Colton's Folly (Native American contemporary romance)

Chapter
1

The flight to Rapid City had been canceled at the last minute, for no reason that Abigail Colton could ascertain. She was forced to fly to Bismarck instead, and from there to take a six-passenger “puddle jumper” to someplace called Christy’s Field, adding four hours in layovers to the original seven hours of flying time. Even worse, the change would put her out of reach of the Bureau of Indian Affairs representative who’d been assigned to meet her at the regional airport in Rapid City. She called Arthur Koehler at her first stopover.

“Don’t worry, my dear,” he reassured her. “I know Christy’s well. I’ll call the reservation and have someone meet you. You should arrive at approximately the same time. And by the time you make the drive to Crossroads, I’ll be there.”

He’d wanted to say more, but the boarding announcement had come over the public-address system and Abby had rushed off. She made her connections smoothly, and when she arrived at the small private airfield out on the North Dakota prairie a message was waiting at the courtesy desk. Her escort would pick her up at 2:00 p.m.

“Oh, Lord,” she groaned. She’d been in transit since one in the morning and now she had nearly two hours more to wait, but at least someone was on the way. She looked around the pocket-size terminal and found a row of benches.

“I’ll be resting over there,” she told the clerk, and motioned to the other side of the room. “If anyone asks for me, just point him in my direction.”

The young man in the gray plaid shirt smiled sympathetically. “Rough flight?”

Abby smiled back. “Just long. Unbearably long.”

He reached under the counter and pulled out a small pillow. “Here, Miss Colton. Take this over there and sack out. When whoever it is gets here, I’ll send ’em over.”

She smiled again and tucked the pillow under her arm. Carrying the shoulder bags she’d brought with her, she moved to the far side of the almost empty room; thirty seconds later she was stretched out on the hard wooden bench and sleeping soundly.

Sometime
later a presence intruded on her rest. She woke slowly, feeling her back stiffen against the unyielding surface on which she lay, wishing that whatever had roused her, hadn’t. Shielding her eyes against the glare of ceiling lights, she turned her head and found herself staring at a pair of muscular, denim-clad legs that, as her eyes traveled upward, seemed to go on forever.

She swung her own legs onto the floor and leaned back in an effort to gain a normal perspective on the man who stood before her. The legs ended at a narrow waist bounded by a worn leather belt, into which their owner had tucked a pair of equally worn calfskin gloves. Above that spread a wide expanse of chest more defined than hidden by a plaid wool shirt and an open sheepskin-lined vest.

She rose, finally, from her place, and was relieved at the improvement afforded by her upright position--this was indeed a person of human proportions. Even so, he stood a good head taller than she did, and she found herself grateful for her entire five-foot-nine-inches.

His stance was easy
--weight evenly dispersed on those long legs of his, broad shoulders relaxed, hands hanging loosely at his sides. Still, Abby sensed something slightly out of kilter, just a little bit off, something she could not yet identify.

She took in the darkly handsome face with its deep copper tan, then focused on a pair of hard brown eyes that disclosed nothing of what he was thinking.

“Are you my ride?”

“If you’re going to Twin Buttes.”

She nodded silently, then put out her hand. “I’m Abby Colton.”

“Cat Tallman.” He didn’t see, or perhaps chose to ignore, the hand she’d extended in greeting. “Got any luggage?”

She indicated a single nylon tote and an overstuffed shoulder bag. “Just these. I had the rest shipped.”

He hefted the tote onto his shoulder, and Abby picked up her bag, then remembered the pillow. Unconsciously, she put her hand on his arm to detain him. “Wait. I’ve got to return this.”

He looked at her, then at the hand resting lightly on his sleeve, and slowly eased away from her. The utter contempt behind the gesture stunned her and brought a flush to her cheeks. She turned on her heel and went to the desk, where the clerk looked at her and gestured with a jerk of his head.

“Watch out for that Indian, miss. He’s trouble.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. He’s always stirring things up, getting his people
worked up about this or that.” He shuffled some papers on the counter and made check marks on a typewritten form, then looked up again. “Someone ought to just take the whole lot and ship ’em off to where they can’t bother the rest of us. Make life a lot simpler.”

Abby put down the urge to respond; such stupidity was common, and she wasn’t here to reform the world. She handed him the pillow, saying only, “Thanks,” and walked back to where Cat Tallman waited.

“How long a ride is it?”

“About three hours.”

“Time enough to get acquainted.”

He turned to her just as they cleared the door leading out of the building. “It helps to know your enemy.”

Aha! She thought. “Why should we be enemies?”

“For one thing, I’ve been against your being hired, and I did everything I could to prevent it.”

A smile twitched at the corners of Abby’s mouth. “Really? And what went wrong?”

He shrugged. “Too near the end of the school year. It was you or no one.” He gave her a sideways glance. “Which makes me wonder why you took the job. What happened back there to make you available suddenly? Seems mighty odd to me.” When she didn’t respond, he went on. “Anyway, I figure I ought to be able to find someone better than you for the fall.”

Abby felt the first small buzz of anger. “What have you got against me?”

“I don’t believe you’ll be a friend to my people.”

“If I weren’t a friend I wouldn’t have come.”

“Others like you, who came before, didn’t always have our best interests at heart. Most of the time they were here for some other reason, and when they got what they wanted, they left. None of them really cared about what went on here.”

“I’m different,” she responded with deceptive softness. She was furious.

His dark eyes bored deeply into hers. “You’re new...but you’re not different. Your kind never is.”

“You’re wrong!” she shot back.

Brushing past him, she stood at the curb and took a long, deep breath, letting it out slowly in an effort to calm herself. This was what she’d sensed
--an edginess beneath the surface calm, a hostility hovering very near hatred. She felt him beside her.

“C’mon, let’s go.”

He led the way through the watery sunshine of a mid- April day. A jeep waited in a No Parking zone; with little wasted motion, they stowed Abby’s bags, climbed aboard and belted themselves into the seats.

While he concentrated on negotiating their way off the field and onto the highway, Abby tried to picture what lay ahead. She’d always known that none of the research she’d done, the books she’d read, the government reports she’d studied, the interviews and indoctrination meetings she’d attended, had really prepared her for the work she was about to begin. But if the attitude of the man behind the wheel was any barometer, she was in big trouble.

She glanced at his strong, implacable profile. As leader of the community that had hired her, he could make things very difficult for her, or smooth the way. Clearly, he’d chosen the former alternative.

“You appear to have decided something about me without even knowing me. How can that be?” she finally asked.

“I know enough.”

“To jump to conclusions.”

“To know what to expect.”

“That’s nonsense!”

“Is it? Okay, tell me what you know about my people.” His tone implied that she knew nothing; Abby was determined to prove him wrong and spoke without hesitation. But she chose to take him at face value when she spoke. “They’re members of the Sioux nation, or the Lakota, as I think you prefer to be called. This particular
tayoshpaye,
or clan, broke away from a larger group migrating to Canada under the leadership of Sitting Bull. When they came upon a valley guarded by twin rock formations and saw the river and the rich grasslands, they decided to remain.

“For some inexplicable reason, your ancestors managed to escape resettlement to one of the larger reservations in the Dakotas, such as Standing Rock, when the government was appropriating lands for white settlers. Twin Buttes was put under federal protection in the late 1800s and gained status as a reservation before the close of the century.

“It still retains most of its autonomy, and has managed to escape termination, thanks to the farsightedness of your tribal council and traditional chiefs, of which you are the most recent. In fact, the community leaders rarely turn to the BIA for assistance, except in emergencies such as the one that resulted in my being hired.” Abby paused in her narrative. “What did happen, by the way?”

“Your predecessor, Philip Carson, signed a three-year contract. He broke it two months ago to go up to Alaska. When the school board failed to find a replacement through the usual channels they contacted the BIA for help. That’s all I know. You’ll have to get the rest from Arthur when you see him.”

Abby nodded. “To continue: the school board is composed of five members and is essentially autonomous. The tribal council is made up of ten members. In case of a tie, the deciding vote is cast by you, as traditional chief. You’re a veteran of Afghanistan and the closest thing to a doctor on the reservation, having been trained as a medic during the war.” She smiled. “I hear you’re pretty good.”

He merely grunted, so she continued. “There’s no police force inside the reservation, but your people have managed to live rather peacefully over the years, with rare incidents involving the neighboring town of Crossroads. When anything does happen, the sheriff there responds, but things have been quiet lately.”

Abby thought for a moment. “Now, let’s see what I’ve left out. The economy, which is barely above subsistence level? Poor education? The poor housing? Or the problems with alcoholism? The isolation and bitterness?” She looked at him once more. “What else would you like me to tell you?”

He grimaced. “At least you’ve done your homework.”

“I told you I was different.”

“You’re just smarter than the others, that’s all.”

Abby rolled her eyes in irritation but said nothing as she turned her attention back to the road again. Cat, too, went silent, and she used the opportunity to observe the passing scenery. A highway marker indicated that they were running west on Interstate 94, a four-lane highway that lay like a velvety gray ribbon of asphalt beneath the pale sky. On either side the prairie stretched to the distant horizon, flat and never-ending, unbroken by either buildings, fences or billboards. Out here the evidence of man’s invasion was sparse--only the jeep and the highway itself and, faintly visible far in the distance, telephone lines and the poles supporting them.