The figure shambled toward them. No bear. It would have dropped back to four legs. Probably wouldn't have approached her, either, especially with the dog at her side. Bears steered clear of humans, unless they were surprised without an expedient escape route…or sows with cubs in the spring.
Still, she didn't know who was out there, and it might behoove her to retreat. Too many years of dealing with danger and conflict had weakened her trust in her fellow man.
But was this feeling a true safety measure, or was she once again allowing her unstable emotions to take control?
Should she go back on her meds?
Don't take anything at face value.
She turned around to start back to the roadway. "You're right, Scarlet. We'll return to the cabin. If that person wants to stop by, we can — "
She inadvertently brushed against a huge pine, and a heavy shelf of snow slid off the limb and landed on her boot and snowshoe. The unexpected weight staggered her, and she lost the tempo of her stride and stumbled. Luckily, her physical training allowed her to regain her balance immediately, and she strode onward.
The faint call that flashed past her ears could have been a shout from the distant figure, but it reminded her far too much of the indistinguishable words last night in the cabin. The words that accompanied Scarlet's fear. Words she had a hard time admitting she'd heard, since they might be a symptom of her PTSD.
"Kymbria! Hey, don't run off!"
Kymbria halted and glanced over her shoulder. The figure was closer, and it appeared he was on skis. The cross-county glide could explain what she had taken as that lumbering gait. Still, just because the person knew her name didn't mean it was someone she wanted to see. Besides, it was a male voice, not one she recognized, although his shouting from a distance could account for that.
"Kymbria!"
She bent and unsnapped her snowshoes. She could leave them here if she had to, come back for them later. Or use them for a weapon. He could move much faster than her on his skis, but she was near the road now. The going would be easier to the cabin. Plus if flight didn't work, she had her own arsenal of self-defense maneuvers the Army had taught her and which she practiced diligently, given the places to which they deployed her.
When she stood back up, the figure had halted in the distance, as though aware of her uneasiness. The man removed his heavy cap from his head, and his inky hair shone in the early morning sunlight.
"Keoman?" she whispered.
"Hey, it's me, Keoman," he confirmed. "Wait up!"
Elated, Kymbria ignored his words and stepped off the snowshoes into the drifts. Her legs, clad in polyethylene with a down lining, didn't feel the cold as she surged forward. She met him halfway between the distance that had separated them and flung herself into his arms before she remembered Scarlet's growls a moment ago.
"Oh." She pulled back, glancing around for the setter. Scarlet sat right behind her, head cocked to one side, not a hint of distrust for Kymbria's companion on her face.
"She won't attack me," Keoman confirmed. "You remember how it is with animals and me."
Instead of carrying on the conversation, Kymbria curled her arms around his neck and buried her face beneath his chin, breathing in his scent, allowing herself to enjoy a man's embrace for the first time in too many months. Keoman appeared to sense what she needed — he always had — and held her tight until she was ready to break the embrace and step back.
"How did you know I was here?" she asked.
"The moccasin telegraph," he said with a grin, the same grin she'd teased him about when they were in their teens, assuring him it was too sexy for his hard-planed face. His dark eyes sparkled with what she took as pleasure in seeing her. "Amber called me last night. You're here a couple days early."
"Uh huh. And Mom's not a bit happy that I left her and Risa behind."
Keoman chuckled. "You better expect a visit from her as soon as she can get here. How's that beautiful daughter of yours?"
"The most gorgeous, smartest, wonderful baby ever born on this earth. I've got pictures back at the cabin."
"Of course you do." Keoman's grin faded as he asked her, "And how are you accepting her now?"
She would never let anyone else besides Keoman, or perhaps Niona, question her feelings about Risa. But Keoman asked for reasons that pertained as much to their deep friendship and coming healing ceremonies as they were intrusive.
"I can honestly say," she replied fervently, "that the first time she looked at me and recognized me, she crawled so deep into my heart, I'll never let her go. And it just keeps growing and growing. I never think of her parentage these days. I just want to protect her with my life, even if it means protecting her from myself."
"We'll do our best," he assured her.
"I know you will. Now, back to you. What are you doing wandering around out here in the woods instead of driving over to see me?"
The dark pain in his eyes flew by so fast she would have missed it, had she not had training to spot those exact emotions.
"You're here so we can concentrate on healing you, not what's going on in my life," he began.
"Like hell," she replied. "We're friends, and that's a two-way relationship."
"Yeah, friends," he said. "Because that's what you wanted."
That grin was in place again, and Kymbria knew immediately what he referred to. When they had hit their teens, they'd both been driven by hormonal urges to experiment with their relationship. On her end, Keoman hadn't stirred her senses the ways she had seen in the movies or read about in books. She didn't swoon when he kissed her.
On his end….
Hmmmm. She didn't recall them ever discussing Keoman's end of that experiment after she fell into a fit of giggles one day when she pulled back from what should have been a soul-shattering kiss.
"You got anything to eat back at the cabin?" he asked. "Something for a man, not girly-girl food. Ham? Bacon — "
"Sausage and biscuits?" she interrupted. "With a half-dozen eggs fried in the sausage grease? And the coffee should still be hot."
"Let's go." He bent and removed his skis, then laid them over his shoulder before he wrapped his arm around her waist. They walked back through her tracks to retrieve her snowshoes, Scarlet trailing them. As they neared the cabin, all the while chattering about various friends and what they were doing, the sound of a snowmobile on the lake cut through the still air. Kymbria made a mental note to ask Keoman to check her machines before he left. Right now, amidst their inane conversation, she was searching for a way to get her friend to explain that burst of pain in his eyes.
Blackmail. I'll withhold breakfast until he tells me. I've got a feeling he needs someone to talk to as badly as I do. But Keoman's one of those men who holds onto his personal hurts until they fester.
Their talk would have to wait, she realized as they walked into the kitchen and shed their heavy garments. The noise from the snowmobile out on the lake abated right in front of her cabin. She and Keoman hung their jackets on hooks by the door, then walked through the cabin to the glassed-in deck. There was the machine, pulled up next to the bank. The bundled-up driver — could be male or female, no way to tell under the all-encompassing clothing — climbed the snow-deep steps toward them.
A neighbor also in residence this winter, she assumed as Scarlet growled low. Maybe the one from across the lake. Courtesy indicated she should greet the person. Caution demanded she hesitate.
So many harmless-appearing Afghanistan men and women, even children, carried destruction….
But Keoman was with her now. The other person was outnumbered.
The snowmobile driver knocked. Whoever it was could see them also through the bank of windows.
"Who is it?" she called.
"I'm renting a cabin across the lake." A man's voice, low-timbered, pleasant. "Ran out of coffee this morning and saw your lights on over here."
Yes, the cabin where she'd noticed smoke last night. She still didn't recall wh
o owned it, but it was an even longer trip into town from that shore than hers. Hjak hadn't mentioned any problem residents up here, only the admonition for her to take heed in the lonely land.
The snowmobile driver removed his helmet and brushed at his flattened blond hair, hair that could use a good cut. Male, maybe forty, her age, six foot or so, green eyes. Even under the bulky clothing she could tell he was in shape.
"I know him," Keoman said. "It's all right."
Kymbria unlocked the door.
"Caleb McCoy," the man introduced himself as he removed a glove and extended a hand. Then he glanced over her shoulder and nodded at Keoman. "Morning, Keoman."
"Kymbria James," Kymbria replied with a short grip of greeting. "You can leave your boots on the rug here beside the door." She snapped her fingers at Scarlet and called her over. "Friend," she said. Caleb waited patiently as the setter sniffed his legs, then padded over to the rug in front of the fireplace.
"How do you take your coffee?" Kymbria asked Caleb.
"Black," he said in a tone of thanks. He kicked off as much loose snow as possible on the steps before he walked through the door. While he removed his boots, she went into the kitchen. Behind her, she could hear a murmur of conversation between the two men.
When she returned, Caleb stood with his back to the fire, padded snowsuit unzipped on top to expose his thermal shirt, heavy socks on his feet. Keoman was out on the glassed-in deck, one hand cupped in front of him as though holding something. When Kymbria said "Here," and handed Caleb his coffee, Keoman jerked as though startled and turned to stare at Caleb, one hand now hidden behind his back.
"Thanks," Caleb said as he accepted the cup. He glanced at Keoman, then quickly away. "I didn't expect service like this. A cup of ground beans would have been fine. But I won't turn it down."
He grinned at Kymbria, but when he hefted his cup to take a sip, his gaze once again quickly shifted to the other man, then back.
"Good coffee," Caleb said as he lowered the cup. "Special brand, or just the way you make it?"
He was trying to distract her, Kymbria realized. And when Keoman stuck his hand in his blue jean pocket and murmured something about getting himself a cup of coffee, his effort was blatantly obvious to her trained eye. Besides, she didn't distract easily. She stepped in front of Keoman to block his path.
"What's going on?" she asked. "I'll be damned if I let you two treat me like some bimbo who needs to be protected by macho men. I've deployed to both Iraq and Afghanistan. Probably seen more gore and guts than both of you combined."
When they continued to remain silent, she went on, "Either one of you ever seen the carnage left behind by an IED?"
"Not recently," Caleb replied. "When my Marine unit deployed during Desert Storm, those roadside bombs weren't common, like they are now. But we did run into one or two of them."
"I've not only seen what they can do," Kymbria said, "I've helped counsel the survivors."
The two of them still exchanged another cautionary glance before Keoman blew out a breath and pulled his hand out of his pocket. He kept his fist closed as he asked, "Did you hear anything out on the lake last night?"
A curl of trepidation spread through her stomach, up her back. Even this morning she recalled the sick feeling she'd had when those words whispered in her mind. And she couldn't forget the fear in Scarlet's body language as she curled up tail to nose in front of the fire. Something definitely had been out there, but she'd forced herself to believe it had only been a wild animal and Scarlet's reaction had been her lack of familiarity with them.
Wild animals don't talk…or whisper.
"I — " She cleared her clogged throat. "I assumed it was a wolf or something. It scared Scarlet."
Keoman opened his palm. When he extended it towards her, it held a small flat agate in the shape of a turtle. A fetish, she realized. Someone had polished a stone in the shape of his clan symbol and carried it with them.
"How on earth did you see this in the snow?" she asked Caleb as she started to reach for the fetish. But Keoman pulled it back.
"It was lying on the bottom step of the stairs leading up the bank," Caleb replied. "In plain sight. Someone had brushed off the snow on the step to make sure it was visible."
"There's a small hole in the back of the turtle," Keoman added. "Someone wore it around his neck."
"That explains it, then. Someone passing by — maybe a skier or someone on snowshoes — found it lying along the lake. My set of steps was the first one he passed, and he laid it there so I'd find it."
"There weren't any signs of a skier or snowshoes anywhere around those steps," Caleb assured her. "No snow on top of the fetish, and like I said, the step was bare. We didn't have any overnight snowfall."
Keoman stuck the fetish back in his pocket and walked past her. "Let's all get some coffee."
She allowed him his coffee, poured a cup for herself, then started a new pot before she joined the two silent men at the table. "Now, tell me the rest," she ordered Keoman, staring at him intently, her grip on her cup tight.
He thinned his mouth, then asked her a question instead. "I noticed your place wasn't plowed or shoveled. Don't your parents contract with Len Skinaway to make things ready when you come up here?"
Her rein on her temper threatened to snap; it had been fragile anyway since Afghanistan, another PTSD problem. She leaned across the table, her look so fierce it evidently even startled Keoman, who scooted his chair back a foot or so.
"Tell me what the hell is going on, Keoman Thunderwood, instead of avoiding the issue and only discussing it with men folk!"
"That question did have something to do with…what you call the issue," Keoman spat back, rising to his feet, his anger a match for hers.
"Hey, hey." Caleb T-ed his hands. "Time out. I'm obviously the men folk you're alluding to, and I'm not privy to everything Keoman's thinking either. All he told me was that he thought we better call the sheriff about that fetish."
"Hjak?" Kymbria swung her gaze to Caleb. "Just because you found a fetish on my step?"
"No," Keoman said, his eyes now dark and flat. "For two reasons. One, because Len Skinaway was reported missing by his daughter yesterday evening…and he's Turtle Clan. Two, because you heard something on the lake last night." He frowned. "Although…that might be a totally different situation."
The coffeepot gurgled its last drop into the pot as Caleb and Kymbria waited for Keoman to continue. Instead, he turned to walk out of the kitchen as he said, "I'm going to use your phone."
Chapter 8
Sheriff Hjak didn't object when Keoman accompanied him out of the cabin and down to the lake. Caleb remained on the glassed-in deck with Kymbria, studying her surreptitiously when he could. Obviously, he wasn't furtive enough. Her deep brown eyes held a dangerous glint when she turned away from the windows with no warning.
"Why are you staring at me? And don't say you weren't, because I could see your reflection in the windows."
"Sorry," Caleb apologized in what he hoped was a nonchalant tone. "Just admiring a beautiful woman."
"No, you weren't," she replied. "I'm a trained counselor. That wasn't admiration in your expression. It was speculation."
Caleb shrugged, hoping she would take it neither as an admission nor an argument. "All right. I was wondering if you knew why Keoman was so interested in that fetish. And what he meant about this being a totally different situation."
"Why didn't you ask him? And why should I know what he's thinking?"
Obviously, she was a lot sharper than him. He shouldn't have tried to pull information out of her without breaking his promise of secrecy to Keoman. Caleb tried to shovel himself out of the hole he'd dug and pull out the foot that had ended up in his mouth when he tumbled into the hole.
"I got the impression you and the shaman had been together a while this morning."
Her frown increased, and Caleb realized he'd only antagonized her deeper.
"And that means h
e spent the night?" she flared.
"None of my business if he did, but he would've had to have arrived late last night. After he was at my cabin."
She spread her hands and shrugged in a what-does-that-have-to-do-with-things manner.
"I'm sorry," Caleb apologized again. "All I can say is that I haven't had enough caffeine yet this morning."
"I doubt that's the problem," Kymbria said astutely, studying him for a second. "Why don't you come out and say what you're dancing all around?"
Because it would mean I might as well pack up and head home. He admitted, though, to a desire to have this woman's — if not admiration, then at least approval.
"Has Keoman told you why I'm here?"
"Should he have?" she asked in return.
"Not necessarily. You are a Chippewa tribal member, though, aren't you?"
"Officially, yes, I am a tribal member. Ojibway, which we prefer to be called rather than Chippewa. And if you'd studied our culture before you came up here, you'd know that Keoman's not called a shaman. He's a Midė, a member of the Midewiwin Society. I'm surprised he hasn't corrected you if you've been calling him a shaman."
At least her tone of voice was less hostile, more along the line of informational, if somewhat patronizing.
"Mostly I guess I've thought of him as a healer," Caleb said. "But thanks for the correction."
"Well, I haven't been an actual part of the tribe for…wait a minute. You didn't have to introduce yourself to Sheriff Hjak when he came in, either. So you know both him and Keoman. How long have you been here in the Northwood?"
"Only a couple days," Caleb said before he thought.
"And what are you doing here? How did you get to know both Keoman and the sheriff so quickly?"
Again, he couldn't answer that without violating Keoman's confidence. He still wasn't sure why the shaman…the Midė…wanted to keep the real reason for Caleb's presence here under wraps, but for now, he had to abide by his wishes. Otherwise, Keoman and the tribal Elders would close against him. He could warn her about something else, though.
"You probably need to know this anyway," he said. "You'll be here alone at times."
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