by The Witness
"There's a difference. I'm FBI and you're a civilian and part of a criminal investigation."
"Oh, for heaven's sake! I'm the witness, not the accused. You seem to keep forgetting that. Anyway, I'm sick to death of all this stony silence. I know you don't have a very high opinion of me, and to be honest, I'm not overly fond of you, either. But since we're stuck with each other can't we call a truce for a while and just talk like regular human beings? Is that too much to ask?"
For her trouble she received another of those piercing looks. He lowered his gaze and took another bite. She had about decided he wasn't going to answer when he surprised her by saying, "What do you want to know?"
"Well, for starters, tell me about your mother. What's her name? What's she like."
"Her name was Mary Morning Star Zah. She was tiny and delicately built." He glanced at her again, a look of mild surprise flickering across his face. "Sorta like you."
"You said was. Do you mean...?"
"Yeah. She died when I was seventeen. Anyway, she was small, soft-spoken and shy. I guess it was a case of opposites attracting, because my dad is a big, rawboned man. Tough as old shoe leather and as hard and unbending as they come."
Ah, that explains a lot, Lauren thought. Like father, like son. However, intuition told her she'd best keep that observation to herself.
"How did they meet?"
"Back then, my grandfather was running the ranch. They'd had a poor hay crop that summer due to a drought around Monticello, but farther south they'd had plenty of rain, so my grandfather sent Dad there to buy hay from a Navajo rancher named John Zah. He was my mother's uncle, and she happened to be visiting him at the time."
"Was it love at first sight?"
"I wouldn't know. I wasn't there."
"Very funny." She shot him a reproving look, but she refused to let his sarcasm discourage her. "Well, I happen to think the whole thing is very romantic," she insisted. "It's not every day a man marries a Native American princess and carries her away to his ranch to live happily ever after."
Sam snorted. "Guess again."
"What do you mean?" A troubling thought occurred to her, and she frowned. "How did their families react to the marriage? Surely there weren't any objections?"
"Plenty. On both sides."
"But that's awful."
"Maybe, but both my grandfather Rawlins and my mother's people worried that Mary wouldn't be happy living totally in the white man's world." Sam shrugged. "As it turned out, they were right."
"Oh, no. You mean the marriage didn't last?"
"Nope. She stuck it out as long as she could, but she missed her family and reservation life. I was four when they split."
"Oh, dear. So I guess after that you grew up on the reservation with your mother."
"You'd think so, especially since the Navajos are a matriarchal society that believe the children belong to the mother. But my old man wasn't about to let her take me away from him. Or I should say, from the ranch. I was a Rawlins and his only child, and Rawlins men had worked the Double R for over a hundred years."
Sam's fork clattered against the empty metal plate. He rolled to his feet in one fluid motion and dumped the dishes into the pot of water, then squatted down on his haunches to scrub them.
"I'll wash up later. Please, finish your story," Lauren urged.
He kept on scrubbing, and when he was done with his plate he reached for hers. "There's not much else to tell," he said finally. "Both my parents sought custody, but since the decision was made in the white man's court by a white judge, my father won."
Though he spoke in his usual controlled way there was a harder edge than usual to his voice, revealing his anger and resentment.
"You weren't happy with your father?" she probed.
"I wasn't unhappy." He glanced up at her and his mouth took on a wry twist. "God, don't ever play poker. Not with that face. You might as well have your thoughts printed across your forehead. There's no reason to look so troubled. My dad didn't abuse me or neglect me. We just didn't get along. We still don't." Sam shrugged. "It happens. It's no big deal."
"You quarreled a lot?"
"Locked horns on a daily basis like two bulls."
"Over what?"
"You name it. We couldn't agree on a single thing, and nothing I did pleased him. After a while, I stopped trying." His mouth twisted. "Actually, to tell the truth, I went out of my way to annoy him.
"He hated it when I visited my mother, so I spent a lot of time on the reservation, even after she died. In my teens I started wearing moccasins and let my hair grow long and wore it in a braid just to infuriate him."
"And did it?" Lauren asked quietly.
"Oh, yeah. He ordered me to cut it, but I wouldn't, even though I actually preferred to wear it short. I guess you could say we're both strong-willed."
More like stubborn, Lauren thought, fighting back a smile. Except for taking the skillet outside to rinse it in the snow, Sam finished washing up and sat cross-legged before the fire and picked up the snowshoe again. Tipping her head to one side, Lauren studied him while he worked, her woman's intuitive radar tingling. "You think your father resents your Indian blood, don't you?"
She hadn't meant to voice the thought aloud— somehow it had just popped out before she could stop it—but she knew instantly by the look he flashed her that she was right.
Those dark eyes stabbed into her like icicles and his face seemed to turn to granite. He stared at her in silence for an uncomfortably long time, but finally he went back to weaving fill-line.
Lauren knew she should let the matter drop, or at the very least, change the subject. Sam obviously was not going to answer her question. But for some reason, she just couldn't. "You indicated that your father expected you to take over the ranch someday, but obviously you didn't. Don't you like ranching? Was that the main problem?"
"Damn, you're a nosy little thing, aren't you? Persistent, too."
"I guess I am." Lauren waited, then gently prodded, "Well?"
"Actually, I love ranching. Taking over the Double R was what I always wanted to do, what I assumed I would do someday. Just not on my dad's terms."
"So what happened?"
"After our last big argument, right after I graduated from college, I decided I'd had enough and walked out. Within a week I had applied to the Bureau. That was sixteen years ago. I've never looked back."
"But surely you eventually made up with your father? Please tell me you two are okay now."
"We're not at each other's throats, if that's what you mean. Probably because we don't communicate that often."
"You don't talk to your father?" Lauren stared at him, stunned.
"I didn't say that. I give him a call two or three times a year—usually on his birthday and the holidays."
"When was the last time you visited him?"
"Look, I told you, we don't get along, so what's the point? Every time we're together we just end up in an argument."
"But...he must be an old man by now. How could you—"
"Let it go. It doesn't concern you." Though his voice was soft, its deep timbre carried a warning. So did the steel in his eyes. When he was satisfied that he'd silenced her he went back to work.
"I'm sorry. You're absolutely right, of course. But truly, I wasn't passing judgment. It's just that my father and I were close and I miss him so much and...well...I can't imagine being estranged from him."
"Not all families are the same."
"Yes, of course. You're right. Please forgive me. I shouldn't have stack my nose in."
Clearly he had not expected an apology. He stared at her again, trying to decide if it was genuine and whether or not to accept. Finally he nodded and lowered his gaze once again to his work. "It'll soon be time to turn in. I suggest you take a last trip outside," he said without looking up.
"All right," Lauren agreed in a subdued voice. She rose and fastened the cord around her waist and tied on the snowshoes. She felt terrible about
stirring up such a bitter issue. No matter how much Sam tried to brush the matter aside as unimportant, it was obvious that the rift between him and his father was painful.
Feeling strangely depressed, she slipped out the door and headed for the stand of trees. Odd, how quickly you could become accustomed to something, she mused as she trudged, head-down, through the icy darkness. Only twenty-four hours earlier she had been terrified to trek out here alone, with visions of all manner of wild beasts waiting to pounce on her flickering through her mind. Now it seemed routine. Or maybe she was just too down to care.
Lauren took care of her business in as short a time as possible and hurried back to the cabin. The instant she stepped back inside Sam tossed the bottle of vitamins to her and ordered her to take one.
When she took off the snowshoes, he put aside his project and strapped them on and, without another word, disappeared outside himself, taking the pan of dishwater with him.
Shaking her head, Lauren watched him go. She took the pill then brushed her teeth and slathered lotion over her face and hands. After she brushed her hair, she pulled off her boots and scrambled into the sleeping bag.
Settling onto her side, she stared at the fire, a painful knot of emotion lodged in her chest. Sam was right; his relationship with his father was none of her business. They were not friends, after all. She was merely a witness he'd been assigned to protect. She should just butt out.
Still...she couldn't stop thinking about what he had told her, or help but be sad and horrified that he was estranged from his father.
Like her, Sam had grown up with only a father for most of his life. If anything, that should have drawn the two men closer. It certainly had worked that way with her and her father. No matter how hard Lauren tried, she couldn't conceive of a disagreement so rancorous that you would voluntarily cut yourself off from a parent.
Her own father had been a stickler for perfection and a bit of a slave driver, but she had loved him dearly, and he her. Her chest ached at the thought of the emotional void between Sam and his sole remaining parent. It just wasn't right, she thought, as a huge yawn overtook her.
Lauren settled her cheek into a more comfortable position atop her stacked hands, her eyelids drooping as the day's activities began to catch up with her. She was drifting off when a gust of freezing wind announced Sam's return. Only then did she give a thought to their sleeping arrangement.
The night before she had been too exhausted to worry about that aspect of their situation. Now, however, as she lay with her eyes closed, pretending to be asleep and listening to him moving around the cabin, her nerves began to jump.
She was being foolish, she knew. There was nothing sexual about their sleeping together. It was necessity, pure and simple, just as he had informed her the night before.
The man was an FBI agent doing his job, and that job was to keep her alive, whatever it took. As long as they were stranded in these mountains, that included keeping her from freezing to death.
Besides, he certainly wasn't lusting after her. He couldn't have made it any plainer than he already had that he didn't even like her. She was just a job to him, an assignment. She had nothing at all to worry about.
Despite the pep talk, Lauren lay awake, every muscle in her body tense, waiting for him to slip into the sleeping bag beside her. She heard him shake out a vitamin from the bottle, and a few moments later brush his teeth. After that there was only the crackle of the fire and the moaning of the winds, and a steady, whispery sound. Frowning, she tried to identify the source.
Curious, Lauren opened her eyes a slit, but all she saw was the fire. She raised her head an inch or so and turned it, and discovered Sam, sitting mere inches away, once again fashioning a snowshoe.
"I thought you said it was time to turn in?"
"I want to finish this first. With any luck this storm will pass and we'll need these shoes tomorrow." He glanced up and scowled. "Go to sleep."
Sam saw the offended look that flickered over her face. Then came that proud lift of her chin. "Yessir. Of course. Whatever you say, sir," she snapped. Her head dropped back down and she flounced over onto her other side.
Sam gritted his teeth. Damn. He hadn't meant to snap at her. He was angry with himself. He stared at the top of her head, his mouth grim. Dammit, he couldn't believe he'd actually told her those things. He never talked about his personal life to anyone.
Well, almost never, he silently amended, remembering a tedious, nightlong stakeout he and Todd had been on together years ago. The combination of boredom and sleep deprivation must have numbed his brain. Eventually their desultory talk had turned personal and he had revealed that he and his father had never been on the best of terms. He'd regretted the slip at once, and being one of his few close friends, Todd had known that. Tactfully he'd never mentioned the matter again.
When Lauren had urged him to talk he had gone along with her for a couple of valid reasons. First of all, because she was right. If he got them off of this mountain alive and to a safe place they were going to be together constantly for possibly the next couple of months. It made sense, and it would certainly make their situation more bearable, to establish some sort of casual rapport.
His other reason was less concrete, more a gut feeling he could no longer ignore. Because, God help him, he was actually beginning to believe that she was exactly who and what she claimed to be. Not totally convinced, but getting there.
Sam cursed under his breath. He had pegged her as Carlo's woman because everything pointed in that direction. It had seemed so obvious that he hadn't seriously considered any other possibility. The way he should have. The way he'd been trained to do.
But the longer he was around her the more he realized that there were just too many little things that didn't add up. She was bright and observant and willing to learn and insisted on pulling her weight. That, he realized, stemmed from her determination to be independent. Who the hell ever heard of an independent mistress?
And then there were those exquisite manners of hers. He could easily picture her rubbing elbows with princes and prime ministers and society's upper crust.
Not exactly the qualities you expected to find in a bimbo mistress, or even a lounge piano player.
The trouble was, he hadn't wanted to believe her story. He still didn't. Their situation was too precarious—and too damned close for comfort. If they managed to survive, they were going to be alone together for weeks, maybe even months—just the two of them.
As long as he believed that she was Carlo Giovessi's whore, the sharp pull of attraction he experienced around her was an irritating nuisance, but nothing he couldn't handle. If he accepted that she was the innocent she claimed to be, he wasn't so sure.
In his fifteen years with the Bureau, he'd always kept a professional distance between himself and the witnesses and suspects in all his cases. Not only was it the smart thing to do, it was Bureau policy, and he'd never had a problem with it...until now.
So what was it about this particular woman? What made her different? No logical answer came to mind, and for Sam that just made the situation all the more frustrating.
He was good at solving puzzles. His analytical mind liked to examine all the facts and clues, all the various motivations and possibilities, and piece them together into a complete picture that gave him, if not solid answers, at least a good educated guess.
His reaction to Lauren, however, had nothing to do with logic.
Sam sighed and raked his hand through his hair. He could be in trouble here real fast, he thought with a frown.
He strung the last fill-line and tied it off, giving the knot a hard jerk. He put the finished snowshoe with the others and added more wood to the fire. When it was blazing he looked over his shoulder at Lauren. Fatigue had overcome her anger and she was fast asleep.
Sam tugged off his knee-high moccasins, removed the felt liners and placed them in front of the fire, then lifted the edge of the sleeping bag and slid in beside Lauren.
Turning onto his side, he looped his arm around her waist and fitted the front of his body snugly to the back of hers.
A curling strand of her hair tickled his nose. Sam captured it and tucked it behind her ear. Sighing, Lauren wiggled her bottom and shifted into a more comfortable position.
Sam groaned. He stared down at the top of her head. In the light from the fire her auburn hair blazed. And it smelled wonderful, like wildflowers and shampoo. And woman.
Sam's jaw clenched, and he focused his gaze once again on the fire. Oh, yeah, he was definitely in trouble.
Ten
Sam awoke with a start. Like a stag in the forest, he raised his head, listening.
Something was different.
The fire had burned down to glowing embers and a few weak flames, its faint glow extending no more than a foot or so in front of the hearth. Once again, Lauren lay sprawled half over him, sound asleep, but he knew that wasn't what had disturbed him.
Sam lay motionless, alert, his eyes searching through the darkness around them. Then he saw the patch of moonlight spilling in through the grimy window, and he knew.
It had stopped snowing.
"Dammit!" He shoved Lauren off of him, jerked down the zipper on the sleeping bag, and rolled out, bounding to his feet. Heart pounding, he stuffed the warm felt liners into his knee-high moccasins. How long ago had it stopped snowing? Jesus!
He paused long enough to give Lauren's shoulder a rough shake. "Wake up," he commanded. Hopping on one foot, then the other, Sam rammed his feet into the tall moccasins.
Lauren raised her head and blinked at him as he drew up the drawstrings at the top of his footgear and tied them securely over his pant legs.
"Wha...what is it?" She pushed her hair out of her face and cast a bleary look around, confused. "It's still dark. What're you doing up?" she mumbled.
"Get up. It's stopped snowing. We're getting out of here."
Lauren sat up and looked around, her eyes growing wide and frightened. "We're...we're leaving? You mean...right now?"
"Not right this minute, but soon. First I have to hike back to the plane."