Always Look Twice

Olivia followed her. “Don’t shut me out, Allie.”

“I’m not.” She rubbed the goose bumps on her arms. “Sometimes ghosts bring messages. Dad used to say that.”

“I know. But I’m not sure what this wanagi was trying to say.”

“Maybe we should leave some food out for it, the way our ancestors used to do. If we don’t, we might offend it.”

Olivia thought about the vegetarian chili Allie had packed in the pantry. “I don’t think it would like that healthy crap you eat.”

They looked at each other and laughed, breaking the tension. To the Lakota, ghosts were wakan, hard to understand. Sometimes they haunted people, twisting their mouths and eyes. And sometimes they whistled outside someone’s home. Olivia’s ghost had done neither.

“Maybe it just wanted me to confront the motel,” she said. “To quit avoiding it.”

Allie sank onto a velvet sofa laden with embroidered pillows, a fat white candle flickering on the wrought-iron table beside her. Shadows swirled on the walls, making her mural come to life. “Maybe the wanagi was Dad.”

The room nearly tilted. Olivia hadn’t considered that possibility. She glanced at the gun cabinet in the corner. She still had the.44 Magnum he’d used. “Why would he make me go there?”

“To stop those visions you keep having of him,” her sister said.

“If that was his intention, it didn’t work.”

They sat quietly for a moment, lost in thought. The banana bread aroma was gone, but vanilla-scented wax filled the air, like a milkshake melting over a flame.

“Who do you think is staying in that room?” Allie asked.

Olivia recalled the heavy beige drapes in the motel window. “I don’t know. Lots of people have stayed there.”

“But who’s there now? Who was the ghost trying to make you aware of?”

Olivia’s heartbeat blasted her chest. And suddenly she knew.

Ian West.

The special agent with the glowing eyes.

Chapter 2

Olivia parked her Porsche around the corner and entered the office of the Z-Sleep Inn, where the woman behind the counter gave her an empty smile.

Good, she thought, the clerk’s mind was on something else, and preoccupied people were easy to fool.

Olivia had covered her jumpsuit with a long black sweater, a bulky cardigan that toned down her look. But that was part of her ploy.

“May I help you?” the other woman asked.

“Yes. My husband is checked into Room 112. His name is Ian West.”

The clerk merely nodded. She was a color-treated blonde with wire-rimmed glasses, an averagely attractive girl in her midtwenties whose name tag identified her as Carla.

When Olivia’s sixth sense kicked into gear, she realized Carla was new to the area. That she was trying to sell a screenplay.

That was even better.

Olivia opened her sweater, exposing the skintight jumpsuit. “I flew in to surprise Ian. He’s here on a business trip.” Next she adjusted the bondage belt around her hips, flashing an I’m-going-to-handcuff-my-husband-to-the-headboard smile.

Carla’s eyes grew wide, but she didn’t overreact. This was Hollywood, after all. And she was trying to fit in.

“I need the key to his room,” Olivia said.

“Oh, oh…of course.” The clerk took a moment to do her job, fiddling with her computer, making sure Ian West was registered to Room 112.

Bingo. Olivia saw the recognition on the other woman’s face. She secured the key and thanked Carla, leaving the blonde staring after her.

Agent West was still at the police station, where he intended to remain for a while. That much Olivia could feel.

With a deep breath, she entered the room, closing the door behind her. When it clicked into place, her pulse jumped to her throat.

The decor had changed. The Z-Sleep Inn had updated their color scheme, using light woods and maroon accents. It didn’t look like the place where her dad had taken his life.

But it was.

Olivia went to work, trying to get a reading on West, hoping to uncover something that revealed more about him. He was annoyingly tidy, making her job more difficult. He would notice if she left something out of place. His belongings were carefully unpacked, his underwear and T-shirts tucked neatly into a dresser that doubled as an entertainment center.

She went through the drawers, searching for witchcraft tools, possibly a vile of blood, a black candle or a bundle of dried herbs.

Nothing, she thought, as she restacked a handful of printed boxers. Strange, but she’d pegged him for a white-briefs kind of guy. Yet there wasn’t a pair of bunhuggers in sight.

She paused, glanced around, then poked through West’s toiletries on the vanity counter outside the bathroom. He used disposable razors and a generic brand of shaving cream. His designer cologne was a bit more costly. She removed the cap and sniffed. Nothing suspicious there. It actually smelled pretty good.

So what was the deal? Olivia frowned, wondering why West was staying in her father’s old room. There had to be a mystical reason, something the special agent was hiding.

Finally she opened the closet. He favored dark suits, pale shirts and narrow ties. Apparently, the only shoes he’d brought were Western boots.

Stupid urban cowboy.

She checked the pockets of his suits, digging around for magic stones. Onyx, jet or a sturdy hunk of geode. Geode, a mysterious rock formation with a hollow cavity, promoted psychic ability, something West coveted.

His pockets were empty, not even a piece of lint. Maybe he wasn’t so stupid after all. He hadn’t left behind one shred of witchlike evidence.

Olivia closed the closet door and turned to look at the bed. Should she try to invoke the wanagi to help her? She knew that calling upon a ghost was a dangerous game.

Was the entity her dad? Was he trying to warn her about West? Or had West conjured the ghost? Was it part of his magic?

Suddenly she heard a vehicle.

Damn it.

She knew it was West’s rental car. She could feel his energy connected to it. The son of a bitch had tricked her. He’d left the station earlier than he’d originally planned.

There was no escape. Motel rooms weren’t equipped with back doors. Olivia darted into the bathroom, which wasn’t much bigger than a photo booth. She glanced at the commode. The seat was up.

Because flushing herself down the toilet wasn’t an option, she drew her gun and hid behind the door, leaving it slightly ajar, the way it had been before.

She sure as hell hoped that West didn’t need to use the bathroom. Or he wasn’t hankering for a shower.

With any luck, the special agent would dump his briefcase, change into some casual clothes and head back out to grab a cheap meal. She doubted the FBI had given him a luxurious per diem.

Olivia heard him enter the motel room: the click of the door, the dead bolt sliding into place. She waited, listening to his footsteps.

Then she cursed. Something was wrong.

There was no time to ground out another expletive. He’d stopped breathing, stopped moving. She could feel his pulse, feel him reaching for his gun. Damn him all to hell.

He knew someone was in his room.

Olivia didn’t have a choice. At this point, catching him off guard was her best defense. She waited, listening to him scan the room. And just when he focused on the closet, she swung open the bathroom door, taking aim.

He was just as fast. Within a heartbeat, his gun was pointed at her, too.

They faced off, an even match.

“I smelled your perfume the minute I came in,” he said. “I suspected it was you.”

What was he? A wolf? Her fragrance wasn’t that strong. “Holster that thing, West.”

“You first.”

She didn’t budge. “What compelled you to stay here?”

“What are you talking about?”

“This motel. This room. One-twelve.”

“I still don’t know what you’re talking about.” And his gun was still pointed at her chest.

She blinked, but she didn’t stumble. A vision flashed across her mind. West was in her loft, kissing her, pushing his tongue into her mouth. And she was kissing him back, putting her hands all over him, dragging him to her bedroom.

No, she thought. No.

Olivia steeled her emotions, tempted to aim the Glock at his fly. “I asked you about this room.”

“Humor me.” He watched her. Aware, it seemed, that she’d nearly lost her composure. “Give me a clue. Tell me why this motel matters.”

“My father committed suicide here.”

“Christ.” His gaze shifted, but only for a moment. “In this room? I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

He seemed sincere, but she wasn’t going to back off. Not until she found a way to frisk him, to check his pockets for magic stones, to search for an amulet around his neck, something, anything that could be used against her.

“When?” he asked. “When did it happen?”

“Ten years ago.”

“How he’d do it?”

“A.44 Magnum.”

“Christ,” he said again, only this time he sounded as if he were praying. “Can we put these away now? Or are we going to keep this up all night?”

“Fine.” She agreed to holster her weapon at the same time as him, waiting for another chance to strike.

She stepped out of the bathroom, inching closer to him. He remained where he was, studying her through those bone-chilling eyes. They weren’t glowing, but they looked right through her, nearly penetrating her soul.

“Who told you I was staying here?” he asked. “Muncy? Riggs?”

A blast of betrayal gripped her hard and quick. “They knew?”

“They could have found out, I guess. I gave the lieutenant the name and number of this place. Right before I left the station tonight.”

Which meant Muncy and Riggs didn’t know. “Casper warned me that you were here.”

“Who?”

“The friendly ghost.”

West frowned. His tie was loose, and a strand of his hair fell across his forehead. His features were taut, strong and serious. She wondered if his wife had left him for another man.

He blew out a rough breath. “My grandfather says that when you pass a graveyard, you should chew a little ginseng, then spit it out on each side of your mouth, four times each way.”

“That drives away the ghosts?”

“He thinks so. He never said anything about motel rooms, though.”

“Your grandfather is a superstitious man.”

“A lot of Indians are.”

Olivia could see West’s profile in the vanity mirror. For all she knew, his grandfather was a witch. “I heard about an ancient Creek belief. Supposedly they wouldn’t allow their children to congregate where old people were conversing because the elders might bewitch them. Is that true?”

“Yes, but that’s because some of the old men had been through so many fastings in their lifetimes, people thought they might be wizards.”

Exactly, she thought, as she lunged at him, knocking him against the closet door.

He cursed, rolled over on top of her and pinned her arms to the floor. She took the opportunity to knee him in the groin. Hard. As hard as she possibly could.

“Shit!” He doubled over, wincing in pain.

She frisked him, checked his pockets, then pulled open his shirt.

Nothing. Nada. No witchcraft tools.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” He found the strength to shove her away.

“Your eyes were glowing earlier, and now here you are, in the room where my dad killed himself. That’s too damn weird for me.”

“My eyes?” He braced his back against the closet. He was still wincing, still feeling the brunt of her attack. “They’ve always been like that.”

“They’re your power.”

He made a face. “Well, thank you very much, but I’m not feeling particularly powerful right now.”

“What about this room?”

“Maybe Casper drew me here.”

“Why would he do that?”

“To tie us together. To help you trust me.”

She thought about her premonition, the vision of them kissing in her loft. No damn way was she going to let that happen. “Fine, we’ll call a truce. But if you try anything funny, I’ll kill you.”

“Likewise.” He got to his feet. He was doing his damnedest to maintain his machismo, to pretend that his balls weren’t still throbbing in his brain. “Now get the hell out of here.”

Olivia almost smiled. “See you around, Agent West.”

With that, she left him alone, knowing this was the first time a woman had knocked him on his ass.

Later that night Olivia couldn’t sleep. She tossed and turned, gazing at the window, where moonlight glinted through lace sheers, sending a filigree pattern across the floor.

After she climbed out of bed, she slipped on a pair of sheepskin slippers, warming her feet from the linoleum. The loft was a little chilly at two in the morning. But just a little.

She smiled to herself. That was the beauty of living in Southern California. While other parts of the country were banked in snow, L.A. offered mild temperatures, even in February.

Olivia went into the kitchen, where a twenty-watt bulb above the stove served as a nightlight. She fixed herself a cup of mint tea and noticed conversation-heart candies dotting the counter.

Allie had left them for the ghost.

She picked one up, read the Be Mine inscription, almost ate it, then set it back down. Allie used to leave cookies and milk for Santa Claus, too.

Olivia tasted her tea. She’d never believed in Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny or any of those childhood myths.

Allie had believed in everything.

Taking her cup, she walked to her sister’s room and peeked in. A low-burning lamp bathed a collection of fancy dance shawls with an amber glow, making the retired powwow regalia look like oversize butterflies with fringed wings.

Olivia expected to find Allie in bed, sleeping like a castle-bound princess, but the pink-and-gold chamber was empty.

She closed the bedroom door and headed to Allie’s studio, knowing that was where she would be. Sure enough, her sister was working. The smooth side of a buffalo hide was stretched across a table, with Allie leaning over it, drawing a design she intended to paint.

“Couldn’t that wait until morning?” Olivia asked.

Allie looked up. She wore white pajamas and pair of cat-shaped slippers. Samantha, the real cat, slept on a nearby shelf cluttered with art supplies. “No. I have to do this now.”

“Why? What’s the hurry?”

“It’s going to be a portrait of Dad, so he can travel the Ghost Road. If I paint a tattoo on his wrist, the old woman will have to let him pass.”

Olivia moved farther into the studio, still clutching her tea. In the early Lakota days, the Ghost Road was a path taken by spirits. To the south the road branched, where an old woman inspected the tattoo of each spirit. Those without tattoos would be pushed over the side of a cloud or a cliff, condemned to roam the earth as ghosts.

“Spirits don’t get a second chance on the Ghost Road, Allie.”

The younger woman continued sketching. “Dad might.”

Olivia wished her sister’s artwork had the power to free their father. He’d taught them about the old ways, but he’d lived a modern life. A tattoo for the Ghost Road wasn’t something he’d considered. “Do you really think it’s him?”

Allie glanced up. “Who else could it be?”

“I don’t know.” Olivia laughed a little. “I’ve been calling it Casper.”

Her sister laughed, too. “At least Casper was on TV and in the movies.” Her mood turned solemn. “Do you think Mom knows that he’s dead? That he killed himself?”

“I have no idea.” Joseph Whirlwind wasn’t a well-known actor. His suicide hadn’t made the papers. He’d disappeared into the bowels of Hollywood, like so many others before him.

Allie smoothed the hide. “I wonder where she is.”

Olivia didn’t want to think about their mother, about the betrayal that still left her empty inside. What kind of woman walked away from her family? Discarded them like trash?

She changed the subject, focusing on Allie’s project instead. “Are you going to paint some weapons for him? A lance? A shield?”

Her sister nodded. “I’m going dress him in the traditional way, too. Eagle feathers in his hair and beaded moccasins with fully quilled soles.”

“That’s a good idea.” There were only two times when moccasins with quilled or beaded soles were made. When a baby was born and when a loved one died.

“So did you find out who was staying at the motel?” Allie asked.

Olivia sighed. She couldn’t seem to shake West from her mind. “It was the special agent assigned to the Slasher case.”

“An FBI guy?” Her sister stopped drawing. Her hair was loose, falling in a thick black curtain, glimmering under the studio lights. “Wow. That’s wild.”

Yeah, wild. “He confuses me.”

“Why? Because Dad drew him to that room?”

Olivia frowned. West had implied the same thing. “We don’t even know if the wanagi is Dad.”

“It is. It has to be. And after the Slasher case is solved, he’s going to travel the Ghost Road.”

After it’s solved? Olivia glanced at the buffalo hide, at the rough image that had begun to appear. She sipped her tea, needing warmth, needing reassurance.

Then without the slightest warning, Samantha opened her eyes, arched her sleek black body and hissed at a shadow on the wall.

Leaving Olivia chilled once again.

At daybreak Olivia drove to an area in the high desert where the Manson gang once dwelled, an area where methamphetamine labs brewed illicit drugs, and relocated sex offenders pretended to be part of society.

She parked beside a house encompassed by a chain-link fence. The front yard was littered with old car parts, broken-down swing sets, wagon wheels, goofy-looking lawn jockeys and bearded gnomes. Several outbuildings stored even more salable junk, things exposure to the elements could damage. A metal aircraft hangar sat behind everything else, taking up a noticeable portion of the seven-acre property.

Olivia approached the perimeter of the front yard and waited for the rottweiler on duty to snarl and bark his fool head off.

He did just that, baring his teeth until he realized who she was. Then he wagged his docked tail and whined for attention.

“Clyde, you big baby.” She unlocked the gate with her key, entered the property and knelt to pet him. “Where’s Bonnie?”

Just then, a miniature dachshund came around the corner, her long, low-slung body wiggling. She looked like what she was—a wiener dog Clyde could consume for breakfast. But he wouldn’t dream of it. Bonnie and Clyde adored each other.

Olivia tapped the dachshund’s pointed nose and received a sappy grin in return. “Okay, you guys, I’m going to wake up your master.”

She walked passed the junk, where a sixty-year-old house with a sagging porch made a run-down statement.

Once again, she used her key, hoping Kyle wasn’t in bed with his latest lover, whoever the unfortunate girl might be.

His house was a mess, almost as cluttered as his yard. She passed the kitchen and winced. Food-encrusted dishes were piled in the sink and stacked on the counter, leaving little space for much else.

Kyle Prescott was a decorated Desert Storm soldier, a half-blood Apache who looked like an indigenous god, but he was also the biggest slob on the planet.

She tore open his bedroom door, and he awakened with a start. He was alone, as big and broad and surly as a brown bear.

“Olivia.” He cursed her name. “Do you know what time it is?”

“I need to blow off some steam.”

“Oh.” His demeanor changed. He smiled and patted the empty space next to him. “In that case, I’m all yours.”

“Not that kind of steam.”

“Figures.” He climbed out of bed, unabashed and completely naked.

Olivia had seen his bare butt before. She had been his on-and-off lover for nearly three years, a mistake she didn’t intend to repeat. He was a bit too bizarre to make a woman feel secure.

“Go make some coffee and I’ll meet you in the kitchen,” he said. “Then we can get started.”

He stumbled down the hall to take a shower, and she battled the dishes in his sink, searching for cups that were worthy of washing. He had three coffeepots, and all of them were thick with caffeine-laced drudge. Finally she found a fourth unit. A reconditioned model, it was clean and shiny and stored in a generic box. But what did she expect? Kyle was a junk dealer.

By the time he finished his morning routine, Olivia handed him a cup of his favorite brew. His blunt-cut, shoulder-length hair was held in place with a cloth headband, styled after the Mexican Period in Apache history.

Bare-chested with jeans and knee-high moccasins, he was an Indian groupie’s dream, a gorgeous sight to behold. But in spite of his mixed-blood roots, Kyle didn’t sleep with white women.

Olivia had met him through AIM, but somewhere along the line, he’d outgrown the American Indian Movement. These days he belonged to an underground warrior society, a militant group the government wouldn’t approve of.

Not that the feds approved of AIM, she thought.

Kyle called the FBI the Federal Bureau of Ineptitude, and men like Special Agent West, fibbies.

“I shouldn’t let you use me like this,” he said, taking his coffee to a Formica-topped dinette set near the window. “I should make you return my keys.”

She plopped down in the chair across from him. “We can’t be friends if we’re not sleeping together?”

He shrugged, feigning indifference. Olivia wanted to kick him. She knew he enjoyed being her instructor. The power-blasting rush probably gave him a hard-on.

“What’s got you so wound up?” he asked.

“Everything.” She blew a weary breath. “The Slasher, my sister’s passive nature, the FBI.”

That caught his attention. “What FBI?”

“The agent assigned to the Slasher investigation. I had a premonition about him. We were kissing, pawing each other, getting all hot and nasty.”

“That’s sick.”

“He’s registered with the Muscogee Nation.”

“A Creek?” Kyle sipped lazily from his cup. “I knew those civilized tribes couldn’t be trusted.”

And she knew he was being smart. “This isn’t a joke.”

“I didn’t say it was. An Indian fibbie is some serious shit.” He frowned at her, and the sharp, rugged expression made him look even more handsome. “Why’d you kiss him?”

“I just told you, it was a vision. A premonition. It hasn’t happened yet. And it’s not going to,” she added, even though the idea had begun to arouse her.

“Maybe it wasn’t a premonition.” He leaned back in his chair, scraping the metal legs against the floor. “Maybe it was somebody’s fantasy.”

“Somebody’s? You mean his?”

“Or yours.”

Trust him to bait her, to accuse her of being the guilty party, to figure out that she was attracted to West.

Olivia yanked away his cup, nearly spilling the rest of the hot brew. “I’m tired of shooting the breeze.”

He came to his feet, six foot four of raw, rugged muscle. “Then what do you want to shoot, Liv?”

She gave him an exasperated look. No one but Kyle called her Liv. And no one but Kyle offered her the tools, techniques and tactical training she craved.

She needed him.

And he damn well knew it.

Chapter 3

Olivia followed Kyle outside, where they took his Jeep to the aircraft hangar, a ten-thousand-square-foot structure designed to his specification.

They reached the metal building, and once they were inside, he smiled at her, looking a tad wicked in the compound he’d created.

Kyle claimed it was nothing more than a sophisticated, indoor, laser-tag course, equipped with a montage of movie props and set changes, including lifelike audio tracks and things that varied the weather, creating heat, rain, ice or wind.

But to Olivia it was more than that. The other people who came here—mercenaries and militants—played war games. But she was a psychic honing her skills, using her mind, instead of her eyes, to locate a target.