Tempting Fate: A Colorado High Country Novel

  Chaska pointed to the DVDs. “You get to pick, Naomi.”

  “I didn’t watch movies growing up,” Naomi said. “Do you know how amazing it was the first time I went to a movie theater?”

  He’d grown up with it, so of course he couldn’t imagine. “What did you see?”

  She handed a DVD to Chaska—Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. “I saw this. I hadn’t read the books, so I had no idea what was happening. I loved it anyway. It seemed incredible to me.”

  “I bet it did.” He bent down, loaded the DVD into the machine, trying to imagine all the things that had been new to her after she’d run away—not just movies or technology, but paying bills, holding a job, dealing with paperwork, getting a bank account, finding her way around a big city. She’d had to adjust to an entirely new way of life, and she’d done it by herself at the age of sixteen.

  “I read all the Harry Potter books after that. I identified with Harry.”

  “Why?” Chaska wasn’t the biggest Harry Potter fan, but he’d have sat there watching paint dry if it had made Naomi feel better. He clicked Play and went to sit down beside her.

  She gave him a heartbreaking little smile. “He is the Boy Who Lived. I figured I was the Girl Who Lived.”

  That hit Chaska right in the solar plexus.

  “Thank goodness for that!” Winona called from the kitchen, where she was popping corn. “And, hey, popcorn is Oglala, too.”

  “It is?”

  Chaska chuckled. “She’s joking—I think.”

  Naomi snuggled against him while they watched the movie, her gaze on the screen. But his gaze was on her, watching the subtle shifts in her expression as she reacted to what was happening to Harry and his friends.

  You were led to her.

  How could he have gotten so lucky?

  Afterward, Winona dragged herself up to bed, Naomi and Chaska giving her time in the bathroom before heading upstairs themselves.

  It felt right to go through the normal bedtime rituals together, sharing toothpaste, Chaska brushing her hair, the two of them undressing in the bedroom, throwing their clothes onto his sofa. Oh, yeah, he could get used to this—sharing life’s most mundane moments with her. But then nothing felt mundane with Naomi.

  They lay together in silence, skin against skin, her head on his chest.

  “I’m afraid,” she said. “I don’t know why, but I am. I can’t shake the feeling that everything is going to crash in on me.”

  “You’ve been through a lot, Naomi. Finding your father—that’s a big deal. It’s only normal that you’re nervous.”

  “I don’t know what I should hope for—that the test shows he is my father or that it shows that he isn’t.”

  “Then why don’t you just leave it to fate? Nothing you can do will change the outcome of that test.”

  But she couldn’t let it go, not yet. “I guess if he isn’t my father, I’m no worse off than I was before, right?”

  “True.”

  “And if he is my father…”

  He trailed his fingers down her spine. “If he is your father, then a whole new world opens up for you—a new family, a new community, a new way of life.”

  “That’s part of what scares me.”

  He could understand that. “You’re a survivor, Naomi. You survived Peter and Ruth. You ran away and survived life in a world that was completely unfamiliar to you. You fought back and survived those bastards up in the mountains. You did all of that on your own. You can handle this. I will be right there beside you—Winona, too. You’re not alone. Oglala is our world.”

  Some of the tension left her body as he spoke. Then her hand slid down his chest and belly to stroke his cock. “How about you take my mind off all of this by giving me something else to think about?”

  “Angel, I think you’re onto something.”

  Naomi woke with a start, dreams giving way to reality in a rush of adrenaline. She sat upright, saw that it was early still, the sun not yet high enough to spill its light onto the backyard.

  Chaska sat naked on the sofa, lighter in hand, about to do his morning prayer, the eagle feather sitting in its box before him. “Come.”

  She got out of bed and went in search of her bathrobe, not quite as free with nudity as he was.

  He waited for her, made room for her to sit beside him. When she had settled, he lit the sage bundle, letting it burn for a moment before blowing out the flame, a column of white smoke filling the air with the sharp scent of burning sage. Next, he took his eagle feather out of its box, passed it over the column of smoke four times. Then he smudged himself, fanning the smoke over his head and onto his body with the feather.

  She expected him to speak a few words in Lakota and then put everything away, as she’d seen him do before. Instead, he picked up the abalone shell with the sage bundle in it, turned toward her, and wafted the smoke over her.

  “Tunkasila, Creator, I ask that you be with Naomi today, giving her strength, guiding her to the right path. She has not had an easy journey, but she is strong and courageous. Help her to know that she is not alone, and help her to find the answers she seeks. All my relations. Mitakuye Oyasin.”

  Tears trickled down Naomi’s cheeks. Not knowing what to say, she went with what she knew. “Amen.”

  It was the first time she’d said anything to God in ages.

  Chaska put the eagle feather back in its box, kissed her, took her hand. “It’s going to be okay. No matter what happens, it will be okay.”

  “I hope you’re right. What if he doesn’t like me? What if …?” There were so many “what ifs.”

  Chaska was quiet for a moment, his brow bent. “Some of our ceremonies can become difficult at times—Sun Dance, hanbleceya, inipi. Before my first Sun Dance, my grandfather said to me, ‘When you’re afraid or weary, pray for strength for the man next to you.’ On the third day, the day I was supposed to pierce, I was nervous. I started praying for all of the other dancers—not for myself, but for them. When it was my time to pierce, I walked up to that tree, feeling strong, my fear gone.”

  She wasn’t sure why he was telling her this.

  He went on. “I know you’re nervous, angel, but I’ll bet Doug Otter Tail is nervous, too. What if you don’t like him? What if you’re angry at him? How is he going to explain all of this to his wife and children? When you feel afraid, think good thoughts for him.”

  Chaska’s words came together for her, putting a lump in her throat.

  “I hadn’t thought about that.” Somehow, knowing that this man would be nervous, too, made her feel less afraid. “Your grandfather must be a very special man. God, what if he doesn’t like me?”

  This made Chaska laugh. “He’s going to love you.”

  They dressed and went downstairs for breakfast, where Winona was getting the guest bedroom ready. “You’re sleeping together, right? Old Man can stay in here?”

  Naomi’s face burned.

  Chaska chuckled. “Yes.”

  After breakfast, Winona headed off to the clinic, while Chaska drove Naomi to her appointment, where they took X-rays of her ankle, removed her stitches, and told her that everything looked fine. Dr. Renshaw examined her, gave her a boot to wear for stability, and warned her not to put weight on that leg for another month.

  They made a quick trip to Food Mart after that to grab things that Chaska knew his grandfather liked to eat—Spam, Cup Noodles, and lots of Coca-Cola—and drove home again. There were no cars in the driveway, no one waiting for them.

  “When do you think they’ll get here?” Butterflies danced in Naomi’s stomach.

  “That depends on how much time Old Man spends talking with his buddies. It’s only a two-hour drive from Cheyenne to Scarlet.”

  Naomi did her best to keep busy. She helped Chaska clean Winona’s hummingbird feeders one by one and then cooked a batch of hummingbird food based on a recipe of Win’s. When it had cooled, Chaska carried the pitcher of liquid out to the porch for her and gave
her a plastic measuring cup to use to refill them.

  But Naomi wasn’t fast on her crutches, and the hummingbirds discovered the food in the measuring cup before she could pour the mixture into a feeder. They flocked to her, sipping straight from the cup. One even landed on her hand, perched there for just a moment. “Chaska, come see!”

  “They like you.”

  “They like the sugar water.”

  Like bright jewels, they hovered only a foot from her face, dipping their beaks into the sugary concoction, drinking it up.

  That’s how Chaska’s grandfather found her—standing on the porch with her crutches, holding a measuring cup, hummingbirds flitting around her.

  Elderly and bent with a face that resembled a weathered, old pumpkin, he chuckled when he saw her. “Hihanni waste. Good morning.”

  Behind him walked another man—tall, with short dark hair, his face now familiar.

  Doug Otter Tail.

  Naomi’s pulse spiked, her heart taking off.

  When you feel afraid, think good thoughts for him.

  Then she looked into his eyes and saw that he was nervous, too.

  Chaska helped Naomi finish with the hummingbirds, taking a moment to be alone with her before joining Old Man and Doug in the kitchen. He took her hands, kissed her fingertips. “No matter what happens, I’m here. It’s going to be okay.”

  He texted Winona, who turned the clinic over to volunteers and came home. She gave Old Man a big hug then got everyone settled with something cold to drink. They talked for a while about the drive, how hot it was in South Dakota, Grandfather’s powwow friends in Cheyenne.

  “How did they get so old?” Grandfather chuckled at his own joke.

  Then he set his medicine bundle on the table, took out his sage and his eagle feather, a feather that had belonged to his grandfather. “We’re talking about some important things today, so it’s right for us to pray first.”

  That’s how life was when your grandfather was a spiritual leader. No one did anything important without getting right with the spirit world first.

  When the feather had been stowed away, Old Man looked over at Naomi. “My grandson has told me about your recent difficulty with these men in the mountains. He told me how you escaped from them. You are very courageous to have come through that as you did. I am glad to see that you are healing.”

  “Aho,” Doug and Chaska said almost in unison.

  “Thank you,” Naomi said.

  “Now, we would like to hear about the medicine wheel you wear.”

  Chaska reached under the table to hold her hand.

  Naomi told them the whole story—how she’d been found by the dumpster with the medicine wheel tucked inside her blanket, how she’d been adopted by Peter and Ruth, how she hadn’t known about the medicine wheel until Peter had shown it to his congregation during a sermon about the evils of heathenism, how she’d wanted nothing more than to hold it with her own hands.

  Chaska could tell she was nervous by the tight grip she had on his fingers, but she spoke clearly and without hesitation or bitterness or tears.

  “I found it in his room, and I took it. It was the only connection I had to the person who had given birth to me. It seemed important that I should have it, and yet I hadn’t known it existed until that day. When no one was looking, I hid it beneath a floorboard in my room.”

  She told them how Peter suspected her of taking it and how he’d tried to beat the truth out of her with his belt. She told them how she’d taken it with her when she’d run away and how learning about it—what it meant, how it was made—had instilled in her an interest in making jewelry. “I bought a leather cord for it, and I’ve worn it every moment since—except for when Chaska took it to work and sent a photo of it to you.”

  The two men nodded, both of them considering what she’d told him.

  Then Old Man turned to Doug. “You, too, have ties to this medicine wheel.”

  Doug nodded. “May I see it?”

  Naomi lifted the cord over her head and handed it across the table to him.

  He held it between his finger and thumb, running the pad of his thumb over the quillwork. “Granny Otter Tail gave this to me at my naming ceremony. She made these for all of her grandchildren, always with the two little Xs on the back, right here.”

  Doug told them how he’d gotten a scholarship to a summer youth camp and how he’d met a girl there, a wasicu girl, who caught his eye. “We became friends. She had blond hair and bright blue eyes. I’d never met anyone like her before. We became close. She was my first, and I was hers. I wanted to keep in touch with her. She said she wanted to stay in touch, too. We traded phone numbers, and I gave her this.”

  He told them how he’d tried to get in touch with her in the weeks that followed, only to have her mother call him and tell him to leave her daughter alone. “She told me that no daughter of hers was going to date an Indian boy.”

  He handed the medicine wheel back to Naomi. “That’s the last I saw of that medicine wheel until Tina showed me the photo on her cell phone. If I got that girl pregnant, no one told me. If I had known, if she had only told me …” Doug’s voice broke. He swallowed, took a breath. “I would never have left any child of mine in an alley to die, not even when I was fifteen.”

  Chapter 20

  They talked for the rest of the morning. Naomi answered Doug’s questions about her life as best she could, while Winona put lunch together.

  “Ruth taught us all at home. As a girl, I was taught sewing, canning, cooking, and some basic math for recipes. She also taught us to read because we needed to be able to read the Bible. I didn’t graduate from high school. I had to get my GED later.”

  It was mortifying to admit all of this when the man she loved, the man who sat beside her holding her hand, was a rocket scientist and a genius.

  Chaska gave her hand another squeeze, as if sensing her embarrassment.

  “Degrees don’t make a person intelligent.” Grandpa hadn’t said much until now. “A degree is a piece of paper. I don’t have any degrees, but people still call me wise.”

  “She taught you some good skills,” Doug said, “but they’re not enough in today’s world. These are the people the state thought fit to raise you? It’s cruel to withhold education from a child.”

  Naomi didn’t know what to say. “From the outside, they look like the perfect, loving family—eight kids of their own, a preacher and his stay-at-home wife, a beautiful farm. I don’t think anyone looked beyond that.”

  Winona put lunch on the table—egg salad sandwiches and apple slices—and they ate, Grandpa Belcourt making a spirit plate. Over the meal, they agreed that Naomi and Doug should get the paternity test. It was the only way to answer the biggest question: Was Doug Naomi’s father?

  After lunch, they climbed into Doug’s SUV and drove down to Denver to a lab that did DNA tests, including legal paternity tests. The whole thing felt surreal to Naomi, like she was in a movie or living someone else’s life. She’d left South Dakota ten days ago wanting to relax, and now she was hobbling along on crutches with her lover on one side and a guy who might be her father on the other.

  Chaska held the door for Naomi, staying close to her, as he’d promised he’d do.

  Doug asked a lot of questions of the people at the front desk. “Are the results admissible in court? Can they be used as a basis for tribal enrollment?”

  “He’s an attorney,” Chaska whispered in Naomi’s ear.

  She hadn’t known that. “Tribal enrollment?”

  “If he’s your father, you’re legally Oglala Lakota and able to enroll.”

  “Oh. I hadn’t thought about that.” Naomi couldn’t think that far ahead, especially now that she’d met Doug.

  There was so much she didn’t know about him, this man who might be her father, but she liked him. More than that, she believed what he’d told her—that the medicine wheel had once been his and that he would never have left her in that alley. If it turned
out now that he wasn’t her father…

  After the young woman at the desk had reassured them that the results would be legal for tribal enrollment, they were brought back to fill out paperwork.

  Mother: Unknown.

  Child: Naomi Archer

  Alleged Father: Doug Otter Tail

  A tech, a young man, came and read through the paperwork.

  “You don’t know your mother. That’s a first. How does that happen?”

  Naomi found the question tactless but answered, if for no other reason than to show him how rude he’d been. “I was abandoned as a newborn in an alley and almost died. I was adopted. They never found my mother.”

  The tech looked shocked and then embarrassed. “Oh. Sorry.”

  His gaze darted to Doug, and he looked like he was going to ask another question, but he didn’t. He opened two sterile kits and swabbed the insides of their cheeks with what looked like little mascara brushes, explaining that the results would be available in about twenty-four hours and would be emailed to them.

  “If you’re not her father, the result will say that you’re excluded and show a zero percent probability of paternity. If you are her father, it will say that you cannot be excluded as her father and that there is a 99.99 percent probability of paternity.”

  “Why not a hundred percent?” Doug asked.

  The lab tech gave an explanation, which Winona translated for her grandfather, but Naomi was too tense to care.

  Twenty minutes later, they were back in the car.

  “So now we wait,” Doug’s gaze sought Naomi’s.

  It was going to be a long twenty-four hours for him, too.

  When they got back to Scarlet, Winona took Grandfather and Doug back to say hello to Shota, then shown them around her clinic. Old Man had seen it all before, but he held a great deal of respect in his heart for the four-legged and winged ones. Chaska knew that Winona’s work was a source of great pride for him.