Читать книгу From Mission To Marriage - Lyn Stone - Страница 9

A fter driving for about half an hour, Vanessa turned off on a nearly invisible, unpaved side road that led up one of the mountains. “The grans are expecting us. I phoned them about it this morning,” she explained while easily negotiating the twisting path with its overhanging branches and low visibility.

“Take me back to a hotel, will you? I really need to process these prints and fax those and Hightower’s old license photo to—”

“No problem. You can fax from the grans place. They love company. Today is barbecue day. Maybe goat, maybe pork, maybe both.”

Clay’s apprehension grew. Primitive accommodations and food cooked over an outdoor fire didn’t bother him in the least, so he didn’t quite understand this niggling sense of unease in his gut.

“Don’t worry. I promise you won’t get the third degree. Now you might if they got the idea I was bringing you home to get their approval as a potential husband. The tribe’s pretty strict on consanguinity rules, so they’d politely insist on your background if that were the case. But I’ll explain you’re only here on business. I’ll make that very clear.”

“Consanguinity?” He knew what the word meant, of course, but what the hell was she talking about?

“Oh yeah,” she said with a chuckle. “No relatives considered, goes without saying. Also, I can’t marry within my own clan whether there are blood ties or not. Usually there are, to some degree, but it’s not a problem.”

“Yet you aren’t married,” he observed. “Must cut down on the number of potential candidates.”

“Not really. There are seven clans to choose from. But I’ve never felt the urge to go looking.”

“Why not?” And why did he insist on prying into her life as if it were any of his business?

She shot him a saucy look. “Ambition outweighed lust. Simple as that.”

That raised his eyebrows. “A virgin, at your age?” God, he hadn’t meant to say that out loud. He bit his tongue. “Sorry.”

She laughed again, this time a low, seductive sound that sent a ripple of desire straight to his groin. “I never claimed that,” she quipped as she wheeled around a curve and pulled up in front of a two-story log house. “But they probably think so, so let’s end that topic before we get out of the car.”

She tooted the horn, unfastened her seat belt and opened the door all in what seemed one motion, exiting before Clay could pry any further.

Not that he would. What business of his was it if she had a lover? He didn’t even want her to tell him. He’d known the woman barely half a day and had already violated every rule he’d ever made about conversations with the fairer sex.

He couldn’t get over how different she was from every woman he had ever known, how off balance he felt around her. This was not good, and still he knew he would seek her out again, even if something separated them right this minute. If Mercier recalled him and ordered him never to come back here, Clay knew he would disobey orders just to see her, to explore this weird, unsettling connection or whatever it was. It made no sense at all.

“Hey, Du-da, my man! What’s cooking?” Clay heard her cry as she took the stone steps two at a time. He watched as she embraced a gray-haired man who was frowning at Clay over her shoulder.

This wasn’t what Clay had expected. The house impressed him with its charm, slate roof and sturdy construction. The Walkers weren’t poor, that was for sure.

Wind chimes tinkled in the breeze. Oak rocking chairs and a swing graced the porch. The view up here was fantastic, the air sweet, the landscape lush even this late in the year.

The old man didn’t fit Clay’s preconceived image, either. Though probably pushing seventy, he looked like an aging adventurer who kept in excellent shape.

Vanessa turned and beckoned Clay up on the porch. “A-gi-du-da, this is Clay Senate, an agent from Virginia who has come to help me out on one of my cases.” Her manner was polite now, bordering on formal. “Clay Senate, meet my grandfather, John Walker.”

Clay extended his hand and gripped the gnarled one, several shades darker than his own. “Mr. Walker, my pleasure.”

“Welcome,” the man said simply. No questions, just as Vanessa had promised. Well, none yet, anyway.

“Where’s E-ni-si, in the kitchen?” Vanessa asked, linking her arm with her grandfather’s. The man grunted and nodded, gesturing for them to accompany him inside.

Clay held the door for both of them and entered last. Vanessa threw him a reassuring smile over her shoulder. “Smell that? Du-da’s been cooking it out back in the pit for a couple of days. Mouths are watering in the next county, I bet.”

The grandmother stood in the doorway of the kitchen regarding Clay with frank curiosity. She was a beautiful woman, probably around sixty-five, though her face was virtually unlined and her hair barely striped with strands of silver. This was how Vanessa would look in about forty years, Clay thought. He offered the woman his best smile.

“Clay Senate, my grandmother, Rebecca Walker,” Vanessa said. “E-ni-si, Clay and I will be working at Cherokee for a week or two, at least until the festival.”

“Then you both must stay here,” the woman said with a decisive nod. “Please make yourself at home, Mr. Senate. We will feed you first, then my granddaughter will show you where you will sleep.” Then she looked directly at her husband, a question in her eyes. The old man shook his head.

Clay assumed the unspoken query had to do with his reason for being here, that he had not come to offer for their beloved Vanessa. He experienced a surprising little stab of regret at their obvious disappointment. He seriously doubted Vanessa brought many men here, probably for that very reason.

A sharp tug on the back hem of his jacket distracted him. Clay turned slowly, expecting to see a dog. Instead it was a child. Bright brown eyes peered up at him, disappeared behind impossibly long black lashes for a blink, then reappeared. “You Daddy?” she whispered.

Clay’s heart melted. He squatted to her level to answer. “No, not Daddy. My name is Clay.”

She frowned. “Like red dirt?”

He smiled. “That’s right.”

She poked her pink-clad chest. “I’m Dilly.”

He nodded. “Delinda. Like beautiful?”

She smiled back. “That’s right.”

Vanessa scooped her up in a hug and swung her around. “Hey, squirt. What’s happening?”

“Bitsy had kittens. You wanna see?” She twisted in Vanessa’s arms and craned her neck at an impossible angle to include Clay. “You can come, too, but you can’t touch ’em.”

“I promise,” Clay assured her. He had never met a cat he liked and touching one was about the last thing he would want. Still, he followed Vanessa to one of the outbuildings with her little cousin riding on her shoulders, listening as they sang a silly little song about counting cats.

“She’s charming,” he commented to Vanessa as the little girl squatted to run her fingers over the mother cat’s head. “So she lives with your grandparents?”

“Not all the time. She stays the weekends with my cousin Cody and his wife, Jan. Cody is Brenda’s brother. When I take a few days off, Dilly stays with me.”

“Who has custody of her?” Clay asked.

Vanessa frowned. “We do. All of us.” Then she shrugged. “Oh, if you mean legally, on the books, Cody and Jan, but they both work. I guess when she starts school, she’ll stay with them most of the time since they live in town. For now, though, this is a good place for her to spend the bulk of her time.”

Clay could not imagine the child not having a permanent home. Strange that he should feel such an affinity for this kid, only having just met her. Maybe it was because they had something in common—mothers who had died too soon.

“She’s lucky to have family,” he said, wondering what it would have been like if he had been absorbed into his mother’s tribe after her death. For one thing, he probably wouldn’t be feeling like such an outcast at the moment.

“Here,” Dilly whispered, rubbing his hand with a tiny ball of fur. “Don’t squeeze, though.”

Instinctively, Clay opened his hand and accepted the tiny white kitten as she laid it in the palm of his hand. “I thought you said we couldn’t touch them.”

She tilted her head to one side, her small fists resting on her jean-clad hips. Then she reached up and placed her small hand on his wrist, just touching. “Me and Bitsy trust you. Put her back at her mommy’s tummy when you get done. That’s her dinner.” In a bouncing flash of pink and denim, she skipped away and disappeared.

Vanessa relieved him of the wriggling fuzzy kitten and placed it back in the nest with the others. “I’m guessing you’re done, Mr. Red Dirt?” she said with a laugh.

Clay brushed his hand against his coat. “I guess so. Is she always that mercurial?”

That question raised her eyebrows. “Mercurial? What a perfect description of Dilly. And most four-year-olds, come to think of it. You haven’t been around kids much, have you?”

Not ever. There was the Cordas’ new baby, but it was too small to be called a kid yet. It looked so fragile, he always declined to hold it when the opportunity arose. Joe and Martine might trust him with their lives on a mission, but he sort of doubted that faith extended to their infant.

He rubbed the area just below his shirt cuff that still felt the featherlight imprint of the little girl’s fingers. Somehow, the child had touched more than his wrist with that gesture of her trust.

As they walked slowly back to her grandparents’ house, Clay found himself wondering what the future would hold for young Delinda and whether she would ever feel stigmatized by sins of her father. Was it in anyone’s power to save her from that?

The meal was superb and the food plentiful. Clay had to work hard not to overeat. The tender pork with its spicy sauce went well with what tasted like German-style potato salad and the fried, flat bread he couldn’t seem to resist. He had thought the food might be totally comprised of Native American fare, but it was a delicious mix of what he was used to and what he had only heard about. Fry bread, for instance. Until today, he had made it a point never to go where they made it. Perhaps he’d had it once when he was very young and the memory was lost.

“Eat more, please. A large man needs filling.” Rebecca Walker expressed her pleasure in his enjoyment of her cooking with a warm smile. “We have pie. Do you like peaches?”

“Peach is the best,” Dilly declared, jumping with anticipation.

He didn’t like peaches at all, but said he did just to keep the smiles going.

Mrs. Walker was so like Vanessa, but minus the almost frenetic energy, the endless pressing for information and the ready laughter of the younger woman. And the concentrated version of Vanessa that was little Dilly.

Had his mother been like Rebecca Walker? Clay hoped so, because she appeared the soul of contentment.

He finished every crumb of the pie and found it delicious. Had he only imagined an aversion to peaches? These were different, wonderful. “My compliments, Mrs. Walker,” he said sincerely, placing his napkin beside his plate. “That is the best meal I’ve had in years.”

“Years?” she repeated with a soft chuckle. “Doesn’t your wife feed you well, Mr. Senate?”

He tossed Vanessa a sly look that said, Here it comes, that third degree you promised I wouldn’t get. Out loud, to her grandmother he answered dutifully, “I’m not married. In our business, it is difficult to maintain a normal family life. We travel too often.” Had the woman sensed his concealed interest in her granddaughter? He hadn’t betrayed it by so much as a look in Vanessa’s direction. At least not that sort of look.

Rebecca inclined her head and poured him another glass of iced tea. “A shame there is no one for you to come home to. Maybe someday you will find this. My husband liked the comfort of it.” The old man nodded indulgently and shot his wife a knowing grin.

“You traveled a lot, sir?” Clay asked politely.

The old man nodded. “War. Then business school. I used to buy up inventory for some of the trading posts. Retired now.”

Vanessa sipped her tea and expounded on her grandfather’s meager answer. “He purchased lots of stuff from some of the smaller reservations out west and up north who haven’t the tourist trade we have here.” She smiled at her grandmother. “E-ni-si and other locals with creative talents make baskets, pottery and paintings to sell. I’ll take you by the co-op shop so you can see.”

“You’re an artist?” Clay asked Rebecca. He could not believe how many questions he was asking. He rarely did that unless it had to do with investigations, but found himself interested enough to break a few more rules.

The grandmother ducked her head in a show of modesty. “I make baskets.”

“Those ones,” Dilly said after gulping her mouthful of pie. “Up there, see?” She pointed.

Clay reevaluated the row of baskets sitting along the top of the kitchen cabinets. One particularly beautiful, intricately woven example sat on the granite countertop holding a bunch of green apples. He decided he would buy one like that from her before he left. Something priceless to remember these people by.

“Well, come on with me if you’ve finished eating,” Vanessa ordered. “We’ll get your things settled in your room, then take a walk to wear off some of these calories.”

She dropped a kiss on her grandmother’s head as she passed by her chair. “Thank you, E-ni-si. Great meal, as always.” She winked at her grandfather who solemnly winked back.

Dilly laughed with delight as she tried unsuccessfully to wink and instead, gave Vanessa a playful swat as she passed the youth’s chair.

“It’s bath time for you, button nose. Better be clean and have those dollies in bed by the time I come in to say night-night. There’s a bedtime video in it for you if you don’t flood the bathroom, okay?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Dilly agreed. “Ni-si will make me behave.”

Clay felt his eyes burn a little as he witnessed the open affection among these four. A pang of envy struck him like an arrow through the heart.

The child was precious, a true ray of light, and so secure in the love that surrounded her. So was Vanessa, he realized. He envied them that.

How would that feel, being accepted and loved so unconditionally? He wondered where Vanessa’s parents were and if she had been raised by these two from an early age. But he wouldn’t ask. Maybe some of the manners of the elder Walkers had rubbed off on him.

Vanessa’s natural bearing and self-confidence attracted him almost as much as her lithe figure and her lovely, animated features. The swing of her hips wasn’t meant to be enticing, but her unconsciousness of that made it all the more so. He was sweating like crazy.

He followed her out to the Explorer where they retrieved his two bags. She insisted on hefting his carry-on. She led him up the stairs to a bedroom containing a large dresser that looked handcrafted and a queen-size four-poster. It cried out for testing his weight. Along with hers. Clay sucked in a deep breath and released it with a huff of self-disgust. He had to stop this. Stop thinking about her that way.

“Bathroom’s in there. We’ll be sharing that. My room’s on the other side. The grans’ room is downstairs, and Dilly’s, too, so you needn’t worry about noise.”

Noise? Oh, and didn’t that just plant a vision in his head?

“No TV up here,” she said, pointing, “but there’s a radio with a CD player and a few CDs. Mostly flute music, I’m afraid. Cousin Eddie plays and we have to support the family endeavors.”

“Flute,” he repeated. Apparently he was to get a good dose of native culture whether he wanted it or not. “That’s fine.”

But it wasn’t fine. Not the flute, the fry bread or the unfamiliar customs like tribal hospitality and ingrained politeness. He knew now why he had felt so apprehensive about coming here, aside from sharing a house with a female agent who stirred him up the way she did.

Since he could remember, Clay had flaunted his Native American heritage, though he knew very little about it. Raised by his white father, away from any vestige of his mother’s culture since she had died, Clay had used his Native American looks as a form of rebellion against the man who had given him no choice about his upbringing and refused to discuss his mother or their marriage.

Clay had grown his hair long and adopted an attitude of stoicism and silence that he knew very well was stereotypical. Early habits died hard. Even when it no longer served any purpose to provoke Clayton Senate Sr., Clay had not let up. The image had suited him. Until now.

Vanessa and her grandparents made him feel whiter than the Pillsbury Doughboy. That was what bothered him. He had no mask to hide behind when it came to these people because they knew that his mask was about as authentic as a Sioux war bonnet on a Cherokee chief. He did not want Vanessa to see him as a caricature of their people. Or rather, her people. He wasn’t precisely sure he could, in all good conscience, claim either side of his family.

He felt a sharp need to fit in that he had not admitted to since he was eight and had realized he was rapidly forgetting what little he knew of his mother and her people. He had lost any stories, dancing, religion, belonging. His very identity.

“C’mon, let’s go meet Brother Billy Bear,” Vanessa said, catching his hand in hers as she strode past him to the door. “You can give him his daily Coke.”

Clay followed wordlessly, afraid to ask.

Vanessa giggled shamelessly as Clay held the old soft-drink bottle she had filled with the vet’s equivalent of Ensure for her grandfather’s pet. Billy accepted his daily dose with a grunt, bracing the bottle between his paws and sucking down the contents with expertise.

“I’ll be damned,” Clay muttered as he stepped back from the fence. “Where did you get it?”

The old bear was so rheumy-eyed and arthritic he offered no threat at all, but Clay obviously was a city boy with a healthy respect for what he saw as a wild animal.

“Old Billy did his time downtown back in the day, performing for the tourists until Mack Bowstring decided to close up shop. Since Billy was my very favorite attraction, my grandfather offered the man five bucks to take the bear off his hands and give him a good home.” She didn’t confess that she’d been required to work off that five bucks washing and drying dishes for a month in addition to feeding Billy every day until she’d left the mountain at eighteen.

“How old is he?” Clay asked.

“Over thirty now and thirty-five’s about the max for black bears.”

“Better he’s here than in a zoo, I guess,” Clay commented.

“Definitely. He was too domesticated to release in the wild and nobody could stand to have him put down. Gran pulled some strings to get permission to keep him. Uncle Charly’s a vet and keeps a close check on him.”

“I take it you have a large family,” Clay said as they watched Billy licking the bottle, exacting every last drop of the sweet nutritious liquid.

“Huge,” she admitted. “You?”

“Not so huge. I guess you’d never want to leave here, your family, this place.”

Vanessa turned, wondering why he’d ask such a thing. “I already left. I went to college, then the Academy and the job. I have an apartment in Asheville. I make it back most weekends to visit the grans. You thought I lived here?” She glanced back at the house, not minding the junky old mower, overgrown flower beds and the listing tree of gourd birdhouses. Rustic was the look and she loved it.

Clay tore his gaze from the bear and walked a few steps away, his back to her, his hands in his pockets. “I’m here to recruit you.”

Vanessa stared at him, lost for words. Recruit her? For what?

As if he’d read her mind, he answered, “We’re organizing a team of agents and you’ve been recommended for it. COMPASS, or Comprehensive Analysis of Stateside Security is affiliated with Homeland Security and deals with terrorist threats within our borders. I’m supposed to observe how you perform, see how you’d fit, both professionally and personally. If you’re not interested, I need to know.”

“So you can leave and not waste your time?” Vanessa asked. She made him uncomfortable and she knew it. She hadn’t made it to this age without recognizing the signs of physical attraction. She had probably been throwing out a few signals herself. He was ready to get out of here and this was his opportunity. All she had to say was no, she was not interested.

He turned, his expression unreadable. “No, I won’t leave until we’ve concluded the investigation. The thing is, if you can’t see yourself as a candidate for the team, then it’s merely business as usual and I won’t need to do an assessment on you.”

Vanessa considered that. “Where would I have to live?”

“In McLean, Virginia. At least for the first year. There would be extra training involved, connections to make. It would mean travel, but mostly to your southern sector, with occasional calls to other areas to assist fellow agents. We follow the trouble wherever it goes. Sometimes overseas.”

“I see. Is McLean where you live?”

“Yes.”

“It’s expensive there, isn’t it?” she asked.

“More so than here.” He looked off toward the mountains, her beloved Smokies. “You’d jump a couple of pay grades, get a cost-of-living increase and a hefty clothing allowance.” He sighed and shrugged as if he didn’t expect her to care about all that, as if he didn’t himself. “Same basic benefits as you have with the Bureau. Hazardous-duty pay for certain assignments.”

“Would I be the token redbird?” she asked without any bitterness. She knew all about equal-opportunity employment by the government. Had to have those minorities and women.

He smiled. “That plays into it, sure, but your qualifications weigh much more heavily in this instance. Not just any old Indian will do to meet the quota, if that’s what you’re asking. Nor would any female who could shoot straight and speak three languages. The requirements on paper are quite specific and you meet them. Interested?”

She paused for a full minute before she spoke. “You know some people aren’t crazy about being called Indian anymore. Think it’s not politically correct.”

“Does it offend you?” he asked, really curious.

“The majority of people called Indian are satisfied with it. Know why?” Her dark eyes shone with mischief.

“Why’s that?”

“Because the majority really are from India,” she said, laughing. “Gotcha!”

“Cute. Seriously, what do you prefer? Native American? Indigenous person?”

“Cherokee works for me. I guess you have a problem there, don’t you, since you don’t know which tribe to claim.”

“Yes, but I don’t obsess over it. You know we’re digressing here, and I think you’re doing it on purpose. You want time to consider what the job entails, right? But you’re not saying no.”

She frowned as she nodded reluctantly. “I’d be a fool to say no.”

“Would you?” Again he looked around them, taking in the wildness of the landscape, the beauty she usually took for granted, and drew in a deep breath, releasing it slowly. She saw this place through his eyes now. Could she leave for good?

“You’re worried about living so far away from your people?” he asked.

She nodded. “A little. I feel I have a responsibility to the tribe. If I stay in Asheville, at least I can act as a liaison when something like this pops up.”

His steel-gray eyes both challenged and warmed her with that piercing gaze of his. “Have you ever thought that maybe the world could be your hunting ground, the people of it, your tribe? They need you, too, Vanessa. Be a Cherokee, but be a world citizen, too. Could you handle that?”

“Interesting thought. How long do I have to consider it?” she asked. What he said intrigued her. Maybe he was right and she did need to broaden her horizons, give more than she was giving here.

“Until we finish this,” he replied.

“Then I guess you’d better take some notes on me just in case,” she advised. “Could be that I’m not what you’re looking for after all.”

“I think you’re exactly what I’m looking for,” he replied. For some reason, Vanessa thought that sounded personal. Or maybe she was just reading her own fantasies into it. This guy really was every woman’s dream. Unfortunately, all she could afford to do was dream that fantasy, not act on it.

His eyes met hers, their unusual steely color warming. “You could try bribing me with another piece of that peach pie. Maybe a cup of coffee to go with it? I’d probably support you for president.”

She grinned. “Whoa now! Don’t tell me you’re still hungry.”

He nodded, smiling, though his expression faltered a bit, leaning toward sadness. His cynicism and professional distance seemed to desert him all of a sudden. He looked vulnerable to her, almost lost, before he turned away, pretending to focus on the empty birdhouses.

Vanessa could sense his hunger, but it wasn’t for food. It appeared to be a soul-deep need she wasn’t sure she knew how to feed, but she wished she could try. Her grandmother had warned her time and again that she took things too much to heart, that she shouldn’t think she had to try to fix everything and everybody.

Maybe, like old Billy, this man just needed someone to show him they cared and that he had a place in the world. She could do that much, surely. It had worked wonders for the bear.