Sworn to Protect

“Not today,” she answered, clutching a pillow to her belly.

“Yes, today,” he countered, his firm control back in full swing. He’d always been such a bossy jerk, she noted almost distantly. “First things first, a shower.” Because you smell, is what he hadn’t said but she heard anyway.

“I don’t feel like it. Maybe tomorrow,” she said in the hopes of sending him on his way.

“Today,” he repeated, going to her bathroom to start the water.

“Go to hell,” she muttered, but there was little heat and he called her on it.

“Say it like you mean it or don’t waste my time. Now let’s go,” he said, his stance hard and unyielding, like a drill sergeant with an unruly private. “It’s time to get back into the swing of things and that starts with a shower. We’ll work our way up from there.”

Her eyes stung. Why wouldn’t he go away? “You’re cruel. Don’t you understand I can’t just yet?”

If there was a softening in his gaze, it was gone in an instant. “You’re giving up. That’s not the Iris I know.”

She closed her eyes. “That girl is gone.”

“No. She’s just buried under the layers of stink you’re marinating in. Now, either you can get out of that bed on your own accord or I can haul you out. It’s your choice, but you’d better do it within the next three seconds or I’ll make the choice for you.”

“Go…to…hell.” This time she added more heat as anger started to thaw the frozen tundra filling the landscape inside her.

He offered a harsh smile. “That’s more like it but I know you can do better. Time’s up.” He approached her and she shrieked as she surmised his intent. She kicked at him but he managed in one fluid movement to rip her sheet from her body and toss her over his shoulder. She screamed and pounded his back, tears blinding her. Panic built until it threatened to choke the air from her lungs. She inhaled a sharp, painful breath, her mouth working to produce sound but something from her blank memory of that night broke loose and strangled her vocal cords until only a soft mewling escaped her lips.

“Don’t do this,” she gasped, kicking her feet, but he held her securely, thwarting her best efforts, that were pretty pathetic given how weak she felt from not eating or sleeping. “Sonny…please…” she whispered, tears flowing down her cheeks to land on the carpet as he carried her to the bathroom that had filled with steam. “I can’t…”

“You can,” he disagreed, depositing her in the shower, still clothed in her sleep shirt and underwear. She gasped as the water pelted her. It was at once scalding and soothing. She sobbed, flashes of memory coming to her from that night. She’d sat on the floor of the hospital shower after Mya had examined her, watching as the water washed away the blood and dirt but could do nothing to remove the pain and degradation. She’d remained in that shower until the water ran cold but by that time she’d become numb. That’d been the last time she’d showered. She shuddered as great, racking sobs shook her body. Sundance seemed on autopilot and was unmoved by her total breakdown. He grabbed the shampoo and squirted a modest handful into her shaking hands. “Start with this,” he instructed. “I trust you can handle the rest.”

And then he left, closing the door behind him. She stared at the green glob in her palm as if it were her enemy. But in truth, the enemy was the sentinel outside her door, demanding she put herself back together.

Damn you, Sundance. I hate you.

If only that were true…maybe none of this would’ve happened.

Her breath hitching painfully in her chest, she began to scrub until her scalp ached but just as she knew that night…nothing would ever take away the stain of what had been done to her.

Nothing.

Chapter 3

Sundance hands shook as he shoved them through his hair, listening as the water continued to fall in the shower. He knew he was taking a chance pushing her like that, Great Spirit help him, he’d felt each quake of her body against his as true panic had caused her to kick and scratch against his touch. Seeing her shrink into herself, trying to disappear, tore a fissure of wrath and helplessness inside him. But he couldn’t allow Iris to fade into nothingness. So if it meant being the coldhearted bastard who forced her to stay with the living, so be it.

Releasing a short, tight breath, he surveyed the room she’d turned into her prison cell and wondered how Iris had managed to live in such conditions. The stale, closed-in air was enough to send a normal person running for the window, which was exactly what Sundance did first. Throwing open the window, not caring that it was a little brisk outside, he started pulling the blankets from the floor to take them to the washing machine. He’d been here with Mya enough times to know the layout of the house but he never imagined he’d find himself actually doing Iris’s laundry. Up until recently, he hadn’t found much use for Iris aside from her being his sister’s best friend.

But things had changed. He wasn’t quite sure when or how but they had. Before he’d had time to deal with his feelings, Iris had been attacked.

He made quick work of throwing everything in the washing machine and then returned to make the bed with fresh sheets. Having grown up with alcoholic parents, the responsibility of running the house had often fallen to Sundance. Well before most friends his age, he’d known how to cook, clean and drive. He’d just finished when steam escaped from the door as it opened.

Iris emerged from the bathroom, her long blue-black hair lying limply against the deep, rich burgundy bathrobe, her stare red-rimmed and accusatory as it bounced from the freshly made bed and back to him again. “Why’d you come?” she asked, her lip quivering. She clutched the lapels of her bathrobe closer to her neck as if trying to ensure every square inch of skin was under lock and key. Her desperate movements only accentuated how she’d changed in the course of one damned, ill-fated evening.

Iris had always been proud of her womanly curves, now she was doing everything she could to cover them.

“You can’t hide in your house for the rest of your life,” he said gravely, meeting her stare for stare, though what he saw reflected in her eyes made him ache for the loss of something he’d never known he’d wanted.

“I’m not hiding.”

“Mya says you haven’t been to work in weeks and you never leave the house. I’d call that hiding.”

“I’m using my vacation and sick days.” She swallowed, looking away. “I’m…regrouping.” Sundance took a step forward, compelled to reach out to her in some way but she returned the distance between them by taking a faltering step backward until her back bumped against the wall. A hard knot lodged in his chest.

“Iris…” he started but she shook her head.

“I’m fine. It’s fine. I just need to be alone for a little while.”

She wasn’t fine. Any fool could see she was the opposite of the word. Mya had to see her friend was drowning. Why wasn’t she making more of an effort to draw Iris out? Surely wilting and withering away in this house wasn’t healthy. “I can’t let you do this to yourself.”

“I’m not doing anything.”

“Exactly. Not eating, not showering, not leaving the house. You need to snap out of it.”

Her eyes were dry but when he met her gaze he felt waves of grief and shame rolling over him and it made him want to put his fist through the wall. “I’ll be fine,” she said, nodding.

“Stop saying that,” he bit out. “Damn it, Iris, you’re not fine. You’re punishing yourself by barricading yourself up in this house like some kind of communicable disease. It wasn’t your fault. Whoever did this is scum, not you. Help me catch this son of a bitch before he does it to someone else.”

“I don’t remember,” she whispered, shaking her head in a pathetic, scared little rabbit motion that tore at his heart. “I don’t remember…I can’t help anyone.” She pulled the lapels tighter around her body as she began to shudder. “There’s a big white spot in my memory and I don’t think I want to remember. What if he’s someone I know? What if he’s watching me all the time, waiting to do it again?”

“That’s not going to happen,” he said, fighting to keep the growl from his voice. “We’re going to catch him.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I know that I won’t stop until I do.”

She squeezed her eyes shut. “I can’t help you. I wish I could. I can’t remember. It’s safer if I stay in the house. He might know where I work. He might follow me. If I stay here…he won’t find me.”

He wasn’t angry with her but seeing her so broken, so torn apart mentally, it awoke a rage so fierce that he wanted to break things for her sake. But he couldn’t do that, not when he needed to keep a calm head in order to catch whoever did this, not when he needed to be the one person in Iris’s life to keep her focused and moving forward so that she could get through this. He didn’t know why he knew he was the one for the job but he accepted it as he accepted all his responsibilities. He walked slowly to Iris even as she kept her eyes screwed shut. He could see her body quivering through the robe and he didn’t know if it was caused by cold or fear. He lowered himself beside her, taking care not to crowd her but close enough to let her know he was there. He’d never been one to coddle people, never been accused of being much of a nurturer. But here, now, he wished he had more of those qualities. He felt ill-equipped to deal with this kind of emotional trauma but he couldn’t leave her this way either. They sat in silence for a long while until Sundance recalled a memory from their childhood in the hopes of distracting her.

“Remember that time you hid a dead crawdad in my room and I couldn’t find it for weeks?” He smiled at the memory, remembering how bad his room had smelled before he’d found it tucked under his bed. “I’d known it was you even though you denied it. Even swore on your mother’s life that it wasn’t you. I wanted to kill you for that one.” But Mya had pointed out that if he hadn’t embarrassed Iris by snapping her bra in front of everyone during lunch recess, she wouldn’t have felt compelled to seek revenge. He’d grudgingly let that one slide. But there were countless other times when Iris had been the aggressor, the one who’d purposefully gone out of her way to make his life miserable for the simple pleasure of watching his blood pressure rise. He never thought he’d miss that Iris. But sitting here with that woman’s shell was almost too difficult to bear.

“Why are you here?” she whispered.

“Because someone has to be.” He looked her over with a clinical eye. There was no hiding the fatigue that bracketed her eyes, the sallow skin that usually glowed with health and vitality. “When was the last time you slept?”

The minute shake of her head told him she couldn’t remember. “He’s out there. Every time I close my eyes he’s there, watching me. Waiting.”

“I’m here.” No one was going to touch her. He’d make sure of it. He felt pressure against his biceps as she tentatively laid her head against him. “No one’s going to touch you.”

“So scared…” she admitted in a tight, barely audible voice. “So tired…”

“Then sleep,” he instructed softly.

She settled and, after a moment, her breathing became deep and he knew she’d fallen asleep. Pure exhaustion had won out.

Rising carefully, he maneuvered her into his arms and lifted her to the bed. With her eyes closed in sleep, lush lashes resting against her cheeks, and a full mouth that, until recently, he’d always teased her about, calling her fish lips, he found her features familiar yet foreign. Her hair, still wet from the shower, hung down his arm in a fall of black waves that shone like the liquid surface of a lake under the moon’s glow. He placed her on the bed and carefully pulled the blankets over her. Satisfied she was warm enough, he went to the window and closed it, not wanting her to catch a chill for the sake of fresh air.

He couldn’t bring himself to leave, not until he knew she’d at least slept a full eight hours and eaten a decent meal. If that meant he had to stay until that was accomplished, so be it.

The road to recovery was long, but she wasn’t alone. He just had to remind her of that fact.

Iris remembered laughing, enjoying a drink at the bar. The music had been loud and the lights dim. She remembered returning a smile, thinking the guy was good-looking and an excellent specimen for her objective, which had been to get Sundance off her mind. She didn’t want to be attracted to her best friend’s older brother. She’d known him her entire life, so why now? It was as if a light had been turned on in her head and suddenly she was seeing him in a completely different way. She’d never noticed his lean hips and wide shoulders or the way his mouth gentled when he let his guard down and actually smiled. No, she absolutely hadn’t noticed those things. Thank God. Like life wasn’t complicated enough?

And yet…

So Operation Distract Yourself had been going well.

In her dream state, memory and fiction blended together to create a nightmarish landscape. Soon, the music blared to the point of creating pain in her ears. The lights strobed in dizzying seizure-inducing patterns and the sudden touch on her arm as she was pulled from the bar seemed welcome at first.

But then the grip tightened like a vise and agony radiated through her body as the hand that had seemed friendly became aggressive and demanding. Her vision was fuzzy and unfocused. She couldn’t make out his features but she was nauseated by the blend of malice and excitement washing over her. Hands grabbing, punching, violating…

She slapped at the phantom attacker, a scream caught in her throat, trapped and useless, until the scene shifted with a slow slide to endless black that was somehow less frightening and even soothing.

At least when she was drifting in midnight, no one was hurting her.

Chapter 4

Mya, on break between patients at the clinic, peppered him with questions.

“How’d she seem?” she asked, frowning as if she already knew the answer, which she probably did, and just wanted Sundance to confirm or deny. “She’s having a rough time still, isn’t she?”

“Yeah, you could say that,” he answered drily, still troubled over Iris’s departure from the human race. “She’s totally cut herself off from everyone and it’s not healthy. You of all people should know that. Mya…why haven’t you tried to coax her out?” Mya affected a wounded expression and tears welled in her eyes, making him realize he’d totally bungled that one and he tried to make amends. “It’s not your fault. I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s coming out of my mouth. The situation has got me all tied up in knots.”

She rested her hand on his shoulder. “I know. And trust me, I tried. She won’t listen and I’m afraid to push her too hard. As a doctor I can be clinical about certain things but she’s my best friend and more like a sister. I can’t seem to separate my feelings. Any leads on who did this?”

“No,” he admitted, frustrated. “But I don’t have much to go on with Iris’s memory of the event compromised. Have the toxicology reports come back yet?”

“No, but it should be soon,” she promised. “I’ll call as soon as they do.”

“Thanks. Listen, I’ve got an errand to do before heading back out to Iris’s house. I just stopped by to let you know that there’s a new guy in town, and before you say you’re not interested in meeting anyone, he’s not exactly a stranger. He’s an old friend of mine named Chad Brown, who’s been assigned to the area as the liaison to the Bureau of Indian Affairs.”

“And how do you know him?” she asked, her brow lifting with faint interest.

Sundance smiled. “He used to live here. We were friends up until he left in junior high and then we caught up to each other again after high school. He went the college route, while I went law enforcement. He’s a good guy. I think you’ll like him.”

“Any relation to Paul Brown, the director of Indian Affairs?”

“Chad is his son.”

“Nice to have connections,” Mya quipped.

“In this day and age, it absolutely is. But don’t hold the nepotism against him. He’s really made a name for himself in certain circles. He’s done a lot of good work out there for Native Americans. You could do a lot worse.”

“Mmm-hmm,” was all she said to that. “I’m a big girl, Sonny. I don’t need you trying to find me a date. I can do that all on my own. Besides, with everything that happened to Iris, I can’t even think of dating.”

“I’m just saying it’d be nice to know my sister has someone to take care of her if I’m not around.”

She leveled a direct look his way. “I can take care of myself. Stop acting like you live in the time of our ancestors when women had to have a man to watch over them. I’m perfectly capable of caring for myself, thank you very much. Now, I have patients to see. Please give Iris a hug for me, and thanks for looking out for her.”

“I’m just doing my job,” he answered gruffly, not comfortable with the spotlight or the implication that he was doing this out of more than a sense of responsibility to one of his tribe. “But in all seriousness, Chad’s a solid guy. Just think about it, okay?”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” she answered in a tone that Sundance knew to mean she would purposefully forget as soon as he left the building. Mya had given her heart away years ago and she hadn’t yet recovered from it being shattered. He had hopes, though, and even if he wasn’t what he’d consider a matchmaker of any sort, he never passed up the opportunity to let Mya know what her options were. She waved and disappeared, her break over.

Sundance climbed into his Durango. He had two stops to make before heading out to Iris’s house. One for food, another…security.

Iris managed to shower and run a brush through her hair, but she couldn’t bring herself to open the drapes or windows. Each time she tried, panic seized her by the throat and choked the breath from her lungs. She huddled in her bed, staring at the window, wishing she had the nerve to open it and breathe the cool, cleansing air, but the thought of being visible to whoever might be out there filled her with immobilizing dread. The feeling of being trapped in her home had begun to manifest but she couldn’t bring herself to do anything about it. She couldn’t move forward or backward and her impotence was maddening.

A knock sounded at the door and her heart jumped in her chest, banging so hard she thought for sure it might pop free, but when she heard Sundance’s voice she released a shaky breath and climbed from the safety of her bed to answer the door.

She couldn’t say she was happy to see Sundance two days in a row at her darkest hour but she couldn’t rightly say she was disappointed either. Again, she was stuck somewhere in the middle.

Iris opened the door and startled when a large black dog sat beside Sundance, eyeing her with the guileless curiosity only animals and babies possessed. “What…?” She gestured to the animal as she looked to Sundance for the answer. “A dog?”

“A guard dog, specifically.” He patted the dog’s broad head, his hand firmly on the leash. “Saaski, meet Iris, Iris, this is Saaski. He’s a wolf-shepherd hybrid and once he’s bonded to you, he’ll take someone’s head off if they try to touch you without your permission.”

Iris stared, unable to believe what Sundance had done. Tears brimmed in her eyes. “You got me a guard dog? Why? I mean…I don’t understand…”

“You couldn’t sleep because you didn’t feel secure. I suspect it’ll be a long time before you feel totally safe, but until then, Saaski will do his best to make sure that no one gets near you without a fight.”

She swallowed, her gaze reluctantly leaving Sundance’s to look at the dog. His thick, rich coat was as dark as sin with twin, burning coals for eyes. His face held the wise cunning of a wolf but he had the solid, muscular build of a German shepherd. She held out her hand to him and he sniffed at it before taking an exploratory lick. His heavy tail thumped and wagged—the dog equivalent to a “Hey, I like you” greeting—and she smiled for the first time in a long time.

She looked up and Sundance handed her the leash. “Thank you,” she said, her voice hardly more than a whisper as gratitude overwhelmed her. How’d he know to do this for her? Why hadn’t she thought of it for herself? In the past her schedule didn’t lend itself to having much more than a houseplant or two but she knew the moment she looked into Saaski’s eyes, she’d do whatever she had to to accommodate her new companion. She didn’t doubt that this dog would protect her above all things and it meant more than she could voice that Sundance had done this for her. “Please come in,” she said, moving aside so he could enter. “Are you hungry? I have, like, twenty frozen casseroles of some sort that Mya brought. I don’t know what they are but I’m sure they’re edible.”

Sundance closed the door but declined her offer. “I can only stay for a few minutes. The breeder I got Saaski from runs an obedience and defense class in Forks. I want you to take it with Saaski. It’ll help you bond with him. Plus, the commands he’s been taught are in Navajo, so you’ll need to know how to control him using the commands he already understands. He’s a young dog still, only a year old, but the breeder said he’s smart and with the right training, he’ll be better than any house alarm you can buy.”

She ran her fingers through Saaski’s coarse fur. “Is he housebroken?”

“Well, he’s kennel trained and I brought the kennel for you. It’s in my Durango.”

“He sleeps in a box?” she asked, frowning at the idea of putting this glorious animal in a cage. She shook her head. “He can sleep with me.”

The corner of Sundance’s mouth lifted as if amused. “Somehow I had a feeling you’d say that. All right, I’ll put the kennel in the garage and if you need it, you know where to find it. I also bought a small bag of food to get you through to when you could get to town to buy a larger one.”

She chewed her lip, hearing what he wasn’t saying. Sooner or later she’d need to step outside of this house, if only to purchase dog food.

Sundance cleared his throat, adding, “But this bag should last you a few days.”

So she had a few days to get used to the idea of venturing out on the reservation. The thought gave her an unpleasant chill, but she nodded slowly. Of course Sundance was right, she couldn’t hide forever no matter how appealing the thought.

“He’s beautiful,” she said softly. “What does his name mean?”

“The breeder said it means ‘of two worlds.’”

“Appropriate,” she murmured, continuing to stroke the dog’s fur, blinking back tears. She felt caught between two worlds, too. Her previous world and her reality. She met Sundance’s stare and her breath hitched in her chest. What did he see? Did she want to know? She pushed her hair behind her ear, glad for the shower she’d taken this morning. “Sundance…about yesterday…” She stopped, the words seeming to dry up on her tongue. How did one thank another for forcing them to return to the land of the living? It’s not as if she and Sundance had been close. Yet, his message had come through loud and clear when she’d managed to effectively block out everyone else, including her best friend.

“Not necessary,” he started, but she cut him off with quiet determination.

“It is necessary,” she disagreed. “I know I need help. I’ve seen enough traumatized women in my profession to recognize the signs but I never realized it would be so difficult to pick up the pieces and try to move forward. Each time I thought about dragging myself out of my bed toward reclaiming my life, an overwhelming terror took over and I would end up a shaking, crying mess. It became easier to just accept that inside equaled safety, out there—” she gestured outside “—meant danger.” Tears pricked her eyes as she admitted, “I’m such a coward.”

“You can get through this,” he said, holding her stare without reservation. She saw strength, determination and even a hint of anger in those familiar eyes, and she drew comfort in knowing Sundance was ever the same, even if she had changed irrevocably. “And don’t you dare bow your head in shame. You did nothing wrong. Remember that.”