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and up into her thighs. Beside her, the fire danced and writhed, sent rainbow streamers into the dark sky. She tilted her chin to watch the dazzling display. Color exploded across the sky, gushed up from the trees, encompassed her, overwhelmed her. A shooting star sped across the heavens in a flow of showering sparks. It was close, so close she could touch it, ride it. ...
Back, back, back, she leaned, until she lay sprawled in the dirt, arms spread.
A face appeared above her, a pale blob of color against the dark sky. "Vi?" The word?was it her name??was deep and vibrating, drawn out to an impossible length.
Alaina.
Viloula blinked, tried to wet her lips enough to speak. She wanted to reach out, to touch Alaina's face, but before she could move, the ground vanished, and suddenly she was falling, spilling through an endless, lightless void. It was a magical, dizzying sensation that left her laughing and breathless. Stars sped past her like fireflies, caressing her face with light and warmth.
Then she was floating, her body riding an invisible wave of air. Back and forth, back and forth. She closed her eyes, released a heavy breath, and felt as if she were dissolving, melting into the air itself, as if she were a feather, or less, nothing at all. ...
The vision hit her like a crack to the jaw, wrenching the breath from her lungs. She gasped, tried to reach out, but she had no hands, no arms. It was just a sound at first, a booming, thunderous echo of gunfire.
Killian. The name exploded in her mind, sent panic spiraling through her blood. She was suddenly hot, suffocatingly hot. She felt the prickle of sweat on her brow. Her heart beat so fast, she couldn't catch her breath.
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Run! Run! She tried to scream the warning, but her throat was so dry, she couldn't, or she had no throat, or no memory of how to speak. She didn't know, couldn't be sure. Everything was shifting in on itself, moving. The world was a kaleidoscope of blasting color and deafening sounds.
She thrashed from side to side, not wanting to see any more. A harsh, desperate whimper pushed past her lips.
Blood. It splashed across her eyes, dripped down her cheeks. She felt its slimy downward movement on her skin, tasted its metallic bitterness.
She clawed at her face, screaming, trying to get rid of it, but the more she touched her face, the bloodier her hands grew. Wildly she looked down at her body, trying to see her wound. She got a fleeting glimpse of blue fabric darkened by blood.
Killian was beside her, and for the first time his face was crystal-clear in her mind. She was afraid for him, desperately frightened, though she didn't know why.
Killiannnn . . .
He dissolved into the night and the blood vanished.
Gasping, fighting for air, she sat up. In the distance, shimmering and uncertain, she saw two bodies intertwined. Sounds came at her hard. She heard a woman's crying, the roaring echo of thunder, hammering rain, gunfire. The noises fused into one throbbing din and battered her ears, deafened her.
She clamped her hands over her ears and suddenly there was silence, utter, breathless silence. Her vision zoomed across the desert, focused on the people in the distance. Lightning electrified the sky, illuminated their faces and the jagged, broken rock behind them. A huge, fiery red sun hung inches above a black plain of earth. An ornate silver cross hung suspended in the air, its shadow cast across a huge rock wall. Then the cross
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shimmered, moved, tumbled end over end across the sky, and disappeared in a puff of purple smoke.
Alaina. Killian. Blood. Tears. Sunset.
The lightning struck again. And Alaina was gone.
Shuddering, Viloula squeezed her eyes shut. "More," she cried out, her voice scratchy and weak. It couldn't be over. Whose blood had she seen? Whose death? "More ..."
But the images began to slide into one another. They blurred, started to fade. Panic squeezed her throat, made her gasp for breath and claw for answers. Oh, God. Oh, Jesus, no ... It couldn't end yet, not yet. She didn't know enough. Whose blood had she seen, whose tears? What was happening?
Weak, dizzy, she fell backward, into a darkness so deep and black and thick, there was no escape. It closed around her, seeped into her nose and mouth until she couldn't breathe, clogged her ears until she couldn't hear, and weighted her arms and legs.
With a last, shuddering breath, she melted into the nothingness.
Lainie paced from one end of Vi's little cabin to the other, gnawing hard on her thumbnail.
"Will you please stop that? You're giving me a headache." Killian leaned forward in his chair and covered his face in his hands. A deep, heavy sigh slipped through his fingers. "She's been asleep too long."
Lainie started chewing on her thumbnail again. Panic was close, clawing at her. She fought it, tried to concentrate on remaining calm, but couldn't. She felt so damned helpless and afraid. She and Killian had been in this room for hours, waiting for Viloula to wake up. Whatever sparks had connected them before were gone
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now, lay frayed and forgotten in the silence between them.
He turned to her, and in the dim lamplight, she saw the network of lines that pulled at his mouth and eyes. He looked drained and exhausted .. . and afraid.
Lainie brought her cold hands together, twisted her fingers into a tense ball. "She shouldn't have taken it. Not even to help me get home."
Home. The word and all that it meant slammed into her. How many days did she have to get home? How long before Kelly returned to an empty house and the government stepped in to "help out"?
Don't think about it. Not now, not yet.
She released her breath slowly, concentrating on regaining her composure, or at least the illusion of it.
"Oh, God ... I have to get home."
Killian threw her a dark, accusatory look.
She went to perch on the chair beside his. Leaning toward him, she tried to make him understand. "I know you think all of this is nothing, but it's not. It's life or death, and Viloula knew it."
"Yeah. Only it's your life and her death. Did she know that?"
Lainie felt as if he'd hit her. With a trembling breath, she sagged back in the chair. Bowing her head, she stared at the hands folded in her lap until tears turned them into a pale smear against her red sweater.
"Hey." Killian's voice was soft, husky. "I shouldn't have said that. It's not your fault. Viloula knew what she was risking. It's not your fault."
Lainie didn't look at him. She couldn't. Instead, she nodded.
He started to reach for her, then drew back.
She lifted her moist gaze to his face.
"I just care about her," he said quietly.
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"Yeah. Me, too."
They stared at each other, and in his gaze, Lainie saw the same helplessness that threatened to overtake her. She thought she should say something to him, but she had no idea what. The memory of his violent hug was so close, she could almost feel his arms around her again, warming her.
"Are .. ." She tried not to finish the sentence, but she couldn't help herself. "Are you really going to let Skeeter take me to Fortune Flats?"
He nodded.
"Why Skeeter and not you?"
He didn't look at her. "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth, Lainie. Just accept it."
She gave a soft, hollow laugh. "I've never been good at just accepting things."
Slowly, reluctantly, he met her gaze. There was a bleakness in his eyes that took her breath away, made her feel?again?as if she knew him. As if his pains were hers, somehow. "I can't help you, Lainie."
"You mean you won't."
Without answering, he turned back to the sleeping woman. "Here, Viloula," he murmured, reaching into the water basin beside him. Pulling up the towel, he twisted it. Water streamed through his fingers and splashed into the bowl. Gently he pressed the wet rag to her fevered forehead.
The simple gesture threw Lainie back in time for an instant. Suddenly she was a you
ng mother again, nursing her baby daughter through chicken pox. She remembered keenly how alone she had felt when Kelly's fever spiked, how incompetent she'd felt.
She would have given anything to have someone beside her, someone to help her.
She cast a sideways glance at Killian. He sat hunched
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over Viloula's bed, his big, suntanned hand covering one of hers. His hair was dirty and limp, hanging in a ratty silver tangle over his collar. A day's growth of black beard shadowed his cheeks, made his face look bruised in the pale light.
He'd never looked more handsome. She remembered how she'd felt when he had rescued her in the cave. In that instant, everything Viloula said seemed more than possible. Killian wasn't just a character in her book, wasn't simply a physical embodiment of her imagination.
Suddenly it hurt to look at him. She closed her eyes, but in the enforced darkness it was worse; she imagined his touch on her forehead, heard his softly spoken words: "You'll be all right, Viloula. You'll be all right."
A shiver traced her spine. She opened her mouth and stared at him, feeling unaccountably dizzy.
She'd spent a lifetime wondering what it must feel like to be cared for, looked after. She'd sought that welcoming, comforting touch in a hundred men's hands, until, at last, she'd stopped waiting for it. She'd even thought that she'd stopped wanting it.
But now, watching Killian minister to Viloula, she saw the naked, painful truth. She'd never stopped; it had lain dormant inside her beneath an avalanche of enforced coldness. She felt it now, an aching, hurtful need to be held and touched and cared for.
As if drawn by her thoughts, he looked at her. "Are you okay?"
She swallowed hard. "Fine."
He stared at her for a long time, as if seeking something in her eyes. "Go to sleep," he said at last. "I'll watch her."
Sleep. The word filled her with a sinking sense of despair. He made it sound so easy; go to sleep. He might
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as well have suggested she try brain surgery. "I'm not tired."
He frowned. "I can see it in your eyes."
His eyes saw more than she wanted to reveal. The silence between them thickened, became laced with undercurrents.
Unable to stand it, she spun away from him and went to the stove. "You want a cup of coffee?"
"Yeah," he said as she reached for the tin pot. "Coffee would be great."
She pulled a speckled blue cup from the shelving behind the stove, poured him a cup of strong, black coffee, and crossed back to the bed.
Without meeting his gaze, she handed it to him.
He took it, set it down on the bedside table. "Thanks."
"No problem."
After that, the silence fell again, thick and heavy and strained.
Killian threw the damp washrag down on the bedside table and leaned back in his chair, letting out a harsh sigh. God, he was tired. He raked his fingers through his tangled, dirty hair and came forward, resting his elbows on his knees and covering his face with his hands.
He listened to the slow, steady sounds of Viloula's breathing. The old woman was sounding better, and her fever had finally broken about a half hour ago.
Tiredly he lifted his head and glanced sideways.
Lainie sat sprawled in a chair in the corner, her legs pushed out in front of her and crossed at the ankles. Her head was cocked to one side, her mouth parted slightly. Her arms hung limp at her sides.
As he watched her, she frowned in her sleep, made a soft, breathy sound that might have been the word no.
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She moved restlessly, her head snapped suddenly to the left. Then she quieted again, fell silent.
She looked painfully vulnerable right now, and the need to go to her, to wake her from her fitful sleep, was powerful. So powerful .. .
He frowned and forced his gaze away from her. He'd made a decision, he'd given her what she said she wanted: a way out of this hellhole. As soon as Viloula wakened, Killian was going to send Skeeter and Lainie to Fortune Flats with his blessing.
There, he thought, that ought to do it. He was acting like a goddamn hero, doing what she asked of him. So why did it make him feel empty and lost? As if he wasn't doing the right thing at all.
Why Skeeter and not you?
"She's asking too much," he said softly, wincing at the desperate tenor of his voice, wondering bitterly who he was trying to convince.
"Alaina?" Viloula's cracked, reedy voice cut through his thoughts.
Relief rushed through him, banished the fear and apprehension for a heartbeat. "Thank God. Viloula?" He turned to Lainie, raised his voice. "She's trying to say something."
Killian's voice, ragged and hoarse, roused Lainie from her stupor. She blinked hard, sat upright in her chair. "What?"
"She's trying to say something."
Lainie stumbled to Viloula's side and skidded into the chair, clutching the seat edge. She scooted closer to the bed, leaning over Viloula. The old woman lay motionless, looking frail and withered against the linen sheeting. Purple shadows puddled beneath her eyes; her lips were colorless and dry.
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Lainie swallowed hard. "I'm right here, Vi. Right beside you."
"Lainie? Killian?" Viloula's voice was raspy, spiked by shallow, painful breaths.
Lainie shook her head, blinded by hot tears. "Don't talk, Vi. Don't try?"
Viloula smiled. It was weak and trembling, and the most beautiful smile Lainie had ever seen. "I'm starving," she grumbled.
Lainie let out a relieved laugh, then clamped down on her lower lip and covered her mouth with her hand. "Viloula?" she ventured. "Are you all right?"
The old lady nodded. "I had a vision."
Lainie drew in a sharp breath. Hope pounded in her chest, made it hard to hear anything but her own heartbeat. "Do I get home?"
Vi looked at her. "You leave here."
Lainie felt as if a ten-thousand-pound boulder had just been lifted from her chest. "Where?"
Viloula let out a hacking, rattling cough. "I saw de place clearly. It is a rock. . .. De Navajos call it de rock dat lightning struck." She looked at Killian. "You know dis place?"
He nodded. "Yeah. It's fifty, sixty miles due east."
"When do I need to be there?" Lainie asked anxiously.
Viloula frowned, thinking. "I saw a cross-----I t'ink
dat mean de Sabbat'."
"Okay, Sunday. What time?"
"A storm, very bad. And de sun was setting." Her frown deepened. "De storm is de key. You must be at de rock when de lightning strike again. If you miss it ... dere will be no more chances."
Lainie felt a flutter of fear. She pushed it away, refused to give in to it. "I'll be there."
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Viloula rolled her head slightly, stared up at Killian. "You were wit' her."
He gave a hollow laugh. "Those are some drugs, Vi."
Viloula reached for the amethyst at her throat. Unhooking the golden clasp, she eased the heavy stone necklace off her throat and pushed it toward Lainie. "You will need dis, child. To find your destiny."
"No, I couldn't?"
"Dis necklace has de magic to fulfill your destiny." A smile lit her black eyes. "It will come back to me."
Lainie took the necklace, felt its cold, impersonal weight in her palm. Slowly she put it around her neck and clasped the catch. The weighty stone settled in the hollow at the base of her throat and warmed the skin. A small, rhythmic pulse seemed to emanate from the amethyst.
Viloula looked at her hard. "Use it wisely."
"How?"
"I doan know."
"I don't understand. ... I didn't need the necklace to get here."
"But you will need it to get back, I t'ink."
Lainie's voice was tight with emotion. "Thanks, Viloula. I pray to God you'll get it back."
"I will." She turned slightly to face Killian again. "It is a dangerous journey," she whispered. A tiny frown pulled at her mouth.
&
nbsp; Lainie knew instantly that Viloula was withholding something. "What are you hiding from us, Vi?"
Viloula flinched at the question, drew in a fluttery breath. Her eyes took on a glassy, faraway look, and Lainie was somehow certain that the old woman was reliving the vision. "Dere will be a deal'," she said finally in a dull, quiet voice.
Lainie shivered. There will be a death. "Whose?"
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"I doan know."
"Perfect," Killian said, leaning back in his chair.
Viloula ignored him and looked at Lainie. "It is all up to you, Alaina. You need to believe.. .."
"Believe in what?"
Viloula closed her eyes and sank back into the bed. "I doan know dat, eit'er. Maybe in destiny ... maybe in love ... maybe in yourself."
For a long time, neither Killian nor Lainie spoke. Then, finally, he pushed to his feet. "I'm exhausted, Lainie. I'm going back to the cabin to get some sleep. Are you coming?"
"I think I'll stay here a second longer."
After Killian left the cabin, Viloula's eyes cracked open. "Is he gone?"
Lainie nodded. "Yeah."
Viloula released a weary sigh. "You and Killian must leave in de morning."
Lainie shook her head. "He's sending Skeeter as my guide. Killian's not going anywhere."
Viloula frowned harshly, her gray lips puckering. "Wit'out Killian, maybe dere is no destiny, no doorway." She wagged a gnarled finger at Lainie. "You doan go nowhere wit' Skeeter, child. It is Killian dat must take you."
"Jesus," Lainie sighed. "It just gets worse and worse. I can't make Killian take me anywhere."
Viloula reached out, curled her bony fingers around Lainie's hand, squeezing. "Dat boy want to take you, Alaina. Trust an old woman to see what de young ones cannot. He want to take you, he just afraid. You know what dat is like."
"Yeah," she said softly. "I know what it's like to be afraid."
Viloula squeezed her hands again, drew her close.
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"Remember what I tole you. Your lesson ... dat is de doorway to de future, not some rock."
Lainie tried to smile, but couldn't manage it. "I hope I figure out my cosmic failing before I get there."
"You know de lesson, Lainie. In your heart, you know it."
Lainie leaned forward. "Come with me, Vi."
Viloula shook her head. "It is no journey for an old woman."
Lainie swallowed hard, feeling the embarrassing sting of tears. "I ... I'll miss you, Vi."
She smiled, though her eyes were misty, too. "Didn't you learn anyt'ing from all dat reading, child? Dere ain't no good-bye in dis life. You and Killian and I ... we always be together, somehow." She pressed a thin, cool hand to Lainie's cheek. "You are stronger dan you t'ink you are, Alaina. You will make it home."