Shadowed Read online

  “You shouldn’t be helping that dog of a man,” Mehoo-Jimmy snapped. “All he does is take, take, take. Probably doesn’t even care that you’re working yourself away to nothing, trying to keep his worthless hide from being nailed to the nearest tree.”

  “Of course, he cares,” Nina protested. “He feels terrible about what he did. He just hasn’t been the same since Mom died. You know that.”

  “That was twelve years ago, Nina. The death of a loving spirit is a terrible thing, but you can’t use it as an excuse forever.”

  Mehoo-Jimmy was only saying what she herself had often thought, but Nina couldn’t help the surge of guilt she felt when hearing it spoken aloud. Her mother had begged her to take care of her father when she was dying, and Nina had done her best, though she was scarcely twelve at the time.

  Cooking and cleaning the house as well as doing her homework had been a heavy burden at such a young age, but somehow, she had managed. And no matter how much she might hate her father’s drinking and gambling, she could never forget all the good times. The way he and her mother would laugh and dance in the little kitchen to the tunes coming out of the scratchy old radio… The way her father with his charming Welsh accent and deep blue eyes—the one feature Nina had inherited from him—would tell silly jokes and tickle her mother until she laughed so hard she cried…

  “They were so in love,” she murmured, looking down at her hand again. “I guess…I can’t blame him for missing her so much.”

  “He had a problem with gambling fever a long time before he met your mother.” Mehoo-Jimmy sighed and put a withered hand to Nina’s cheek. “Just don’t work yourself to death for him, eecho. He’s had his life, and he used it badly—don’t let him take away yours too.”

  “He’s not,” Nina said a touch defensively.

  “Yes, he is.” Mehoo-Jimmy sounded sad. “Look at you—you’re halfway through your twenties, and you still have no house or family of your own. You ought to find a good man to love you—someone to cook my special fry bread for.”

  “You do make good fry bread,” Nina admitted, glad to change the subject. “I’d eat it all day if it wouldn’t go straight to my behind and hips.”

  Mehoo-Jimmy made a disgusted hmmph sound. “You’re too skinny as it is, eecho—you ought to be eating a whole plate of fry bread every day.”

  “The top of me, maybe. But this…” Nina patted her too-generous hips and ass. “This is never getting skinny, no matter what I do.”

  “Nothing wrong with having wide hips,” Mehoo-Jimmy said with certainty. “It shows you’re fertile. The right man will come along and want to put a baby between those hips.”

  “Mehoo!” Nina shook her head, laughing in embarrassment. Mehoo-Jimmy was known for speaking her mind, and she didn’t mince words. Half the time, Nina had no idea what she was going to say next.

  “It’s true,” her adopted grandmother insisted. “Just you wait and see.”

  “Well, I promise if I find a man who actually wants a girl with big hips and a wide behind, I’ll bring him home and feed him your fry bread—how about that?” she said.

  “Hmmph,” Mehoo-Jimmy said again, frowning. “I’ll believe it when I see it. You don’t have time to find a man with all the hard work you do.” She narrowed her eyes at Nina. “The best I can do is send out a prayer that the man will find you.”

  For some reason a shiver went down Nina’s spine. She thought again of the man in her dream, the one whose face was always shadowed.

  “Don’t do that, Mehoo,” she begged. “I’m fine just like I am, really.”

  “We’ll see.” The old lady turned her attention back to her half eaten burger. “We’ll just see.”

  “Well, right now, I see it’s time for me to go.” Nina glanced at her watch. Actually, it was past time. She hopped up and dropped another kiss on Mehoo-Jimmy’s wrinkled cheek. “Love you, Mehoo. I’ll see you later.”

  “Good-bye, eecho. Be well and safe. And thank you for lunch.” The old lady smiled and shooed away a cat before taking another bite of the burger with her big false teeth.

  Nina waved as she slid behind the wheel of her car. Time to go to her shift at Massage Envy, which would last until nine. She loved working at the museum, but it did make for some long days.

  She sighed wearily as she took a back road that led to South Tampa. The long hours had never bothered her before, but back when she first started her demanding schedule, she hadn’t been woken at least once a night by the dreams. And once she woke up, she couldn’t get back to sleep. Couldn’t get him out of her head.

  How much longer could she keep going like this with little to no sleep? And why couldn’t she stop having the dreams?

  Not for the first time, Nina wondered uneasily if something was wrong with her. Was she having some kind of mental breakdown? Going crazy?

  Of course I’m not going crazy, she denied to herself uneasily. Everything is going to be fine. I’m sure tonight I’ll be able to sleep without dreaming. Tonight will be the night the dreams finally end.

  But she didn’t believe it—not really. The man with the shadowed face was too real to just fade away like that. He wanted something from her—something Nina was afraid to give.

  But what?

  Chapter Three

  Sylvan frowned as he stared down at the male lying on his exam table. According to Saber, Reddix had collapsed with no warning. Saber had thought it might be due to exhaustion and truly, anyone seeing the dark circles and ragged appearance of the Touch Kindred warrior would say the same. But Sylvan’s tests, performed quickly and discretely while the male was unconscious, said otherwise. The RTS Reddix suffered from was extremely serious—obviously more so than even his best friend knew. Sylvan wondered if Reddix himself had any idea of his dire prognosis.

  He sighed and shook his head. Well, there would be time enough to tell him. In the mean time, he would let Reddix rest as long as he could. Not that the rest appeared to be doing him much good. As Sylvan watched, the big male body jerked and his eyes tracked restlessly under his lids. Was he registering the emotions of others even in his sleep? Or was he simply dreaming?

  There was no way to know…

  It took a long time to find the swamp witch’s hut. Hours of slogging through the putrid water coated in yellow and purple algae, pushing the low hanging branches and vines out of his way. Most of the vegetation on Tarsia was bright orange and yellow, colors that reflected the light of the planet’s red sun and hurt Reddix’s eyes, which were made more sensitive by his RTS. Still, at least he was away from the crowded city, away from the constant intrusive buzzing hum of emotion that always surrounded and invaded him.

  The fact that the rotten smell of decay, the fetid heat, and the stinging flies that kept buzzing around his hooded face were preferable to his own cozy home on the outskirts of the city told Reddix volumes about himself. The RTS really was getting worse. If he didn’t get a handle on it soon…

  But he refused to think about that. Up ahead, he saw a wooden shack with a wisp of purple smoke coming from its crooked chimney. That must be the place.

  Slogging through the blackish-purple mud, he came around to the front of the ramshackle place. But just as he was raising his hand to knock, a voice called his name.

  “Reddix…Reddix, son of Redan, second in command of the Clans of the Touch Kindred.”

  Reddix frowned. The voice seemed to have come from inside the shack, but he couldn’t feel any emotions coming from the low wooden structure.

  “Come in,” the voice, a low, feminine contralto continued. “Come in, I’ve been expecting you.”

  A shaft of unease pierced him. How could she be so close without him feeling her emotions? Generally when he was within twenty yards of a person, he began to feel what they felt as sensations against his skin. The closer he got or the more people there were, the more magnified the feelings. Touching intensified it even more, which was why Reddix went out of his way to keep his hands to himself.