Broken Wings (9 page)

“
The longer you stay here,”
he said in a calm manner, “the more danger you’re putting him in.
They killed your sister down in Carson City. And if they get one
look at you,” he said of the white law men, “they’re going to know
you were one of her accomplices.”

He wasn’t overlooking the similarities
between Maggie and Molly. They both had red hair and they looked
alike. Mary was the different one with hair as dark as
night.

“
I can’t leave him…” her
words trailed off on an injured tone.

“
You’re wanted,” he said.
“Remember?”

Yes. And up until now—as far as she
knew—she’d been an unidentified party. But now that Molly had been
identified, this was not a safe place for Maggie to hide. Not safe
for her. Not safe for Tajan. And not safe for his
people.

Tears slipped from the corners of her
eyes.

“
I’m thankful that he found
you and nursed you back to health,” he said with a measure of
compassion. “But if you truly love him, you’ll leave here with me
tomorrow…before they find you and he ends up dying trying to
protect you.”

Her grandfather’s words crashed down
around her a little too harshly. Even so, they rang of pure
truth.

* * *

Once Tajan heard that Bradford intended
to take Maggie back to California the next day, he was overcome
with anger. Inside his own grandfather’s lodge, Tajan paced paced
the length of the interior while Timeko and his grandfather, the
Chief, looked on.

He stopped, as if a cold wind had
frozen his body, and faced his elders. “I will not let him take
her!” he said in his native tongue.

“
It’s not your choice,”
Timeko replied in the same language. “And she’s in danger here.”
Timeko hoped to reason with his son, yet fearing there would be no
way of reckoning with him.

“
The girl must be returned
to her grandfather,” the Chief finally spoke, issuing the final
words on the matter.

And those were the worst words in the
whole world for Tajan. His grandfather had the last
word.

* * *

The tribe’s council decided Tajan’s
wife would not accompany him to his lodge that night. Doing so
could make it all the more difficult to separate them in the
morning.

Just before daybreak, Tajan emerged
from his lodge. Having had all night to wallow in his anger, it had
swelled to the breaking point.

How dare they? How dare his own people
attempt to take away the only thing that had ever meant anything to
him?

Maggie emerged from a nearby lodge.
She’d been grilled half the night about the danger she’d be
bringing to Tajan if she stayed. They’d all tried to make her feel
guilty and they’d done a pretty good job of it, too.

She didn’t want to bring danger to him.
Why couldn’t they see that? She loved him more than life itself. In
fact, she couldn’t imagine life without him. How in the world was
she supposed to go back to California and put on this farce of a
pretense that she was happy about it? She didn’t know how she was
supposed to survive without him. But everyone seemed so certain of
one thing—if she stayed, Tajan would die.

Bradford led Maggie past Tajan. She
paused, gazing into his eyes. She wished she could tell him it was
a bad joke. That everything was going to be okay. But that was a
lie. It wasn’t going to be okay. Nothing was ever going to be okay
again.

Bradford gave Maggie a tug, prompting
her away from Tajan’s side. Her eyes never left Tajan’s steady gaze
as she was led away

Tajan had put forth a good front—on the
outside. But inside, he was dying. His heart was breaking. The fact
that she could actually walk away from him was killing
him.

Bradford nudged Maggie to get on the
horse. She did it—in an almost trance-like state—and turned back
for one last look. Tears were starting to smear her vision. Even
so, she could see his stone-faced glare.

Tajan didn’t take his eyes off her
until she and her grandfather disappeared from view. He went back
inside his lodge and emerged again, shortly. His anger was spilling
over. He mounted his horse and took off in the opposite direction
that Maggie and her grandfather had gone.

~~~~

PART THREE

THE REVELATION

~~~~

CHAPTER 18

Billy and Rio traveled the winding road
up the mountain on their way up to Lake Tahoe. Once again, he was
driving her car while she rode shotgun.

“
Kryptonite
” by
Three Doors Down
poured out over the radio as
she admired the mountainous terrain. Rio sang along with the tune
while keeping her eye on a black SUV in the side view mirror. The
fact that they were being followed hadn’t eluded her. If Turner
thought it had, he’d underestimated her.

Prior to reaching the south shore of
the lake, they stopped at Vista Point. Many years ago the locale
had been turned into a scenic spot with its gigantic boulders
scattered all around, many of which were stacked on top of each
other. The only thing that had changed since Maggie and Tajan’s day
was that modern civilization had built one guard wall against the
south side.

Rio sat silently on the man-made
railing, gazing out over the magnificent sight before her. The lake
stretched for miles in all directions, surrounded in its entirety
by the colossal mountains of the Sierra Nevada.

Billy leaned against a huge rock. “You
seem to be right at home.”

“
I do like it here.” Her
eyes stayed glued to the lake. “I can’t quite put my finger on it.”
She looked at him. “But I feel a sense of comfort here.”

“
This was probably a place
where Tajan and Maggie spent much of their time.”

Rio wasn’t her usual spunky self and
Billy hadn’t missed out on that. She seemed preoccupied. “Hey, I’m
going to go find a bathroom. You want to come?” In his own way, he
was offering to leave her alone for a while so she could work out
whatever was bothering her.

“
I’d like to stay here,” she
said. “If you don’t mind.”

“
That’s okay,” he said.
“I’ll be back soon.”

He walked away and Rio decided to
explore the locale. Almost in a daze, she wandered through the area
until, unbeknownst to her, she came to the place where Tajan had
asked Maggie to marry him and then claimed her as his
own.

Rio climbed onto the same boulder the
star-crossed lovers had made love on all those years ago. She
examined the rock and eased down. Lying on her back, she propped up
her feet. She closed her eyes and covered them with her
forearm.

Why couldn’t she get the warrior out of
her head? Was she losing her mind? He was after all just a face
painted on a canvas. Granted, a captivating face, but it was
nothing more than that. The man had been dead for over a hundred
years. Still, Rio couldn’t stop thinking about him.

A chill breezed through her as she
wondered what it must have been like having Tajan looming above her
in the throes of passion. Her sexually inspired musings were
invaded by the sudden smell of an unusual aroma that seemed almost
sweet in a masculine sort of way, and quite unlike anything she’d
ever perceived even though it felt familiar.

She could almost swear she felt his
lips brush against her cheek. Overwhelmed with the certainty that
if she opened her eyes she’d see Tajan, but she didn’t dare try it.
Instead, she savored the thought of his tongue exploring her neck
in a tantalizing way. She swore she felt his long hair tickling her
breasts.

But how was that possible? She wasn’t
naked. Rio’s eyes sprang open and she jumped up. Tajan was not
there. In fact, no one was there, and that was somehow
disheartening. Surveying her surroundings, she saw Billy heading
her way from the end of the trail.

She scrambled to cover herself and felt
the heat burning her cheeks when she remembered that she was fully
clothed. Unable to rid herself of the flush that had fallen over
her at the mere thought of—
hey, what was that
anyway
?

Billy stopped at the side of the rock
she was sitting on. “Uh oh.” The corner of his lip twisted. “There
it is again.”

“
What?” She glanced down,
making sure she wasn’t actually as naked as she felt. This
thing—whatever it was that she’d seen—seemed so real. She could
still recall Tajan’s hair tickling her breasts.

“
You know…” Billy folded his
arms across his chest and leaned against the rock. “That same look
you got when you thought you saw yourself getting your picture
taken with Maggie’s sisters.”

Rio looked away, defeat swelling inside
her.

“
What?” Billy laughed
nervously. “What happened while I was gone?”

“
I don’t know.” She
shrugged, trying to blow it off. “I fell asleep. I was having a
dream, I guess.”

“
A dream?” He looked at her.
“About what?”

“
I—” She shook her head
“—can’t remember.”

“
Well, personally, I think
you can. But I’m not going to push you. If you don’t want to talk
about it,” he said with a slight nod. “That’s up to
you.”

How could she? How could she tell this
virtual stranger—a man she also happened to be conning—that she was
fantasizing about his third-great grandfather?

~~~~

CHAPTER 19

Rio and Billy sat across from each
other in a booth at Grandma Hattie’s, a restaurant that was popular
with the locals. And with good reason; they served up excellent
food and Rio was growing fond of their blintzes.

Considering Billy’s opinion of Maggie,
one would think he’d shy as far away from Rio as he could get.
Billy hated Maggie. He hated her for destroying Tajan’s life.
That’s the way he saw the story, and no amount of talking could
convince him otherwise.

In light of that, being around Rio
should be the last thing he’d want. It stood to reason that her
being there would seem like his worst nightmare had come to life to
haunt him.

But that wasn’t the case, at all. The
more time he spent with her, the more he felt drawn and connected
to her. And the bond was pure. As far as Billy knew, Rio Laraquette
was indeed his cousin. He never thought for a second that that
could possibly be a lie.

The waitress sat a hot tea plate down
in front of Rio and poured a cup of coffee for Billy. Rio dropped
the teabag into the pot and reached for the sugar. Grabbing several
packets she ripped them apart and dumped the contents into her
empty cup.

Pouring the tea, she cast a stealthful
glance across the room. At this point, she hadn’t made eye contact
with the two men watching her and Billy from a booth near the
entrance. She planned to let them flitter in the wind a little
longer. It wasn’t time to let Turner’s goons know that she was on
to them.

But she was going to have to tell
Billy, sooner or later. Yep, the time was drawing close.

She looked at Billy. “What do you think
we should do now?” The thought of finding a bonafide treasure was
becoming more and more intriguing.

“
We’ve got to figure out how
to read that map,” he said. “We’re certainly not going to find
anything out until we can do that.”

Rio checked on their tails. They were
still there. Without missing a beat, she looked back at Billy.
“Yeah, but…” She dipped a spoon into her hot tea and stirred it.
“That map makes absolutely no sense at all.” She pointed her spoon
at Billy and then laid it on the saucer alongside the cup. “Even
your dad says so.”

“
Maybe we need to talk to
him again.”

“
Okay.” She tilted her head
to one side. “We’ll go see you’re dad again…if you think it’ll
help.”

If somebody didn’t come up with
something, the odds of them finding the treasure were pretty much
nonexistent. What’d they expect? To just stumble across it? “Well,
I’m at a loss,” he said. “Maybe he’s got some ideas.” But in
reality, Billy knew he didn’t.

With a new plan, or at least the seeds
of a new plan, they finished their breakfast and paid the check and
then headed out.

They crossed the parking lot and strode
toward Rio’s car. Billy fished her keys out of his Levi’s front
pocket and unlocked the door.

Glancing up, she saw the same black SUV
that had been following them, the last few days, parked a few
spaces over.

Rio and Billy headed to his parents’
house, and she never said a word about the SUV or that they were
being followed.

* * *

Bill Tajan had done everything and
anything he could think of, all that morning, while trying not to
think about what he truly didn’t want to consider. Rio, Maggie and
Tajan. He knew the legend but he’d never put much stock into it.
Oh, he was all for the romanticized notion of Tajan and Maggie.
However, he’d never been real big on the idea that a reincarnated
Maggie would come waltzing back into the Washoe people’s lives, dig
up that treasure and give it to them.