Rider on Fire & When You Call My Name. Sharon Sala
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awake,” she muttered, more to herself than to him. She rubbed her arms where he’d been holding her, then looked up.
“Do you see me?”
He looked at her face as if trying to imprint every line and curve into his mind forever. There was no mistaking who she was, or why she was here. But from the little bit she’d just said, he suspected she was not in on the deal.
“Yes, I see you,” he said softly.
Sonora exhaled a shaky breath. She didn’t know what to say next.
“Do you know why you’re here?” he asked.
She shook her head.
“And yet you came?” he asked.
She thought of the nights and days of hallucinations and was halfway convinced that this was nothing but a repeat of the same.
“It seemed I had no choice,” she muttered.
“Your father waits for you,” he said.
Sonora jerked as if he’d just slapped her. She was disgusted with herself for being so gullible. Whatever had been happening to her, now she knew it was a dream.
“I don’t have a father,” she said angrily.
“But you do,” Adam said. “Have you ever heard your mother mention a man by the name of Franklin Blue Cat?”
She snorted in a very unladylike manner, and added a succinct curse word to boot.
“Mother? I don’t have one of those, either,” she said. “I was dumped on the doorstep of a Texas orphanage. The details of the ensuing years are hardly worth repeating. And now that this little mystery is over with, I’m out of here.”
Adam winced. Franklin would be devastated by this news, and he couldn’t let her leave. Not until they’d met face-to-face.
“You’ve come all this way. Don’t you at least want to talk to him?”
“Why? He never bothered to look me up.”
Adam heard old anger in her voice. The story wasn’t his to explain, but if he didn’t convince her of something, she would be gone before Franklin got a chance to state his case.
“Franklin didn’t know about you. He still doesn’t.”
Sonora shook her head. “You’re not making sense. And by the way, who the hell are you?”
“Adam Two Eagles.”
She tried not to stare, but it was surreal to be standing here having this conversation with a specter from her dreams.
“So, Mr. Two Eagles, what do you do for a living…besides haunt people’s dreams?”
Adam stifled a gasp of surprise. He’d been in her dreams? This he hadn’t known. The Old Ones had really done a job on her.
“I haunt nothing,” he said quietly. “I used to be in the army. Now I’m a healer for my people, the Kiowa. I know you’re Franklin’s daughter, but I don’t know your name or what you do.”
“Sonora Jordan is my name. I’m an agent with the DEA.” Then she turned the focus back on him. “So… Adam Two Eagles. You call yourself a healer.”
He nodded once.
She reached behind her, felt the seat of her Harley and clung to it as the only recognizable thing on which she could focus.
“Healer…as in medicine man or shaman, or whatever it is you people call your style of voodoo?” she asked.
“Healer, as in healer,” he said. “And my people are your people, too. Whether you accept it or not, you are half Kiowa.”
The words hit Sonora where it hurt—deep in the old memories of childhood taunts about being a throwaway child with no family and no name. She’d lived her entire life branded by two words that a priest and a nun had chosen out of thin air and given to the latest addition to their orphanage. Sonora because it was the priest’s hometown, and Jordan for no reason that she knew other than that they felt by not giving her a Latino name, she might have a better chance at a decent life. A quixotic thought for two devout Catholics who believed that everyone was equal in the eyes of God.
“You can’t prove that,” she muttered.
“Well…actually, I can,” he said. “You’ve come all this way. You don’t have to believe me. Follow me if you dare, and see for yourself.”
Sonora thought of the handgun tucked into the storage behind the seat and then of how far she’d let herself be guided by a whim. What could it hurt? If she had to, she could take him. Besides, maybe this would finally put an end to being a walking nightmare just waiting to happen.
Adam watched her eyes, only guessing at the jumble of thoughts that must be going through her head.
“I won’t hurt you,” he added.
She fixed her gaze on his face, remembered the last thing he’d said to her in her dream, and then sighed. “I know that,” she said.
Her assurance was startling.
“Why do you say that with such confidence?” Adam asked.
“I’m here because I fell into some sort of twilight zone. I’m here because I keep dreaming of a man who’s either sick or dying. And I’m here because you keep haunting my dreams.”
Again she mentioned seeing him in her dreams. Intrigued, he had to ask. “What am I doing in your dreams?”
“Trying to seduce me… I think.”
He wondered if he looked as startled as he felt.
“Indeed,” he drawled. “And did I succeed?”
Thunder rumbled in the distance.
Sonora glanced up at the sky. Either she holed up in another motel until this storm passed, or she followed this man. Despite the fact that she’d seen his face in her dreams, she didn’t know him. For all she knew, he might try to harm her. Then she sighed. Miguel Garcia wanted her dead. So what was new? It was either the devil she knew or the one she didn’t.
“I have one question to ask you,” she said, ignoring the fact that she had not answered his.
He shrugged. “Then ask.”
“This man you claim to be my father. Does he have a wind chime on his front porch that looks like a dream catcher?”
Despite the depth of his tribal beliefs, Adam was taken aback by the question.
“Yes.”
“And does he have a hobby of carving things out of wood?”
Adam thought of his friend’s fame that was known all over the world by those who indulged in his particular brand of art.
“Yes, you could say that,” he said.
“And…a few days ago, was he taken ill?”
Now Adam was feeling off-kilter.
“You have seen all of this…in dreams?”
She shrugged, then nodded.
“The Old Ones have been playing with you,” he said softly.
“Who?”
“Never mind,” he said. “If you want to meet your father, then follow me.”
“I need gas.”
“I will wait.”
She reached for the nozzle to the pump, quickly filled the tank and then dashed into the station to pay.
Adam saw Franklin in every movement she made, from the cut of her features to the way she moved when she walked—with her toes pointed inward