Broken Wings (4 page)

There was a knock at the door, but it
didn’t startle or surprise her. She pushed herself up from the bed
and headed for the window. “Story of my life.” She peeked through
the curtains.

Billy Tajan. She smiled and opened the
door.

He gave her a sheepish grin. “I hope
you don’t mind that I dropped by without calling.”

“
It’s okay.” She tilted her
head and shrugged. “You want to come inside?” she asked, taking a
step back.

Billy entered the room carrying the
jewelry case with the turquoise necklace. “My father asked me to
return this to you.” He offered it to her. “He says he appreciates
the gesture, but the necklace is yours.”

“
Your father should keep
it.” She backed away. “I’m sure it means more to him than
me.”

“
You’re probably right,” he
said. “But my dad can be a pretty hardheaded guy sometimes.” He
laughed softly. “He’s not going to take no for an answer. So you
might as well keep the necklace.”

When she blatantly refused the jewelry
case, he laid it on the table.

Rio had left the necklace at the
Tajan’s on purpose. But she didn’t do it to win points. She was
simply trying to give it back.

The look on Bill’s face when he opened
the case and saw the long lost necklace had tugged at her
heartstrings. That, and something she couldn’t explain, urged her
to leave it there and return it to its rightful owners.

After all, it wasn’t really hers. She
was just a con who’d been hired to do a job.

Rio sat down in one of the two chairs
at the small table. Billy claimed the other.

“
You know,” she said. “I
envy you.”

“
Why?” He pushed the jewelry
case across the table toward her.

“
Because you know the
heritage and I don’t.” She pushed the case back.

In order to pull this off, Rio had to
pretend like she really was Audrey Tajan’s daughter. And Audrey’s
daughter would be trying to let the reality of the situation sink
in. Audrey’s daughter would have a ton of questions about her
Indian heritage and her obvious resemblance to their
ancestor.

She was halfway there. Relative or not,
her curiosity had piqued regarding the resemblance between herself
and Maggie Fuller. She also fancied the idea of being tied to such
a close-knit family that had this incredible history. She found the
Tajans’ ancestry fascinating.

“
Up until my mother died, I
didn’t even know there was any Indian blood in me,” she said with a
shrug. “She always told everybody she was Hawaiian.”

“
Lord knows, I’ve had the
history shoved down my throat more than a few times.”

Billy Tajan couldn’t get far enough
away from his white ancestry to suit him. It was the curse that he
alone had been forced to bear. No one else in the family had been
obliged to walk around, day in and day out, with white skin. Every
time he looked in the mirror he was reminded of the legacy that he
alone had to endure.

Maggie Fuller and her lust for the
white man’s dollar had been the cause of Tajan’s death. That’s the
way it was in Billy’s eyes.

But now that Rio had shown up, he was
no longer alone. Finally, there was someone else to share his
burden. Oh sure, he’d been a little reluctant to believe her at
first. But his father believed her. And who was he to throw
skepticism into the mix?

Billy had quickly decided to trust his
father’s instincts; something he’d learned to do a long time ago. A
practice that, so far, had not failed him.

“
It sounds like a
fascinating tale.” Rio’s tone, she hoped, was encouraging enough to
get him to talk about the star-crossed lovers.

“
Well...I guess I could fill
you in,” he said. “If you’d like.”

“
If you don’t mind,” Rio
said, “I’d love to hear the story.” If he was willing to share the
tale with her, she wanted to hear it. She was eager to hear more
about the warrior.

“
Okay. To make a really long
story, short…our third great grandmother Maggie Fuller was white.
She and her sisters, Mary and Molly, lived in central California
with their grandfather.” He paused, catching his breath, and then
continued on. “The girls were notorious bank robbers. Yes it’s
true. After the Comstock Lode was discovered in 1859 they decided
to come up here and cash in.” Billy seemed less than enthused as he
relayed the family’s history, Rio’s interest amplified. “They went
up to V.C. and high-jacked a bunch of gold and silver as it was
being shipped out. Well, at least that’s the way the story goes.
Nobody can agree on how much gold and silver they stole though.”
Billy laughed it off. “It’s supposed to be buried around here…
somewhere...because legend says they never got the chance to go
back and get it.”

Well now, this was becoming more and
more interesting by the minute. Billy Tajan was telling her the
same story that Turner had. Was it possible? Was there really a
treasure? “Do you believe it?” She kept her tone calm, an amazing
feat considering her heart felt like it was going to pound out of
her chest. “About the treasure being buried around here
somewhere?”

“
My father believes it,” he
said, but he didn’t sound convinced. “He has half a map that was
allegedly created by Maggie herself. It’s supposed to lead to the
treasure.” Billy rolled his eyes and kept his laughter to a
minimum.

Rio tamped down the urge to leap up and
grab her briefcase. It had to appear like she was thinking over her
options. She let out a soft moan as she leaned over and grabbed the
red leather attaché propped up against the nightstand. She set it
on her lap and unzipped the top. Digging around in her briefcase,
she came out with the small leather case that she’d gotten from
Turner. She opened it and pulled out the folded map.

She avoided direct eye contact but
peeked at him with a stealthful eye. He looked like he was buying
her ruse. Good.

“
I found this in my mother’s
things,” she said, handing it to Billy.

He took it, but made no move to unfold
the faded and worn document. “What’s this?”

“
Till now, I wasn’t really
sure.” Rio returned her briefcase to the floor and leaned back in
her chair. “But now I think it’s half a map.”

What the
... Billy opened it up
and stared at it. This made absolutely no sense. “How did Audrey
get a hold of this?” he asked, for his own benefit more than
Rio’s.

“
Beats me.” She sounded
bored. “I didn’t even know it existed until after she
died.”

“
We need to go show this to
my dad.”

Billy and Rio went back to his parents’
house, where they showed Billy’s father the document. The senior
Tajan retrieved his partial map from its secret hiding place and
lined up the two. They were a perfect match.

“
Can you read it?” Billy’s
outlook had gone from skeptical to hopeful.

Bill studied the map, and after a brief
bout of silence he started shaking his head. “It makes absolutely
no sense at all.”

The map was full of hand-drawn,
unmarked roads and trails and had no visible landmarks
whatsoever.

“
We just haven’t figured out
how to read it yet.” Finally Rio had found some
optimism.

“
Do we want to figure out
how to read it?” Billy asked. If they did that then he’d feel
compelled to go find its treasure—if there was indeed
one.

“
Do you believe the treasure
is real?” Rio asked Bill.

“
Yes I do,” Bill said in a
tone that Billy only heard when his father’s mind was made
up.

“
Well then…” Rio said, “I
say let’s go find it.”

~~~~

CHAPTER 6

Turner Atkins wasn’t the nicest or the
most upstanding guy around. By all outside accounts, he was a seedy
character who was most likely always up to no good. This particular
instance was no exception.

He didn’t care what people thought of
him. He hadn’t gotten where he was by being a doormat. All that
mattered to Turner was that people, in general, were afraid of him
because that meant he was in charge. And damned if that little
spitfire—she was anything but. Turner didn’t like it. It wasn’t
right. Some little two-bit con thinking she could play ball with
the likes of Turner Atkins.

Inside his Vegas office Turner was on
the phone, barking out orders. “Put a tail on her,” he said. “If
Timmons is right about her…I don’t want to find out about it after
it’s too late.”

~~~~

CHAPTER 7

Billy waited beside Rio while she
unlocked her motel room door. “So,” he said as she opened the door
and went inside. “You really want to do this?” he asked, following
her in.

“
Damn straight I do.” She
tossed her keys on the table.

“
This could take some time,
you know. We don’t even know where to look.” He let his thoughts
ramble out. If he justified it then he wouldn’t look like a weirdo
when he extended an invitation to his newfound cousin. “So, why
don’t you check out of here and come stay at my place?”

Rio studied him with odd curiosity
lighting her eyes.

“
I have an extra bedroom you
can use,” he assured her. “You are family, after all.”

“
Okay...” The word lingered
on the air. “But on one condition.” She sat down at the table. “You
have to make that short story really long again.”

“
You’re fascinated by him,
aren’t you?” That’s the way it seemed from his vantage
point.

“
Just curious.”

“
Well then—” He didn’t put
much stock in her reply. “—you’d be the first woman that
wasn’t.”

* * *

At Billy’s house, he led Rio down the
hallway and stopped at the doorway to the extra bedroom. “It’s not
much, but it’s free.”

“
My kind of place.” Rio’s
smile turned on at half pressure.

He gave a little chuckle and set her
bags down inside the doorway. Billy made no move to enter the room.
“You’d better get some rest,” he said. “We’re going up to V.C.
tomorrow.”

“
Virginia City?”

“
Yes…Virginia City.” He
flashed a quick smile and turned away.

“
Goodnight…” She watched him
disappear down the dimly lit hallway. Rio backed into the room and
closed the door.

She lay down on the bed, curled up and
stared off into space. Times like these, most any of her childhood
memories could resurface and become so vivid, as if it had happened
only yesterday. The memory that came creeping out this time
happened when she was about six years old.

She was hiding in her room
and she could hear her parents arguing. Their yelling had scared
her.

The sound of her mother’s
voice had come crashing through the walls. “You and that
kid...you’re both driving me nuts!”

Rio’s father’s voice held a
commanding tone, but it wasn’t nearly as boisterous as her mother’s
had been. “Abby, lower your voice. She’ll hear you.”

“
I don’t care if she does.”
Abby blurted out her contempt. “She’s so stinking needy. You’re
both so damned stinking needy!”

Rio hadn’t moved from her place on the
bed, except that maybe she’d drawn up into more of a fetal
position. She was still staring off into space, and tears had
trailed over her face like miniature rivers.

~~~~

CHAPTER 8

Rio had never allowed any man, besides
her father, to drive her Corvette. That car was her baby. But she’d
gladly turned the keys over to Billy because he not only knew the
area better than her. And, it was a great way to gain his
confidence.

“
I can’t believe you’re
letting me drive.” There was a heady and exhilarating quality in
his voice.

“
Well, you know the area
better than me.” She played it off as logic. “And besides…” She
gave him a gentle smack on the arm. “I trust you.”

Rio marveled at how the town of
Virginia City was still preserved in all its glory. Had it not been
for the power lines and vehicles lining the streets, she might have
thought she’d stepped back in time.

There was something eerie about the
place. If she really thought about it, this was the same sidewalk
people had rambled along more than a hundred years ago. Tourists
could still enter the same shops, saloons and hotels the miners,
shopkeepers, and less than desirable folks frequented back in the
day.

She could easily see the most
levelheaded people swearing they’d felt a cool, brisk nudge bump up
against them as they ambled along the town’s vintage wooden
sidewalks, even though was no one there.

That gave her the
willies
.

Billy parked the car in front of an old
saloon that’d been converted into a gift shop.