I pulled back, startled. He’d caught me off guard. I’d almost let myself flop against him and I’d responded to his lips for a dangerous couple of seconds. “Sky.”
His voice deepened, growing husky. “I’m sorry. I just wanted you to know…if anything happens to me…”
Callie reappeared in the doorway with the oils. “What did I miss? If anything happens to you, what do you want her to know?”
Sky glanced at Callie, then locked eyes with me. “I want her to know I love her. I’ll always love her.”
Callie sat beside me on the bed. “We know, Sky. And I love you too, Marcie. Always have, always will.”
A deep voice came from the hall and a shadow fell across the room. “Nice to know you’re all so in love with each other.”
I looked up.
Quinn leaned against the doorjamb with arms crossed, frowning. His dark black hair hung loose on his shoulders, and he wore the turquoise bolo that matched his eyes. “Surprise.”
Chapter 11
Had he seen the kiss?
“Quinn.” I hopped off the bed as if it burned my skin, sputtering. “What are you doing here?”
Quinn’s eyes raked across Sky’s prone form, then returned to me. “I missed you.” For a second, his veiled expression dropped, and his eyes swam with hurt. In a flash, however, they challenged Sky. He stared at me, Sky, and back again. “So, what? You’ve all moved in together?”
Callie giggled the way she did when she was extra nervous. “No, silly. We just had an incident and Sky got hurt and…”
I touched her shoulder to stop her flow of words. “Don’t be ridiculous, Quinn. My friends came to dinner, that’s all. And we had a break-in.”
Alarm flitted over his face. “A break-in? Where?”
Sky opened his eyes, which had closed the minute Quinn appeared in the doorway. “The shed. They took all your stuff, man. Sorry. Your wood. Your tools. And he came back tonight for another go at it.”
I walked to Quinn’s side. Emotions scrambled through me. Anger. Hurt. Relief to see him. Embarrassment that he’d caught me on Sky’s bed. Humiliation that he might have seen the kiss. Anger again. How dare he sneak up on me? “It’s a good thing Sky was here. He stopped the guy. And got banged up pretty good in the process.”
Quinn let down his armor. His shoulders relaxed, his jaw lost some of its tension. “Thanks, man.” He stepped back into the living room. “Can I speak with you, Marcella?”
Nervous as a skittering filly, I followed him into the room. “Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?”
“I tried to. I called all day. Your cell doesn’t work up here, so I left three messages on the landline.”
I glanced toward the blinking red light. “Oh.”
“You didn’t notice?”
“Uh, no. I was out most of the day. Up at Mountain Memories with Roberta.”
“Oh?” He looked curious. “All day?”
“Most of it. Then I shopped at Charlie Johns.”
He glanced at the mess in the kitchen. I still hadn’t put away all the groceries. “So I see.”
“I saw McCann.” I groped for anything I could use to change the subject away from Sky.
“Really? Where?”
“At the café. He’s part of the investigation.”
“The serial killer? I heard about it on the radio on the way up here.”
“Yeah.” I brewed and poured him a cup of decaf without asking and handed it to him the way he liked it. “Here you go.”
“Thanks.” He took the cup as if it were the most natural thing in the world. “I heard about the killings. That’s part of the reason I came up here.”
“Part of the reason? What’s the rest?”
“I wanted to explain. I didn’t do a very good job of it this week.”
“Explain what?”
“About Kimi. About my reasons for letting her go.”
I got myself a cup of coffee and we settled on the couch. Not close together, but not completely apart.
I crossed my arms tight in front of my chest. “You know how much you hurt me,” I said, my voice shaking.
He set his cup on the side table. “It wasn’t really about you. About us.”
“Are you kidding?” My voice rose an octave. “It was totally about us. About our new family.”
He looked at me with a serene expression, totally opposite to how I felt. “Marcella. Our Seneca nation is falling apart. When there’s a nearly full-blooded Seneca girl like Kimi who can be raised by another Seneca family… one who can be taught our traditions, among our people…I felt like giving her up was the most generous thing we could do. You know, to let her be raised in a loving family who would be sure to pass on our traditions.” He brushed back a lock of dark hair that had fallen over his eyes.
I sighed. “What really upset me was how little you cared about me. You didn’t care that it ripped my heart out, Quinn.” I stood and paced. “You knew how much I loved her. Love her. I love that baby.”
He raised a hand in the air. “Of course you love her, babe. So do I. But you were sort of…sort of blinded by that love.”
“Blinded?”
“You didn’t think of her welfare. You thought more about your own happiness.”
“Her welfare? Really?” I felt my insides go cold. It traveled from my gut, swirled around my heart, and landed on my face, which hardened into a mask. “Why don’t you think we could have taught her all she needed to know about your heritage? Why wouldn’t we be good enough for her?”
Quinn stood now, facing out the window toward the river. “At our house she would go to the local school, pick up habits and knowledge from local teens with very different moral codes. She wouldn’t be part of ceremonies or events that take place every week on the rez. She’d be isolated.” He swept a hand toward the river. “She wouldn’t feel like a true Seneca citizen.”
I still didn’t see his point. He really cared more for his heritage than me. It hurt me so badly, I could barely breathe. “How do you even know that Fred’s sister would give her a good home, anyway?”
“I know the family. They are good people.”
I clenched my hands tightly together. “Better people than me?”
He didn’t answer.
“Well, then. That explains it.” I tossed a pillow at him and pointed to the couch. “Don’t even try to come in my room tonight. You can sleep upstairs or on the couch. And tomorrow, I’m volunteering at Project Hope. So don’t expect to see me in the morning.”
He turned, looked as if he were about to say something, but pressed his lips together. “Volunteering with Sky, huh?”
I stalked to the kitchen and slammed my cup on the counter. “Yeah. With Sky. With Callie. With a lot of people.”
“I guess you don’t need me up here then, do you?”
I choked out the words. “I guess not.”
He grabbed his coat and put it on. “I’ll stay at a hotel tonight. I was hoping to bring you and Dak home. But it looks like you’d rather not come with me.”
“That’s right.” I struggled to hold back the tears.
“Okay. I’ll, uh…I’ll see you, uh…sometime. I guess.”
I turned my back on him and winced when he slammed the door.
Chapter 12
“Marcie? Are you okay?” Callie gingerly poked her head out of the bedroom doorway. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to listen, but…”
I waved her into the room. “How could you not hear?” I said. “I wasn’t exactly whispering.”
She tossed me a rueful smile. “Sky’s asleep.” She shut off the light and closed the door. “We talked about it. We’re staying with you tonight. Is that okay?”
“It’s more than okay.” I sank onto the couch beside Dak, who’d surprisingly slept through the whole Quinn visit. I was glad he did. He got upset when we had words, and the last thing I wanted to do was hurt my dog. There was enough hurt going around without adding to it.
I
’d cried so much for the past few days that as much as I felt like I needed to let it out again, my eyes stayed dry. All of the moisture seemed wrung out of my body. I just lay my head in my hands. “I’d be scared if you left. That guy might come back.”
She slid onto the couch next to me and kissed my cheek. “Don’t worry, sweetie. We won’t desert you.”
I cuddled up to her. “Thanks. I don’t know what I’d do without you right now.”
“Let’s watch a movie and forget about everything,” she said, slipping an arm through mine. “Just like the good old days.”
A small smile crept over my lips. “I bought the popcorn, if you wanna pick a movie.”
She jumped up and started to go through the pile in the cabinet under the TV. “How about The Station Agent? Is that a good one?”
I gave her a thumbs-up from the kitchen, taking the popcorn out of the microwave as quietly as I could before the beep sounded.
Sky emerged from his bedroom, bleary-eyed. “Is he gone?” He looked around the area, his shaggy hair shifting over his eyes. “I thought I heard a car drive away.”
“He is.” I poured the popcorn into a big plastic bowl. “He went to a hotel.”
Sky dragged a blanket behind him that he’d wrapped around his shoulders. “Did he see us?” His eyes filled with worry. “I’m so sorry, if he did. I didn’t want to cause more trouble between you.”
“I’m not sure what he saw. He didn’t say anything about it.”
I stared up at his sweet face. So rugged, yet so full of compassion. He’d suffered so much in life. More than anyone in our normal circle of friends and family could expect to endure for ten lifetimes. Yet he remained kind and strong.
He wobbled toward the wall and I hurried to his side. “Whoa. Steady there.” I helped him stand for a minute until he caught his balance. “Should you be up so soon?”
He flashed a blinding smile at me. “I want to see the movie, too.”
“Okay.” I took his arm and guided him to the couch, where Callie and I made him comfortable on one end with pillows and his quilt.
“Do you want orange or berry vitamin water?” I paused near the fridge. They gave me their orders and I brought the popcorn and drinks to the living room. “Here we go.”
Callie popped the DVD into the player and turned down the lights, leaving room for me in the middle of the couch. I stoked the fire one more time, threw a few logs on, and settled between brother and sister.
We fit just right, like the old days when we used to sit side-by-side on the dock at night.
Sky unfolded the quilt and spread it over the three of us.
I set the popcorn on my lap so everyone could reach, and settled back to try to forget.
As much as I loved the movie The Station Agent—no, adored the movie—I found it hard to concentrate. I’d seen it at least a dozen times, and had fallen in love with the characters from the first viewing. I could almost repeat every line, and I enjoyed seeing Callie and Sky laugh and tear up in the right places. It was their first time.
But I couldn’t tear my mind away from Quinn and the feeling we were slipping away from each other. A sinking feeling overcame me, and sadness crept into every cell of my body.
I don’t know if it was our special bond, or if I exuded such pain that it filled the room and made my pals from childhood understand, but when we’d finished the popcorn, both Callie and Sky each took one of my hands, and held them for a long time without saying a word.
I glanced at Callie from time to time. With her dark hair and violet eyes, she was really pretty in a haunted sort of way. But lately, since she’d met Copper and had come out, that wounded look had been slowly replaced by the steady joy of a woman in love. She’d loved me that way a long time ago, and I’d been such a selfish, typical teenage girl that I’d never caught on until years later when I read her diary.
I know, it’s awful to read someone else’s diary. I read it to help find a clue when she’d been kidnapped. But we got her back, safe and sound, and all was good. Nevertheless, it had been an awakening for me. Painful. I felt so bad that I’d never been there for her during her formative years when she realized who she was, and hadn’t helped her while she suffered in silence—for decades.
I woke at midnight with my head on Sky’s chest, one arm flopped over him and his big hand on my back. With a start, I opened my eyes, but didn’t move. I lay there for a few minutes, enjoying the simple contact of man and woman. Softly, quietly, I extricated myself and stood up. Callie snoozed on one end of the couch, her feet curled up under her. I turned off the TV and grabbed another blanket, tucking her in. She mumbled and shifted, but didn’t wake up. Sky’s blanket had fallen to the floor, so I did the same for him. He slid down on the couch and tried to lie sideways, but his feet fell off.
I touched his shoulder. “Sky? Want to go back to your bed?”
He looked at me with bleary eyes. “Huh? Oh. Okay.”
I led him to the bedroom and tucked him in. He reached for me before I left. “Stay with me,” he mumbled.
“I can’t, big guy. Gotta sleep in my own bed.” My heart thrummed hard beneath my ribs. I leaned over to kiss his cheek. A sisterly kiss. A chaste kiss. Nothing to feel guilty about this time.
Before I turned off the light, he started snoring softly.
“’Night, Sky.” I padded to my own room next door, closed the door, and slipped under the comforter where Dak had already warmed the bed. “Move over, schnookums. Make room for your mama.”
He moved closer to the window. I lay one arm over his big, furry body and snuggled close to him. “Night, Dak.”
He shoved his cold nose under my arm, and we both fell asleep.
Chapter 13
I woke with a start at six the next morning. Memories flooded back to me. Losing Kimi. Fighting with Quinn. The break-in. The serial killer.
The kiss.
I’d woken up several times during the night, thinking about it. Guilt and longing had invaded my dreams.
As I lay in the cold bedroom under my comforter, stroking Dak’s soft ears, I wondered about my future. Would I patch things up with Quinn? Was it possible? Probable? Could we get past this?
I seriously wondered. If he’d seemed sorrier for my loss, I might have had more hope. But he seemed so sure of himself, so confident that what had happened to us had been some altruistic act for the good of the child.
And that “selfish” comment had really burned me.
How could he call me selfish, when I’d dropped everything that had previously filled my life to care for Kimi? I’d fed her, bathed her, taught her words, washed her little clothes with care, and positively doted on her.
I’d loved her.
I still loved her.
After some more righteous self-pity, I forced myself up and put on some flannel-lined jeans, a long-sleeved thermal shirt, and a sweatshirt. I wouldn’t look elegant this morning, but I’d be warm. I laced up my boots and quietly opened the door.
Callie still slept on the couch, her head and entire body tucked under the quilt. I turned up the electric heat so I wouldn’t wake her up clanging the wood stove. I slid into my parka and beckoned Dak to follow me out the front door. He padded behind me and I cracked open the door, trying not to make a sound. We slipped outside.
Mist swirled above the river, gray and icy cold. Three or four fresh inches of snow covered the ground. I shivered, pulled up my hood, and walked over the snow with Dak around the side of the house. He quickly took care of business, but before I could head back inside, Copper pulled up in her patrol car.
“Morning!” I trotted to her side when she stepped out, jamming my hands into my pockets. “You’re up early.”
She cracked a tired smile and hugged me. “Been up all night, remember?”
“Oh right, you pulled an all-nighter. Ugh, that must be hard.”
She shrugged. “You get used to it.”
“Sky and Callie are still asleep. Do you want coffe
e?”
“No, thanks. I’m up to here with coffee.” She drew an imaginary line across her chest. “Let’s just take a look at your break-in site.”
I shivered again, and pointed to the shed. “He tore off the lock. Took firewood and tools. And he came back last night.”
“What?” She peered at me over her dark glasses.
“Sky scuffled with him about eight o’clock. Callie saw someone sneaking around out here, and Sky went out to confront him. Problem is, the guy jumped him and conked him on the head. He’s okay. But the creep got away.”
Copper rolled her eyes. “You guys should’ve called me back.”
I nodded. “Probably. But we were thinking more about Sky after that.”
I watched as she took photos and notes. When she was done, I fished the necklace out of my pocket. “I almost forgot. I found this in the dirt last night.”
She frowned. “No good looking for prints on it,” she said. “But that’s okay.”
I smiled apologetically. “It didn’t dawn on me at the time that it might be evidence.”
She twirled it at the end of one finger. “St. Christopher, huh? Think the perp came back looking for it last night?”
“Makes sense to me. There wasn’t anything of value left here.” I pointed to the empty tool bench and the meager stack of wood. “But why would he care so much? Who’s gonna get all worked up over some stolen firewood and a few power tools? I mean, what with a serial killer running loose and all. Why would he take the chance to return here, especially when he knew we were in the cabin?”
“Your lights were on?”
“Yeah. And my van and Callie’s Jeep were in the driveway, like they are now.”
She compressed her lips. “Hmm. Maybe this medal has special meaning for him.” She drew an evidence bag out of her pocket. I wondered if she carried them around everywhere. “I’ll keep it for now.”
“Thanks. What’s next?”
She followed me up the back steps and stopped before we went inside, looking back at the shed. “I’m sorry to say there’s not much we can do. All tracks have been obliterated, so we can’t look for prints or tire tracks.”
Tall Pines Mysteries: A Mystery/Suspense Boxed Set Page 74