Stealing Thunder
Patricia Rosemoor

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Table of Contents

Cover Page

Title Page

About the Author

Epigraph

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Copyright

Patricia Rosemoor has always had a fascination with dangerous love. She loves bringing a mix of thrills and chills and romance to Intrigue readers. She’s won a Golden Heart from Romance Writers of America and Reviewers’ Choice and Career Achievement Awards from Romantic Times BOOKreviews. She teaches courses on writing popular fiction and suspense-thriller writing in the fiction writing department of Columbia College Chicago. Check out her website, www. PatriciaRosemoor.com. You can contact Patricia via e-mail at Patricia@PatriciaRosemoor.com.

Thanks to the writers who are always willing to brainstorm with me – Marc for the movie set and Sherrill, Cheryl and Rosemary for the big finish.

June 22, 1919

Donal McKenna,

Ye might have found happiness with another woman, but yer progeny will pay for this betrayal of me. I call on my faerie blood and my powers as a witch to give yers only sorrow in love, for should they act on their feelings, they will put their loved ones in mortal danger.

So be it,

Sheelin O’Keefe

Prologue

Bitter Creek Reservation, South Dakota

“Come out and meet your accusers, sorcerer!”

The deep voice rumbled through the crowd. Thirteen-year-old Ella Thunder felt a cold lump in her chest as her father jerked her away from the window and the sight of angry faces surrounding the house. Half the people who lived on the rez awaited him.

“Go to your room, Ella!”

Trembling, Ella backed into the doorway of her bedroom, but she refused to go inside. She wouldn’t abandon her father!

A rugged man with features as craggy as the South Dakota Badlands, Joseph Thunder radiated power as he stepped toward the front door. Ella only hoped his power was strong enough to save him.

“Joseph, no,” Mother said, her delicate white hands catching on her husband’s muscular bronze arm. “They’re beyond reason! We should have left once the rumors started.”

Ella had heard the disgusting rumors. How her shaman father was secretly doing bad things. How he’d taken Nelson Bird’s mind from him because Nelson had caught him.

Lies!

“Out, sorcerer!” thundered the voice. “Before we burn down your house!”

As Father reached for the handle, Ella rushed past him and threw herself against the door. “No!” Her heart was beating as fast as a hummingbird’s wings. “Let me go. I’ll tell them they’re wrong!”

“Ah, Ella. There was never a braver girl.” Father’s dark eyes filled with sadness, and he kissed the top of her head. “Someday you’ll have great need for that bravery, to get you through a journey of terrible danger. But not this day. This day is mine alone to suffer.”

She fought him, but she couldn’t stop him from pulling her away from the door. A lump in her throat threatened to choke her, and her eyes burned.

Mother’s blue eyes filled with tears as she pleaded, “Joseph, please do something. Use your power to stop them!”

The request shocked Ella and made her recognize the depth of Mother’s desperation. Her mother believed in Christian teachings, not in the mystical powers of the Lakota.

“Some things are predestined and no power is strong enough to stop them.”

Ella knew her father never used his power for himself, but only to help others—and wondered if that was a personal decision, or something not of his choosing, that he was bound to.

His forehead drawn into a scowl, Father stepped out onto the dirt road and spoke to the crowd. “Don’t let wild talk overcome your good sense!”

Seeming as if they were struck speechless by this horror, the grandparents huddled together at the kitchen table, holding on to her younger sister, Miranda, as if waiting for the judgment call of the crowd.

Ella wasn’t going to wait. She ran out into the street in time to hear Roderick Bird, Nelson’s older brother, accusing her father.

“What you did to Nelson is proof enough for me that you practice sorcery!”

“I did no evil to Nelson—”

“Liar!” came a chorus of voices.

“You’ve brought disease and poverty to the rez,” one woman yelled, “so we have no future!”

“The future is in the earth beneath your feet,” Joseph said. “You must believe—”

“Get him!”

The crowd surrounded her father and dragged him toward the church. “No!” Ella screamed, trying to reach him. “No!”

“Leave Joseph alone!” Mother yelled. “He is innocent!”

But the crowd was too frenzied to listen. Wearing a venomous expression, Ami Badeau shoved Ella out of the way, and an elbow to her chin from another woman made her see stars. She tripped over a rut in the road and fell to her knees. Dazed, she saw Mother chase the crowd.

This wasn’t happening, Ella thought, her chest squeezing tight. Their neighbors…people who’d come to Father for help when they were sick or needed spiritual or practical advice…they weren’t themselves. Their faces had changed, their eyes burned with madness. Only her father’s apprentices Leonard Hawkins and Nathan Lantero, who was also her cousin, appeared sane.

“Let him go!” Leonard yelled.

“Stop and think what you’re doing!” Nathan added.

Jimmy Iron Horse, Father’s third apprentice, was part of the angry crowd. He shoved Nathan out of the way. “We know what we’re doing! Getting rid of a sorcerer who is bringing his evil to the rez!”

Nathan and Leonard physically tried to get to Father, to stop the mob, but they were only two and were easily shrugged away.

It was up to her to do something! Ella thought, vaguely noting the green tinge to the sky. She scrambled to her feet, but the earth itself seemed to have shifted, and the air felt thick, as if it was trying to hold her back.

As if someone had cast a spell…

Concentrating on parting the dense air like she would a curtain, she plunged into the crowd. Voices rose into a chant, and she smelled smoke. She shoved one dancing woman out of the way and squeezed past another who was singing a death chant. Then she stumbled into the open circle where her father was already bound to a post, his hands behind him, wood stacked around his legs, the track of a raven—a long line intersected with an upside down V—drawn on his forehead in black. Father appeared stricken at her presence.

Ella locked gazes with him. What should I do? Tell me!

Go, Ella, get out of here!

No, I won’t!

Her heart thumped with a strange beat. As men with burning torches approached, Jimmy Iron Horse among them, her head went light. The flicker of something powerful and scary blossomed inside her.

Ella let go and felt her mind opening…

The sky darkened…the clouds stretched…the earth rumbled…

“No, Ella!” Father yelled. Even hunted and bound he was aware…one with the earth as was she. “It’s not time! You’re not ready for this! Nathan, stop her before she is destroyed!”

Hands gripped her hard and whipped her around and the earth tilted. She looked up into a distorted face and blinked to make her cousin come into focus.

“Nathan! Help me free him!”

“We’re not strong enough to stop this, Ella.”

She kicked Nathan hard. His grip loosened just enough to let her pull away from him. She turned to see the kindling already burning. Flames licked her father’s body. The smell of flesh and hair scorched her senses.

“Nooo!”

Ella launched herself toward him, bare hands beating at the flames, ignoring the heat shooting up one arm as her sleeve ignited. Nathan tackled her and rolled her along the ground, smothering the flames.

Father!

The word echoed over and over in her mind as Nathan covered her eyes so she couldn’t watch her father burn.

Chapter One

Black Hills, South Dakota, 15 years later

A wave of homesickness as wide and deep as the Irish Sea swept through Tiernan McKenna as he sat his roan gelding Red Crow and studied the Bitter Creek Mustang Refuge—grassy meadows amidst winding rugged canyons, ragged rock spires backing pine and cedar forest.

The trees gave the Black Hills their name, because from a distance, the foliage made the mountains look black. Missing the rolling land and lush green valleys of the Emerald Isle, Tiernan gazed out over the valley below, where mustangs grazed. Nothing like the Thoroughbreds he’d worked with all his life, horses he’d trained and ridden, these horses were feral.

He’d thought this was what he wanted—a complete change from his old life, a way to get out of his brother Cashel’s shadow, a chance to cowboy. He’d grown up watching old American Westerns on the telly. Cimarron, The Magnificent Seven, High Noon, Billy the Kid—those were only some of the movies that had entranced him. So here he was in the American West and ironically, an historical Western film called Paha Sapa Gold was just starting to shoot in the Black Hills, mostly on refuge land, thereby infusing the organization with sorely needed money.

Longing seared Tiernan as he gazed out on the film’s camp in the distance. There were trailers for the production staff and the stars behind the supposed Main Street, though mostly facades like cardboard cutouts represented the town. The only interior sets here were the jail and the saloon. The remaining interiors would be shot in an L.A. studio.

On adjoining reservation land backed by ragged pinnacles of rock, a dozen tepees made up the Lakota Sioux village set. And up in the hills—Tiernan wasn’t certain if it was reservation land or refuge—was the sealed-off entrance to an old gold mine. He’d heard the production company was planning to use that, too, since Paha Sapa Gold referred to the Custer Expedition’s search for gold in the Black Hills despite it being Sioux land.

In the flat below were two side-by-side fenced pastures, empty now, that would hold the horses to be ridden in the film. They would come both from the MKF Ranch where he worked and from the reservation. Even the refuge mustangs would be used as a wild herd in a couple of scenes.

Too bad he wasn’t part of that—the old films had fascinated him, had enticed him to make his move from Ireland to America. Well, that and not wanting to answer to Cashel anymore. Whether it was horses to train or psychic abilities to control or women to woo, Tiernan didn’t want to be second best to his older brother anymore. He needed to be his own man, wherever that would take him.

So, after considering long and hard, Tiernan had left Ireland to make a life of his own. Second cousins had taken him in, had allowed him to test himself, to see if this life really was for him. While satisfying, the reality of it—the hard, dirty, unromantic work of cowboying, the answering to yet another relative—took the luster out of those films he’d loved so much. He’d thought that, like the silver-screen cowboys, he would find a way to make his own mark, on his own terms.

Now he realized he’d been telling himself a fairy tale.

Now a confused Tiernan didn’t know what he wanted.

Now, missing his brothers Cashel and Aidan despite himself, missing Ma and Da, missing the green countryside and near-daily rains that brought life to Ireland’s estates separated by hedgerows and limestone fences and paved roads, he wasn’t so certain.

Had he made the biggest mistake of his life in leaving behind everything he knew and loved?

McKenna pride wouldn’t allow him to admit it, to go crawling back—he had to make a go of it here. He had to prove to himself that he would find that elusive something that would give him the mantle of responsibility and make him feel like his own man.

Riding out on the Bitter Creek Mustang Refuge run by his cousin Kate and her husband, Chase Brody, alone on his day off, Tiernan felt even more lost as he was swept up in a timeless, borderless land without end—nothing but raw nature in every direction, not even a road in sight. The sensations filling him were simply overwhelming.

For all he knew he could be days—weeks, months—from civilization…he could simply imagine it…

Below, the feral horses stirred, then were instantly on the move. Flight instinct kicking in, they roared down the valley as one unit—grays and chestnuts and bays and sorrels and Pintos and Paints. His own mount danced and squealed, and a wave of psychic energy that nearly obliterated his vision engulfed Tiernan as he fought to keep the gelding under control. He shook away the dark, sought the reason in the opposite direction, looking to the forested red cliffs, expecting to see a mountain lion, the only real predator to threaten the herd.

Nothing jumped out at him, neither man nor beast, but once infected with the fear, he knew something—or someone—was out there.

About to take his mount down to the valley to look for the danger, he was startled to hear his name yelled from behind.

“Tiernan, wait! I want to talk to you!”

He turned in the saddle and saw Kate Brody riding straight for him. Kate was one of his second cousins, her mother being a McKenna, and them having the same great-grandparents. Feisty and outspoken, she was a veterinarian, able to sit a horse or doctor it as well as anyone he’d met.

The smothering sensation of a moment ago flitted away like the morning mist. “A good afternoon to you,” he said as Kate drew alongside him, her freckled face wreathed in a smile, her wild red hair poking out from under her brimmed hat.

“I have great news. It’s Quin—he just got the call. He’s going to be chief of police of Blackwood, which is only thirty-some miles north of here. Everyone’s so excited!”

“How grand for him.”

“For us all. That means he’ll stay and not disappear again.”

Tiernan was closest in age to Kate’s youngest brother, Quinlan Farrell, who’d been a federal agent working mostly undercover until he’d recently returned to his home state with his wife-to-be, Luz Delgado. The Farrells were throwing a big engagement party for the couple. Quin had been hoping for a lawman’s job in a smaller venue and now he had one. Well, good for him. Tiernan could appreciate a man wanting to cut his own path rather than follow the one his family set out for him. Quin was lucky his family was so supportive of his choice.

“What about the film?” Tiernan asked, suddenly thinking of the responsibility Quin had taken on. “Surely Quin can’t still work on it in addition to handling a new job.”

Since Chase and Kate were too busy keeping the refuge going, they’d hired Quin to be their liaison with the production company—a temporary stopgap until he landed something more permanent. The company had barely taken up residence. Filming would begin in the next few days.

“Of course Quin can’t do both jobs,” Kate said. “So Chase and I were wondering if you would consider taking over for him.”

“Me?” Even as he questioned her, his pulse quickened. “I know nothing about filmmaking.”

“But you do know how to wrangle horses. That and acting as a buffer when the crew needs something from us is basically all you need to do.”

Somehow Tiernan didn’t think the job would be quite so simple, but he didn’t care. This opportunity seemed heaven-sent.

“What about your parents?” Tiernan had been working on the MKF Ranch since arriving from Ireland. “They will be counting on me—”

“Already taken care of,” Kate assured him.

His enthusiasm for coming to South Dakota renewed, he said, “I’m your man, then.”

“Good. I need to check on the volunteers—they’re out mending fences. We’ll talk more this evening. Dinner at our place. You can move in with us. We have a spare bedroom and bath. Pack your things and bring them over about six.”

With that, Kate turned her mare and moved off.

And a smiling Tiernan turned back toward the red cliffs where he’d sensed the threat that had panicked the herd and decided to investigate.

WHY COULDN’T SHE be happy? Ella Thunder wondered. Having just driven in from Sioux Falls, she’d turned off the highway and had cut across land that was now a mustang refuge, a shortcut to the rez. Halfway there, she’d stopped in the shelter of some pines and gotten out of her SUV to get a better look at the herd and to reconnect with the land. Something had spooked the mustangs, though. They’d raced across the valley as if death was nipping at their hooves.

The thought reminded her of the reason Mother had taken her and Miranda to her own people and kept her daughters away from the rez to keep them safe. Fifteen years and Ella was finally returning for a short visit, all because of a film. All despite Mother’s objections. A high school history teacher, Ella had written a textbook on Native American peoples in South Dakota for her students. After reading Ella’s book for research, Jane Grant, the producer of Paha Sapa Gold, had hired her as a consultant.

Ella had gone through the screenplay and made several suggestions to make the story more authentic. Because Jane thought Ella’s perspective might be useful when filming the spiritual tribal scenes, she’d hired Ella to come on set at least for a few weeks.

A job that would make Ella face her past.

It was time.

She didn’t want to live as she’d been doing anymore…no more than a shadow in this world. Part of her had died with Father in that nightmare she’d tucked to the far reaches of her mind. She didn’t stray there anymore, not on purpose, but sometimes her mind betrayed her and she had no choice but to relive the unthinkable.

Ella fought it, then unable to help herself, closed her eyes and saw Father tied to the stake. The air around her stirred as it always did with his presence.

It’s time, he tells her as the fire licks at his feet.

Time for what? Ella asks.

The journey…

Journey? Father, what do you mean?

Danger everywhere, he says. Look to your other half, for only then will you be whole.

As quickly as her father had entered her mind, he was gone.

Ella opened her eyes and the earth came back into focus. She rubbed her left arm, the scarred area a little stiff from the long drive in air-conditioning.

That wasn’t a memory. Then what had it been?

Nothing like this—Father talking to her as if he were still alive—had ever happened to her before. What did Father mean by her other half?

Her chest tightened and her stomach knotted. That fateful day, Father had said she wasn’t ready, that she would be destroyed…but now he was saying it was time? Or was she telling herself this, conjuring her father herself? Fear licked at invisible wounds, and Ella huddled within herself at the enormity of the charge.

“Oh, Father, I don’t know.”

But part of her did. Some intuitive part deep in her soul. Father had said she would need her bravery for a journey of terrible danger. She’d remembered that when she’d accepted the consultant job on Paha Sapa Gold. When she’d gone against her mother’s wishes and agreed to return to the place of nightmares.

Ella closed her eyes and tried to call her father back so that he could explain further, so that he could tell her what he expected her to do.

Father, I need you.…

But the air around her remained still.

When nothing further happened, Ella decided to get going. The grandparents would be waiting, her return a momentous event in their quiet lives. Mother had insisted her returning to the rez would be a huge mistake, but Ella didn’t regret coming to reconnect with the grandparents who wanted to know her in person again. Grandparents she hadn’t seen in fifteen years.

Despite her arthritic hands, Grandmother was too stubborn to give in to the affliction. Ella knew this from their phone conversations, even as she knew Grandmother would have been cooking since dawn, to celebrate the return of her granddaughter.

Was there true reason to celebrate?

Though Ella was no less determined to return to the rez, doubt had set in after signing the contract with the movie company. Was she really ready to face her past and the people responsible for her father’s death? Who had started the rumors? Who had whipped the crowd into a feeding frenzy? Would she know them when she saw them?

Picking her way back to her SUV, she heard a twig snap nearby and froze. Her pulse fluttered. Focusing in on the sounds around her, she heard an explosive squeak like that made by the tail feathers of a hummingbird…in the opposite direction, the low, throaty noise of a jackrabbit in distress…and directly behind her a whispered footfall that reminded her of a cougar preparing to pounce.

That would account for the mustang herd taking off, she thought, scanning the ground wildly for a weapon and spotting a softball-sized rock.

Before she could reach for it, a sharp pain in the back of her head accompanied by an explosion of light confused her senses, made everything go in and out of focus, sent her reeling, facedown into the earth.

FOR ALL HIS curiosity, Tiernan hadn’t expected to find anything, so when he spotted the dark green SUV sheltered under a boxelder amidst the pines, he stiffened, his surprise touching Red Crow, who danced sideways. Not making a sound, Tiernan held the gelding in check and focused all six senses.

What came to him strongest was a blinding pain. He let go and the pain subsided and his vision cleared.

Dismounting, he looped the horse’s reins in a low branch of a pine and moved carefully to the left, through a scattering of trees, toward a clearing overlooking the meadow valley. That’s when he saw her—an attractive lass in jeans and a long-sleeved cotton shirt, dark hair flowing down her back in a thick ponytail. She was sitting on the ground, trying to get to her feet but not quite managing.

Tiernan rushed to her side to help, but what he got for his trouble when he touched her arm and murmured, “Easy, there,” was a fist square in his chest.

The air rushed out of him and he let go of her and she scrabbled back, staring at him with wide-open amber eyes. “Get away from me, or I’ll…I’ll…”

She looked around wildly—for a weapon, he supposed.

“You’ll what?” he asked in the soft, melodic voice he used when working with horses, a voice meant to calm and seduce. “I’ll not be hurting you.”

“You knocked me out!”

“’Tis someone else you need to be accusing. I just rode up a few seconds ago.” He indicated Red Crow, now standing quietly in the pines, his head lowered as if he were napping.

“If it wasn’t you…”

Again, she looked around.

“The culprit would be gone,” Tiernan said.

“How can you be sure?”

He concentrated, tested the atmosphere, then shook his head. “If anyone else was around, I would sense it. ’Tis my fey Irish blood,” he explained.

Frowning at him, she tried to stand once more. And once more he moved closer, this time hesitating before touching her.

“May I offer my help?”

She thought about it for a second, then gave him her hand. Though she wasn’t a small woman—only a few inches shorter than he and nicely curved—he easily pulled her up to her feet. She stood there, amber gaze taking him in, while he did the same. Pale skin, wide-spaced round eyes, high cheekbones, strong chin, full lips—a mix of the people in this state.

She was the most fascinating-looking lass he’d ever met.

“Thank you,” she said. “Ella Thunder.”

He grinned. “Powerful name. Tiernan McKenna. I would be a cousin to Rose Farrell.”

“Farrell.” As if suddenly realizing he hadn’t let go of her hand, she pulled hers from his grasp and slid it behind her back. “They have a ranch a couple miles from here, right?”

So she didn’t know them. “That they do. The MKF—stands for McKenna-Farrell. Aren’t you from this area?”

“I used to be,” she said. “I was on my way to visit the grandparents.”

“On refuge land?”

“On the rez. This is a shortcut.”

He could see it in her—she was definitely part, though not all, Native American. “You stopped for some reason.”

“Just to look around. It’s been a long time,” she admitted. “I was here maybe five minutes.” She checked her watch. “I must have only been out for a few minutes.”

“So, in the five minutes you were here just looking around, someone decided to hurt you?”

She frowned at him again, her thick dark brows nearly pulling together. “You don’t believe me?”

“Nah, nah, that’s not what I was saying.”

“Then what did you mean?” she asked.

“Just trying to make sense of it all. Wondering if the thing that spooked the herd was human rather than something four-footed.”

“I thought it might be a cougar, too.”

“So if the culprit was human, he could have done something to scare off the herd and then didn’t want you to see his face. The question is…what was he up to?”

“I don’t know. We could look around to see.”

“I’m thinking you shouldn’t be walking around. Or driving. You could have a concussion.”

“What I have is a headache.” She gave him a fierce look. “Of the human kind.”

He stared down at her, tried to read her for anything unusual. Oddly, he didn’t get much off her, as if she were somehow blocking him mentally. Now how was that possible? he wondered.

“Are you dizzy? Any ringing in the ears?”

“I’m a little off-center. Not exactly dizzy. More like light-headed. No ringing.” Her voice rose with her irritation. “Are you a doctor?”

He shook his head. “Working around horses, I’ve seen enough accidents—had a couple myself. I know the signs of a concussion. Let me get a better look at your eyes.”

Before she could deny him, he lifted her chin. The contact was potent and he froze like that, not daring so much as to breathe. What was it with this woman? What was she doing to him? It took all his concentration to suck in some air and do what he meant to do. He checked her pupils—both equal in size and therefore normal—and gazed right through them, searching…searching…

A quick flash of light accompanied sharp pain and disorientation and finally the sensation of falling.

Tiernan blinked and shook his head to clear it. “I don’t think you were hit at all—not enough to knock you out, that is.”

She stiffened. “I thought you believed me.”

“Turn around. Let me look at the back of your head. Please.” With that she turned and he asked, “Where does it hurt?”

“Here.”

Inspecting the area she’d indicated, he saw a tiny pinprick. “Just as I thought. You were darted.”

“What?”

Ella flipped around to face him. A little flustered but steady enough.

“We do it with horses when necessary,” Tiernan explained. “The dart contains a small explosive charge that detonates on impact and injects the drug. The dart itself often bounces off the animal.”

The reason she’d recovered so quickly was that she’d barely gotten any of the drug. He inspected the ground and spotted a hint of yellow in the crushed pine needles that had been under her body. He stooped and dug out the dart, held it up with the tips of two fingers, then carefully pocketed it in his vest. Hopefully, he’d recover the attacker’s fingerprints, as well.

Unarmed but for a knife sheathed on his belt, Tiernan surveyed the area, demanding assurance that the danger was over. He sensed nothing but he wasn’t at ease, either.

“In a shady spot like this, the dart will flash when the explosive detonates,” he went on. “That was the flash that accompanied the pain.”

“I didn’t tell you I saw anything.”

“Of course you did or how would I know it?”

Though Ella didn’t argue further, she gave him a suspicious expression. “Well, do I check out, McKenna? Can we look around now?”

Feeling only that she was slightly out of sorts, nothing more serious, Tiernan grinned and said, “Just take it slow and yell if anything doesn’t feel right, Thunder.” She did remind him of a thunder cloud, ready to rumble at him. “Could you tell the direction your attacker came from?”

Reorienting herself with the valley, Ella turned to the area behind her and said, “Somewhere over there.”

Tiernan scanned the ground until he found some needles trampled on the forest path, no doubt by the attacker’s feet. “This way. Stay close.”

They moved through the trees, following the faint impressions.

Ella was the first to say, “Wait. Here the tracks go in two directions.”

“Hum. I would guess the way we’ve been going is the way he retreated, but he came from the northeast. Must’ve seen or heard you and decided to investigate.”

“For someone who isn’t from here, you have a good sense of direction.”

“Internal compass.”

“Because you’re fey.”

Tiernan merely grinned at her and moved along.

The grin didn’t last long. As he stepped through the trees onto red earth and rock, his senses picked up once more. Something had happened here. Something bad. Foreboding filled him as he scanned the ground, noted that there were no footprints. Had whoever walked here purposely obliterated them? Someone had been here, of that he was certain. He felt remnants of the human presence.

“Dead end,” Ella said, coming up behind him.

“I don’t think so.”

Stepping forward, he looked across the valley, trying to find the spot he’d been in when the horses had fled. But it wasn’t visible. So whatever had happened here, he wouldn’t have been able to see.…

“What are you doing?” Ella asked, her hand suddenly grabbing his arm.

Tiernan stopped just short of the cliff’s edge. He hadn’t even realized how close he’d gotten. What he did realize was that his pulse was humming, his gut was tightening. He simply couldn’t decide if it was because of whatever happened here…or because of Ella touching him.

He removed his arm and the humming faded, the tightening eased.

And then, disturbed by the sensations he’d just experienced, he took that last step forward and looked down only to have the nightmare of his past flash back at him.

Chapter Two

Tiernan’s back straightened and he removed his hat—crushing it to his chest—and lowered his head, causing Ella to hesitate from stepping forward.

“What is it?” she asked.

“We need to get back to refuge headquarters, call the authorities.”

He turned from the edge of the cliff and indicated they should go back the way they came. His movements were stiff, his face pale. There was something deeply wrong here, she could sense it. Tiernan McKenna was an attractive man—dark reddish brown hair framing a handsome, boyish face. The tight line of his wide, unsmiling mouth and the shadowed expression in his thick-lashed green eyes told her it wasn’t good…but she wasn’t leaving until she saw for herself.

When Ella stepped forward, he put an arm out to stop her. She didn’t say anything, just met his gaze, making her intent clear by staying fast. He changed his stance, moved away from her, and she was about to take that last step when she glanced down and saw the scratching in the earth—a long line with an inverted V halfway through it.

The last time she’d seen that sign had been on Father’s forehead right before he’d died.

Her chest suddenly squeezing tight, she couldn’t move for a moment. Someone had scratched the raven’s track purposely as a warning.

Someone malevolent.

Reluctantly now, her stomach clenching, she looked over the edge, her gaze going straight to the body sprawled on a ledge thirty or so feet below.

He lay so still he almost looked like he was asleep—a man, young, copper-skinned, probably Lakota—but his head was twisted unnaturally and his dark eyes were open, vacant. Though she couldn’t see from such a distance, she instinctively sensed his eyes were already clouded with death.

She closed her own eyes and said a silent prayer for the poor man’s soul.

“Do you know him?” Tiernan asked.

“I—I’m not sure.” She blinked her eyes open and looked again. “It’s been too many years.”

She focused on the man, opened her mind, calling in vain to the elements to guide her. No matter how hard she tried, the power remained unresponsive. It had been too long since her father had taught her…

Tiernan broke into her thoughts with a soft, “Hey.”

Suddenly the summer day seemed cold and the fitful wind iced over her. As if he could sense that, he wrapped an arm lightly around her shoulders; this time, she accepted his touch and, despite herself, leaned into his warmth.

That she’d nearly witnessed a murder, nearly had seen the killer, made her shudder inside. It scared up too horrible a memory.

“C’mon, let’s get you away from here,” Tiernan said, leading her back the way they came. “I’ll get you to headquarters, then call the authorities. Let them handle this.”

“I—I have a cell—”

“As do I, for all the good it’ll do us in this area. I’ve never been able to scare up a signal in this part of the mountain.”

“The grandparents—they’re expecting me.”

“You can call them on a land phone, can you not?” When she nodded, he said, “The authorities will want to take our statements.”

Ella knew that to be true, even as she knew she couldn’t be completely truthful. If she told anyone other than the grandparents about the raven’s track she’d seen in the earth, they would laugh at her, treat her like she was primitive. Foolish.

Maybe, but memory told another story.

The last time she’d seen that sign Father had been burned to death!

Despite Tiernan’s trying to take care of her, Ella insisted on driving herself to refuge headquarters. She hated feeling out of control. When they arrived at the refuge, he jumped out of his truck and was at the door of her SUV practically before she could open it.

“Come on, let’s get you inside,” he said, trying to take her arm.

This time she avoided him. “Thanks anyway, but I’m fine on my own.”

Reception was a large room that held a seating area on one side, a work area on the other. The place was empty, so Ella crossed the planked floor and threw herself into one of the chairs with a leather base and upholstered cushions just to steady herself.

“Are you all right?”

“As all right as anyone can be after finding a body, I guess.” She looked over to the desk and noted the telephone. “Do you want to call the authorities or shall I?”

“A deputy and an ambulance are already on the way here. I was able to scare up a signal on my cell a half mile back and so called it in.”

“The sheriff’s office?”

“Who else?”

He hadn’t been around long enough to know the politics of crimes dealing with the Lakota. The tribal police would be called in when one of her own was involved, the FBI when it involved murder.

Let the sheriff’s deputy sort it all out, she thought, wishing she had never stopped to take in the scenery. All she needed was to be involved with another murder.

HOURS LATER, AFTER the body was retrieved, after they both gave their stories to a sheriff’s deputy who’d sounded skeptical when Tiernan suggested murder, after a medic had checked over Ella and had drawn her blood to test for drugs, Ella was then free to head to her grandparents’ home.

Tiernan was sorry to see her go. Though he didn’t reason it out, he watched her SUV drive off until it disappeared in the distance.

At which point, he realized Kate was studying him. She balanced her little girl—eight-month-old Maggie, otherwise known as Magpie—on her hip and just gave him a look that went right through him.

“What?” he asked, concentrating on Maggie, who was cooing at him and staring, too. Smiling into her bright green McKenna eyes, he brushed her chubby cheek with his thumb and got a peal of laughter from her.

“You have a thing for Ella Thunder,” Kate stated.

Tiernan sobered. “And here I was thinking your psychic abilities were reserved for your horses.”

He turned away and went inside, planning on getting himself a mug of coffee.

Headquarters was really part of Kate and Chase and Maggie’s home. Their living quarters, other than the kitchen, took up the second floor, a log addition to the original stone single-floor building. A balcony fronted the second floor, an enclosed porch and patio backed the first. The spare room and bath that would be his for the summer were just off the kitchen.

Kate and her family had to come downstairs for meals, which was just as well since Kate and Chase ate, slept and lived their jobs anyway. Maggie spent as much time with her grandmother as she did at home. Though Chase had been here, as soon as the sheriff’s men left, he went to check on the herd, to make sure no one had messed with his mustangs.

Kate caught up to Tiernan. “I don’t need to be psychic to see the way you were looking at Ella the whole time she was here.”

Heading across the reception area, he said, “I felt sorry for her is all.”

“Maybe. But there’s something else.”

“I have no interest in women.” Realizing what he’d just said, Tiernan stopped dead in his tracks and clarified. “That is, in pursuing a relationship with one.”

“Because you’ll go back to Ireland and you fear she won’t want to go with you?”

“Because I cannot ever fall in love.”

Kate snorted. “Is this some kind of impairment you’re claiming?”

“More like a dark legacy. You should understand that since your side of the McKennas have had to deal with a legacy of your own.”

He entered the kitchen. Kate followed, quickly set Maggie down in her corner playpen, then got in front of him.

“Whoa.” Green eyes wide, red hair seeming electrified, she said, “You can’t just make such a provocative statement and then walk off. Explain!”

Now he’d gone and done it. Tiernan hung his head. He’d only ever discussed the secret with immediate family, his brothers mostly, because they were all at risk. He supposed Kate was family and it wouldn’t hurt to tell her.

“Can I at least get coffee first?” He needed something to bolster himself before getting into it.

Kate stepped aside. “Pour one for me, too.”

As Tiernan picked up the pot, he said, “My great-grandfa-ther Donal was something of a ladies’ man. He involved himself with the wrong woman, then left her to marry the one he fell in love with. The wrong woman claimed to be half faerie and all witch. And it must be true, because she put a love curse on all Donal’s descendants. We are destined to love…but if we act upon our feelings—physically, that is—we will somehow put the one we love in mortal danger.”

“Sounds like the ravings of a woman scorned.”

“Except ’tis a prophecy that’s come true many times over the decades.”

“Oh, come on,” Kate said, though she didn’t sound as skeptical as one might think she should be.

“Truly. My grandfather lost my grandmother to a horse-riding accident soon after she gave birth to my da. My great-aunt lost her beloved in a bank robbery. My uncle lost his new wife to a speeding car…”

Though he’d only been seven at the time, Tiernan could still see the whole incident in his mind, a scene that he couldn’t erase, because he’d been with Aunt Megan—she’d traded her own life for his. Nightmares of her death had followed him all his life. That he couldn’t put the incident behind him after so many years made him think it was because he needed to atone for what happened. This more than anything had convinced him the prophecy was true.

“And the list goes on,” he said through the lump wedged in his throat. “I can do without that kind of doom hanging over my head.”

“But those could have been coincidences,” Kate argued. “They all had children, right?”

“Eventually, because they settled for someone who wouldn’t invoke the witch’s curse. Unfortunately, though the spouse may survive, the prophecy doesn’t depend on love to infect the next generation.”

Kate frowned. “Sounds really sad to me, Tiernan…whether it’s settling…or living alone out of fear—”

He interrupted. “There are worse things.” How could a man live with himself if he caused his woman’s death? he wondered, knowing how his aunt’s death had crushed Uncle Ross. Better never to love at all. “Now, I would appreciate your telling me about the new job with the film company.”

Even as he changed the subject, Tiernan remembered that moment on the cliff when Ella had grabbed his arm and something disturbing had passed through him. Just his response to an attractive woman, he told himself. After the tragedies he’d seen happen to love-happy people he cared about—after seeing Aunt Megan lying still and cold and broken on the pavement and knowing there would be no justice for her death—he could never let it be more.

Not a problem since he probably would never see the lovely Ella Thunder again.

TRYING TO KEEP herself relaxed and entertained by thoughts of Tiernan McKenna with his mesmerizing green eyes, seductive Irish lilt and fascinating way of getting to her with just a touch, Ella drove through the rez. Despite her determination, a memory of her father in his last moments came back to her, cramped her stomach and pushed Tiernan out of mind.

Ella took a deep breath and shook away the vision as she drove past sad-looking houses and trailers, kids shrieking as they played in the dirt, their imaginations turning junk into toys. Though the rez was small in size, with residences mostly scattered far and wide over the land—only a few dozen had been built around the center of town—Grandmother had written that the houses and trailers were overcrowded, that there were too many people and not enough money.

Looking around, Ella could see it for herself. Though she didn’t remember the rez looking so worn, she supposed it always had been. Things always looked different through the eyes of youth.

Other than work provided by the casino or general store or gas station, or for the tribal police or council, there simply weren’t enough jobs on the rez. People had to drive into Bitter Creek or Custer or to one of the farther towns or cities to find work. She knew the film company was not only paying the rez for using their land and horses, but hiring many of the Lakota to do odd jobs or to be extras in the movie. A few had even been given speaking parts. Hopefully enough money would be infused into the rez to kick-start the economy here.

The first building of any notable size that she passed was the casino. And then the government offices. A few dozen homes were scattered around the rez’s center.

Ella drove straight to what used to be her own home and left the SUV, her stomach in knots. The air outside was thick, hard to breathe, her mounting tension no doubt the cause.

Then the door opened, and a small woman in long skirts and a bleached cotton shirt shuffled out. Her hair was pure white now, her skin like elephant’s hide. Dina Thunder was an old seventy-one. And seventy-one was old for the rez, where people rarely survived their sixties. The smile that curved Grandmother’s lips and lit her eyes exactly as Ella remembered made her a welcoming committee of one.

“My Ella!”

Grandmother held up her arms and Ella couldn’t help but notice the arthritic joints in her hands. When she stooped to hug Ella, Ella was aware of how fragile the elderly woman had become despite the roundness of her figure. Grandmother held on to her as if she might never let go.

A white-haired man stood in the doorway—Grandfather. Samuel Thunder was still an imposing figure, his face a carved reminder of her own ancestry. His eyes were unfocused, his head cocked slightly as if he were trying to get a sideways look at her.

Ella knew eye disease hampered Grandfather from making out details, such as her features, but he could get impressions, and whatever he did see made him smile, showing off his gold tooth. She went to him and hugged him, too. She used to think Grandfather was so tall, like Father, but now she was nearly his equal.

“Grandfather, I missed you.”

“You are a woman now, Ella. Strong and beautiful, Joseph’s true daughter.”

“I hope this is so.”

“Can you eat?” Grandmother asked.

“I’m starving.”

“Inside with you.”

The walls were painted white, better to show off the collection of woven baskets that surrounded the combination living and dining room. A threadbare rug covered part of the planked floor, and a bow and arrow perched over the stone fireplace.

Ella inhaled the luscious aroma coming from the stove and sighed—the memory of Grandmother’s cooking kicking in. “There’s no bison stew as good as yours.” Her mouth was already watering.

“I made a corn pudding and baked pumpkin, too. And blueberry Wojapi to go with the fry bread.”

As they ate, they caught up on the missing years, concentrating on the positive rather than dwelling on the dark past that sent Ella, her mother and sister, Miranda, fleeing to the white world. A past from which her mother had never recovered. The grandparents wanted to know every detail about Ella’s work as a teacher of history, especially of their history.

“We have your book on the table by the couch so everyone who comes here can see it,” Grandmother told her.

“Your father would be proud of you,” Grandfather said. “Your returning to us shows that you are as fierce a warrior as he was.”

Ella’s pulse fluttered and her chest tightened. “Not fierce. The movie interested me…I couldn’t resist. A couple of weeks here seemed perfect.”

The grandparents exchanged looks that told Ella they didn’t accept that. Believers in fate, they would assume her presence had been guided by her animal spirit. While the film had delivered her, they would be convinced she was here for something more.

When they finished eating, Grandfather went outside to sit and to puff on his pipe, and Ella began clearing the table.

“It is so good to have you home, Ella.”

“Only for a few weeks, Grandmother. Only for the movie. This isn’t my home anymore.”

“This is where you are needed.” Grandmother hesitated only for a moment before saying, “We have no shaman. No one will practice here after what happened to Joseph.”

“I’m not a shaman.”

It is time…whispered through Ella’s head, but she instantly denied it.

Time for what? To give the people hope? Or to give hope to herself?

Ella pushed back the confusion. She reminded herself that she was just here for a summer job.

“Please, Granddaughter, the people need a spiritual leader. Do it for your grandfather and me—for your father—so that the legacy of the elders continues.”

The plea got to Ella—Grandmother had never asked anything of her before. While Ella remembered the tenets of her father’s beliefs and powers, she wasn’t sure she could actually execute them. Furthermore, even if it was something she wanted to do, she feared what might happen if she tried. She’d shut herself off from calling on the elements for fifteen years because Father had proved using abilities people didn’t understand was too dangerous, and she wasn’t about to embrace the danger again.

Still, having to deny the elderly woman made her feel bad. “I can’t help anyone, Grandmother. I am no medicine woman. And I don’t know if I remember enough of what Father taught me.”

“Talk to Nathan. He remembers.”

The tight, scarred skin on her arm twitched and Ella smoothed the cotton sleeve covering it. Part of her thanked her cousin for saving her. Part of her blamed him for letting her live burn- and memory-scarred.

Pausing a few seconds, she then asked, “So Nathan turned his back on shamanism?”

Grandmother nodded. “He has other interests that concern our people.”

“What kind of interests?”

“He’s become an activist. He’s part of First Nation.”

Ella knew about the long-standing activist group First Nation—a group that believed the Lakota should withdraw from all treaties with the United States and should reclaim the Paha Sapa for The People. Paha Sapa—the heart of everything that is—otherwise known as the Black Hills, Ella thought. Father had taught her the mountain held great power that needed to be respected. She knew that three decades ago, a federal court had agreed that in taking the land to mine gold in the 1870s, Custer had broken the treaty. The court had awarded the Lakota money that had now amassed to nearly a billion dollars. The Lakota were unwilling to trade their rights to the land for money. They didn’t believe in buying or selling the earth they walked upon.

Ella said, “I don’t think the U.S. government is ever going to give the land back to The People.” Her band was lucky to have been awarded a small reservation on one edge of the mountain, a lush piece of land compared to Pine Ridge, the next closest reservation on the Badlands.

“No. But I fear what First Nation might do to reclaim land they believe belongs to us,” Grandmother said. “We don’t need more war. Poverty and disease already take their toll on The People. What we need is someone who can heal the ills, not increase them.”

Doing the dishes gave Ella time to consider Grandmother’s words, as scary as it was for her.

Why had she come here if not to get involved with The People? an inner voice asked. Her working with the movie company and then coming back to the rez just to sleep would prove nothing.

She needed contact…knowledge…closure.

She needed to know the real reason that Father had died.

She needed to find the villain who was responsible and see that he was punished.

Chapter Three

Early the next morning, Ella left the house for her SUV, ready to head out to the film set and meet with Jane Grant. They’d only spoken on the phone or via e-mails, so she was a little anxious to get together with the producer in person. She was about to open the vehicle door when she sensed interested eyes on the back of her neck.

Turning, she locked gazes with a man standing just behind her. His eyes were dark and he had long black hair, a braid in the front decorated with strips of beading and feathers. His features had matured, his body filled out, but she had no doubt as to his identity. She remembered what Grandmother had told her about him the night before. Her stomach tightened as she nodded to her cousin.

“Nathan.”

His expression serious, Nathan Lantero stepped closer so that she could see that he was wearing a beaded necklace with his totem, a buffalo cast in gold. Ella couldn’t help but be surprised—it looked like real gold, an unbelievable luxury amidst so much poverty. She remembered when they were kids, they would secretly search the abandoned mines in hope of finding gold. Now it looked like Nathan had, if not in the way they’d imagined.

What kind of work had he been able to get to earn it? she wondered.

“I heard you left the Wasi’chu, Ella. I couldn’t help but wonder why, after all this time.”

He almost sounded disapproving, she thought, as if he thought she should have stayed with her mother’s people. Wasi’chu was used as reference to the White Man, but she suspected as an activist, Nathan used it in its newer negative context, to describe a human condition based on exploitation. That he’d used it in reference to her made her stomach knot and her pulse rush a little faster.

Her back up, Ella said, “An odd question considering you lived with your father’s people for years.” Both her father and his mother had married outside the Lakota. “Besides, I have roots here.”

“You had a nightmare here.”

“Nightmares follow wherever you go,” she said, knowing this to be true. “No place is safe.”

Nathan nodded, and Ella knew he, too, had felt her father’s death. He’d been one of the family. Almost like a brother to her. Even so, she hadn’t really spoken to him since the day her father was murdered.

Ella wanted in the worst way to ply her cousin with questions about the past. Perhaps he could help her sort it all out. Not now, though. No time—she had that meeting. Besides, with that attitude, Nathan surely wouldn’t be receptive to anything she wanted.

Still, she needed to try to make peace between them.

“I…I never thanked you for trying to help Father…and me.”

“Joseph was my teacher and my uncle. He was like a father to me, as well.”

A grief-stricken thirteen-year-old, Ella had placed blame on him. Analytically, she now recognized Nathan had not only saved her from disfigurement or worse, but he’d done what he could for her father. Of course, emotions had no logic, and back then, hers had been out of control.

“I’m sorry I was so horrible to you after…”

“So there are no hard feelings?”

“For you? No, of course not,” she said. “You and Leonard Hawkins tried to stop what happened. Not everyone went along with the crowd.”

“What about those who did?” He glanced back as if looking over a now-invisible angry crowd, when no one even walked within sight of the house. “Can you forgive and forget?” he asked, turning back to search her face.

Ella had no answer. She wanted to be able to forgive—holding hatred in her heart could make her as sick as any disease—but she simply didn’t know if she could look at the past through a softer lens.

“Maybe that’s why I’m here—to find out if forgiving is possible.”

“I hope that’s true.”

But she could tell he didn’t quite believe her. His thick brows were furrowed, and his full mouth pulled tight. More important, she felt his doubt come at her in palpable waves.

Doubt and something else…something darker…something that made her take a step back and jam her elbow into the car.

Ignoring the shot of pain, she asked, “What is it you fear, Nathan?”

“Revenge is a strong need.”

“You think I would deliberately hurt others?” Or did he mean himself?

“I don’t know you anymore, Ella.”

“Nor I you.” Suddenly wanting to put some distance between herself and her cousin, Ella looked away from him and swung open the door of the SUV, but hesitated before getting in. Being rude wouldn’t earn his help in the future. “I need to go now or I’ll be late to an appointment.”

“Then I’ll probably see you on the set.”

Ella supposed she shouldn’t be surprised that Nathan knew she was working on the film. Undoubtedly Grandmother had told him.

What was he going to be doing there? Working or protesting?

“Did you get a speaking part?”

He stared at her for a moment, making her shift uncomfortably as she wondered what was going through his head.

Then he said, “Only speaking to the horses from the rez. I’m moving some into a pasture near the Sioux village set this morning.”

“I’ll see you there, then.”

Nathan gave her a ghost of a smile and backed off as she climbed into the driver’s seat. But he didn’t turn away.

Considering Nathan was part of an activist group trying to regain the Black Hills for The People, Ella found it odd that he would want to have anything to do with the movie. Then again, money was money and he surely needed to make a living somehow.

After driving off, Ella kept glancing into her rearview mirror. Nathan was there, still watching her, until she turned the corner.

It was only then that she relaxed.

What the heck?

Why had he been giving off such a weird vibe, like he didn’t want her there?

Lord, who knew? Maybe he considered her Wasi’chu. Maybe he resented the work she’d gotten, especially her being the consultant for the spiritual scenes. Though he was no shaman, Nathan had been one of Father’s apprentices. Grandmother said he remembered. Perhaps he’d wanted to be the consultant and resented the lucrative work going to someone who’d spent the last half of her life living in the white world.

Maybe he had a point.

As she drove, Ella let her thoughts stray back to the day before. It was still too early to call the sheriff’s office—she doubted they would know anything until later. If she didn’t hear anything by midafternoon, she would call for an update.

She turned onto a gravel road that cut between reservation and refuge and remembered her encounter with Tiernan McKenna, whose people owned this land. Without calling it up, she could see his handsome Irish face. The way he looked at her with such concern…the way his expression changed with an injection of humor.

And then she remembered the nonverbal connection between them. The connection had been made several times, in different ways. She’d felt him, as if she could sense him inside her somehow. Like nothing she’d ever felt before, she thought. Tiernan seemed strangely intuitive—“Irish fey” he’d called it jokingly. For some reason, Ella thought it was more than that, something more compelling, perhaps even dark. The more she considered it, the more edgy she became.

One didn’t have to be a Native American shaman to have powers that the average person could only imagine. Ireland was a land of fables. But perhaps there was more fact than fiction to the magic claimed by the Irish.

Ella shuddered at the possibilities.

Only here for a few weeks, she might never see Tiernan McKenna again.

Good thing…

BEFORE LEAVING FOR the set, Tiernan called the sheriff’s office and asked for the deputy who’d taken his statement. He’d been up half the night remembering…and worrying.

“We determined Harold Walks Tall’s death was accidental,” the deputy said.

Familiar words tore through him.

Though he was certain that was not true, Tiernan made no rash claims as he once had. He endeavored to stay calm, focused, logical.

“Are you certain the man wasn’t darted?”

“No markings on him, no tranquilizer or other drugs in his system.”

“Then how do you explain what happened to Ella Thunder?” Tiernan asked, wondering if she had any lingering ill effects from the drug.

The attack on Ella being the only reason he was thinking of her at all.

“Coincidence?” the deputy responded. “Look, probably some hunter was out there and saw movement through the trees and thought she was a deer. When he realized his mistake, he took off. It don’t make him a nice person, but it don’t make him a criminal, either.”

Tiernan guessed the assumption was logical given what the authorities had to go on, but remembering the way his psychic instincts had been aroused—something he couldn’t prove and therefore wouldn’t share. He was certain the fall was no accident. It wasn’t the first time he’d been privy to such a mistake in a death investigation. Having had experience trying to convince the authorities they were wrong, he knew it was an exercise in futility.

“Why would a hunter use a tranquilizer rather than a bullet to bring down an animal?” Tiernan asked.

The deputy coughed and hemmed and hawed. “Can’t really say why…”

Tiernan knew arguing would be a waste of energy. Even so, he asked, “What about the dart itself?”

“No fingerprints.” The deputy was starting to sound really uncomfortable. “Look, the lady is okay, which is what really matters, right? Searching for someone who made a mistake would be a waste of manpower.”

The lack of resolution lay heavily on Tiernan’s mind as he drove out to the set, taking the truck that Kate had said was his as long as the job lasted. He knew what he knew, but it was nothing he could prove, and it was none of his business anyway, he thought.

Not like the last time.

So why was he so focused on it? Focused on a lass he didn’t even know?

He tried to get it—her—out of mind and concentrate on the job at hand as he approached the shooting location. Some carpenters were at work on one of the buildings, a handful of men surrounding a couple of cameras looked as if they were trying to decide where to set up and extras and production staff milled about.

Driving straight to the double-wide marked as the office, Tiernan went in search of Doug Holloway, the first assistant director, who would be his supervisor.

Doug turned out to be a small man both in height and weight. His thick sandy hair was tied back in a ponytail and his pale blue eyes hid behind a pair of round tortoiseshell glasses. He was young—twentysomething—and fast talking.

“I’m not a horse expert—that would be you—so I’ll give you the shooting schedule with the number of horses I need. It’s up to you to have them ready to ride on time every day according to schedule. Got it?”

“That I do,” Tiernan said, taking the folder from Doug and browsing the contents. “What about the horses from the reservation?”

“Not your headache. You’ll coordinate with a Lakota—Nathan Lantero—who should be bringing in the reservation’s horses anytime now.”

Closing the folder, Tiernan said, “Looks like I’d better do the same since you’ll need some of those horses first thing in the morning. Which pasture do I use?”

Doug shrugged. “First come, first served. Both have trailers parked outside the gates to use as tack rooms. Just let me know when you’re finished setting up.”

“Will do.”

An all-day job, Tiernan thought, but one better than rounding up cattle. Until he’d come here, horses had been his life. Hoping Kate or Chase could help him for a few hours, he left the trailer and made for the truck. He’d barely reached the parking lot when he spotted the familiar, green SUV. He turned back toward the set to look for Ella, but he didn’t see her. He was getting that odd feeling again, that sense of connection. The prophecy came immediately to mind, and Tiernan told himself that it would be best for him to stay away from the woman.

What was Ella doing here in the first place? he wondered.

Was she an extra? Or had she simply come along with a friend or relative for the experience?

Whatever the reason, he intended to avoid her and hoped their paths wouldn’t cross when he returned with the herd.

“WHY DOES IT have to be a cottonwood?” Jane Grant asked. “I don’t understand why any tree wouldn’t do.”

They were discussing the Sundance to be shot in the next few days and Ella wanted the scene to be as authentic as possible. They’d been at it all day and this was the last planning detail that needed attention.

“Well, it doesn’t. You could use another tree, but the cottonwood is sacred to the Lakota,” Ella told her. “The leaves are shaped in the conical pattern of the tipi. And an upper limb cut crosswise will show a five-pointed star that represents the Great Spirit. If you want the scene to be truly authentic…”

“All right, then, a cottonwood it is.” Jane made a note of it on her laptop. “I’ll get someone on it before we break for the day.”

While intelligent and efficient, Jane Grant seemed too young, not even thirty years old, to be a producer of a major motion picture. Her short blond hair was spiked, her medium-length fingernails painted the same dark blue as her tight pants. She wore a hand-worked leather halter top and matching boots…with three-inch heels. Ella wondered how in the world she could walk in those on such uneven ground without twisting an ankle.

When Jane looked up and closed the lid of her laptop, Ella said, “I appreciate your taking the details of our ceremony so seriously. Rituals need to be observed properly so the gods bestow the blessings of life on The People.”

Jane nodded. “All right. I appreciate your willingness to work with me. Not all Lakota are as cooperative.”

Ella’s only response was a smile.

“Well, that finishes your work for the day,” Jane said. “Meet me here in the morning. Ten should be fine. I’d like you to look over everything before we start shooting.”

Ella got to her feet. “Good, I’ll see you then.”

As she left the trailer, a ruckus caught her attention—stomping hoofbeats accompanied by sharp whistles. Horses, twenty or so, were being driven toward the pasture on the set. Ella couldn’t help but be drawn toward the activity. And when she spotted Tiernan McKenna bringing up the rear of the herd, her step quickened. His cousin Kate remained at the gate and shooed the horses through.

Then, remembering her earlier thoughts about Tiernan and Irish magic, Ella slowed and thought twice about approaching him. What in the world was she doing?

Too late. Tiernan spotted her. Not knowing what else to do, she waved and indicated she wanted to talk to him. Maybe he knew something about the murder—a good enough reason for her interest.

Tiernan and Kate quickly got the horses into the fenced pasture. He bent over to say something to his cousin, who grinned at him and hit him in the arm as if she were teasing. Now, what was that about?

Then Tiernan turned his gelding in her direction, and Ella felt her pulse rush a little faster. Behind him, Kate watched, waved to Ella, then took off the way she’d come. His expression sober, Tiernan stopped the horse directly in front of her but didn’t dismount.

Feeling her face grow warm, Ella looked up at him and said, “I didn’t know you were working on the set.”

“That would make two of us. Are you just visiting or are you one of the actresses?”

“Actress?” Ella couldn’t help but laugh at that. She’d made the same mistake with Nathan earlier. “I couldn’t act my way out of a paper bag. I’m just doing a little consulting work. The producer wants to get the Lakota scenes dealing with spirituality right. I’ll only be here for a couple of weeks.” She realized that, despite her earlier thoughts, she’d relaxed while talking to Tiernan. His expression had softened, as well. “So you’re wrangling the horses?”

“The ones from both the family ranch and the refuge. Not the reservation horses.”

“No, that would be my cousin.”

“Cousin?” His forehead pulled into a frown. “Do I detect some tension there?”

“Nathan can be difficult,” Ella said, then admitted, “We had words earlier.”

“’Tis a shame.”

She shrugged. “The reason I stopped you…have you heard anything about what happened yesterday?”

“It seems that Harold Walks Tall’s death was declared an accident.”

“No! That can’t be right!”

“I don’t believe it, either. But apparently they found no drug in his system.”

“What about what happened to me?”

“The deputy put it to a hunter making a mistake, thinking he was aiming at an animal. A waste of time ’twould be going after someone who merely made a mistake.”

She didn’t miss the sarcasm in his voice. “That was no more a mistake than Harold Walks Tall’s death was an accident!”

“’Tis not me you need to convince.”

“There’s just no way to prove it,” Ella said.

No easy way.

No way she wanted to take.

All her instincts had been aroused by the incident. Before she’d known there was a body, she’d sensed the darkness and danger…and then she’d seen the raven’s track in the earth. But those were all things she was unwilling to talk about. Things that could raise suspicions. Things that could get a person killed.

Forcing the image of Father as she’d seen him last out of her mind, Ella was about to suggest it would be best to leave it alone when the thunder of hooves caught her attention again. She looked past Tiernan to see another herd of horses heading toward the fenced pastures.

“Looks like Nathan is here.” Her cousin and two other men from the rez were bringing in the herd.

“I should be introducing myself, then. Forge a bond since we shall be working together.”

“I’m not sure that’s possible. Even though Nathan went away to university and lived in the white world for years, he returned to his mother’s people and the rez. He’s become something of an activist, part of a group that wants to dissolve treaties and take back the Black Hills for the Lakota.”

“Could that happen?”

“What reason would a powerful government have to give over settled and valuable land?”

“Aye, that I understand. Hopefully it won’t cause troubles here.”

“Hopefully.”

“Maybe you ought to come with me, do the introductions.”

Ella glanced over at the herd her cousin had brought. Nathan was behind the last of the horses to go into the pasture. One of his men swung closed the gate and latched it.

“Looks like it’s too late.”

“Not if you ride with me.” Tiernan removed his left foot from the stirrup. “Get on.”

Ella hesitated but Tiernan gestured for her to mount behind him. Tossing caution to the wind, she slipped her foot into the stirrup and bounced upward, catching him around the waist to anchor herself as she threw her free leg over the horse’s back.

He took off immediately, and as her breasts pressed into his back, Ella realized her mistake. Her head went light and her pulse started to race and she felt that uncomfortable connection with him yet again. And from the way he suddenly stiffened in the saddle, she expected he felt it, too.

What did this mean? Her being light-headed and disconnected from everything but him? She felt as if she were converging with him somehow—not here, but on another plane.

Distracted by the discomfort and weird thoughts, Ella didn’t realize one of Nathan’s men was yelling about something in Lakota until Tiernan stopped near the pastures. Even though she was an expert in Lakota history, she’d spoken nothing but English since leaving the rez. Even so, she caught some of the words. Something about a curse. Then the man looked her way and his face curdled in contempt. She didn’t recognize him, but he pointed at her and said she was the one.

“What’s going on?” Tiernan asked.

“I—I don’t know.”

And then she did. Scratched into the fence posts that joined the two pastures was a raven’s track.

Chapter Four

“What is he talking about?” Tiernan asked, glancing back to see that Ella’s face had gone white.

“Superstition,” she said, but he knew there was more to it than she was willing to admit.

“Jacob, back to the rez,” Ella’s cousin ordered.

Jacob kept his eyes on Ella as he backed up and got hold of his horse. He kept staring at her even as he mounted and rode off.

Tiernan could feel Ella’s horror. Her arms were still wound around his waist. He had that feeling again, same as the day before, something he didn’t want to recognize. Still, sensing she was close to panicking, he tried to comfort her by placing his free arm over hers and clasping one of her hands. And then he called up peaceful thoughts and concentrated on that and gradually felt her calm down.

An imposing figure, Nathan Lantero walked over to them, stopping near Ella. “Don’t worry about Jacob,” he told her. “I’ll speak with him.”

“Do you think it will do any good?”

“It’s only a sign, Ella. Nothing bad happened. What will he be able to tell The People? Nothing.”

“I hope you’re right.”

Not wanting to dismount and break the fragile bond he had with Ella, Tiernan stayed fast as he addressed the other horseman.

“Looks like you and I will be working together, wrangling horses for this film. Tiernan McKenna.” He held out his hand for a shake.

Dark eyes seared him as if trying to look through him, to make him retreat, or at least look away first. Tiernan didn’t so much as shift in the saddle. There was something to this Nathan beyond what he could see, only he couldn’t put his finger on what. He trusted his instincts, though—psychic or otherwise—and they were all on alert.

Finally, the other man reached out and took his hand. “Nathan Lantero. Ella’s cousin, though she’s probably already told you who I am. What’s an Irishman doing in the wilds of South Dakota?”

“Working with horses, same as I would do back home,” Tiernan said, getting everything and yet nothing from the contact with the man, as if Nathan were blocking him. “Well, in a manner of speaking,” he qualified. “In Ireland I trained Thoroughbreds. And I’m here in this area because the Farrells are blood.”

“Good people,” Nathan said, pulling his hand free. “I used to work for Kate’s husband, Chase, on the refuge.”

“But you quit?”

“I had more pressing interests.”

Though his curiosity was piqued, Tiernan didn’t ask Nathan to explain what those interests might be. “I shall be seeing you, then.” He nodded to one of the trailers. “Right now, I need to be getting the tack shop set up.”

Nathan simply inclined his head.

Tipping his hat in return, Tiernan signaled Red Crow to go back the way they’d come. He waited a bit before saying to Ella, “So your cousin worked for the refuge.”

“I didn’t even know that. He was barely eighteen when Mother brought us back to Sioux Falls, and then Grandmother said he went to California, to go to school and to live with his father’s people.”

“But he returned here. His pressing interests in the Black Hills?”

Ella didn’t look thrilled about the fact. Tiernan supposed she feared the activists could start a war over their holy land. He hoped not. He hadn’t forgotten the troubles in Ireland. He wouldn’t wish that violence and fear on anyone.

As they approached the trailers, he asked, “Where should I drop you?”

“The parking lot would be best since I was on my way out when I saw you.”

When Ella dismounted near her SUV, Tiernan felt an inexplicable sense of loss. He couldn’t say why, but he wasn’t ready to let her go.

“I’m wondering if we could get together later,” he said. “Maybe have a drink.” When her expression shifted to one of caution, as if she was searching for reasons to decline, he wheedled, “I think we should talk more about what happened yesterday, don’t you? Besides, I wouldn’t be knowing anyone here but relatives.”

Ella’s expression cleared. “Sure. A drink. I could meet you in town this evening about eight? A place called Red Butte Saloon.”

“I will be there.”

Tiernan smiled down at Ella and he kept himself from giving her a wink. She reminded him of a deer poised to flee at the slightest hint of danger.

There was danger enough around them—he was certain of that, no matter what the deputy had claimed—reason enough for him to keep Ella close.

ELLA CENTERED HERSELF before entering. The Red Butte Saloon had a purposely Old West feel and its bar was of black walnut, massive and hand-carved, a long mirror along the back wall making the place look twice as big. The walls themselves were lined with wood paneling and decorated with Western and Native American memorabilia.

Part of Ella wished that Tiernan wouldn’t be there, while another part looked forward to seeing him again. Beyond his being attractive and charming—he was definitely both—he interested her and she couldn’t quite say why.

Tiernan had gotten there before her and didn’t see her come in. He stood at the bar, beer in hand, with a group of men. She doubted he knew them—at least he’d said

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