Naked Edge

  She could barely say the last word, her heart thudding. "You grow sick or go mad and then die. The only way to cure the sickness is to ... find and kill the witch."

  Find and kill the witch.

  That sounded good to Gabe. If he ever got his hands on the son of bitch behind all of this, he'd be only too happy to pull the trigger. He'd seen Kat gravely injured and in pain. He'd seen her devastated by grief. He'd seen her afraid for her life. But he'd never seen her like this--shaken to her very core.

  Irving picked up the plastic bag and examined the contents again. "By sending this to you, they're trying to cast some kind of spell on you?"

  "Or trying to tell me that I'm cursed, that I'm already as good as ... dead." Her voice dropped to a near whisper. "It's hard to explain."

  Tom, who'd been silent and busy taking notes, looked over at Kat. "Are skinwalkers common to all American Indian cultures?"

  Kat shook her head, her gaze fixed on her hands. "Only Dine. Only Navajo."

  "So whoever sent this knows you're Navajo and knows it would upset you." Irving shifted his gaze from Kat to Tom and then to Darcangelo. "It seems to me we ought to consider the possibility that the person behind these death threats and yesterday's shooting is American Indian--someone who knows Ms. James and is familiar with Navajo beliefs."

  Gabe could see from the troubled expression on Kat's face that the idea was upsetting to her. "Not necessarily. With the Internet, anyone could find out about skinwalkers."

  Or Navajo sexual mores, right, Rossiter?

  "Good point." Irving nodded. "Still, it's something we ought to consider. Ms. James, is there anyone who comes to mind who might have done this, anyone in the American Indian community?"

  "No, not in the Indian community." She shook her head. "I don't know any Navajo in Denver, and everyone I do know loved Grandpa Red Crow, too. They've been praying for me, hoping I'll get to the bottom of this."

  "What about non-Indians?"

  Kat's gaze met Gabe's as if seeking his guidance. "I . . . I don't have any proof, but Officer Daniels, the officer who pulled my hair, made the decision to raid the inipi. He was the first officer to respond when we found Grandpa Red Crow, and he was one of the first officers to respond to the shooting yesterday. Every time I looked his way, he was . . . watching me."

  "I can corroborate that." Gabe then filled Irving in on everything he knew about Daniels, including the complaints he and Kat had filed against him for excessive use of force and Feinman's apparent attempt to get Gabe to withdraw his complaint. "It was clear to me they were trying to cover for him."

  Irving seemed to consider this, then he turned back to Darcangelo. "What have you and Hunter learned from the Boulder boys?"

  Darcangelo shrugged. "The Boulder PD is being territorial. We had one hell of a time getting the locations of the city's surveillance cameras, and we still don't have the report from yesterday's shooting. So far, we've been polite, but ..."

  "Really? You? Polite? That's a first." Irving raised an eyebrow. But Gabe wasn't fooled. He could feel the affection between the two men. "You have my permission to be yourself. This has spilled over into our jurisdiction now, and that means I want everything they've got going all the way back to the raid on the sweat lodge."

  Darcangelo grinned. "Yes, sir."

  "In the meantime, we need to keep you safe, Ms. James. Where are you currently staying?"

  "I'm staying at Gabe's house in Boulder, and he's acting as my ... bodyguard."

  "Are you satisfied with that arrangement?"

  Kat nodded. "Yes."

  "Mr. Rossiter, do you think you're up to it?"

  "Yes, sir." Gabe filled the chief in on his experience and tactical training, feeling oddly like he was in a job interview.

  He was grateful when Darcangelo vouched for him. "I worked with him when we were chasing Hunter. Rossiter here is rock solid."

  They spent the next several minutes debating whether Kat was safe enough at his place or whether she ought to be set up in a police safe house under twenty-four-hour DPD surveillance or secreted in a hotel. In the end, they agreed that she was probably safe at Gabe's--with a little additional plainclothes police surveillance that Chief Irving promised to provide as soon as possible, jurisdiction be damned. Gabe found himself both liking and respecting the old man.

  "One last thing: secrecy." Irving looked over at Tom, who'd sat silent through most of the meeting. "Ms. James will need to keep her location secret, and that means not sharing it with anyone outside this room. It also means limiting her time in public or in the office. We don't want to give the perpetrator an opportunity to follow her home."

  Tom turned to Kat. "James, take what you need to work from home."

  "Okay." Kat still looked deeply shaken, and it took everything Gabe had not to put his arm around her. "And thanks, everyone. I'm grateful for your help."

  With that, the meeting was over.

  Tom left the room with Irving. Darcangelo picked up the two evidence bags--one holding the bone, the other the envelope in which the bone had been mailed--and dropped them into a much larger envelope. "Hunter was sorry he couldn't make it. He and the rest of the SWAT team are doing some kind of training exercise today. You know how those SWAT boys just love to play with their toys."

  That made Kat smile. "Thank him for me. And thank you for coming. I know this isn't the sort of case you usually handle."

  "Hey, it's no problem. You're family to us, Kat." Darcangelo walked around the table and ducked down to kiss Kat on the cheek. "Call if you need anything, got it?"

  She nodded. "Thanks."

  Darcangelo met Gabe's gaze. "I'll be in touch."

  Gabe waited till he and Kat were alone, then he gathered her into his arms. She leaned into him, as if he was the only thing keeping her on her feet, and he knew she was near the edge. "Let's get your things together and get you home."

  CHAPTER 18

  "ARE YOU OKAY?"

  Kat buckled her seat belt. "Yeah."

  She stuck the key in the ignition, turned on her headlights, then slowly backed out of the parking space, aware Gabe was watching her.

  "Why don't you let me drive?"

  She shook her head. She needed to drive. It would distract her, give her something to do, help her feel in control again. "I'll be fine."

  But the moment she said it she knew it was a lie. She could barely think in a straight line, let alone drive. She felt sick, shaken, confused. And suddenly Gabe's house in Boulder seemed a million miles away. She slipped her truck into park and squeezed her eyes shut, fighting back her tears. She heard the passenger door open and close, and then Gabe was there opening her door, unbuckling her seat belt, smoothing her hair from her face. "It's going to be okay."

  Feeling ashamed, she slid over to the passenger seat and buckled up again, staring out the window as Gabe drove her truck out of the underground garage, an enormous steel mesh gate lifting to let them out. Julian was there, waiting for them in his unmarked police car--a dark Chevy Impala. Gabe drove through the parking lot, turning west onto 13th Street and heading toward Speer, while Julian followed a couple of car lengths behind to make sure no one tailed them.

  For a time, they drove in silence, Kat's sense of shame growing. She deserved to feel ashamed, reacting as she had. There was no such thing as skinwalkers. She knew that. Skinwalkers were no more real than witches or fairies or goblins or any other creature dreamed up to explain the unexplainable. And yet, when she'd realized it was a human bone ...

  She shivered, chills skittering down her spine.

  Without a word, Gabe reached over and turned on the heater.

  Kat supposed she should call Uncle Allen and tell him what had happened. He'd hold a special inipi for her so she could sweat out the evil. But Allen had enough on his mind without having to worry about her. Besides, the evil, if there was any, was inside the heart of the person who'd mailed that package, not inside her. No skinwalker had sealed that envelope, addressed it
, stuck a stamp on it, and dropped it in the mail. A human being had done that. That's what she had to remember.

  Whoever had sent it was trying to use her culture against her, trying to make her believe her life was almost over, trying to frighten her.

  And he succeeded, didn't he?

  Beneath the dregs of her fear she felt it--anger. Anger at herself, at the person who'd done this, at Officer Daniels and those who protected him. White-hot, it built slowly, moving upward from her stomach, chasing away her chills, dispelling her lingering sense of dread. She wasn't some helpless victim. She had her mind, her courage, her spirit. She wasn't a sheep to be spooked and herded. She wouldn't let anyone, Bilagaanaa or Indian, manipulate her.

  She looked over at Gabe, hesitant to say anything, but feeling the need to redeem herself in some way. "You must think I'm silly."

  "Silly?" He frowned. "Why would I think that?"

  For a moment she thought he must be teasing, but when he glanced over, his expression was serious. "How I reacted . . . It was . . . ridiculous."

  "No, it wasn't." He reached over, took her hand, gave it a squeeze. "You're being way too hard on yourself."

  "But skinwalkers ..." She wanted to explain, but it was still hard to say the word out loud. "They don't exist."

  "I know there's no such thing as ghosts, but if someone rigged my house so that I started hearing clanking chains at night and seeing strange transparent shapes drifting past my bed, I'd get pretty creeped out." He glanced over, gave her a lopsided grin. "I'd run the other way faster than Shaggy and Scooby."

  "Are they friends of yours?"

  He laughed. "You've never heard of Scooby-Doo?"

  "Scooby who?"

  But this only made him laugh harder. "Never mind. The point is that every culture has its mythical monsters, and just because we know in our rational minds that they don't really exist doesn't mean people can't play on those fears."

  He looked over at her, all trace of humor gone from his face. "I'm not going to let him hurt you, Kat. Whoever he is, I'm not going to let him hurt you."

  GABE PARKED KAT'S truck in his garage beside his SUV so that no one would see it and know she was there. He disarmed the alarm system and carried her suitcases inside to his bedroom. "Make yourself at home. Let me know if you need anything."

  He left her to settle in and went to double-check the doors and arm the alarm system. Once he was certain the place was secure, he went downstairs and grabbed his hunting rifle and extra ammo for both the rifle and his HK semiauto, which he still wore in his shoulder harness. He loaded the rifle and carried both it and the extra ammo upstairs, leaning the rifle against the wall beside the entertainment center and stashing the ammo on the floor beside it. He'd never taken anyone's head off before, but he was ready to do just that.

  Get past this, motherfucker, whoever you are.

  He'd just started digging around in the refrigerator, trying to figure out what to make for supper when he smelled it--smoke. He walked toward his bedroom and saw Kat holding what looked like a bald eagle feather over a curling tendril of smoke rising from a bundle of white sage that sat in a large abalone shell on top of his chest of drawers. Eyes closed, she spoke soft words he couldn't understand, wafting the smoke over her head with the feather.

  She was smudging--praying and purifying herself to wash away the feeling of taint that receiving and holding the bone had left on her.

  Feeling like an intruder, he started to turn away, but just then she opened her eyes and saw him. She picked up the abalone shell and took a hesitant step toward him, feather still in hand, uncertainty in her eyes.

  Gabe nodded.

  She walked over to him, then used the feather to waft sage smoke against his body, whispering foreign words. He caught the smoke in his hands, drew it over his head, the pungent, earthy scent somehow revitalizing, the moment strangely intimate.

  By the time she stepped away, the sage bundle had stopped smoldering. She set the abalone shell down on his dresser and placed the eagle feather in a long, slender box that looked like it had been carved by hand. Then she looked up at him and gave him a tremulous smile. "Thank you."

  "Are you hungry?" He wasn't sure her stomach was up to eating just yet.

  "A little." She seemed to hesitate. "I really just want to take a bath."

  At the word "bath," an image of her naked and sitting in his tub blindsided him, sending his thoughts in a distinctly nonspiritual direction. "You go ahead. I'll make supper. Let me know if you need anything."

  Like my help undressing or washing your luscious body or. . .

  Yeah, he was despicable.

  He willed himself to walk away, heading back to the kitchen where he rummaged mindlessly in the fridge and the cupboards, unable to concentrate on dinner, testosterone shorting out his brain, making it terribly hard to think about anything but what was happening in that tub.

  He grabbed stuff to throw in a salad and set it on the counter, then opened the freezer. He had chicken, of course, but he also had elk fillets, buffalo rib eyes and trout. But could her stomach handle any of that? Maybe he should just make omelets.

  He decided to ask. He walked to the bathroom, leaned toward the door, and opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out. Kat had left the door open just a crack, and there, in the bathroom mirror, he could see her reflection.

  His mouth went dry.

  She sat with her back against the foot of the tub, shaving her legs, her dark hair tied in a hasty knot at the back of her neck, tendrils spilling around her face. Her breasts swayed gently with her movements, her dusky nipples tight, her caramel skin rosy from the heat of the water, the scents of white sage and honey rising with the steam. Then she raised one slender leg out of the water and slid her razor over glistening skin.

  Sweet Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!

  He was in so much trouble.

  KAT RINSED THE shaving cream from her leg, set her razor down on the side of the tub, then reached for her soap, which had slipped into the water and bobbed near her toes amid floating leaves of white sage.

  "It's the soap, isn't it?"

  She gasped and looked up to find Gabe watching her. He was leaning against the bathroom sink, black turtleneck stretched across his chest, his pistol resting against his left side in its shoulder holster. He looked more than a little dangerous--in an oddly appealing, very male way. His gaze slid over her, his eyes dark.

  She fought the urge to cover herself. He'd already seen her completely naked, had already touched her everywhere. "The ... the soap?"

  "Your skin always smells like honey." His voice was deep and warm and seemed to fill the small room. "It's the soap."

  The soap.

  She stared at it for a moment, the way he was looking at her making it hard for her to think. "It's honey soap. A friend of mine ... She, um, makes it in her kitchen using honey." Of course she makes it from honey, Kat! "Honey from her own hives."

  For a span of heartbeats, he just stood there, watching her, his gaze all over her, a look of restrained male desire on his face. Heat flooded Kat's cheeks, her body seeming to come alive with memories of last night as the silence stretched between them.

  Then, at last, he spoke. "Do you want me to go?"

  And she realized she didn't. "No."

  He crossed the small room in a single step and slowly knelt beside the tub, his gaze never leaving hers. Then he pushed up his sleeves, took the soap from her, held it to his nose, and inhaled, his eyes drifting shut. "Mmm."

  The masculine rumble of his moan sent a rush of heat to her belly, anticipation coiling inside her.

  He opened his eyes, rubbing the soap between his hands to work up a lather, his lips curving into a smile that made her pulse skip. "Just lie back and close your eyes. You're in good hands."

  Good hands.

  Oh, yes, he did have good hands, and the thought of them touching her almost made her squirm. She leaned back against the tub and closed her eyes, only to have them po
p open again when she heard the clink of the soap dropping into the soap dish.

  He chuckled. "I said close your eyes."

  Barely able to breath, she did as he asked, her nipples drawing tight, her entire body tense, as she waited, impatient, wondering what exactly he would do. But what she felt first wasn't his hands on her breasts, but his lips as they brushed warm and whisper-soft over hers once, twice, three times.

  "Kat." He kissed her upper lip, then her lower lip, flicking it with his tongue, catching it between his lips, nipping it.

  Then his hands slid over her breasts, soap slick and hot, cupping and shaping them. His fingers caught her nipples, teased them to aching points, giving them little tugs she felt all the way to her womb. She gasped and arched her back, offering herself to him, awed by the delicious feeling of skin sliding over soapy skin. The sensation unleashed a torrent inside her, left her feeling hot, wet, empty.

  Oh, she wanted him! She couldn't deny it, couldn't ignore it, couldn't lie to herself about it. She wanted Gabe.

  "You're driving me out of my mind." Gabe drank in the sight of her, inhaling deeply, her musky scent mingling with the scents of honey and white sage. His groin throbbed, his cock almost painfully hard, but there was nothing he could do about it at the moment. He'd thought about unzipping his jeans, just to relieve some of the pressure, but he didn't want to do something that would make her pull away. Besides, he couldn't seem to take his hands off her.

  She lay against the back of the tub, her eyes squeezed shut, her lips parted, her breathing rapid. She held tightly to the sides of the tub, as if she thought she might drown. Her wet skin was flushed from the heat of the water and the heat of her own blood, her cheeks rosy. Her dark hair had come loose from its knot, the ends floating in the water around her. And her breasts . . .

  They filled his hands, her wine-dark areolas like puckered velvet, their tips hard little nubs that pressed against his palms. He caught one between his thumb and forefinger and rolled it lightly before doing the same with the other, gratified by her little whimper and the way she arched upward, pressing her thighs tighter together to ease the ache he'd built there.