12

February, 1907

The old one Silver Eagle called Shima, Mother, perched close by the loom. His orphaned niece, one of the children rescued from the school, stared wide-eyed over the old woman’s shoulder at Olivia’s vain attempts to master the devilish instrument of torture. Oh, for a piece of cloth, needle, and thread. But no rest for the weary.

She was determined to become as much a part of their culture as she could. Much in the same way Lottie Moon ministered to the Chinese. Much in the same way her brother, Charles, would as he sailed across an ocean to fulfill Miss Moon’s call for more laborers for the harvest.

Her awkward, bilágaana fingers stiff from the cold, she tried again, inserting the red yarn in the loom. She beat the wool fibers down on the warp, a task even little Shandiin—Sunshine they called her—could accomplish easily at her tender age. Whomp. Whomp. Whomp.

On the rim of the mesa that day . . . she’d thought maybe she’d heard God wrong about His call to serve Him among the Navajo. But five months later, she knew she’d heard Him right. She was learning the complex Diné tongue. Shima had taught her to make the kneel-down bread spiced with green chiles. She’d taught Silver Eagle and his niece to read and write simple English using the miraculous stories of Jesus from her small testament.

The snow lay in deep drifts across the high country as the isolated family hogan had been pounded week after week with heavy blizzards. Safe from the army and a “rescue” she no longer desired. Safe to do the Lord’s work among a people caught in transition between two worlds. A patient, proud people rooted to the earth.

With a crash, the hogan door banged open. In a rush of Arctic air that sent Sunshine scurrying for a blanket to throw around her shimasani, Silver Eagle staggered into the octagonal one-room dwelling with an armload of firewood. Kicking the door shut behind him with the heel of his deerskin shoe, he sent Olivia a special smile, a smile reserved just for her.

She cast one more look through the lone window at the hurricane of snow blowing outside. Safe here to love and be loved. But beyond these walls? Theirs—a forbidden love.

And she prayed winter might never end . . .

Present-day, Late April

With the tourists spending so much money at the Center, Debra had grudgingly allowed Erin to act as their unofficial tour guide during their stay in Cedar Canyon. She and Debra had declared an unspoken truce of live and let live. Erin kept her inventorying out of Debra’s way. Debra stayed out of Erin’s path. By avoiding one another, they managed to keep it civil.

Barely.

Tulley had taken vacation days—“for the good of his people”—and was now playing catch-up at the station. Adam had volunteered to take Tulley’s shifts during the days the Japanese were in town. It had been almost a week since she’d last spoken to Adam.

She wasn’t sure if she was glad or sad about this. She ought to be glad for the protection of her heart but couldn’t quite work up the feeling. Thoughts of Adam floated constantly through her conscious hours. Debra, however, saw plenty of him.

Debra always made sure she ‘happened’ to mention to another staff member or docent while in Erin’s presence about a late-night date or party with Adam. Erin managed to avoid running into Adam on his daily lunch get-togethers with Debra by closeting herself in the storage room. Tulley still wouldn’t allow her to return to her vandalized house and so she and Nia continued to cohabit for the time being.

She stopped attending the Little League games, despite disappointing Sani, after one afternoon Debra offered her beverage to Adam who took a sip. Debra then pivoted in the stands toward Erin. Biting the end of the straw with her teeth, Debra smiled her coyote grin like the evil trickster Maii. Repulsed, Erin hoisted her purse and left.

The next few weeks flew by. Adam stopped coming to the Wednesday night suppers, though Franklin, a few code talker buddies, and miracle of miracles, Joe Atcitty, came by to sample her pie one night. She was still no closer than she’d been the day she arrived to solving the mystery of Olivia. But the People continued to amaze and astonish her. She’d never felt so much at home anywhere before in her life.

One afternoon, after the last of the docents had gone home and Erin prepared to close the Center for the day, Adam walked in. Cleaned up. Dressed up. His hair still damp from the shower. An enticing aroma of sandalwood preceding him.

“Debra’s in her office.” Erin retreated behind the safety of the Information Desk. “I can buzz her—”

Adam flicked away her words with his hand as if swatting away an annoying fly. “Sheridan called a week ago. He fixed the windshield and the part he ordered for your car came in, but I,” he threw back his head, “haven’t had time to deal with it. I told Tulley to take care of it.”

His face settled into an expression as hard as the San Carlos. “Which he promised to do this weekend on his next day off.”

“Fine.” She kept her tone celery crisp, struggling not to allow the tiniest bit of hurt into her voice.

He pursed his lips. “Tulley ought to be able to handle it.”

With an effort, she averted her eyes from the vicinity of his mouth.

Adam’s jaw tightened. “He’s brilliant like you. Got a fancy mechanical engineering degree he’s never used.”

Something flew right into her. “No doubt he’ll make something of himself one day. Already is. Unlike—”

Growling, he bared his teeth. “I don’t think you want to finish that thought, Erin Dawson.” His tone could’ve frozen ice cubes on the equator.

“What thought?” Debra slithered into the reception area, swinging her big, Coach purse by the strap. Silver lace rosettes adorned her shimmering, low-cut, cocktail blouse.

He jammed his hands in the pockets of his khaki pants. “Nothing. You ready to go? Meeting friends of yours tonight, right?”

Debra seized him by the lapels of his white oxford shirt, open at the collar. “Yes, we are. And aren’t you all cowboy, gone dressed up?” She planted a quick kiss on his lips and gave Erin a wink over her shoulder. “Wouldn’t you agree, Erin?”

Erin cleared her throat and tried to swallow past the constriction blocking her lungs. The white shirt was a fitting contrast to his bronzed skin. And the navy wool blazer stretching across his broad shoulders.

“Not cowboy.” Adam eased himself out of her grasp, keeping his poker face intact. “More like Indian, remember?”

Debra laughed, shrill and overblown. “Tulley picking you up after work, Erin?” She looped her hand into the crook of Adam’s arm.

“Yes.”

Adam’s eyes went flat. Shadows creased his face.

Debra gave his arm a squeeze, her aubergine claws coiling around his bicep. “Young love, so sweet and pure. But sad.” She leered into his face. “Little Erin’s internship will be over in a few weeks and it will soon be bye-bye back to Carolina for our golden girl.”

Was that a flash of emotion in Adam’s eyes, though quickly clamped down? Or just wishful thinking on her part?

She fought the urge to cry. Or, throw the computer monitor at them both.

Debra dragged him toward the door, leaving a pungent trail of orange blossoms in her wake. “Tell Erin good-bye, Adam.” She halted on the threshold. “Go ahead, say it.”

Adam grabbed the door handle. “Good-bye.” And he shoved Debra out onto the sidewalk without bothering to turn around.

Nia was home when Tulley dropped Erin off at the apartment. Noting Nia’s long face and fighting her own melancholy, she didn’t let Tulley get much beyond the front door before crying off dinner citing a long day and early bedtime for herself.

“Thanks.” Nia’s bottom lip quavered. “I wasn’t up to making polite conversation with him tonight.” She plopped on the sofa and patted the seat beside her. “What’s wrong?”

Erin filled her in on her run-in with Adam and Debra.

Sighing, Nia cradled a throw pillow to her chest. “I hate to see you go, but I’ll be leaving same time as you.” She fingered the sage green fringe. “I accepted the job offer in Flagstaff.”

Erin drew in a sharp breath. “Oh, Nia. I’m sorry.” For Nia to have taken that drastic step meant she’d lost all hope where Tulley was concerned.

“You know there’s nothing between him and me. He’s my babysitter.” Erin made a face. “Assigned to me for the duration of my internship, for some obscure reason known only to the Machiavellian brain of Adam Silverhorn.”

“Men.” Nia punched the pillow. “Are. Stupid.”

“Clueless.” Erin nodded. “Tulley Singer is about to lose the best thing—”

Nia grimaced. “The best thing that never happened to him.” She gave an unladylike snort. “He’ll never even know what he missed.”

Erin rested her chin in her hand. “Interesting when you put it like that. I’ll have to give that some thought.”

“What do you mean?”

The phone rang. Nia unwound her legs and stretched for the side table where she’d laid her mobile. After a brief mostly one-sided conversation from the other end, Nia shut off her phone and rose.

“Dispatcher called in sick.” She glanced over to Erin. “There’s mutton stew you can reheat in the fridge. All right,” as Erin pulled a face, “maybe an acquired taste for your delicate bilágaana constitution.”

Nia threw her pillow across the length of the sofa. Erin dodged. “Hate to leave you feeling so blue . . .”

Erin scrunched her own pillow missile. Nia’s eyes danced, but she backed up a step.

“We’ll talk more tomorrow, friend.” Erin launched her pillow in Nia’s rapidly retreating direction.

After Nia left, the apartment took on the silence of a tomb. Unwilling to face the dark direction of her thoughts, after changing into her comfy gray, stretchy pajama shirt and pink polka dotted bottoms, Erin flipped open her laptop. It’d been a day or two since she’d checked her messages. Mainly because of the message from her mother in her Inbox that she’d been dreading.

“Time to face the music.” She worried her upper lip with her teeth as she scanned the message from her mom seven thousand miles away in Papua New Guinea. Her mom wanted to know what she was going to do with her life once the internship was finished.

“Good question,” she said to Nia’s tabby cat curled into a contented ball at her feet under the kitchen table.

Time was running out. Running out for solving the mystery of Olivia. Running out for deciding what to do with the rest of her life.

Lend an extra pair of hands and hugs at Jill and Fernando’s orphanage in Lima? Help Todd organize and operate the administrative portion of his medical clinic in Khartoum?

“What, Lord?” She inspected the ceiling. “I want to serve You with all my heart. Always have since I was little. You know that. Why won’t You show me what You want me to do?”

Or, had He already? Through her mother? And Erin just wasn’t paying attention?

Her eyes focused on the last paragraph of her mother’s e-mail. It read, “A young, handsome Australian surgeon has joined your daddy’s staff. I’ve shown him your picture and he said he couldn’t wait to meet you when you come for a visit . . .”

She rolled her eyes.

Really, Mom? Seriously?

She was a grown woman. Twenty-seven come summer. Fully capable of making her own choice for a mate. Adam’s face teased at her eyelids.

Okay. Bad example.

“ . . . You know we’d love to add you permanently to our staff as well,” her mother wrote. “It’s time you started taking your part in the Great Commission seriously instead of chasing after ancient history, dead ancestors, and even deader dreams.”

Tears winked in her eyes. None of them had ever understood about Olivia. She didn’t quite understand the pull of Olivia, either. And she wasn’t exactly hiding her believer light under a bushel here. People needed Jesus just as much in Arizona as they did in Papua New Guinea.

She dropped her head onto the table. She was so tired. Sick and tired of the pressure to be like Jill and Todd.

To be perfect. To fulfill the hundred-year legacy of the missionary Dawsons and Thorntons. Her mom hadn’t bothered to ask how her search was unfolding, if she was seeing someone, or how her day was going.

“And it’s going rotten.” She shook her fist at the computer screen.

She missed her sister, Jill, at this moment with an intensity that produced a small ache in her heart. Though their adopted sister, she, Todd, and Jill had always been close. Out in the field as her parents set up one church plant and clinic after another, they’d only had themselves to rely upon.

Her mom had home-schooled them out of necessity during their elementary years, but as soon as each one had turned eleven, they’d been bundled off to the boarding school for MK’s in Kyoto. She’d never forget the day she arrived at the school, overwhelmed by the strange language, faces, and smells. Jill demanded her little sister share her dormitory room and had taken Erin under her wing introducing her to all her school friends who hailed from every part of Asia where their parents served in the mission field. She’d also held Erin every night for six weeks as Erin cried herself to sleep missing her parents and the sounds of the rainforest.

At least she’d had Jill. Todd, the oldest, was in the boy’s dorm. They’d made a pact to eat meals together and sit together during early morning chapel. When he’d graduated to attend medical school at Duke and Jill had followed to get her teaching degree from the nearby University of North Carolina, Erin had counted down the days and years until she could join them, share the commute from their grandmother’s home-place, and complete her education, too.

She needed to talk to Jill. Erin glanced at the time, calculating the hour in Lima. Not wishing to interrupt the routine at the orphanage or any rare, free time between Jill and her native husband, Fernando, she decided to shoot her sister an e-mail.

Dear Jill,

A smile twitched at her lips. Because of her formal, almost British training at the boarding school, it was difficult for her to use the popular, shorthand slang of Facebook, Twitter, and computer users.

She began by recounting her experiences since arriving in Cedar Canyon—the tutoring sessions, the fitness program, her professional duties at the Center. She peppered her narrative with colorful descriptions of her new friends—Pastor Johnny and Iris, Nia and Tulley, Sani, Clarence and Doli. Laughing, she gave Jill a blow-by-blow account of the Japanese Invasion. Her sister would get a kick out of that.

And then, an unfortunate thing happened. Her thoughts flew to a certain tribal policeman.

“Confession is good for the soul,” she said out loud to the empty apartment. Jill, a spiritual anchor in her life, would know what to say. Perhaps she’d help Erin know what to do about . . . everything.

She poured out her heart regarding her dilemma and their parents’ not-so-subtle pressure to join them. Her sense of failing them. And God. Her never measuring up to their expectations. The grief of always being a disappointment to the family.

. . . And I’ve been a complete and utter idiot, Sis. There’s this man, Adam Silverhorn.

After I tell you what I’ve gone and done, how I feel, I don’t want you to hold back.

Let me have it. Don’t pull any punches. I wish you were here . . .

Typing the keys on the keypad madly to finish pouring out her thoughts, she hit Send before she lost her nerve. Before she lost her nerve to unburden her heart of things she’d wished to say to someone for years. She closed her eyes.

Confession was good for the soul. It was good to be accountable to another person. But better to cleanse her conscience before her Creator. A wry smile flickered on her lips. She was starting to think like the People, too.

“I’m sorry, God,” she whispered, her heart as heavy as the boulders surrounding Cedar Canyon. “Sorry for not obeying the command You put into place for my protection as a believer. Sorry for wasting the opportunity to show Christ to Adam and instead spending most of my time mooning over . . .” She licked her dry lips. In a deep place inside her, a sensation grew God had put her, as well as others, into Adam’s life as Scripture said, “for such a time as this.”

“I don’t know what to do with these feelings for him. Wrong feelings for a believer to have for someone not of Your kingdom.” She lifted her hands and her face toward the ceiling. The cat stirred at her feet. “I give my love for him to You. It’s Yours now. Do with it what You please.” She sighed, deep and long, sorry for the sarcasm and anger she’d launched at Adam earlier. Just because he’d hurt her.

“Forgive me, God?” She closed her laptop and buried her head into the crook of her arm against the table. “I don’t deserve another chance. But if in Your grace You see fit to ever let me talk to him again, be my Guide, my Center, my All. Help him to see Jesus in me. Help me to be salt and light for the sake of his eternal soul.”

She cried, long convulsive sobs that ended in hiccups for breath. Nia’s cat removed himself to the bedroom. Erin followed into the hall bathroom. She winced, taking a quick look in the mirror at her puffy, red face.

What a hopeless case she was. Couldn’t even cry pretty.

She dabbed her swollen eyes with the edge of a tissue. Finding the cat on her bed, she scooped him into her arms. She nestled the silky tabby fur against her face as she settled back upon the mattress.

Yet like lancing a rancid wound, the worst hurt was over. Things were right once again between her and her God. A peace filtered through her parched soul like the summer rains on the mesa. But like any serious wound, the consequences of the injury were only now just beginning. The throbbing hurt might stretch into months and years.

She reached for her Bible.