by Cait London
“Exactly how did you happen to pick this special place?”
“Janice, and a combination of things,” Owen answered grimly. “The pond, the stream, and the river reminded her of home. She showed me a real-estate advertisement one day. The house looked like the one we grew up in, when our parents were alive. She felt safe back then. I wanted her to feel that way again. And this place was affordable.”
He breathed deeply as if regretting the move to the farm. “Janice was very excited, and I was desperate to do anything that might change her course. I thought at the time that maybe she understood that she needed to get away from where we’d grown up. Maybe she needed a clean start. Here, there was a river nearby and a freshwater creek to water the horses. In Montana, she used to stare at the lakes—natural ones—for hours. She promised if we moved, she wouldn’t do that here.”
“Owen—”
“I already know: My sister may not be able to keep her promises.”
As they approached the Shaws’ home, Leona saw the signs that it was being renovated. Boards and supplies were piled on sawhorses on the front porch. “A new delivery,” Owen explained. “I had to hire a carpenter to help me get this place in shape faster and allow me time to settle into business. He’s going to keep his saw and store his things in the barn, when he’s not working in the house. I don’t want Janice anywhere near saws. He’s agreed that he’ll always be on his guard about any tool that might be dangerous.”
Janice hurried down the front steps to meet them. Her smile at Leona was brilliant and happy. “You came! I saw your car, and I knew. I knew you’d come…. For Owen, and for me.”
Leona ached for the girl, who looked even more vulnerable with her roughly shorn hair. Instinctively her hand went to smooth the thick blue-black mass. “Hi, Janice.”
Janice stilled at that first physical connection and Leona’s senses prickled and stretched, startling her. Waves of fear and hope and struggle moved into Leona’s fingers and palms, the sensations weaving up her arm. Suddenly, Janice took Leona’s other hand and placed it on her head. “Heal me. I know you can,” Janice whispered desperately.
“I’m not a healer.” Aisling, the Celtic seer, had possessed that gift. In Leona’s dreams, Aisling had bent over the wounded and the ailing, giving ease. Claire, as an empath, could ease a troubled soul to some degree. Tempest had definitely eased her troubled husband, but then love might have been his medicine.
Janice’s big dark eyes looked at Owen. “She’s a healer. I can feel her doing it when she touches me. Make her help me, Owen.”
When Leona glanced at Owen, his expression revealed nothing. His hand warmed her shoulder, then pressed lightly. “Try,” he whispered. “Just try. You’ve already done a little in your shop, and that was only instinctive reaction. This time, think about it.”
She’d already focused on Janice once. If Leona continued, and fully opened that doorway to her inherited DNA and gifts, she might never go back.
Janice’s black eyes begged her. The girl’s startling pain seemed like ice crystals beneath Leona’s hands, jabbing at her skin.
Damn her curiosity, native to psychics. She needed to know…. Leona spread her fingers over Janice’s head.
“Don’t be afraid to let someone cut your hair. It’s beautiful and only needs a little trim,” she whispered gently. The soft, soothing words had seemed to cross her lips of their own accord.
At her side, Owen stiffened. “She has been both afraid and fixated on scissors. She hasn’t used them, until she cut her braids. I thought it best if we steered clear of scissors altogether.”
Leona understood; Owen was afraid of what his sister would do to herself. “I’ll cut it for you, Janice,” she said gently as she moved her hands to frame Janice’s face. “You trust me, don’t you?”
“I trust you,” Janice repeated, as if mesmerized.
Leona wound through her senses, intuitively seeking that latch on to Janice’s psyche. Amid the red patches, the zigzagging yellow alerts, the screams of pain, a sweet nugget glowed. Leona wound her way through the past images in Janice’s mind to that fragile, childlike innocence.
“So here we are, aren’t we?” she murmured to Janice and to herself. Leona understood that all the quivering, uncertain threads had settled into a stream, flowing between the women.
She sensed a masculine warmth, tinged with a dark hunger for savage revenge. She hurried to protect that sweet little stream of connections against it. “Don’t touch me, Owen.”
“We’re women, brother. You’re interfering,” Janice explained gently, but her stare remained locked on to Leona’s.
With a quick intake of breath, Owen eased back slightly and crossed his arms. He glanced at Robyn, who had come outside with a glass of water and a white paper cup of pills. Owen’s voice was calm and low as he ordered, “Not now, Robyn. Go back into the house, please.”
“What is happening? What’s wrong with Janice?” Robyn’s voice was protective and angry. The tone jarred Leona, but she tried to hold tight to the streaming connection to Janice. The stream shifted slightly, uneasily, ready to escape Leona.
Owen moved quickly toward Robyn, his voice a low murmur as he eased her inside the house.
Leona sensed an angry prickling; the connection to Janice began to weaken and slide away from her. She reached for it, gripped tight and fought to keep her voice even and soothing. “I don’t think you should go to the pond again, Janice. Or to the stream or river. You won’t, will you?”
Leona thought she heard a furious scream as anger prickled and burned her hands. Still, she kept them firmly on Janice’s face. The sketched image and the one from her dreams sprang into her mind. The man’s expression was murderous, his eyes fiery, and his mouth spewing silent curses. His thin black braids snaked around his face as if alive.
The images blended, swerved away from each other, and the wolf’s-head brooch glowed and floated to the surface.
“You come from an ancient people, ones who see the future, don’t you?” Janice asked.
“My line is very old. So is yours.” A silver thread spun around the brooch, then wove together in a single strand. Then the threads started to break away, tiny masculine sparks weakening it. Leona glanced at Owen and found him leaning close, too intent and grim. She understood that he was trying to latch on to that thread, to seek information. The dark shadows hovering around the thread seemed like snakes, poised to strike; the interference could be deadly to Janice’s fragile psyche.
Leona held her breath, startled by the knowledge that had just leaped at her. How did she know that?
Whatever was joining her to Janice, Leona couldn’t afford interference. “Owen, go get my bag from the car, will you?”
When he hurried away, she smiled at Janice and took her hands. Leona kept the link strong, but her mind questioned the past moments. How did she know what to do? Why did she know everything, all at once? Was this what had happened to her grandmother, the cause for her overload and destruction?
Leona sensed an energy swerve and immediately refocused on Janice. She kept that critical psychic link, imprinting herself over the evil that had bound the girl. “You’re mine now. The man in your drawing can’t have you. He’s angry, but I’m going to give you something of mine, for protection. When you wear it, you are to know that you are strong and safe. Know that me and mine are with you always.”
“You wanted my brother away, so we can speak.”
“Men.” With a smile, Leona dismissed the male ability to understand women. In the layers of her mind and body, Owen’s energy had attached too strongly. He had interfered with her clarity. Leona needed that clarity to protect Janice. Everything she did now was pure instinct; as an untrained intuitive, she was purely trusting her senses. What if she did the wrong thing and harmed Janice even more?
“You won’t harm me. I feel as if I’m lighter, freer. Owen is your man. You feel him deep inside, where you have let no one else. He frightens you, because
of what you are with him…what you know you can be.”
Something taken, something given. Janice had picked up traces of Leona, just as Leona had foraged through Janice’s senses.
In Janice, Leona had found traces of the sea and of sailing, of the angular Viking alphabet carved on stones. She had also found elements of another ancient civilization, older than the new and more dominant Viking influence. “Your brother’s gray eyes say he comes from Viking ancestry. That may be what I feel around him.”
“You are one with him now. Only some of the men of our family have eyes like that. It is said that these men are different somehow. It’s said that we are of shaman blood, but it’s said that only the light-eyed men have the sight.”
Shaw for shaman, a Native American medicine man and healer. And Owen had that Viking strain running through his blood. He’d probably known all along that he was of two potentially intuitive bloodlines, a descendant with powerful gifts.…
Janice nodded, her eyes so black that iris seemed one with the pupil—almost as black and mesmerizing as the man in her sketch and in Leona’s nightmares.
“Sometimes my brother knows things. He feels things I can’t, but he doesn’t want to talk of them. You want to give me a talisman that comes from an ancient woman, your grandmother.”
Janice had caught traces of Aisling. Leona took a deep breath and admitted to herself that the forged connection had been stronger than she’d expected—in both directions. “My grandmother many times over. The brooch isn’t the original, but I’ve worn it. It holds me and my sisters and my mother in it. You wear it. You hold it and think of me. Focus on it and me, Janice. We’re going to do this. We’re going to get whoever is harming you. We’re going to tear you free so that he won’t ever bother you again.”
“But you’re afraid,” Janice stated solemnly, another tidbit she’d snatched from deep within Leona.
“Very. I could make a mistake that would endanger us all. The man in your sketch has hunted my family. He’s caused others to harm them. Now it’s time to stop him. You and I.”
“And Owen.”
“Owen, too.” Leona glanced at Owen, who had returned to her side. If Owen had anything to do with this psychic tangle, Leona was determined to discover exactly how he was involved. Right now, Janice had to be saved.
Leona took the bag Owen had brought to her; she reached inside to find the replica of the Viking brooch. When she gave it to Janice, the girl gripped it in both hands. She closed her eyes and brought it to her chest, as if pressing everything Leona had said inside her heart. Leona placed her hand over Janice’s. “Remember what I’ve said. And don’t be afraid.”
Janice nodded solemnly, then she whispered to Owen, “She gave me her protection. You must protect her now. The hunter is close. He comes from the ancient time of her family’s beginnings, and of ours.”
Owen’s hard stare pinned Leona’s. “Nothing is going to hurt either one of you. I’ll be with you every step of the way.”
A sudden movement caused Leona to glance at the house. A curtain had moved slightly as if they were being watched. From her expression earlier, Janice’s nurse-caretaker wasn’t happy. Perhaps she had the right to be suspicious of Leona.
“I have to go now, Janice. But I’ll come back tonight and help you with your hair.”
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
Leona called Claire as soon as she left the Shaws. “I’m fine. You can call Tempest and Mom. I felt you all with me.”
“We were worried.”
“You felt it? It was that strong?”
Claire’s soft voice had curled warmly around Leona. “Yes. I knew you were helping Owen’s sister. You were moving on instinct, and you knew exactly what to do. But be careful, Leona.”
“I will be.”
“You know about yourself then, that you have more than the one gift? You know that you can ease and heal?”
Leona thought of how her instincts had told her to touch Janice, to calm her, of the threads weaving between them. She’d known how to dive into the stream and follow it. “Yes, I know. But I don’t want to do this. I’m terrified of myself.”
“You’ve always been strong. I’ve always felt it in you, and so did Mom. We all knew. Grams told me before—”
“She went off the deep end? You could have told me. Or at least let me sense it.”
“Would you have believed?” Claire chided gently. “I thought Grams told you that day—just after Dad’s accident. She was staying with us, and you acted petrified of her for days. We didn’t know why. She wouldn’t say what she had told you. We’ll never know now what secrets she knew, what caused her to drink and go mad.”
Her grandmother had leaned close to Leona, her green eyes brilliant with fear. Her fingers had dug into Leona’s thin arms, her whisper urgent. He’s coming…. The one…
Leona momentarily struggled with the fragmented childhood memory, but more of it escaped her. “Grams never said anything about what I could do. I’ve always thought of it as a curse that I wouldn’t let have me.”
“Yes, well,” Claire stated in a crisp fierce tone, unlike her usual soft flowing one. “There is one curse that isn’t getting any of us—not if I can help it.”
Leona smiled to herself. Claire’s Viking strain had just leaped, ready to do battle. “You’re right about that. I love you. Truly, I do.”
During the morning at work, Leona had replayed the scene with Janice many times. Something taken, something given, she thought, trying to understand her instinctive reactions, and her connection to Janice. Between interviews for an alterations seamstress and a part-time clerk and helping her customers, she sat in her upstairs office, fighting her claustrophobia. The new shelving reminded her of Vernon and she remembered her missing scarf. Picking up the telephone, she dialed his number.
His voice sounded drowsy. “Been feeling droopy lately, Ms. Leona, but I’ll get your closets done as soon as I can. Been working overtime at Billy Balleau’s and Cheslav’s. I don’t touch personal stuff. Haven’t seen that scarf.”
Could she believe him? She had to be very careful now. “Okay, just get well, Vernon. And let me know when you’re working at my house from now on, will you?”
“Huh? Is something wrong?”
“No, but I just like to know when you’re there. I’m expecting company in the next day or so, so no need to do any work then. Take some time to get well, then we may have to discuss moving this shelving in my office back a little. It’s taking up too much space.” Leona needed time to determine whether the handyman could be dangerous to her.
Strangely, Vernon didn’t argue the point before the call ended.
Of course, Leona wasn’t expecting anyone. Her sisters had called with a warning, prior to Greer’s midmorning call. “I thought I’d just hop over to see you for a bit. Is that all right?”
“Is there a reason?” Leona had asked.
“You know there is,” Greer had answered softly. “It’s your life and I don’t want to interfere but I’d like to see you.”
Greer’s maternal link, combined with her powerful extrasensories, usually set Leona on edge. However, for Janice’s sake, Leona wanted her mother’s help. “Could you do me a favor?”
“Of course. I’ll make arrangements to come to you right away.”
“I’d rather you wouldn’t.”
The slight trembling of her senses told Leona that she had wounded Greer by once again rejecting her mother’s offer of help. Leona hadn’t asked anything of her mother since the parapsychologists and doctors had swept the Aisling-Bartel triplets into a nightmare of psychic testing.
“You’re going to need help, Leona.” Greer’s voice was as uncertain and trembling as the tingling in Leona’s senses.
She wasn’t as strong an empath as Claire. She didn’t have the developed powers of her mother. She may have endangered Janice even more by promising protection that she might not be able to deliver.
Af
ter years of closing the door on what she was, Leona was also uncertain. “There’s someone I need you to protect. Could she stay with you?”
Greer’s answer was immediate and firm. “Yes. She’ll be safe with me.”
Just as the triplets had always been safe with their mother…Greer had done everything she’d known to protect them. Her mother had done the best she could….
Leona’s resentment began to shatter, the shards spilling at her feet.
Seven
OF COURSE HE HAD LEONA’S SCARF.
Rolf Erling brought the silky, swirling shades of teal and turquoise to his face. As he nuzzled Leona’s exotic, unique scent, he smiled. “Yes, I have your scarf, my lovely.”
She’d sounded upset on the telephone when she’d thought she was speaking with Vernon. The shelving that had been deliberately created to consume Leona’s personal space had done its job, jump-starting Leona’s claustrophobia. Then, she was already suspicious that her little safe nest had been invaded, creating another pressure on her psychic antenna.
Rolf smiled again, his plan coming together perfectly. With all her concerns, Leona didn’t have enough reserve energy to block him—even if she knew how. He’d been watching her startled reaction to his mental broadcast today. He’d actually used that watery triangle, a perfect psychic portal, to connect with her senses and take her very close to that river. Just a few more extrasensory pushes, and Leona would have tried to see who was calling her from the river. She would have gone over the cliff and into the deadly currents.
“Maybe next time, sweet Leona.” A skilled master at traps and seduction, Rolf was in control of all the little pieces. Leona had definitely taken the bait. To ease Janice would draw away even more of Leona’s energy. Then she was deeply troubled by the inexplicable actions of her closest friend, Sue Ann. Leona was also under pressure to find help for her shop. Then Alex, a grieving widower, had snagged bits of her sympathy. Every time Alex brought up his wife, Leona’s unresolved grief for her husband quickened.