Poor baby, she thought wickedly. That was the breaks. He’d appeal, of course, but that didn’t concern her. Once he was found guilty in a court of law, the case would be closed as far as the local police were concerned. Gavin would be shipped off to prison, gossip would die down, and with time, the murder of Christina Montgomery would be forgotten. And no one would know that the real killer still walked the streets.
Holding that knowledge deep inside like a treasure, she fairly purred with satisfaction as she leaned across the table to Micky Culver, her live-in boyfriend. “Did you hear what that man behind you just said?” she whispered. Her smile sultry, she mimicked softly, “’I’m not paying six-fifty to eat with a murdering Indian.’ Can you believe it, Mick? Everything’s going to work out just the way we want it to!”
His brown eyes hard and his mouth compressed into a flat, angry line, Micky arched a scraggly brow at her. “What do you mean ‘we’?”
Far from offended, she only laughed. “C’mon, baby, you know you don’t mean that. You don’t want anything to happen to me. You love me.”
Grudgingly, he had to admit that was true. When Audra had come to him in despair, penniless after she’d been swindled out of her inheritance by her mother’s lover, he’d thought he’d died and gone to heaven. Finally, he had a chance to prove his love for her! He’d taken her in, given her a home, and thought they would spend the rest of their lives together.
But lately he’d begun to have doubts. He’d known she was no angel—neither was he—but she was enjoying Gavin Nighthawk’s predicament more than she ought to. The man had a little girl, for God’s sake, and she needed him. But Audra didn’t seem to care about that. All she was interested in was getting her own butt out of a sling, and if that meant an innocent man would go to prison for a crime she’d committed, she didn’t seem to have a problem with that. But he did. In fact, it bothered him more and more each day.
Micky wanted to blame Audra’s cold-blooded attitude on Lexine. Ever since Audra had gotten involved with her birth mother and started visiting her in prison, she hadn’t been the same. She’d become harder and self-centered. But as much as he hated Lexine Baxter’s influence, he knew she couldn’t make Audra do anything she didn’t want to do. Audra was a grown woman, responsible for her own actions. Because of her, Gavin Nighthawk was in a tight spot, and she was delighted.
“Who are you?” he asked, truly puzzled. “I don’t know you anymore. I’m beginning to wonder if I ever did.”
“Don’t be silly.” Audra laughed, not taking him seriously. “Of course you know me, honey. I’m just like you. That’s why we get along so well.”
There’d been a time when he would have agreed with her. Neither of them had much use for the law when it got in the way of what they wanted. He’d done some time in jail and didn’t fool himself into thinking that before it was all said and done, he wouldn’t repeat the experience. But unlike Audra, he wasn’t proud of what he’d done. He was just weak sometimes, and when life closed in on him and he didn’t know where the rent money was coming from or how he was going to eat, he did stupid things. But he’d never physically hurt or killed anyone. He’d robbed from folks who could afford the loss and had insurance to replace what he’d taken. Still, he wasn’t pleased with himself.
But nothing seemed to bother Audra at all. Was she really that cold? That mean? He didn’t want to think so, but he couldn’t be sure. And that was what worried him.
“Are you really going to do this?” he rasped in a low whisper that didn’t carry beyond her ears. “Are you just going to sit there and let that man go to prison for something you know he didn’t do? Would you really do that?”
Surprised that he even had to ask, she all but laughed in his face. “Are you kidding? You’re damn straight, I would! It’s a tough world out there, baby, and a girl’s got to do what a girl’s got to do. Anyway,” she said with a toss of her short, bleached-blond hair, “he’s only getting what he deserves. She was the mother of his baby—he should have married her and taken care of her instead of leaving her out in the woods by herself to get in trouble.”
“So it’s his fault that you came along and killed her?” he whispered incredulously. “Is that what you’re saying?”
Pushed into a corner, she shrugged. “Well…yeah. If she’d been where she was supposed to be, none of this would have happened.”
Unable to believe she could justify murder so easily, Micky actually felt nauseated. Pushing away the steak sandwich he’d barely touched, he threw down his napkin and abruptly rose to his feet. “Something in here’s making me sick to my stomach,” he said coldly. “I need some fresh air.”
And for the first time in their relationship, he walked out on her, leaving Audra staring after him in stunned surprise.
Laughing Horse Reservation was north of town and home to the Northern Cheyenne tribe. It was here that Summer had spent the summers of her childhood, getting to know her father’s people and their traditions. And it was here that she had first been introduced to medicine when she was taught the ways of tribal medicine. She’d loved it, loved caring for her people, and when she’d returned to Whitehorn after college and medical school for her residency in immunology at Whitehorn Memorial Hospital, one of the first things she’d done was open a clinic on the reservation.
It was hard, working two jobs, but she was doing the right thing and had no regrets. Life on the reservation had improved some since she was a child, but poverty was still rampant and medical care practically nonexistent. It was the very young and the very old who suffered the most, and she did what she could to help them. She even took her services on the road, making rounds on the reservation once a week, driving from one home to the next long into the evening, visiting with patients, examining them, caring.
Usually she loved making house calls because they gave her a chance to reconnect with her heritage and memories of long-ago summers. But as she left the Hip Hop Café behind and headed for Janet Crow’s house on the far east side of the reservation, all she could think about was Gavin Nighthawk. There had to be something she could do to help him.
Troubled, she thought she hid it well. Taking Janet’s blood pressure as the older woman chattered about her new granddaughter, Summer smiled and nodded and made the appropriate responses. But Janet was shrewder than she’d given her credit for. The older woman waited until Summer had listened to her heart and pulled the stethoscope from her ears before she arched a brow at her and said, “All right, missy, what’s wrong?”
“Well, your blood pressure’s higher than I’d like, but—”
“No, not with me,” she cut in with an impatient wave of her hand. “I’m an old woman—it’s my time in life to fall apart. I’m talking about you, girl. What’s wrong with you? What are you brooding about?”
“I’m not brooding,” Summer began, only to swallow the rest of her words when Janet gave her a hard look with brown eyes that were as sharp as a hawk’s. She might be seventy-five and not as healthy as she could be, but she had earned her place as a tribal elder. She didn’t miss much.
“All right,” Summer sighed, knowing when she was beaten. “It’s the trial, okay?”
Janet didn’t have to ask which one. “His days of freedom are numbered,” she said flatly. “I hope he’s wise enough to enjoy them while he can.”
“So you think he’ll be convicted?”
Janet’s shrug was uncaring. “It makes no difference to me.”
“But he was born and raised here on the reservation!” Summer protested, stunned by her attitude. “He’s Cheyenne. Don’t you think the tribe owes him some kind of loyalty?”
“Why? Where was his loyalty when