by Cait London
Between those perimeters and the barn and house on the west side lay the farm pond. It nestled in a hollow and mist hovered over it.
Owen saw nothing unusual, but then he remembered Janice had had the same reaction to the pond.
The recent heavy rains had filled the pond. White farm ducks and the Canadian geese swam at one end of the silvery surface, others pecked for food along the bank. “Janice’s nurse sometimes comes down here to feed the birds. We’re getting quite a flock in a short time. The real-estate agent said the pond was natural…most are man-made.”
“Is this the only natural water on the place?” Leona asked suddenly.
The ragged fear in her tone alerted Owen. He glanced around the area again and still found nothing unusual. “No, there’s a stream from a natural rock bluff just beyond those trees, and it leads down to the Kentucky River just over that hill.”
“I didn’t know you lived so close to the river,” Leona whispered unsteadily. Suddenly, she turned to him. “Okay, I’ve had it. Who are you, Owen Shaw? You’re not all Native American, or you wouldn’t have those gray eyes.”
“My people were Blackfoot, though they didn’t keep to the old ways. My parents told me that every so often light eyes turn up in our family, always in the males. Why, does it matter?” Her question surprised Owen; he hadn’t expected his bloodline to make a difference to her. He tried to keep the sharp bitterness from his tone. Unpleasant youthful experiences had taught him that some people still held that red-white difference close.
Leona’s expression suddenly softened. “I didn’t mean it that way. I’m sorry. You told me something of your name, but I’d like to know more. Shaw is English, isn’t it? It’s important that I know your ancestry.”
In another century, “Shaw” had been taken as a tribute to shaman. In his bloodline, the gray-eyed shamans weren’t only medicine men, but their unusual visions linked to elements not known to their people. As a boy, Owen had fought those same troubling images, had stored them away and never wanted to open them again.
Owen wasn’t ready to give up that information just yet. “My family took ‘Shaw’. It’s easier to pronounce. Exactly why do you need to know our ancestry? Has it anything to do with what’s happened to Janice? And why did you react that way to the pond? I need to know why. Janice reacts the same way.”
Leona hugged herself. She watched that pond, as if she expected a terrifying monster to walk out of it. “It could be tied to her—or not.”
Owen studied the streams of mist rising from the pond. To him, the mist was only nature, the water adjusting to the temperature of the air. “Why are you affected by it? Maybe there’s a common link. Janice is definitely certain that you can help her. When we were in your shop, I saw how you could calm and relieve her. She believes in you.”
“She shouldn’t. I’m no spirit woman. You’ve read about my family. I’ve never wanted any part of being an intuitive, a clairvoyant, an extrasensory. Senses beyond the normal five can envelop your mind and your soul, until you don’t know the difference between real and unreal. My grandmother killed herself because she couldn’t stop it. That so-called gift literally sucked away everything she was, her essence, replaced it with an overload of terrifying visions and left her mad. She tried to wash them away with drink, and that only made them worse.”
“Maybe she couldn’t control it. Your mother can. You could.”
“Control takes study and work. I’ve got better things to do. And I don’t want it,” Leona stated fiercely.
Owen noted Leona’s intense, thoughtful expression. From his own experiences and his research on psychic phenomena and genetics late last night, Owen understood Leona’s reluctance too well. Just as his bloodline gave the “gray-eyes” insights, Janice had probably received her share. As a woman with black eyes, her perceptions could have come more from the Shaws’ Blackfoot side. “When it’s in the blood, there’s little chance you can escape, Leona.”
She watched the three crows perch in a tree that had been struck by lightning. The sunlight touched their feathers in blue-black shades as they angled their heads, staring down at the humans. “Boy, that’s right.”
Owen noted Leona’s attraction to the birds; he’d read that empaths could be connected to nature, and that psychics generally were more receptive. Legends about crows varied among different peoples. The crows could be an omen of some kind, good or bad.
He knew Leona understood—perhaps in some hidden layer of her senses, she knew more than she realized. Her natural instincts had told her to hold Janice close and to ease her; he had witnessed the connection between the two women. “I believe that what is in the blood eventually turns up. It can’t be refused.”
“Sure it can. Everything is a matter of choices.”
“Sometimes we don’t have a choice.” His words reminded him of his own potential. If it really were true about the males with gray eyes in his family, then he might have a choice to reach her on another level. Focusing completely on Leona, he tried to catch that intangible particle she’d given to Janice, that psychic connection.
Leona suddenly glanced at him, shivered, and moved slightly away. “Stop it. You’re trying to—I don’t like it.”
She was definitely receptive to him, in more ways than one. He’d felt his senses quiver lightly, briefly linking with Leona’s. The tiny experiment drove him on. “You said to keep Janice away from computers. What do you know about a psychic connection made through a computer? I think that’s when Janice started hearing voices and trying to kill herself. She usually wore earphones and seemed to talk to herself. Maybe she was actually talking to someone else. For a time, I thought the connection to someone else may have been through sound and electronics, but now I wonder. She hasn’t been on a computer for a while, but the voices started up again when we arrived here. Has that happened to your family?”
“Not directly. But I’ve heard of it happening. From what I know, and what you’ve told me, trauma could have made Janice vulnerable. Every traumatic incident can heighten an intuitive’s awareness, sometimes on one level only, sometimes on all levels. My grandmother may have been overloaded at all levels. I don’t know…. Janice is creative, and that means she’s receptive to certain elements…which is why she sensed the energies on the bags she touched. And she loves and easily connects with animals. They respond more to her, another potential psychic element. She’s probably very curious—all traits that could make her a perfect candidate for someone stronger.”
“What do you mean, ‘stronger?’ Someone like the man in that sketch? Who is he, Leona?”
“A stronger mind can influence one that has been weakened by trauma, that’s all. A computer is a perfect conduit and situation for the seduction of someone susceptible, or vulnerable, or both.” Glancing at the pond, she said, “Let’s get out of here.”
Owen didn’t move; he had to know why Leona seemed so eager to be far away from the pond. Perhaps it was the same thing that disturbed Janice. “You’re feeling something right now, aren’t you? What is it?”
Shaking her head, Leona stared at the lush bluegrass at their feet. She rubbed her arms as if chilled, though her green T-shirt should have given enough warmth against the early-morning temperature. When Owen tilted her chin up, Leona’s pale complexion accentuated those terrified green eyes. Sunlight played in her dark red hair, the tendrils catching fire. “Please, Owen,” she whispered desperately.
“Sure.” Owen didn’t question Leona’s need just then. He only knew she was terrified, and he would protect her with his life.
When they turned, they saw Janice standing on the front porch of the house. Her long, pale nightgown seemed ghostly in the shadows. Robyn came quickly to her side, speaking to her and urging her inside. Before the front door closed behind her, the nurse waved and called, “She’s just fine. We’re going to have a little breakfast now and get dressed.”
“You’ve got to get her out of here, Owen,” Leona stated suddenly as she
gripped his hand. She hadn’t intended the warning, but there it was on her lips, quivering with terror. “She’s picking up every psychic residue possible from that pond and stream, and the Kentucky River. She’s feeling too much, all at once.”
“Are you?”
Leona glanced at the pond and shivered again. She ran her hand across her chest as if seeking the missing brooch. “I just know things instinctively, and I don’t want to. But Janice is in danger here. I know that without a doubt. Now what I need to understand is why you called me last night?”
As he would gentle Janice, Owen smoothed his hands over Leona’s hair. How could he tell Leona that he had focused on her last night, needing her, just before he fell asleep? She was skittish of him now, fearful of what had happened between them and what her mind pushed away. “I told you. I thought I heard you call my name.”
She looked back at the pond, the mist over it topped by the rising sunlight. “I’d like to talk with Janice—privately. But first, I’ve changed my mind. I’m walking to the pond.”
“Not without me.”
They walked across the field to the steam, which bubbled out of the rocks and rushed toward the river. Leona and Owen followed it to the edge of the cliff, which dropped down into the green, swirling currents of the Kentucky River.
A rabbit zigzagged out of the brush, and a squirrel scurried up an oak tree. Attuned to the familiar sounds, Owen settled into watching the red-haired, tall, slender woman as she stood beside him at the edge of his field, overlooking the Kentucky River. The tall rocky bluff on the other side served to outline her lean, tense body. Suddenly, she leaned toward the water as if entranced.
Owen wrapped his arms securely around Leona’s waist. Leona had moved too close to the cliff’s dangerous edge. Janice had acted the same way, as if something was in the river, drawing her to it. “Watch your step. This bank isn’t that secure, and a fall down that cliff would probably kill you.”
Leona tensed, then leaned slightly back against him, her hands over his. As Owen waited for her to answer, birds chirped, flitting in and out of the shadows cast by trees. “Did you call my name just now?” she asked.
“No.” Owen rested his cheek against hers. In his arms, Leona’s body was taut and trembling. She had definitely sensed something that terrified her. He wanted to replace whatever frightened her with the sound of his own voice, and whispered into her ear. “No, I didn’t.”
Her fingers dug into his hands. “Liar. Tell me you did. Don’t play games now, Owen.”
“I didn’t say your name. Let’s move back from this edge. I wouldn’t want to find you at the bottom. That would not be very pretty.” Taking her hand he led her back a few feet.
Leona looked toward the house and the barn. She scanned the stream and bluff, where water ran from the layers of rocky outcroppings and fell into the river. Then she looked back at the field’s pond. She seemed to be measuring the distance from one to another.
Owen waited for her to speak, and when she did, Leona’s whisper quivered in the morning air. “The streams, the pond, and the river create a powerful triangle here. It’s said that water is a universal medium for psychics. They can transmit thoughts and impulses, sensations and feelings to each other, or to one who is receptive. We could be standing within a whole field of energy—someone’s, anyone’s.”
“So I’ve heard. You’re drawn to this place, aren’t you? The same as Janice?” Owen’s instincts told him to pick up Leona and carry her to safety, but he didn’t want to frighten her when she was so vulnerable.
Leona shrugged, but Owen noted that she gripped his hands tightly. “We were three when our sailboat overturned. My sisters and I were terrified. That incident imprinted the fear of water on all of us, I suppose. My sisters and I were linked with the water somehow. It was so frightening, bobbing on the swells. I felt crushed, water pushing at me from all sides. I’ve never liked that too-close feeling.”
She paused and breathed deeply, as if bracing herself before continuing. “Our terror, the cries of each other, opened us up to the water’s energy, so to speak. We became more receptive to psychic energy, and it’s easier to access when we are near large bodies of water. We grew up on the Northwest coast. Our house overlooked the Pacific Ocean. I miss it sometimes…. Our nightmare at the institute heightened our senses even more. Now we can’t even live near each other for any period of time without tangling our senses. But we are definitely too susceptible to other intuitives when around natural bodies of water.”
Owen turned her to him; he needed to see her expressions, everything held deep in her eyes. “There’s more to it than that, isn’t there?”
Leona searched his face, and her body trembled. Her hands gripped his shirt. “Yes. And you feel it, too, don’t you? You do, damn you.”
“What makes you think that?” he asked warily.
“I know what you are. What you really are,” Leona stated carefully as she pushed Owen away. Her hair fanned out around her head, the tips catching fire in the sunlight. She turned to walk back toward her car. “I’ve got to open the shop. I’m leaving.”
Owen caught her in two strides. He jerked Leona to him and held her tight. Her eyes had turned that dark, angry gold, and she stood very still. The air seemed to bristle around her, pricking him. “What’s this going to prove?” she asked tightly. “That you’re bigger? Stronger?”
“Oh, hell, I don’t know anything anymore. What do you think I am?”
“Someone who could be dangerous, to me and to my family. Is it fun, standing out here and calling me at night? Is it?” she demanded furiously.
“Calling you?”
“Broadcasting near the water, or through the evening mist on my street. It’s possible, and you’re possibly strong enough to do it, aren’t you? You have as much psychic gift as your sister, don’t you? I feel it in you. Are you certain that you didn’t whisper my name just now? As I stood by the river?”
Was Leona hearing voices, the same as Janice? Near that pond? Owen had to know if she had. “No, I didn’t say your name. Why?”
Leona closed her eyes and shook her head as if clearing it. “Let me go, Owen. I have to get to work.”
But she didn’t move. Owen let his heart open to flow into the beat of hers. He had never tried to connect with another person, not this way. With layers of blood and flesh and sinew between, he caught the softer, feminine heartbeat and let it wrap soothingly around his, yin and yang.
“Tell me what I need to know to save my sister,” he whispered against Leona’s ear, even as his body hardened against hers. His hands slid to her waist and followed the shape of her body upward, until they pressed against the outer curve of her breasts. Sweeping his thumb over one fragile peak, he pressed lightly to test her response to his touch. “Tell me.”
Leona’s head rested on Owen’s shoulder. As her face turned slowly to his, a silky red strand brushed his lips and clung to his jaw before sliding away. Her scents reminded him again of Montana’s fresh winds blowing over the fields of sweetgrass. But there was nothing cool about the sensations burning them, the hunger of skin against skin.
“Owen,” she whispered unevenly and lifted her lips against his. “Not here. Not so close to the water.”
“Why?” Sensual fever ruled him now. His ache to make love to Leona pulsed in hot waves throughout his body. Holding her tightly, his hand over her breast, he caressed the sweet shape of it. More than that, he needed to possess her, to claim her, to burn in her fire.
“I—” Apparently torn between desire and caution, Leona shook her head. Her hair webbed momentarily across his jaw, the silk and the scent ensnaring him. “Take me away from here,” she whispered desperately.
Standing in the triangle of water, Owen felt nothing but the woman in his arms and his need to protect her. He glanced around, scanning the area, finding nothing harmful. But then, they weren’t dealing with physical reality, were they?
Attuned to nature’s sounds, Owen heard
his sister’s footsteps on the grass, moving toward the hill overlooking the field. Robyn’s heavier footsteps joined Janice’s. When they both appeared at the crest of the hill, Robyn seemed to be whispering to Janice. His sister resisted the caretaker’s attempts to tug her back toward the house. “Owen? Owen?” Janice called desperately.
“Leona and I are talking. Go inside with Robyn. We’ll be up in a minute.”
Leona gripped his hand, her voice hushed and desperate. “Don’t let her come here.”
“Are you ashamed of what we have?” Owen didn’t move his hand from Leona’s body.
Leona seemed startled, then she frowned. “I’m not sure what we have.”
“You’ve got some idea. And you’re afraid.”
Smoothing the T-shirt’s long sleeves over her arms, Owen slid his hands down to hers, leaning down to whisper in her ear. “You’re going to tell me everything, including who’s hunting you and if he’s the same guy as in Janice’s sketch.”
Owen had denied whispering her name. But Leona had heard the masculine whisper coming through the dappled sunlight. It had wrapped a chill around her.
She’d also felt warmer prickles from her sisters and her mother. There had been another masculine presence, too: stronger, harsher, potentially violent, yet protective. Instinctively, she recognized that energy as Owen’s.
If he hadn’t whispered her name, then who had called her to the river’s swirling green depths and that dangerous cliff?
As they walked toward the house, Owen’s deep tone was deadly serious. “I’ve got a good carpenter. He can help prepare this place for sale. If you think Janice is in danger here, we’re moving. If that triangle is powerful enough to affect you, then Janice is probably influenced, too.”