Never-ending-snake (13 page)

“No one’s accusing you of anything, but thanks,” Ella said. Since she’d carried a pistol and ammunition on the aircraft, and he also may have transported hunters, it wouldn’t have been a productive activity. “Tell us how you got the job taking us to the Rez.”

He leaned
back against the pillow and relaxed. “That’s easy. The tribe has a contract with my company to fly folks back and forth from Albuquerque.”

“How well do you know Adam or Kevin?” Ella asked him.

“I don’t know either of them personally, but I’ve been piloting Mr. Tolino back and forth from Albuquerque for years and know he’s an attorney for the tribe. Sergeant Lonewolf only started flying with
me a few months ago, so I guess that means he’s flown in my aircraft three or four times.”

“What have you managed to learn about Adam so far?” she asked, keeping her tone relaxed.

He shrugged. “Normally he’s a very easygoing guy—pumped up on flights to Albuquerque and then eager to get home on his way back. But he’s been a little uptight lately.”

“What makes you say that?” Ella asked.

“Right
before the flight, I picked up his carry-on, ready to put it in the plane for him as usual. But he blocked my hand when I reached for his attaché case. That took me by complete surprise. Then Adam apologized, saying he’d keep his briefcase with him.”

“Do you have any idea why he was so protective?” Blalock asked.

“I assume he was carrying some important papers and didn’t want to let the case
out of his sight,” he said. “My job is to ferry passengers back and forth, not intrude on their privacy.”

Instinct told her Pete was exactly what he appeared to be. “Okay,” Ella said, standing. “I understand you’re scheduled to be released tomorrow.”

He nodded. “I’ll be going home. You’ve got my telephone numbers, right?” Seeing Ella nod, he continued. “Do you think I should stay on my guard?”

“Be wary of strangers, and if you run into any trouble or
suspect something out of the ordinary is going on, let us know right away,” Ella said, handing him her card.

“Do you think they might come after me?” he asked quickly.

“It’s unlikely, but since we still don’t know for sure who the target of the attack was, it’s better to be cautious,” Blalock said, giving the pilot his card as well.

“There’s no way those two crazies came after me. It had to have been one of you guys,” Pete said, looking at Ella. “Lawyers and police make a lot more enemies than pilots do.”

“Maybe so, but keep your guard up,” Ella said.

As Blalock and Ella headed back to the Rez, he glanced over at her. “You want to stop by my office?”

She shook her head. “Just take me home. I’m calling it a day. Unless something
pops up before then, I need to spend some time with my kid. I want to see for myself how she’s handling everything that’s happened. Dawn’s always thought of Kevin as this larger-than-life person who’s somehow above the danger I face daily.”

“A father-daughter relationship isn’t about facts. It’s about emotions.”

“That’s precisely why I’m worried about her. She adores Kevin. Half the reason I
think she wants to leave the Rez and go to school in D.C. is because she wants to spend more time with him.”

“I don’t think you’re seeing the whole picture,” Blalock said slowly. “If you leave the Rez, you and Kevin are also bound to spend more time together—or at least more so than you are now. In a city of strangers, you’d be more inclined to hang out with each other, and my guess is that Dawn’s
counting on that.”

Ella looked at him in surprise. “That can’t be it. My kid
knows there’s no hope of Kevin and I getting back together. And she likes the man I’m dating—Ford.”

“You’re using logic. Think with the heart of a kid who has a big imagination—one who dreams big and can see what she wants right there in front of her.”

“You may have a point there.” What he said rang true, but Kevin
and she were nothing more than a footnote in history. Even before she discovered she was pregnant, their romance had ended.

Ella’s thoughts then shifted to Ford and her chest tightened. Although she cared deeply for him, there was an emotional and physical distance between them that neither could bridge. Religion—it had divided people and nations since the beginning of time. At one time, she’d
thought they’d be able to work things out, but she’d learned the hard way that in situations like these, compromises satisfied no one. In time, their different beliefs were bound to pull them apart. She suspected that he’d soon be asking her to convert to his religion—a logical assumption considering he was a preacher—and she knew already that would never happen. Ultimately, Ella realized their
relationship had little chance of growing beyond the current level.

As Blalock passed through the town of Shiprock, turning south in the direction of her home, Ella shook free of the thought. Worrying about what might be was as bad as living in the past. That made it easy to overlook today, and the present was all anyone really had.

When Blalock pulled up to her house, Ella said good-bye and started walking toward the porch. On the way, she saw the yellow sports car parked by the side of the house, and cringed. Abigail Yellowhair was here.

Ella had warned Rose repeatedly not to trust Abigail’s friendship, that the woman had an agenda, but Rose had still been willing to give Abigail the benefit
of the doubt and had welcomed Abigail into the Plant Watchers. The group Rose led shared knowledge and protected native plants that often played an important role in the tribe’s rituals and healing ceremonies. Rose’s expertise was so valued that she was also a tribal consultant, recording and locating plant specimens for Navajo botanists, environmentalists, and officials working to protect the
natural heritage.

As Ella came into the kitchen, Abigail looked up from the table and gave her a cold nod. “It’s good to see you doing so well,” she said, her voice not matching her forced smile. “Since this morning I’ve heard a lot more about the events at the airstrip and your involvement.”

“Things were touch-and-go, but I’m fine. Thank you for
your concern,” Ella said, matching her tone,
then looked at Rose. “Is my daughter still up?”

Rose nodded. “She’s listening to music through those earphones. She says it helps her do her homework. I’m not so sure about that, but as long as her grades don’t slip, I don’t think we should say no.”

“I agree wholeheartedly,” Ella said, remembering that it was Kevin who’d bought her the iPod. Taking two of her mother’s oatmeal cookies from the
plate on the kitchen table, she went down the hall to Dawn’s room.

As Ella entered, she saw Dawn sitting at her desk in front of her laptop computer. Ella touched her daughter’s shoulder, and Dawn’s jumped, startled.

“Sorry, Pumpkin,” Ella said, patting her gently.

Dawn closed the lid on the laptop, shut off the tiny music player, and took off her earphones. “Hey, Mom,” she said, scooting over
to the bed quickly.

A wave of uneasiness suddenly swept through Ella. Dawn was only supposed to go on the Internet when an adult could see the screen as well. That was a house rule. Following her instincts, she went to her daughter’s computer and opened it. “What have you got here?”

“
Mooom
! I was just talking to my friend on Facebook,” Dawn said, hurrying over. “I couldn’t have any privacy in
front of Mrs. Yellowhair.”

“This is a friend that you know and have seen in real life, right, not someone you met online?”

“It’s Clara, Mom,” she said pointing to the small photo of the girl Ella recognized as Dawn’s current best friend.

Ella took a closer look at the dialogue box, skimming the conversation that had been going on between the two girls.

“Mother,
please
!” Dawn protested, closing
the laptop once again.

By then Ella had read enough to know that Dawn had been telling Clara how worried she was about both her parents.

Although this was a subject she wanted to broach with her daughter, Ella remained silent for a few seconds, trying to figure out the best way to do that.

“Will you be taking the job in Washington?” Dawn asked, suddenly diverting her.

“I don’t know yet.”

“Mom, you’ve got to take that job! Things would be more . . . I don’t know . . . normal,” she said at last. “Clara never has to worry about
her
parents. They come home at five-thirty every night. They always have dinner together, too, not just at Thanksgiving or somebody’s birthday. . . .”

Ella took a deep breath, then let it out. “There’s more to life than living by the clock. You’re very loved,
daughter, and you have your
Shimasání
here when you come home.”

“Yeah, but if we made a few changes and worked a little harder, things could be even better. Think of all the stuff you and I and Dad could do in D.C.! And
Shimasání
could come with us, too, and maybe stay for weeks at a time. We could help all the
Diné
just by being us. Some people in the Anglo world think ‘Indian’ means ‘stupid.’
Or they think we’re like those people who play Indians in the movies. To them, every tribe is the same.”

“There’s some truth in what you’re saying,” Ella admitted slowly.

“You and Dad work for the tribe, and you want to make things better for all of us. If you work together, there isn’t anything you couldn’t do for the
Diné
.”

“Whoa! I’m a police officer, not a politician,” Ella said with a
ghost of a smile.

“But in our nation’s capital, you could do even more important things for the tribe. And it’s not like you couldn’t
ever see your boyfriend, Ford,” she added. “Of course he’s not like you and Dad but . . .”

Ella looked at her daughter and waited, hoping Dawn would finish her thought. She didn’t want to guess what was on her kid’s mind.

“The thing is, Mom, he doesn’t work for
the tribe, not really,” Dawn said at last. “He works for his church—preaching and trying to get other Navajos to join. Stuff like that. He does a lot of good things for people, but mostly it’s for the ones who go to his church.”

“He practices his own beliefs, sure, but there’s nothing wrong with that,” Ella argued. “This country gives everyone a chance to express their religions, or choose not
to have one.”

“Okay. But you and Dad are Navajo first, and Mom, that
matters
.”

Ella stared at her little girl. She’d voiced some very adult ideas. Yet as the computer made a dinging sound, and Dawn opened it to see the screen, it was almost as if someone had flicked a switch. “Oh, Mom, look! Jane got a hamster! Isn’t he cute? Can we get one?”

“We’ll see,” Ella said with a sigh. Kissing her
daughter’s forehead, she stepped out into the hall. If this had been a preview, she was nearly certain she wouldn’t survive Dawn’s teenage years.

As Ella entered the kitchen once again, Abigail stood. “I’ll be going now and let you two have some time together.” Abigail gave Rose a warm smile, then slipped out of the kitchen.

Moments later they heard her car pulling away.

“So what brought your
friend over tonight?” Ella asked.

“She’s working with me on the Prickly Weed Project.” Rose took a deep breath. “If anyone had told me that I’d actually be growing
ch’il deeníní
in my garden, I would have told them they were crazy.”

Ella chuckled. “I’ve read the newspaper articles. It’s supposed to be a potential source of ethanol, which is added to gasoline to reduce fuel consumption. If it
works, and they can stop using corn to produce fuel, that, in turn, could lower food and animal feed prices.”

“And become a huge crop for our tribe,” Rose added. “Unlike the casinos, this can bring us nothing but good. We’d be making use of something that’s readily available to lessen the nation’s dependency on foreign oil. I’m proud to be able to take part in this. Some of the Plant Watchers
are now busy trying to find places on the Navajo Nation where tumbleweeds already flourish. That hasn’t been difficult, the weed grows almost everywhere, but we also need to see how easy it is to grow them where we want them to be. That’s why there’s a crop planted in our backyard.”

“You may regret that decision,” Ella said with a wry smile.

“If this works, Navajo families who don’t have other
job skills may be able to grow prickly weed and earn a living,” Rose said.

“Isn’t there some hitch in the pilot project right now, something to do with the project’s location?”

She nodded. “The land the tribe wants to use is ideally situated, adjacent to the current Navajo Irrigation project and close to a road network near Farmington. Unfortunately, that has also been occupied by the same Navajo
family for years and they don’t want to turn the bulk of it back to the tribe.”

“Well, if they’re using it, why should they?”

“That’s just it, they aren’t, and since no individual owns tribal land, they have to abide by our laws. They can’t keep those parcels unless they’re farming the land or using it for grazing,” Rose said. “Of course they claim they still have animals, but they let their
grazing permits expire years ago. There have been chapter house meetings about this already,
but I don’t think anything’s been resolved. Of course it will be eventually, and once it is, the Prickly Weed Project will undoubtedly become an incredible gift to the tribe.”