Before Sunrise (11 page)

Drake whistled. “That's heavy medicine.”

“Tell me about it. Jeremiah's father is a shaman. He also has some sort of precognition. I'm not sure I believed in all that before—I do now.”

“No wonder. What were you and Cortez doing out there?”

“Investigating some caves the murdered anthropologist had visited. The caves were behind the Bennett construction site. We got shot at almost as soon as we arrived.” Phoebe closed her eyes, then opened them wide.

“I just want to get patched up and help you find the person who fired that shot. Then I want five minutes alone with them!”

“I'll give you some lessons in martial arts first,” Drake teased.

She let out a tautly held breath. “This really hurts. It didn't break the skin, but it bruised me really bad.” Her hand pressed gingerly against the point of impact.

Drake changed the subject, trying not to think how much damage a traumatic blow could do to flesh, even without penetration. He'd seen a blow to the ribs produce bruising in the lung which led to internal bleeding, even to death.

Later, at the hospital, they did all sorts of tests before the doctor, a young, dark-haired woman, holding a chart, walked into the room they'd given Phoebe.

She glanced over the clipboard and raised her eyebrows at the slight young blond woman in the bed.

“If somebody had shot me,” the doctor pondered
aloud, “I'd be screaming my head off. You're calm for a woman in your condition.”

Phoebe sighed. “I'm an anthropologist. Indiana Jones?” she prompted. “Fedora hat, long black whip, attitude problem…?”

The doctor chuckled. “Okay, I get the point.”

Drake stuck his head in the door. “I have to leave,” he told Phoebe. “Another deputy's picking me up out front. They need me to help interview people near the construction site—even the part-timers have been called in. Is she going to be okay, Doc?” he asked the physician.

“Yes,” the doctor said.

Drake gave her a thumbs-up. “I'll call you later,” he told Phoebe, and then he was gone.

“Now,” the doctor said, leaning against the wall near Phoebe's headboard to thumb through the lab work. “You've got some bad bruising in your groin, in an area substantially larger than where a bullet would have hit you. Which brings to mind another question, why didn't it penetrate?”

“I was carrying two thick Mexican pesos in the pocket where the bullet hit,” Phoebe said matter-of-factly. “It went through one and was imbedded in the second.”

The doctor's thin eyebrows arched. “You expected to be shot and prepared ahead?”

Phoebe grimaced. “Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction.”

“I'm a doctor. I've seen a man shot at point-blank range with both barrels of a shotgun walk a mile to get help and survive,” the doctor said, holding out her hand palm-up. “Let's have it.”

Phoebe told her.

The doctor didn't say anything for a minute. Her eyes went back to the lab reports. “I'd send that shaman a birthday present for the rest of his life.”

“I intend to. He saved me.”

“Why were you shot, do you know?”

“I was helping an FBI agent track a suspicious vehicle in a homicide investigation,” Phoebe replied calmly.

The doctor blinked. “The FBI?”

She nodded. “He's part of the new Indian Country FBI Crime Unit. He came here to investigate a homicide on the Yonah Reservation.”

“And you can track.”

“Assist,” she clarified.

“Was there some particular reason you went with him?”

“Yes. He'd just kissed me half to death in the museum where I work. A grammar school class stopped by to watch. It was either go tracking or explain myself to a
very angry teacher.” She grimaced. “I picked the lesser of the two evils. I like to think of it as exercising the better part of valor.”

The doctor burst out laughing. “Well, you're lucky. Or blessed. Or you have a guardian among the little people.”

“Leprechauns?” Phoebe asked.

“Nunnehi,” the doctor corrected. “The Cherokee say the little people protect travelers in the woods. They can hear them singing sometimes in the distance. Lovely legend, isn't it?”

Singing. In the distance. In Cherokee. Phoebe didn't say a word, but her mind was busy recalling the melody she'd heard in the wee hours of the morning a few days ago.

 

S
IX HOURS LATER
, a weary Drake, who had returned to the hospital, drove her home. The staff had wanted to keep her overnight, but they couldn't find anything severe enough to warrant it. Phoebe had good insurance, but she didn't want to have to use it on something non-life-threatening.

When they got back to her house, Cortez was pacing on the front porch.

“He phoned me every hour on the hour,” Drake confessed. “I had to tell him we were on the way, or he was going to storm the hospital.”

She smiled wearily. “No problem.” In fact, it touched her that Cortez was that concerned, but she wasn't admitting it.

Drake pulled up in front of her house and cut off the engine. He got out to open her door, but Cortez was there first. He slid an arm around her waist and helped her into the house.

“I was expecting you to pick her up and carry her in,” Drake teased.

“He can't lift,” Phoebe said simply. “He caught some shrapnel in the shoulder when he was in Vietnam during the last days our troops were stationed there.”

Drake pursed his lips.

Cortez's eyes softened. “I'd forgotten that I told you that,” he said.

Phoebe cleared her throat, embarrassed.

“Sometimes we get second chances,” Drake said to nobody in particular.

“Like Phoebe just did,” Cortez replied. He was wearing jeans and a flannel shirt. His long hair was loose, but untidy, as if restless hands had mussed it. “And that's why I'm not leaving her out here alone in the wilderness all night.”

Phoebe hesitated. Then she realized that something was missing. “Jock!” she exclaimed, immediately fearful that her would-be assassin had gotten to her dog.

“He's being boarded at the local animal hospital,” Cortez replied at once. “They're going to spoil him rotten.”

“But, you can't do that!” she exclaimed.

“I just did. Pack a bag, Phoebe,” Cortez said quietly. “You're moving in with Tina and me at the motel for the duration.”

“Duration?”

“Until we catch the guy who's doing this,” Cortez said. “And you'd better remember that he was aiming to kill. If it hadn't been for my dad's foresight, you'd be in the morgue.”

Phoebe felt the blood leave her face. She sat down heavily on the arm of her sofa.

“Sorry,” Cortez bit off. “I didn't mean to put it like that.”

“He's right, though,” Drake jumped in. “You can't stay out here alone. He won't stop. Next time, he won't rest on one good shot, either.”

“Exactly,” Cortez replied.

Phoebe ground her teeth together. “It will look like I'm running!”

The two men exchanged a complicated look. “Think of it as advancing to the rear,” Cortez said after a minute. “Even Quanah Parker, one of our greatest Comanche
warriors, did that from time to time. Nobody would ever call him a coward. Right?” he asked Drake.

Drake nodded. “Right.”

She gnawed her lower lip worriedly. “It won't look right…”

“You'll be in Tina's room, with Joseph,” Cortez said patiently. “I'll be right next door. You'll be safe.”

In the room with the baby. The baby was the reason Cortez had deserted Phoebe and married a woman he didn't even love. It wasn't the child's fault, but it would revive a painful memory. She hated the whole idea of it. But staying here alone was terrifying, especially now that he'd removed her only protection—Jock.

“You'll like Tina,” Drake coaxed. “She's really nice.”

“Yes, she is,” Cortez assured her.

“Is she kin to your late wife?” she asked Cortez.

“She's my cousin,” he said slowly.

Sometimes people married their cousins, she was thinking…although she didn't say it aloud. It didn't exactly put the mysterious Tina out of the running as a romantic rival. She glanced from Drake to Cortez. That was when she noticed that they both looked as exhausted as she felt. It had been a very long day.

“I'm sorry,” she said at once, struggling to her feet. Her belly was terribly sore. “I'm making waves, when
you're both dead on your feet, too. I'll pack what I have to have. Did you find anything out there?” she asked Cortez.

He relaxed a little, shoving his hands into his pockets as he moved to the window to look out. “Not much. A shell casing. Garden variety .45 caliber. Could have been fired from a handgun or a rifle.” He turned. “But judging from the velocity,” he added, staring at her, “it was a handgun. A rifle shot would have most likely penetrated the silver and gone right into your body.”

“Then the shooter was close by,” she guessed.

He nodded. “We found the shell casing about two hundred feet from where you and I were standing. But the shooter had to be a marksman, just the same. It isn't that easy to bring someone down at that distance without a scope.”

“You've got ballistics on it?” Drake asked.

Cortez nodded. “I overnighted the bullet to our FBI lab in D.C.,” he added. “If we get lucky, they may be able to tell us where it was purchased, even the sort of handgun that fired it.”

“Were there any latent prints?” Drake persisted.

“One,” Cortez said with a smile. “A partial, but it might be enough. We found one other thing—a cigarette butt.”

“So the shooter smokes,” Phoebe guessed.

He nodded. “If it was his,” he added. “There's no way of knowing when it was left there.”

“It rained night before last,” Drake pointed out.

“The butt hadn't been touched by water,” Cortez replied. “So far, so good.”

“Can I at least go back to work?” Phoebe asked when she'd packed her toiletries and three changes of clothing. She had them in a suitcase, which Cortez picked up with his left hand.

“She'd be around people,” Drake pointed out.

“Good point,” Cortez said after a minute. “All right, but you don't leave the office unless one of us is with you.”

It wasn't her choice, but then, she didn't seem to have one. She glanced from one of them to the other. Talk about being stonewalled…

“All right,” she agreed.

Cortez checked his watch. “We'd better go. I've got an early appointment.”

“With another developer?” Drake asked. “Should we tail you, in case there's another shooting, too?”

Cortez chuckled. “That was below the belt.”

Drake shrugged. “Just checking.”

“I'll lock up,” Phoebe said. She went from room to room, checking windows and doors until she assured that they were all secure.

“It doesn't look like anybody lives here,” Drake murmured. “No photos, no souvenirs, no keepsakes…”

“Most of my stuff is at my aunt Derrie's place,” Phoebe remarked. “It seemed sort of useless to bring along a lot of stuff that I'd just have to move again, eventually.”

“You're planning to leave?” Drake asked.

“Not today,” she said wryly. “I meant someday. It was a figure of speech.”

Cortez didn't say anything at all. He opened the front door and walked out onto the porch.

 

T
INA MET THEM AT THE DOOR
of her room, giving Phoebe a curious look. “So you're the famous Phoebe,” she murmured dryly. “I'm really happy to meet you.
He
doesn't tell me anything,” she indicated Cortez.

“You are not to pump her for information,” he cautioned his cousin. “You aren't to let her out of your sight, either,” he added firmly.

“Yeah, I know why,” Tina said, quickly sobering. “I'm glad you're still in one piece. Good thing Jeremiah's father is a shaman, huh?”

“A very good thing,” Phoebe replied. “I'm only bruised. It could have been so much worse.”

“You'll be safe here,” Tina assured her. “I'm Christina Redhawk. That's his last name, too, but he won't use it,”
she told Phoebe, indicating Cortez. “He has a really vicious sense of humor.”

“He does?” Drake asked, grinning at Tina, who actually blushed.

“Well, the great-grandfather who kidnapped Jeremiah's great-grandmother was named Cortes, with an
s,
” Tina mused.