Never Look Back

“Why do you want to know about ravens?” he asked.

“Because one flew in my window yesterday.”

“No shit?”

She nodded, repeating what she’d told Kyle, revealing only a portion of what had actually happened.

He stuck his hands in his pockets. “Raven keeps the world from being boring.”

“Did he create it?” she asked, inquiring about Haida beliefs.

“In a sense.” Daniel shifted his weight. “But Raven is more of a transformer, a trickster, than a creator.”

Her heart struck her chest. Last year, during all of the witch madness, she’d had dealings with Coyote, another Native American trickster. And those experiences weren’t the least bit pretty. But this was different, wasn’t it? Raven was her angel.

“Did it bite you?” Daniel asked suddenly. “Is that what the bandage on your arm is from? Let me take a look at it.” He reached for her wrist.

“It’s fine.” She pulled away from him, and when she did, she caught a dark shadow outside his kitchen window.

In the shape of a big, black bird.

Chapter 2

Daniel moved in front of the window, trying to get her attention. Damn him. She pushed him out of the way, but it was too late.

The shadow was gone.

Daniel darted in front of the window again. “What’s wrong with you?”

“Nothing.” Allie could only assume that the raven was watching her. That he’d followed her here. As for Daniel, he was too absorbed in her bite. She should have worn long sleeves.

He adjusted his glasses where they’d slipped down his nose. A strand of his Brylcreemed hair had fallen onto his forehead, too. “Let me see your wound.”

“What for?”

“I just want to see it.”

Getting bitten by a bird was nothing compared to what she’d been through. She’d battled bewitched bats and mutantlike giants. But worse yet was her mother. Allie’s mom was a convicted serial killer. It was something she and her sister would never live down.

“Don’t be stubborn,” he pressed.

“Fine.” She set her soda on the counter and removed the bandage. Did he know about her mom? Sometimes Allie and Olivia got crank calls. And sometimes people treated them like ghoulish celebrities. The thought sickened her. “See?”

He examined her skin. “It’s not as bad as it could’ve been.” He glanced up, catching her gaze. “You don’t need stitches.”

“Told you.”

“Lucky for you the West Nile Virus isn’t transmitted from birds to humans. Ravens are susceptible to the disease.” He turned her arm, studying it from another angle. “What did you do to piss him off?”

“What makes you think my raven is male?”

He stalled for a second, getting an analytical look on his face. The expression seemed natural on him. She decided that he had a high IQ. That it wasn’t just his dorky demeanor creating a book-smart illusion.

“I’m not sure,” he responded, not giving her a clear-cut response about the bird’s gender. “So, what did you do?”

She lost focus. “What?”

“To upset the raven?”

“I accidentally knocked him on the ground. But I apologized for that. I tried to soothe him. I think he bit me because my cat plucked a feather from his tail.”

Daniel frowned. “You were in the line of fire?”

She rebandaged her arm. “Yes.”

He tilted his head. “What makes you think he was male?”

“I could tell.”

“How? The sexes generally look alike.”

She took a wild guess, hoping she was correct, hoping she could fool him. “It was a rather large bird, and I assume that males are bigger.”

“Sometimes,” he said. “But not always. Females make a knocking sound the males don’t make. Did it make any noises?”

“Just a loud caw. Do they make a lot of different sounds?”

“Totally. They’re masters at mimicry. They can imitate just about anything.”

She glanced at the window. She wished the shadow would reappear. “Do you mind if we go outside?”

He perked up. “To swing on the tire?”

Lord, he was odd. “I don’t think we’ll both fit. Maybe we can just stand beneath the tree.”

“Okay.” He smiled a little. “I’m not dumb enough to say no to a pretty girl.”

Was he flirting? She hoped not. She had another male on her mind. And this one had long flowing hair, a slightly scarred chest and breathtaking wings.

They proceeded outside, where the sky shimmered on the brink of dusk. Branches clawed and climbed above their heads, with leaves rustling in a late-afternoon breeze. He ran his hands along the rope that secured the tire, and she assumed that he needed to touch something. That he was a physical person.

She looked up. “Do ravens nest in these types of trees?”

“Sure. In the city, they roost wherever there’s a suitable platform to build a nest.” He smoothed his hair, pushing away the lock that had fallen earlier.

“What about mating?” she asked.

“What about it?” he parroted, studying her with a look that made her uncomfortable.

Did he have to be so intense? So curious about her? Why couldn’t he just answer her questions like the animal expert he was?

And then she remembered that there was more to Daniel than being a veterinary technician at the zoo. He was part of Kyle’s Warrior Society, a group of former military men who excelled at close-quarter combat and fought for Native causes. They protected Indian burial sites, and sometimes they stole sacred objects, items that had gotten past the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, and returned them to whom they believed were the rightful owners. So far, they hadn’t been caught.

Of course, Kyle had stopped stealing after he’d fallen in love with a cop. But Allie had no idea what Daniel Deer Runner did in his spare time. Aside from avoid questions about mating birds.

“I think the raven is following me,” she said. “That I saw him at your window,” Allie admitted.

Daniel frowned. “Maybe it was a shadow or something.”

“You don’t believe me? You think I imagined him?” She crossed her arms. She wasn’t about to tell him that the figure at his window did look like a shadow. “Don’t you believe in animal medicine? In spirit guides?”

“Of course I do. But Raven is a trickster. You can’t be sure if he followed you here. Or why he appeared to you in the first place.”

“That’s what’s driving me crazy.” She softened her body language. Getting defensive around Daniel wouldn’t help. And now that she was outside, there was no sign of a big, black bird. “In Northwest mythology, does Raven ever shape-shift into a man? Or a man with wings?”

He reached for the rope again. “As far as I know, he can shift into any form. But I haven’t heard all of the stories. I’ve only been to Canada a few times. That’s where my mother’s people are, but I barely know them. She died when I was a boy.” He sighed, the sound as rough as the twisted nylon in his hand. “I don’t think it matters what form he takes. From what I recall, he helps humans, even through his trickery.”

“So I don’t need to fear him?”

“No. But trying to analyze him won’t be easy. To the Haida, he can be greedy and lecherous, even through his good deeds.” Daniel released the rope. “Whether you’re dealing with a mythological creature or a common raven, a Corvus corax, you’re facing one of the most intelligent, highly evolved birds.”

“Which are you more connected to? The myth or the real bird?”

“I don’t know.” He gazed at her through his glasses, through eyes that were an opaque shade of brown. “I was taught to believe in legends. But I work at a zoo. Sometimes those worlds collide.”

“Either way, I appreciate you taking the time to talk to me. I didn’t know much about ravens before today.”

“The Haida are either from the Raven Clan or the Eagle Clan. My mother was a member of the Raven Clan. Hoya,” he added, using the Native word. “That has always mattered to me. In a scientific and a spiritual sense.”

“That’s understandable.” And admirable, she thought.

“Have you read Poe’s poem?” he asked.

She nodded. “‘The Raven’ was required in school.” But now she wondered if she should search for it online. She barely remembered it.

“Have you read the Teen Titans comics? Or seen the animated show?” Daniel asked.

They’d gone from Edgar Allen Poe to comic books and cartoons? Trust Daniel. He probably had friends who dressed up at Star Trek conventions. “Is there a reason I should?”

“Raven is a superhero from Teen Titans.”

“Really?” She stopped to ponder that scenario. “What are his powers?”

“Her powers. She’s female. Raven is the daughter of a woman who was impregnated by Satan.”

“So she’s part human, part devil?” The way her raven was part human, part angel?

“Yes, but she was taught to control her demon heritage. She learned to heal by absorbing other people’s pain, and she learned to project her soul out of her body for short periods of time. But she has to fight to keep her darkness under control.”

Suddenly they both fell silent. Allie’s ancestry had been steeped in evil. All of the women on her mother’s side were black magic witches, everyone except her and Olivia. Controlling the darkness in their blood, the Apache ènti, was something they understood all too well.

She looked at Daniel and her heart sank. “You know, don’t you?”

He shifted his feet, and his spotless tennis shoes picked up a smidgen of dirt. “Know what?”

“About my mother.”

She didn’t break eye contact, but he did, squinting into the waning sun. Dusk was only minutes away.

“I’ve been trying to act normal around you,” he said.

Normal? She had no idea what that meant anymore. She longed for the days when she was young and naive, when she’d assumed that her family was like everyone else’s. But at twenty-nine, with her childhood behind her, she knew better. “People always treat me differently when they discover I’m related to Yvonne Whirlwind.”

“I didn’t.”

Didn’t he? She wasn’t so sure. She’d just met him. She couldn’t gauge how he would have behaved otherwise. “Do you know about my dad, too?”

Daniel nodded. “He was a Lakota actor who committed suicide.” He stalled for a second. “My father is Lakota, too. But he’s not an actor and he’s still alive.”

“That’s not much of a parallel, is it?”

“No, it isn’t. I’m sorry about your father.”

“He put a .44 Magnum in his mouth and pulled the trigger.” A gun she’d reluctantly learned to shoot. “I was fresh out of high school when he did it.”

“I’ve seen some of his movies.”

“Really? He only got bit parts. He wasn’t famous.”

“He is now.”

A lump formed in her throat. Even though her father had died over a decade ago, long before her mother had gone on a murderous rampage, her notoriety had triggered his. During Yvonne’s trial, the media had drudged up Joseph Whirlwind’s name, along with every old photo and film clip they could find. She suspected that was how Daniel had heard about him. “Dad is a wanagi now.”

He didn’t say anything. He just looked at her.

“It means ghost in Lakota,” she told him.

“I know what it means. But you’re speaking metaphorically, right?”

“No. I’m talking about an earth-bound spirit. He was there when my sister needed him. And someday he’ll be there for me, too.”

“Your life is confusing.” He shook his head. “A wanagi, a raven and a mother on a death row.”

Allie wasn’t about to argue. She glanced up at the sky, where daylight had disappeared, where clouds had begun to gather.

As though something dangerous was on its way.

Danger came in the form of a violent rain. To the Chiricahua Apache, sudden storms were regarded with fear.

When Allie got home, she entered the loft with water dampening her clothes and matting her hair. She looked around for Samantha and saw that her pet was crouched in a corner. The cat didn’t trust the weather, either.

“It’s okay, Sam,” she said, even though things didn’t feel all right. Last year, when Allie’s great-grandmother had cast her dark magic, the earth had been flooded with rain.

She lit a candle and took a deep breath, filling her nostrils with the cookielike scent of vanilla. The flame made a curvaceous sweep, swaying softly, reminding her of a lone dancer, a lost lover.

Allie sighed. If only she wasn’t such a dreamer. As a child, she’d thrived on Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy. And now she wanted to drift in the arms of an angel, to let him keep her safe.

She walked down the hall and into her studio, hoping to find him there. But all she encountered was a puddle of water on the floor.

Weary, she closed the window, grabbed a towel and sopped up the water. Afterward, she walked over to the painting she’d created, gazing at the angel, looking for answers in his eyes.

If she tried to cast a spell, if she used his feather in an incantation, would it draw him near? Or would she be tempting fate? Allie didn’t know what to call herself. She wasn’t a witch. Native witches used their power to perpetuate sickness and death, to do harm unto others. But by the same token, she wasn’t a shaman. Shamans used their power to conduct ceremonies and cure illnesses.

So what am I? she wondered. A grown woman who believed in fairy tales? Who thought Prince Charming wore tattered clothes and big, dark wings?

Unable to stop herself, she reopened the window. A little water damage was better than the raven barreling into the glass.

Finally, she went into the kitchen to feed Samantha and fix a snack. She opened a can of cat food and scooped it into a bowl, but Sam didn’t come running. The animal approached her meal warily, still smarting over the weather. Water pounded on the roof like a thousand angry fists.

Dark and heavy. It was a male rain, Allie thought. Or so she’d been taught. And since that knowledge had come from her mother, she battled a quick chill, rubbing her arm and disturbing her bandage.

Trying to focus on food, she diced an apple and cut bite-size chunks of cheddar cheese. A glass of wine came next. She needed something to pacify her nerves.

Then she got the urge to call Daniel, to ask him what ravens ate. It might help to leave some food out for the bird. She glanced at her cat. When Samantha had been living on the streets, Allie had earned the stray’s affection by feeding her.

She looked up Daniel’s number and punched out the digits. The phone rang and rang. Finally, she left a message on his voice mail. It hadn’t occurred to her that he wouldn’t be home. Where would he go in the rain? Allie intended to stay put.

She finished her wine, then poured another glass. She deserved to get tipsy. She was alone on a stormy night with powers that confused her.

Screw it. A third glass of wine did the trick, giving her a nice buzz. Who cared if she wasn’t a witch or a shaman? Who cared if magic—her supernatural gift—didn’t make any sense? It was part of who she was, of what made her special.

The phone rang and she grabbed it on the second ring. “Hello?”

“It’s Daniel.”

“Oh, hey. That was quick. Where were you?”

“In the shower.”

“Oh.” She wasn’t about to envision him without his clothes. He wasn’t the naked type. Fogged glasses, maybe. Bronzed and bare, no way.

“What’s on your mind?” he asked.

She popped a piece of cheese into her mouth. “I want to know what ravens eat.”

“Damn, woman. You’re obsessed.”

“Yep. So what’s their diet like?”

“They’re omnivorous. They eat animal and vegetable substances. They’re attracted to carrion, too.”

Hmm. She couldn’t recall what that meant. She blamed it on the wine instead of her scattered mind. Allie usually had a zillion thoughts going at once. “Carrion?”

“It’s dead and putrefying flesh. Like a deer that’s spoiling.”

Her stomach roiled. “That’s gross.”

“You think so?” He chuckled. “They eat the insects that feed on carrion, too. Mostly maggots and beetles. Oh, and they’ll chow down on the afterbirth of ewes and other large mammals.”

Now her stomach was turning something awful. “Let’s discuss the kinds of non-animal foods they prefer.”

“What for?”

“Because I’m a vegetarian.” She set her empty wine glass on the counter. “And I’m fresh out of maggots and afterbirth.”

“You’re going to try to lure the raven with bait?”

“That’s the plan.”

“I forgot to mention that they eat spiders.”

“That’s not funny.” But she laughed anyway. “Come on, Daniel, be a pal.”

“All right. Fine. Berries, nuts, corn, grains. Whatever you can scrounge up. They’re not picky.”

“I can do that.”

“Ravens take their food from the ground and store it. So leave it in a place that seems natural. No fancy plates. No silverware.”

“No kidding,” she said, enjoying his sense of humor. She wondered if she should set Daniel up with one of her friends, with someone who thought quasi-geeks were sexy.

“Do ravens have special mates?” she asked, pursuing the question he hadn’t answered earlier.

“Some do,” he responded, still sounding hesitant. “They stay together for years, maybe for life. Females incubate the eggs, but both parents care for their young once they hatch.” He paused. “I think you’re getting too attached to that bird. You can’t become part of its life. It’s not like a stray dog that’s going to adopt you.”

What about a stray angel? she wondered. “I know. I understand.”

“Okay. Be good, Allie.”

“You, too. I’ll talk to you later.” She hung up the phone and suffered an instant pang of loneliness. Suddenly the rain seemed even stronger, more tumultuous.

Ignoring the temptation to call Daniel back, she gathered food for the raven and carried it into the studio. The procedure felt familiar. Sometimes Allie left meals for her dad. The Lakota believed in feeding ghosts.

She set an ear of corn down and hoped her father didn’t think she was putting his food on the floor. Not that he ever ate what she gave him. But she knew the gesture mattered.

After making a floral pattern with sunflower seeds, something Daniel would have admonished her for, she wrote her name in blueberries. Just in case the raven wondered who she was.

She stood there for a moment, realizing how silly her effort was. She decided to sober up, to let the buzz from the wine fade away.

Determined to unwind, she closed the door and headed for her bathroom, peeling off her clothes along the way. The loft had two bathrooms, one for her and one for her sister. Allie’s was decorated with butterfly wallpaper and gold fixtures.

Finally, she soaked in the tub, adding her favorite scented oil, making herself feel soft and pretty.

Even if the rain was pounding like tears from hell.

When the water turned cold, she dried off and slipped on a long-sleeved nightgown, something to keep her warm, something to give her comfort.

After that, she treated herself to a pedicure, painting her toenails a shimmering shade of pink.

And then she cursed a little, putting a damper on her feminine mood. She couldn’t quit thinking about the raven. Yet that damned bird wasn’t going to show up on a rainy night. He was probably snug in a cozy nest somewhere, wooing his mate, feeding her maggots and cawing love sonnets.

So close the window. Forget about him.

Taking her own advice, she headed to the studio and opened the door. Then she stopped dead in her tracks, her heart somersaulting to her throat.

Dear God.

There he was. Her angel. Her protector. As big as life, as glorious as her watercolor, with his clothes clinging to his body and his hair dripping with rain.

She gulped, and his wings swooshed, making a powerful sound. Beneath his work boots were crushed berries. He stood in the center of her studio.

Allie didn’t know what to do, what to say. His eyes, the same pitch-brown eyes she’d painted, were staring straight at her.

Chapter 3

He didn’t blink. He didn’t move a muscle. He just scrutinized her in the way Daniel had.

Yet unlike Daniel, everything about him was familiar, every angle of his face: his slashing cheekbones, his razor-sharp nose, lips that thinned and slanted slightly downward at the corners.

Being this close to him seemed surreal, like a twisted dream. His feathers caught the light, glimmering beneath the studio lamps, creating a violet sheen, a velvetlike softness. She itched to touch them, to absorb their midnight texture.

But she wouldn’t dare.

She took a chance, introducing herself. “I’m Allie Whirlwind.” She gestured to the floor where she’d written her name, and he shifted his feet, squishing the blueberries even more.

She waited for him to respond and got nothing in return. Now what? In some early Native cultures, it was rude to ask someone his or her name. And unless it was spoken in an emergency, it was impolite to say a person’s name to his or her face.

Allie decided that a painting coming to life constituted an emergency. “Do you have a name?” she asked. “Or should I give you one?”

Once again, he said nothing. Maybe he didn’t understand English. Or maybe he didn’t have the capacity to talk. She tilted her head, analyzing him. What if he was missing the parts that she hadn’t painted, things that weren’t visible, like vocal chords or—

She dropped her gaze to his fly. What if he was a big, beautiful, winged eunuch?

God forbid. She’d made jokes about boffing his brains out, wisecracks about having raw, wicked, holy-heaven sex with him.

When she looked up, she caught him frowning at her. But she could hardly blame him. If she were in his situation, she would be scowling, too.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

This time, he squinted at her. Rain was still falling violently from the sky and blowing in through the open window. The floor behind him was soaked.

“I can alter my work.” She motioned to the easel. “Give you what you don’t have.” Of course, that would mean doing a series of renderings, an entire study, sketching him from the inside out. But she’d done anatomy depictions before. It was part of her training, what she considered the da Vinci side of her education. “What do you think?”

More silence.

Allie sighed, and he moved his hands, turning them outward, the way they were in the portrait. She noticed how rough they were. Just like the image she’d created, he had calluses on his palms and dirt under his nails. Did he know that he was a farmer?

Probably not. If he didn’t have vocal chords, or a penis or testes, then he probably didn’t have a brain, either.

Then again, that raven had seemed pretty damn smart. Hadn’t Daniel told her how intelligent the species was? How highly evolved?

She looked at the angel again. She could see him taking in air, letting it out. Apparently he had a fully-functioning respiratory system. So how could he be missing parts that weren’t visible? That she hadn’t painted?

Allie resisted the urge to move closer. If she placed her hand against his chest, would she feel his heart?

A sturdy wind blew, rustling his ragged shirt. Although his clothes were damp, she realized that he hadn’t flown into the loft in his present form. As the angel, he was too big to fit through the window. His wings would have gotten stuck. He must have come in as the raven and shifted afterward, the way he’d done before. Yet the rain he’d encountered clung to him. In a scientific sense that seemed odd. In a supernatural sense, it proved how connected he was to the bird.

“Why did you do this to me?” he asked, sending her into a tailspin.

Heaven help her. Not only could he talk, his voice was strong and masculine, the words articulated deep in his throat. But his tone was raspy, too, as though he hadn’t spoken in a very long time, as though he’d been trying to remember how to form the words, how to accuse her of something treacherous.