work around that.

The old lady spoke. “I must say, you have proven you do your job well, Mr. Winter. In your government job are you used to dealing with the kind of demons you faced with my granddaughter?”

“Never seen anything like them.”

“And you were not afraid?” The blue in the Guardian's eyes turned to grasping talons directed at his face.

Fala butted in. “He wasn't. I told you what he did.”

Her grandmother raised a finger, silencing Fala. “I would like to hear it from him.”

“I was afraid for Fala.”

“You knew just how to subdue the andralia before it rendered the killing bite. How did you know how to do that?”

“Instinct.”

“Then you have good
killing
instincts.”

The teakettle let out a high-pitched whine that punctured the air and almost made Stephen jump. Then he felt only relief at the interruption. Perhaps the inquisition was over.

“The tea is ready,” the old lady said. “Would you like for me to read your future?”

He started to refuse, because he didn't want to know his future, didn't want to know if he lost his brothers or not, and didn't want to know if he could actually harm
Fala. He also suspected the old shaman would tell him what she wanted him to hear. But he said, “Yes.”

She took her time in removing two cups from the cabinet and plopped them before her on the counter. Her movements seemed practiced and calculated as she slowly strained the tea into the empty cup. She spat in the tea leaves, then gazed into them as if she were looking into a crystal ball. The crinkles along her brow pulled and elongated as the cerulean eyes drilled through dimensions and time itself.

Finally she said, “Odd, your future is murky.”

Stephen's brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”

“It usually means there is no preordained pattern for you. The course of your fate has yet to be written in the Book of Life. You can determine your own future.” The old Guardian's expression actually looked open and candid, hiding nothing and telling the honest truth. “You are more fortunate than most.”

Stephen didn't feel fortunate. He had a decision to make. The hardest in his life. Let his brothers live, or let Fala die? One way or the other he lost. He'd regret either decision the rest of his life. He loathed his weakness for allowing himself to care for her. How could he have let it happen? He looked into Fala's beautiful face, the blue in her eyes so vast he could get lost in them, and knew exactly how it happened. His weak human side had lost. And the old Guardian knew that he cared for Fala; it was in the certainty in her shrewd expression. Yes, the paradox was he wasn't fortunate at all, and the old lady in her infinite wisdom knew it.

 

Fala finished whipping the mashed potatoes while Meikoda placed the roast on the table. Fala hadn't been
much help in the kitchen, so Meikoda had finally grown frustrated and handed her the mixer and said, “You can't do much damage with this.”

The potatoes were still lumpy, so she added a splash of milk. And another. “I hope we have enough food for everyone,” Fala spoke over the whirr of the electric mixer, as she watched the lumpy mixture quickly turning to the consistency of melted ice cream. Had she added too much milk?

She listened to Takala tossing the salad, banging the sides of the bowl with the forks. Takala had returned from the cave “too soon,” or so Meikoda had told her. And by the chip still planted squarely on Takala's shoulders and the way she beat on the salad, Fala had to agree with her grandmother, though Takala's skin looked pink and radiant from the cave's sauna-like air. She wore jade-colored hip-huggers and a crewneck sweater. She had spent a long time braiding her hair into coiled plaits around her face. Fala had never seen her looking more pretty, more feminine or more irritated.

Takala stopped tossing the salad long enough to say, “It will be fine. Aden never eats much.”

“It's not Aden I'm worried about,” Fala said. “It's Akando. He eats like a starved dog.” Aden was Akando's brother. He had arrived with Akando, his two children in tow, a boy of four and a girl of two. She could hear Nina playing with them in the living room.

Takala threw some croutons into the bowl. “I'd worry about Mr. Fed in there if I were you. He may be wounded, but the man looks like he can eat.”

Meikoda said, “We'll have enough for everyone.”

“Still, Akando could have let us know he was bringing
Aden with him,” Fala said. There was no bitterness in her voice; it was just a statement. She didn't mind the inconvenience of the unexpected dinner guests, because out of Akando's three sisters and four brothers she liked Aden best, although the tragic death of his wife two years ago had caused him to withdraw from everyone. His other siblings were married with children, thirty family members in all. Their weekly dinner gatherings looked like bingo night at the reservation's recreation hall. That was another thing Fala bemoaned. She liked the intimacy of having two sisters and her grandmother. When she married Akando she'd be marrying a small tribe. Fala made a face at the mixer, gave up on the potatoes she'd ruined and turned it off.

“You should expect that from men, Fala. They never think beyond themselves.” Meikoda made sure the foil covering the roast was tightly wrapped around the serving platter.

Fala thought of Stephen's last kiss. That had been a selfish kiss. He knew she shouldn't be kissing him, that she had to marry Akando, but he'd forced it anyway. She had protested, too, but the moment he'd pulled her into his arms she'd turned helpless and wanted the contact more than he did.

And why had he come into the kitchen, making them laugh? She had no idea he had a sense of humor. Chalk it up to one more mystery about him. Granted it hadn't lasted long, but she couldn't forget how relaxed and teasing he'd been, the softening of his expression and the openness thawing the ice in his eyes. It only made him that much more attractive—and off-limits.

Fala groaned inside. Meikoda was right. Men
were
self-centered. And why had Stephen lied to her about the type of magic he practiced? And why wouldn't he leave? He'd saved her life, done his duty. But no, he had to hang around, trying to be helpful in the kitchen, making her laugh, shooting her those sensual, devouring looks of his. All she could think about was being in his arms again, having his hands on her body.

A ripple of desire shot through her, and she frowned. This was impossible. She couldn't deal with him being so close to her and not being able to touch him. She had tried to ignore him. But that hadn't worked, either. He had stayed in the kitchen most of the afternoon, though he'd grown quiet after Meikoda read his tea leaves. A part of her wanted him to leave because she had to marry Akando and get used to the idea and Tumseneha would definitely try another attack. But there was a part of her that craved his attention and nearness and wanted to bury herself in him. It was driving her crazy.